Lectures on Digital Photography






The course assumes no prior knowledge of photography. I also assume no programming experience. The only knowledge I assume is enough facility and comfort with mathematics that you're not afraid to see the depth-of-field formula in all its glory, and an integral sign here or there won't send you running for the hills. Some topics will require concepts from elementary probability and statistics (like mean and variance), but I define these concepts in lecture. I also make use of matrix algebra, but only at the level of matrix multiplication. Finally, an exposure to digital signal processing or Fourier analysis will give you a better intuition for some topics, but it is not required.

Taking photographs and improving your picture-taking skills are a good reason for taking this course. There were no formal evaluations (or grades) in the Google version of the course, but there were weekly optional photographic assignments, which are included in these web pages. These assignments talk about uploading photos to Google Photos, and then posting albums to a Google+ community. These instructions were relevant to Googlers during course but are now irrelevant. If you want to follow along and perform these assignments you'll need a camera. Since it's a course on digital photography, you'll need a digital camera. In particular, you'll need one with manual control over shutter speed, aperture, and ISO. It's also helpful if your camera has a variable zoom lens, but surprisingly, manual control over focus isn't as critical, since you can easily "fool" your camera into focusing at whatever distance you want. Your camera should also have a flash, as most do. You don't, however, need an SLR (single lens reflex camera). Many DSCs (digital still cameras, also known as point-and-shoots) offer enough flexibility. So do Mirrorless Interchangeable Lens (MIL) cameras. A cell phone won't suffice, though, because it doesn't have a controllable aperture.

The instructor

I am a Professor Emeritus of Computer Science at Stanford, and Principal Engineer at Google, where I lead a team in Google Research that works on computational photography. Here is my Stanford home page, which includes a list of publications. On my home page is a summary of some of the projects I work on at Google.


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