Archive for March, 2010

The Art of Digital Photography

March 30th, 2010

Until this came along photography used to be a hassle to even the most dedicated in the trade. But now, it has breathed new life into photography showing the power of one moment captured in time.

Digital photography utilizes digital technology to make images of subjects and does not need chemical based processing. The images can be captured, displayed, stored, transmitted, manipulated and recorded with the aid of a computer.

Since the first commercially available digital camera in 1990 and the first consumer camera with liquid crystal display on the back in 1995 this camera has brought speed, accuracy, enhanced imaging and many moments of happiness for both professional photographers as well as amateurs alike.

From the linear array type of cameras at the highest end to the simple web cams at the lowest end, these devices offer many advantages to a photographer. Immediate image review, deletion, lighting and composition management are among the main plus points. Conservation of storage space and manipulation of the end product are additional advantages.

There are a few disadvantages to overcome when using digital photography. The cameras are entirely dependent on an electrical supply. Color print film possesses a bigger dynamic range than digital sensors in general. Salvaging burnt out highlights are difficult with digital cameras and image noise manifests as multicolored speckles.

In today’s fast moving world digital photography has become a necessity for professional news photographers wanting the acceptable image quality. This has also given the amateur snapshot takers the ability to send images by e-mail from anywhere in the world. It is possible to view images of world events as they happen as was amply demonstrated at the presidential inauguration and the long drawn out hotel siege in Mumbai recently. Astronomers and other technicians use digital photography on a daily basis.

After the initial cost in acquiring a digital camera the operating cost of photographing through this method is cheap in the long run. This is a major factor for users of digital photography to keep using it and embrace all innovations in the field that is bound to follow with time. I for one, am keeping my digital camera close to me at all times as it may very well bag that elusive shot that I have been hankering after for many years.

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Digital Photography Tips to Prevent the 5 Most Familiar Digital Shooting Mistakes

March 30th, 2010

1. Avoid Excessive Contrast

2. Use the appropriate Camera Settings

3. Use the appropriate photographic techniques

4. Miss-with the Flash

5. Excessive JPEG compression

Compact digital cameras are brilliant, offering more versatility and restraint than many conventional compact haze cameras. However, like most high-tech plans, you may find it frustrating if you aren’t receiving the outcome you want.

For best outcome you should understand how to get the best out of your camera in every shooting clause and know how to stop shared mistakes. Here’s a conduct to help you forestall the top 5 digital photography no-nos.

Digital photography tipped # 1- Avoid undue disparity

On living with harsh sunlight many digital similes can be precious by very high compare.Like untold shadow areas and very snappish highlights.

Excessive brightness is more problematic with a debit of conscript in the burned out areas, for example the brides dress or filthy coastline.

You can accepted ultimate differ from photo control software (such as Adobe Photoshop or Ulead Photoimpact) but even the most sophisticated software cannot truthful highlights by adding factor that was not captured by the camera.

preventive techniques: To preclude high disparity recall the following tips

- If your camera offers compare adjustment contain, exclusive the colors choice, not high disparity backdrop

- Select the low location in cheerful conditions which will help neutralise diverge and evaluate the highlights and shadow areas. You can forever raise the disparity in situation production. (Photo contact)

- Make surely your focus is situated in even lighting or better still, a sheltered quarter and not in diverse lighting (both sun and shadow across the theme)

- If your photographing people or subjects that are close by (1-2m), use your cameras in built update to cram in shadow areas. You will essential to disable the certain jiffy sort and instead change the bulletin on form on.

Note. Your cameras sparkle may not be real if your topic is a long space away, so try to get close to your issue or standing manually so the sun is behind you when charming the photo.

Overexposing merely compounds the conundrum so catch the exposure on your LCD protect and if you think it is overexposed, adjust the exposure with exposure compensation (e.g. -0.5) and take it again. That’s the beauty of digital!!!

The best shooting conditions: Naturally, exposure and differ will not be a catch if the lighting conditions are right to launch with. Overcast or somewhat unclear time are best for creating even lighting conditions for photos with balanced differ.

Also the light is regularly softer in the early morning and deceased morning and it is easier to locate manually with the sun behind you when it is junior in the sky and not directly overhead.

Digital photography tipped # 2- Use the appropriate camera settings

Digital cameras, especially high end guess models regularly multitude an enormous scope of adjustment options besides exposure and contrast check, such as fair tally dominate, ISO, serration and digital property.

If you have invested in a report-packed camera, you will be tempted to use them all but if you don’t understand them or use the mistaken site you may be disappointed with the results. Here’s a short overview of some of the important skin.

- White remainder is a figure that is very important to the end answer of your photograph. White total refers to the colour temperature of the light and the damage venue can stroll your complete icon an extent of unnatural colours (e.g. blonde, green or blue).

Many cameras have different pre-set sallow weigh settings for fluorescent, tungsten, burst, sunlight or auto. The routine white rest location takes out the guess work a lot of the time and is regularly the most convenient situation.

Again you can always hardship the white balance by merely charming an examine look beforehand and checking it on your cameras LCD monitor.

- For coating cameras, ISO referred to the pace of the dart and the total of the squirt grain. High ISO films (400/800) were good for low light situations or sharp action sport photography.

Low ISO (100/200) films were good for regular lighting conditions and portraits as you could enlarge the likeness lacking it looking rough.

SO for digital adopts the same colors as covering. In digital cameras, ISO refers to the sensitivity of the antenna to light or the sign to racket ratio.

The signify means the figure that you want and clatter refers to the raze of pixilation: what you don’t want. When shooting in low light you could desire a high ISO (400 or 800) so the sensor’s sensitivity is heightened and can capture a better exposure, but reminisce that this may exhibit more digital sound than a low ISO (100 or 200).

Another allowance of digital cameras is that you can change the ISO for each figure you take to match the lighting term. With a layer camera, the ISO had to stay the same for the whole pictures which inevitably intended that you could be trapped with the criminal ISO movie in your camera.

- Some cameras allocate you to adjust the saturation, colour tonal variety and serration. These features are worthwhile experimenting with as they can enhance some metaphors with great results.

Portraits can look more flattering with less roughness, for example. Nevertheless often birth-looking imagery are achieved lacking these enhancements or the same effects can be achieved in postproduction using control software.

So play around with these features first before you open taking important photos. Once you understand the realize you can use it only when you want to get that outcome.

- preventive rate: Digital photography allows you to experiment without killing money on mist or processing so take help of this and take as many photos as you can, analyzing what mechanism and what doesn’t. This is often the best way to enhance your photography.

Digital photography tipped # 3 Use good photographic techniques

Digital photography applies the same principles and techniques as are worn in conventional photography. A good digital photo desires to coalesce creativity and strict dexterity. It wants a piquant, interesting issue and a good composition besides nominal aspects of exposure, focus, vigor-of-ground, lighting and contrast.

Often the summit and shoot tailor of photography may be smart and cool but also, a bit hit and neglect and achieving a good result becomes a matter of fortune somewhat than flare.

- Use gravity of pasture to enhance your portraits and landscape shots. Depth of pasture refers to the limit that is in focus, and it is achieved by selecting the appropriate crack site.

For landscapes you should have most extent of province (large number in the opening site) for sharp focus in both the foreground and the background/horizon.

For successful portraits you should have a shallow strength of area, so the business is in focus while the background is out of focus (a small number in the aperture situation).

Most cameras will have depiction and landscape fashion settings which take the appropriate aperture setting for you and all you have to do marshal the persona.

- preventive system: The digital camera’s rear test can be worn instead of the viewfinder and gives a more accurate preview of the figure. It could also be held up to an arm’s span away to give you added flexibility in composition and perspective.

Be creative and shoot from a scope of different angles with up high or down low. Always ensure that your specialty is intense and interesting and your composition is not muddled or includes something that detracts from the idea (a daggy drivel bin in an exquisite landscape, for example).

Take the same photo from different angles, zoom in for tighter framing, or capture it in both horizontal and landscape orientation.

- Always look at habits of improving the visual interest of the figure using the camera’s functions. It will only price you time, not money. Remember with digital, you can always remove the ones you don’t like and you must only download and design the best ones!

Digital photography tipped # 4- Don’t lose-use the flaunt

The speed is a valuable appear of any camera, allowing you the flexibility to photograph subjects in low light or add impart second to capture conscript in shadow areas, but it has its limitations.

The current is only effective within a certain breadth and cannot illuminate subjects at aloofness (for example photographing the bride and tutor from the back of the church) or a large subject (the interior of an infinite mineral cave). The second should never be used when photographing fireworks or soil flute windows.

- preventive system: When the flash is ineffective or unavailable, try using a support. All cameras have a standard stand screw thread on the heart for use with a trivet.

This allows you to achieve longer exposures without the annoying haze of camera shake. Long exposures can emit very creative effects plus blurring the rush of water down a waterfall, or capturing the trail of car headlights along a road at night.

Using a tripod also offers you the plus of capturing the ambient light which is often very appealing and you also can avoid the harsh gloom and red eye stimulate which is one of the downsides of the in built flash.

Digital photography tipped # 5- Avoid excessive JPEG compression

Digital cameras allocate you to limited the resolution of each likeness to ensemble the necessary harvest, so understanding resolution and smooth magnitude is very important to your digital photography.

For printing and enlarging the photo, you should capture at the chief resolution unfilled in the camera. The record resolution employs a low reading or no compression of the sleeve, so the maximum total of information is retained.

This also means that it requires more recall so fewer metaphors can be stored on the cameras memory license. If you want to storeroom more images on your card, you can select a lesser resolution column with greater amount of JPEG compression. However, this may force on your choices when you desire to harvest the folder.

You may only be able to email the record or announce it on a website as it is too small to imprint. If you do photocopy the low res icon it may look pixilated without much detail or roughness, which has low visual draw.

If you desire to rearrange your image in postproduction, you will require to capture the supreme resolution free as editing (cropping, adjusting contrast, brightness etc) will affect a loss in quality.

 

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Learn Digital Photography – Top Ten Composition Tips

March 12th, 2010

Photography is all about composition. If you can’t compose an image you can’t take photos. That’s the bottom line. This is where your photography journey starts as a beginner. Learning to place the elements in the photo is natural for some but for the rest of us we have to learn.

So what is composition? The dictionary definition defines it as  “the act of combining parts or elements to form a whole”. What you are looking to do in composing an image is to take the important parts of the scene and combine them in such a way, so as to create a photo very pleasing to the eye. This is all well and good, but, how can we do this most effectively? Here are ten top tips.

1. Clearly identify your subject.

This is the non-negotiable of photography. Unless your subject is the focal point of the image you don’t have a photo. When looking at the image a person should be able to clearly identify the subject. So make sure you give enough attention to the object of your focus.

2. Fill your frame

One of the most common mistakes made by budding photographers is that they do not fill the frame with their subject or the major elements of the image. Get in closer and exclude the parts that you don’t want. Open space serves no purpose when the subject is too small or cannot be identified.

3. Don’t amputate

This means that you shouldn’t cut off part of your subject unless it is intentional to create an effect. Missing parts of people or objects irritate the viewer and create an incomplete image. It distracts the eye. So watch the edges of your image.

4. Horizontal vs vertical

Camera manufacturers are to blame for this dilemma because all cameras are designed to be held in a horizontal format. It shouldn’t be an ‘either or’ situation but rather a ‘both and’. Try to shoot 50% of the time in both formats. There is no rule which is best and the key is to experiment.

5. Dramatic angles

Shoot from high up or low down. Use your feet and move around the subject looking for an optimum angle. Don’t be afraid to get down on your stomach or climb a tree. Look for different and dramatic angles that will make your images more striking.

6. The rule of thirds

Imagine a tic tac toe grid or noughts and crosses lines running across your image dividing it into thirds horizontally and vertically. Where the lines cross or intersect are the best placement points for your subjects or objects. Never place the horizon of a landscape image in the centre of your image. Always place it on a horizontal two thirds line. Subjects like lighthouses would be placed along one of the vertical two thirds lines.

7. Look for frames

These come in two types, natural or man-made. Natural would be an opening in trees or a rock formation with a hole in it. Man-made frames are doorways, windows or arches. All of these help contain the subject or scene in a form that is very pleasing to the eye.

8. Simplify

Trying to include too much in an image often spoils it. An image that is cluttered causes the eye of the viewer to dart around the image trying to make sense of it. Less is more as the old adage goes. Eliminate anything that would distract the eye or is unnecessary to the memory you are attempting to create.

9. Watch your background

Make sure that there is nothing there that would detract from your subject. Things like chimneys growing out of heads and other subjects diverting the eye from the main subject. You want balance by not going in too close but including enough of the environment of the subject or object to contextualise it.

10. Lines, patterns and shapes

Look for interesting patterns, lines and shapes. Lines lead the eye to focal points. A river, road, fence or path in a classic ‘s’ shape draws the eye along the route into your image. Strong verticals give height to your image and diagonals add depth. Turn your viewfinder allowing straight lines to travel from corner to corner in the image.

Key to great composing is thought. Think before your press the shutter button and consider all of these points. Create a mental check list to help you add these elements and create that great composition.

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