Thinking about getting into photography?  This guide has everything you need to get started.

Beginner Information
Basic terminology
Equipment terminology

Learning Photography
Taking a photography class
Learn by experimentation
Exposure control

Equipment
Point and shoot cameras
Digital SLR cameras
Memory cards
Digital Camera Accessories

Tips
Buying a Digital SLR
Buying a point and shoot camera
Buying lenses

You’ll be a shutterbug in no time!  Happy shooting!

When doing macro photography, every part of your camera becomes more sensitive to even the slightest adjustment. So when you’re taking macro shots freehand (without a tripod), adjusting the focus ring will cause too drastic of a change even by the slightest movement. Instead, set your focus and move the camera itself back and forth to make slight focus adjustments. I find it best to line up as if you’re taking a shot and move your head accordingly. However, if you’re doing studio macro shots with a tripod, this is completely unnecessary. The best work situation where this rule applies would be insect photography, as you can move with the insect freely.

Looking to tone your photography skills but don’t know where to start?  Want to bring some more creativity and liveliness to your photos?  Try out some of these easy tips for every camera, even if you’re a novice photographer starting out with a point and shoot camera.

Shooting vertical or horizontal pictures

Who said you need to choose?  Take both horizontal and vertical pictures of the same subject and determine which makes a better fram for your subject.  Some photographers may argue that photos of people and buildings always look better when taken vertically, but experimentation with different angles will result in creative pictures.

Focus on your main subject

It might be difficult for a viewer to ascertain what you wanted to express with your photo if there are too many distracting elements.  Try moving closer or zooming in to eliminate some of the clutter, of use a simple background so as to make your subject stand out.

Try the Myspace technique

Shoot your subject from various angles, trying out different compositions.  Try shooting from above, from below, from the left, from the right, etc. until you find a perspective that you think fits your subject and conveys your intent.

Place your subject off-center

You don’t have to place your subject in the dead center of your photo to make it clear that it is your main focus.  Experimenting with the placement usually results in more interesting and dramatic shots.  Imagine a tic-tac-toe grid over the viewfinder of your camera and place your subject on one of the 4 intersections.

Watch the horizon

Play with the horizon on your pictures, adding in the effect of distance and space by placing the horizon towards the bottom of your shot.  Another easy way to add depth to your photo is to include foreground elements to your shot.  If you want to invoke the feeling of proximity, place the horizon towards the top of your shot.

Check out the photos below!  Awesome shots taken by my friend George.

Landscapes have always been my favorite subject to photograph. The beauty of nature is something that can never be rivaled and the opportunities of capturing a completely unique scene still remain limitless. While the temperament of Mother Nature will always be most dominant factor in taking a stunning landscape photograph, there are a few conceptual and technical elements specifically tailored for this style that I would like to go over.

Composition

Landscapes is one of the most beautiful, yet overdone, subjects in photography. With this in mind, you need to think outside-the-box when composing your photo. Using a lighthouse as an example, I think we all can agree that taking a photo of a lighthouse face-on from the beach is not going to make the most exciting picture because it’s a composition we’ve seen a million times over. The trick here is to explore new angles; crouch down between two rocks and use them to build a frame around the lighthouse, or climb up the side of a cliff and photograph the lighthouse from above. Depending on your environment, the possibilities to change your point-of-view can be endless.Another compositional element to landscape photography is what we call “foreground interest”. That photo of the lighthouse on the beach I mentioned earlier is boring not only because it’s an exhausted composition, but because the only interesting subject in the photo is the lighthouse. However, if you were to crouch down in the sand and line up your shot with a piece of driftwood in the foreground with the lighthouse in the background, the entire photo is transformed. Look for these opportunities when you find an interesting subject to photograph, and also make sure to follow the rules of three and not center the primary subject.

Technical Issues

One of the most important rules of true landscape photography is to remember that on a sunny day, the sky and the ground will never be properly exposed within the same photograph; either your camera will meter for the sky and underexpose the ground, or meter for the ground and overexpose the sky. If you set out to take any photo where sky and ground meet, you need to bring a tripod along as two photos will need to be taken: one exposed for the sky and one for the ground, and a tripod will ensure that the images will line up correctly when combined. Lens filters do exist which will intentionally underexpose the top portion of your photo (the sky in this example) by a good number of f/stops (imagine tinting only the top portion of your lens), but these filters are not only expensive but awkward to set-up and carry around. While I’m not discouraging you from purchasing an ND (neutral density) grad filter, my experiences with combining two differently exposed images in post process (Photoshop, etc.) have been highly successful, and also allows you more control over the end result. However, somewhat advanced knowledge of how to properly combine sky and ground images in post process is needed to have a flawless image, so you may have to either take a few quick-and-dirty lessons or purchase the ND grad filter system.

Once you’ve set up your tripod and have focused in properly on your subject, it’s time to choose an f/stop that will not only give you the sharpness you want, but will have enough depth of field to have all elements in clear view. Setting your zoom lens to f/8 or f/11 will cover both these concerns and, unless you’re going for a special effect (blurry foreground, for example), should always be used for landscape photography.

Below are some landscape images of mine that illustrate the points I’ve outlined for you. However, keep in mind that these tips, much like your camera, are just tools to give you a leg up; the end result ultimately depends on you and your environment. So get out there and take some photos, and if you don’t like what you see, fret not. Decipher the problem and get right back out there, as your talent with photography, much like any hobby, will constantly improve!

Action photos have always stood out to me.  There’s a dynamic appeal to an athlete frozen in a complex movement.  I have no problem relating to the placement of the subject in time and space; the blurred background streaking behind a downhill bike rider commands the eye with speed.  A zoom lens, a tripod and a digital SLR camera can help elevate any modest sports picture to an attention-grabbing composition of energy and movement.

Timing

“Timing is everything.”  All clichés aside, timing really is key.  Before you attempt any fancy blurred motion shots, watch a few moments you wish to capture without taking a picture.  When you can isolate the crucial movement (the swing connecting with the ball, the arch of the dive) try snapping a photo with your camera set on a high shutter speed to get the timing down.  This is where having a DSLR comes in handy; any delay in the shutter release by a cheap digital camera will make timing your pictures practically impossible.

Camera Basics

Once you have your timing and angel down, you’ll need to adjust your camera based on light availability and desired effect.  If you are lucky enough to have a well-lit subject and a 300mm lens with an f stop of 2.8 (or 500mm f/4; the bigger the aperture, typically, the higher the price) the opportunity for a vivid depth of field moment will present itself.  It’s important to let the environment and moment guide your photographic decisions and techniques when the subject is more or less out of your control.  Since your camera’s aperture will be opened fully in this scenario, you will need to have a fast shutter speed to counter the high exposure of light.

Motion

For an optimal blurred motion photo, it helps for the lighting to be less bright.  An overall dimness will allow a slow enough shutter speed for a blurred background to occur while maintaining the subject’s sharpness.  Keeping the subject sharp in a handheld photo with the shutter speed slower than 1/60 of a second is almost impossible, making that setting a good starting point.  This technique will definitely take you a few tries to master, but the effect is worth it.  While standing in a stationary location with the subject passing by at a decent speed (this is sometimes easier when standing closer to the action) try “tracking” or following the subject in your viewfinder.  If you can match the speed of the subject in your viewfinder correctly and take the picture while your camera is moving, the result will be a blurry background and a sharp subject.  This look is perfect for car races, runners or anything else that is based on speed.

A mastery of outdoor action photography requires lots of practice and mistakes.  The upside is you’ll start going to events, meeting new people and possibly get paid for your noticeable work.

Night photography has always captured my attention through its ability to transform some of our mundane, daily surroundings into dynamic sceneries of light and shadow.  A setting that appears commonplace during daylight hours can take on a surprisingly new atmosphere at night.   I noticed this affect at a public park near my house.  In the park there is a playground; it’s painted with primary colors yet the overall brightness is muted by the uniformity of beige tanbark on the ground and the sun’s reflections on the metal surfaces during the day.  When I returned at night, the park looked like a dark and contemplative film noir scene.  The metal slides that were too drenched with light to photograph reappeared as ominous shapes in the night, a twisting blend of shadows and subtle reflections from street lamps in the distance.

Play Around

I experimented with night photography before I even had a tripod.  I would place my camera on ledges, try every increment of shutter speed and use of the internal flash.  Thanks to my rigorous tests, I discovered that I needed a tripod as soon as possible.  Even with sunlight, it is nearly impossible to produce a photo without blur when using a shutter speed below 1/60 of a second.  When photographing landscapes at night, I rarely use a shutter speed faster than one second.  So, before running out to buy a tripod, try playing with your camera in the backyard at night.  This will help you become familiarized with your camera’s sensitivity to light and the dependence on slow shutter speeds that is inherent in night photography.

Hunt for Spots

Since this is the BARE BONES guide to night photography, all you really need is a tripod.  That’s right; no external flashes, no portable lights and no generators.  All you need is your camera (set to its highest ISO), your trusty tripod and some kind of light source.  Parking lots, parks, moonlit fields, urban views from the top of a hill, streetlights, traffic and store fronts all produce their own unique form of light.  From the macro to the micro, you will find that each light source looks best with different shutter speeds.  For a shot of the stars on a clear night, a shutter speed of a full minute or longer usually does the trick.  To actually see the rotation of the earth, a six-hour shutter speed will produce long, curved streaks of stars moving through the sky.  When photographing traffic moving quickly on a freeway below an overpass, any shutter speed longer than five seconds will probably make the image too bright.  As you practice more, an intuition for the appropriate shutter speed for any type of setting becomes second nature.

The Great Indoors

One tradeoff for not purchasing all those extras (like lights) is that photographing a person outside with only a tripod can be very difficult.  Even though it’s still possible to use the camera’s built-in flash to illuminate the subject and reduce the blur that would otherwise be visible from the subject’s movements, it’s difficult to avoid washing out all the color from the subject.  This is where the exciting world of bars, concerts, dances and other nightlife gatherings comes into play.  While there are interior lights at clubs and bars, the lighting is generally dim or dark.  Using what you have learned about shutter speeds, you can apply the same principals to photographing people hitting the dance floor under a strobe light.  Too much light from the ceiling reflecting on the dance floor will mean a faster shutter speed.  Utilizing the motion of the crowd from a high vantage point, like a balcony, by allowing a blur to show up will require a slower shutter speed.

Night photography has its own cool look.  With only a tripod and a camera, you can create images using available light sources while applying basic camera operating techniques.

*Feature Story*

In an age where social-networking and photo-sharing communities allow and even expect users to publicly document their lives through hundreds (if not thousands!) of crude un-considered point-and-click photographs taken by any person who can afford the steadily declining cost of a compact digital camera, it can sometimes be easy to forget that there even is such a thing as good quality camera work. The internet’s communal meet-and-greet websites are saturated with bland imagery and useless repetitive shots. You don’t have to look far these days to find them.  So what does it take to make your pictures stand out from the rest? The answer, thankfully, is actually quite simple.

The Simple Solution To Better Pictures.

Take some time to actually put a grain or two of thought into each click of your camera’s shutter. Since most of us are using digital cameras these days, we’ve gotten complacent about the quality of our images, relying on the fact that we can take ten times the amount of shots we actually want – returning later to sort through them all and select the better pictures. This is a bland, backdoor way of getting a good photograph and will only yield minimally satisfying results.

Now, keep in mind that when I say “high quality” I’m not talking about glossy, professional magazine pictures. I wouldn’t expect you to bring your 200 dollar digital camera to the Saturday night party and come away with award winning imagery. However, I do believe you can go to that same party and with that same camera come away with pictures that will undoubtedly impress your friends when you post them the next day all across the internet.

A Good Start.

I took a black and white 35mm photography class back when I was in college and would recommend this to anyone who has the time and accommodations. It was a simple class with fairly straight-forward assignments, but it taught me the ins and outs of utilizing my camera as we critiqued each other’s photographs and developed our own film. Except for the physical aspect of the dark room experience – bringing actual prints to life using chemicals and enlargers – the knowledge I learned in that class translates easily to any digital camera I could use now. And above everything else, it taught me to put some thought into the pictures I take.

Think Before You Shoot.

What I mean by thinking about each shot you make is that you should actively consider the subjects you’re framing with your lens. Imagine when you look through that view-finder or at your LCD screen on the back of your camera that you’re actually looking at a miniature painting. A painter considers what he must crop in and out of the image to make it effective and appealing. He considers the distance he is from his subject and what objects are between the viewer and that subject, as well as what objects are in the background. He thinks about the lighting in the area – how it hits his subject and affects the shadows and distinctions of everything in focus. Too often we think a flash is always appropriate, but even at night there are times when turning the flash off makes for a better photograph.

The Elusive Portrait.

I enjoy taking pictures of people. We’re used to smiling faces turned towards the camera and posed for the shot, but the truth is that there are plenty of interesting moments when someone isn’t looking directly into the lens. I like to experiment with different alignments. Our brain wants to put a single person right in the middle of the image, but try something new and see what happens to the dynamics of the picture if you place that individual against the border of your frame. Or instead of being eye level with your subject, get as low as you can on the ground or climb up on something and get a bird’s-eye view. If you have a group of people, stagger them so that some are in focus and some are just out of focus.

Photography can actually be more than just a means to capture the history of moments in our day-to-day lives. It can actually be an art form as well. Again, the point is to get away from the tempting ease of holding the camera up in front of your face and clicking the shutter to actually considering how everything within your frame is aligned. You’ll find it doesn’t take much effort to get your pictures to stand out from the rest, and the more effort you put into it, the better they’ll become. The key is to experiment, to step away from the traditional ideas you’re used to and try something a little different.

Editing Pictures Is An Extra Tool In Getting Quality Shots.

I also like to spruce up my pictures with a computer editing program. They’re pretty simple to download online and some computers have them already installed in their systems. After I upload my images I can try various cropping scenarios, add some unique touch-ups or work with the color schemes. For example, it wasn’t until I had them in an editing program that I realized that some of my full color pictures actually looked better in black and white. Basically, a good editing program gives you an extra step towards a good quality picture.

Think Of Your Camera As An Artist’s Brush.

Unique, interesting pictures are harder and harder to find. You don’t have to be a professional to have your photography stand out. Take a class, read a how-to book or just glance through magazines to sharpen your skills and show you the potential of what’s out there. Look at it as an art form, and you may begin to see photography, and the subjects you’re capturing in the frame of the viewfinder, a little differently. And most importantly, the quality of your images will reflect that change inside of you.

]]> http://rollickguides.com/photography/improve-your-photographs-taking-good-photos-is-actually-much-easier-than-you-might-think/feed/ 0 http://rollickguides.com/photography/creative-photography-exercises-3-ways-to-rekindle-your-passion/ http://rollickguides.com/photography/creative-photography-exercises-3-ways-to-rekindle-your-passion/#comments Wed, 04 Feb 2009 00:00:00 +0000 travis http://rollickguides.com/photography/?p=6

Taking the leap into photography can be a difficult process, but feeling lazy and unmotivated after years of practice is easy.  The thrill of the new camera wears off, everyday surroundings turn predictable and suddenly it’s a chore to go out and take some shots for fun.  For me, setting goals for myself is a good way to get things going again.  Just like “end of the semester” projects in school that seem scary at first but end up being the most valuable, trying a pre-planned exercise is a great way to gain a new appreciation for your camera.  The more time you’re willing to dedicate to rekindling the passion, the better.

1)  Take a Picture Every Five Minutes for Ten Hours

Even though this may seem intimidating at first, what do you really have to lose on a boring Sunday with a digital camera and a gigabyte memory card to spare?  Usually I don’t fill up my memory card with more than 50 pictures before I run off to upload them.  This exercise is great because it forces you to take advantage of your camera’s image storing capability and the potential it allows.  No matter where you are—whether your backyard, a park or being driven in a car—this exercise will inevitably produce creative images thanks to the constant demand for new ones.  If you happen to be in your living room when the five minutes are up, you will have to think differently.  Bizarre angles will be experimented with.  Inventive uses of depth of field will come into play.  Unnoticed details will come to the forefront.  All of these rewards will emerge after three hours, let alone ten.

2) Use Available Light Sources for Night Shots

Spend an evening as a moth by seeking out light sources in your area.  While this exercise may seem simple enough, it’s another basic activity that will help spark a new interest in your camera and your surroundings.  After I bought a tripod and tried this, I found myself in areas of my city that I’d previously overlooked or never noticed.  A clichéd waterfront was then transformed into a superbly noir-feeling dock thanks to green streetlights and the haze of moon through fog.  As you get comfortable adjusting your tripod after not using it for so long (shame) you will begin to notice shadows, reflections, and compositions that were unthinkable during the daytime.

3)  Stray From Your Comfort Zone

Or rather, stray from your comfort style. Are you a portrait type?  A candid person?  A landscape fiend?  Whatever your natural inclination, completely reverse it.  Claiming a type of photography is really claiming what comes easiest and what feels safest.  For those like me who unconsciously gravitate towards the predictable hillside and forest-scapes, try calling a friend and taking their portraits in an area they prefer (an urban setting, perhaps?)  Or if you like to “let things happen” with as little equipment and planning as possible, try executing a carefully planned indoor shoot with dramatic lighting, a group of people or an arrangement of objects.  This exercise may be the most challenging of all, but it will undoubtedly make you reconsider your camera and your relationship to it.

The point of these exercises isn’t to churn out a new batch of cool images—even though you will end up with a few.  Remembering the potential of photography, its ability to make you see the world in new ways, is the ultimate goal.  Even if I go months without snapping a picture, I know it’s up to me to inspire myself.  My problem has always been the fact that oftentimes inspiration must be worked for.  To help kick-start this reinvigoration, creating a project for yourself will help you focus on your camera and push you to try new things with it.

*Featuer Story*

When taking portrait photos, or photos of people in general, it is always wise to use a low f/stop in order to “blur” the background. This tactic will offer less of a distraction from your subject and more focus where it should be. Also, the low f/stop will make it possible to take photos at a faster shutter speed, meaning that portraits in low-light photography (indoors without flash, outside at dusk, etc.) will be possible without noticeable motion blur. However, avoid this tip if you are taking photos where the background will be a large focal point in your photo (a scenic mountainous background, for example).

When taking portraits, or any kind of photo where you want the focus to be 100% on your subject and not the background, you must remember to clear the background of distracting objects. Move your subject in front of an area with a soft, even tone, like the leaves of a tree or a solid background. This will make sure that people looking at your photo will only concentrate on what you want them to.