Saturday, July 25, 2009

Digital Photography Tips

#1: Don’t Assume that DigiCams Do All The Work!

Maybe you have heard something like this before: “The better the cameras, the better the photos.” In this effect, you might have thought of digital cameras. Many believe that these models are just a one-click away for great photos. Do you also believe on this?

Ponder on the following article and the appropriate answer will be revealed to you.

The rivalry between film cameras and digital cameras is relatively fresh. How come? Three mega pixels digital cameras have an array of choices for consumers, which is already comparable to a high quality point and shoot models. Nowadays, the same thing goes with five mega pixels digital models for excellent quality photographs. The thing is, quality photographs can be taken with ease using digital cameras.

Some of the main advantages to digital photography are:

• pictures can be previewed immediately on the built-in LCD screen
• costs of installing films are replaced with memory sticks or cards that are primarily reusable and can store thousands of pictures
• the stored photographs can easily be shared by copying off the images and/or sharing the memory stick or card
• images can easily be transformed into black and white and/or sepia and can also be cropped after the picture has been taken

However, photos under low light and taken using film and digital models are both susceptible to artifacts or granularity. Images taken by both cameras appear to be very similar can be further improved with the advent of software that can improve and manipulate the quality and details of images.

Furthermore, you can take lousy shots with the most expensive Nikon models and make great photos with the passé point and shoot cameras. It suffices to say that it is not the camera that solely makes great and even picture-perfect images. The man behind the camera can squeeze or miss a big time out of the gadget that he has.

The following presents a ten-point aid that will enable you to take photos like a pro using your digital cameras. Practice on these tips so you can maximize the expense of your gadget.

1. Those Tones Should Warm Up

Change your white balance setting from auto to cloudy when shooting sunny landscapes and outdoor portraits. This increases the yellow and red tones, thus resulting in warmer and richer pictures.

2. Use a [Sunglass] Polarizer

A polarizer should always come in handy when taking those general outdoor shooting. Polarized shots have more saturated and richer colors because unwanted reflections and glare are minimized or even removed.

If your digital camera can not accommodate a polarizer, simply place a sunglass as close to the camera lens as possible making sure that the rims of the glass will not be taken along with the image. The effect of a polarizer can be maximized when the light source is perpendicular to the object.

3. Shining Outdoor Portraits

One of the most useful and amazing features of digital cameras is the flash on or fill flash mode. This feature allows you to take control when to use the flash. It simply goes on whenever you want it available. This helps in capturing great outdoor photographs.

The camera exposes for the background first then adds enough flash to illuminate the subject when you are using the flash on option. Wedding photographers have been using this technique for many years to create professional looking portraits where everything in the composition is simply excellent.

To come up with a more relaxed photograph, try putting the subject under the shade and use the flash to add illumination.

You can also practice on using rim lighting where the sun illuminates the hair of the subject from the side or the back.

However, you should not stand that far away when using the fill flash since most built-in models have a range of 10 feet or even less.

4. Macro Mode Frenzy

I am quite sure that you would want to look at the fine details of your surroundings but would not be willing to crouch down and lie on the ground with your belly.

In that case, you just have to look for the macro made or close up symbol, usually a flower icon, and get as close to an object as possible. Once the confirmation light signals you to shoot, just press the shutter down to record the portrait.

However, using the close up mode allows you to have a shallow depth so you can concentrate on the part of the subject that you want to emphasize and let the rest go soft.

5. Chaos of the Horizon Line

There are still photographers who become disoriented when lining up their shoots. In other words, once they look at their cameras monitor, images that are erect seem to be a little tilted or bowed inward.

The most appropriate way to take care of this matter is to take your best shot at a straight picture, then take another picture after repositioning the camera. Afterwards, you can delete the others once you feel you captured a perfectly aligned image.

Also, just practice level framing your shots until you become acquainted with the process.

6. Massive Media Card

You have to have an extra memory card especially when you want more moments to preserve. The following suggestions should be considered before buying a memory card:
a. for 3 mega pixels – a 256 MB memory card
b. for 4 mega pixels – a 512 MB memory card
c. for 6 mega pixels – 1 gigabyte memory card

Then you do not have to miss another shot because your card is full.

7. Not High Resolution All the Time

It is more advisable to squeeze more images by shooting a low quality and resolution settings than taking shots with a high resolution all the time. This way you can reserve a space and a 2272 x 1704 resolution on the next great image of the century and enough for the portrait to be printed on a 8” x 10” inch paper suitable for framing.

However, if you have enough memory (and you should), there is no reason to shoot at a lower resolution and risk missing the chance to display your work the big way.

8. Tolerate that Tripod

Tripods are “unnecessarily bulky” for some so seldom do people like to bring them around.

Nowadays, there is an ingenious way to settle the dilemma whether to bring a tripod around or to do without it. The UltraPod II™ developed by Pedco fits in your back pocket and holds your camera steady in various situations.

You can use the Velcro™ strap to attach your camera on a tree limb or an available pole. Its legs can be opened on any flat surface or even on a boulder.

Now, you can be a real photographer without carrying a heavy burden.

9. The Fun with Self Timer

Another under-used feature on almost every digital camera is the self timer. This function can be used to save the photographer for missing the picture by delaying the firing of the shutter up to 10 seconds.

You can attach your UltraPod™ to ensure that your camera will not be taken away that easily by some strangers. Of course, you need to aim at the subject and not at a distant background before setting up the timer. Also the depth of the subject should be checked too.

By using self timers, you can also avoid accidentally jarring the camera when you are interested in making long exposures of cars driving at dusk as you initiate the focus.

10. Slow Motions

Normally, you will use an exposure of one second or a bit longer to create the flowing effect of water. In this case, you have to look for waterfalls or streams that are under the shade.

One trick is to use a polarizer or your sunglasses to darken the scene and create a longer exposure. More so, this technique can also eliminate distractions from your portrait.

For a really good photographer, which implies using creativity and ingenuity, viewers often get curious and ask, “What sort of camera model do you have there?”

Would it be more humbling for them to hear that you are using a normal aim and shoot model?

Or you can simply say, “Model ME.”

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Taking Wedding Pictorials One Step Forward with Digital Photography

Cameras have always been present in times of events. They can really help people keep all of their treasured memories. Of course, during weddings/nuptials the ever-reliable cameras are surely present.

It is well known that weddings are one of the wonderful events in an individual's life. Many people wait for the day they can have a sacred union with the one that they love. And in order for them to have at least a good memory of this great event, cameras are needed.

You know, it's amazing how far our technology has come with regards to photography. Many devices or gadgets are now being introduced in order to help people treasure special moments in their everyday lives.

There are also new cameras that are being made especially to capture the most treasured times in our everyday lives. Among these devices are digital cameras. These devices are really great for capturing happy moments during events like weddings.

Since the introduction of digital cams, they have outsold film cameras. Thus, this makes digital wedding photography a more popular service than film photography. Why?

Well, this may be because digital photography can take wedding pictorials into new heights. Cameras used for digital photography provides a lot of new advantages to their users.

One of the major advantages of these digital cameras is that they let users skip the usual film separation process, which is among the most time-consuming processes in photography. So, removing one time-consuming process would mean getting results faster, right? And when living in a fast-phase society, quick results are a must!

Another advantage of digital wedding photography is that, even though it provides fast results, the quality of each printed photo is not sacrificed. This means that no matter how fast you get your pictures, the result is still beautiful.

Another advantage of digital wedding photography is that it provides customization options to its users. This would mean that a user can edit photos even before they are printed. You can change the size, brightness, contrast or sharpness of your photo. You can even add or remove some details on your photos.

Digital photography has also integrated with cellular phones. This means that you only need to bring a phone to take pictures during weddings. Nevertheless, it is a fact professional digital cameras can provide better results than the cameras of cellular phones. Most professional digital cams have 6 mega pixels while cellular phones usually have lower mega pixel.

But perhaps the greatest advantage of digital wedding photography is the availability of your photos to be reproduced over and over again without making any variations between the first printed photo and the last photo printed. Digital photography allows users to save their files on their computers, which would mean that they can be reproduced without wearing out any film, since it doesn't need one.

But, no matter how great a technology is, it's still not perfect. One of the major disadvantages of digital photography is that it is not ideal for 4-color printing. Why? Well this is because of the fact that there will always be a variation between the images you will see on your pc monitor and your 4 color printed photo.

Why? Well, computer monitors use RGB, right? Four color printing uses CMYK. RGB and CMYK have entirely different outputs. So, no matter what you do, the image on your monitor will never be the same as your 4 color photos, unless there are computer monitors that also use CMYK to produce colors for the images and texts.

Nevertheless, digital wedding photography is still better than film photography and that is also a fact. See for yourself.