Digital Photography Tips

rudixworld — Sun, 24 Sep 2006 21:24:37 +0000

Most zoom lenses give you larger apertures at wide-angle settings than at full telephoto. If 1:2.8 – 4.8 is engraved on the lens ring, the camera’s maximum aperture of f-2.8 at full wide will shift to f-4.8 (about 1.5 stops) as you move to the extreme telephoto setting. So in low light conditions, shoot wide.
Digital zoom is a worthless feature; all it does is enlarge a section of the image with a resulting loss in resolution. You can do that in any imaging program with better results.
To light small objects without producing harsh shadows or overly-bright highlights, build a small tabletop tent using part of an old bed sheet with an opening cut for the camera lens. Then place the object inside it and aim your light through the side of the tent.
To maintain image quality, convert pictures you’ve shot in JPEG to TIFF. You can then work and re-work them in an imaging program without having them degrade. And if you screw up, the original JPEG is always there to make another TIFF from.
Here’s how to figure out what resolution to scan at: dpi to set for scanning = final image width divided by the original image width x the final ppi desired. So if you want to print an 8×10 inch enlargement from a 4 x 5 inch photo, divide 10 by 5 which gives you 2. Then multiply that by, say, 200. The result, 400, is the scanner dpi setting to use. To end up with 300 ppi you’d have to scan at 600 dpi.
Unless your camera or lens has image stabilization built in, here’s the rule for getting shake-free images when using zoom lenses at telephoto settings. Use the focal length of the lens as your shutter speed. So if you are shooting with the 35mm equivalent of a 400mm lens, set your shutter speed to 1/400th second or faster.
To reduce camera shake when shooting at slow shutter speeds, put your arm through the camera strap so that the strap crosses your back and ends up under your right armpit. Then adjust the strap so the camera’s at eye level when you pull it forward. Result? Rock-steady shots.
Don’t use lens tissue to remove smudges from your lens. It only redistributes the dirt and oil. A LensPen will get rid of everything without harming the optical glass or its coating. www.lenspen.com
Memory cards do go South so trusting all your pictures to one humongous card is a bad idea. Depending on the resolution and compression ratio you shoot at, use cards that hold about 50 images so all won’t be lost if the card takes a dive.
If a memory card goes bad, and gives you a message of doom, don’t mess with it. There are many recovery programs that will save your images and the less you do the better your chances are that you can retrieve them unharmed.
When doing long exposures with a single lens reflex camera on a tripod, don’t forget to cover the eyepiece or light will get in through it and usually put a blurry round circle right in the middle of your image.
All digicam optical viewfinders show you less of the field of view than will be recorded. If you want to frame your images accurately, run a few tests to see how much more will actually be included and compensate for it, usually by moving in.
Much ado is currently being made about shooting in RAW mode, which eliminates in-camera adjustments for color and sharpness, among others, and let’s you fiddle with them yourself afterwards in an imaging program. But shooting in RAW inflates file sizes, slows down certain camera functions, and requires more work. If your exposures and white balance are correct (and they usually are) stick with JPEG. The quality will be virtually the same without all the hassles.
Bracketing is a great feature to use when you’re shooting under difficult conditions (extremely low or bright light). The camera will shoot one picture at what it thinks is the correct exposure and then two more, one overexposed and the other underexposed. Among the three, one should be right on the nose.
15. Cameras vary in their compression ratios (the smaller the better). The best on one brand may be 1:2 while on another it may be 1:4. Anything up to 1:8 will produce acceptable images; in fact, you’d have a hard time telling the difference. The Canon Digital Rebel, for example, uses 1:7 at its best setting and huge prints from its images look just fine.

16. To make sure the colors you see on your monitor print out correctly, you must calibrate it so it accurately displays the colors in your image files. The printer uses that file and not your monitor for its output. Calibration assures that the monitor is displaying exactly the same colors that are in the file and that any changes you make to the image on your monitor will be made to the file which, in turn, will be reflected in your print-out.

17. Use the right paper for your inkjet printer. Epsons shoot cold dots of ink while most others shoot hot ones. It’s perfectly OK to use third-party papers (Red River has a huge selection) but make sure they are compatible with the type of printer you have.

18. Start off with a good imaging program. Adobe Photoshop Elements 3.0 is the world’s greatest bargain and that’s what you should use. Don’t spend a fortune on the full version of Photoshop to begin with; in fact, it might be a bit overwhelming. Photoshop Elements is probably all you’ll ever need and for under $100 it’s a steal.

19. You may be a techie and love all that geeky stuff, but photography is still about making pictures that say something. The finest equipment is worthless if you can’t use it to express yourself. Read a few books that emphasize the creative side. One to get is Bryan Peterson’s “Learning To See Creatively.”

20. Sometimes it’s hard to just aimlessly wander around looking for good pictures to shoot. Always give yourself a mini-assignment to stay on track. Like kids at play, people at bus stops, interesting doorways, afternoon shadows, and so on. That way, you have a direction in which to go and the challenge of trying to interpret things in your own unique way.

21. Move in. Most pictures have way too much extraneous junk in them. By taking a few giant steps forward, your pictures will become more dramatic and go from ho-hum to ooh-ah.

22. Shoot, shoot, and shoot. Shoot a few pictures a week and it will take you forever to become a good photographer. But shoot a couple of hundred shots a week and you’ll progress a lot faster.

23. As a rule of thumb, never shoot less than six to ten pictures of a subject. Explore it from different angles, go for different poses, stay with it, trying with each new shot to make a better picture than the one before.

24. The worst pictures you can possibly make will be with the camera’s flash. Unless you’re shooting “record” shots (your possessions for insurance purposes, for example), stash the flash. Start shooting with available light and you’ll begin to feel the magic.

25. Try new points of view. Get down and shoot up or up and shoot down. Tilt the camera to induce some dynamic tension. Come in ultra close or shoot from really far away. And guess what? If you turn your camera 90-degrees to the left or right you can shoot exciting vertical images. It’s a built-in feature on every camera– use it.

rudixworld — Sat, 23 Sep 2006 23:35:19 +0000

Ronald Kadrev, a Danish free-lance photographer with 15 years’ experience, is an established contributor to numerous magazines and supplier for advertising agencies and other firms. His specialties include magazine illustration, photo documentaries, and on-location portraiture, though he periodically does advertising and PR photography as well. He shoots digital images on all assignments. He offers an extensive stock photo file. His home and studio are in the village of Rude (though he is actually very polite). He works often in Copenhagen. Olsen is a firm believer in the idea that simplicity furthers understanding of the visual message, and that portraits, in the broadest sense, must portray the subject rather than the photographer (photo above excepted).More than 670 of Olsen´s images are available online at the new image-database flickr.com