Looking Backward for Your Future in Photography

James Maynard - May 04, 2013 | Outdoor Photography, Photography Equipment, Photography Gear, Photography Tips, Technique, Tips

Photo editing can turn good pictures into great photographs quickly and easily. Software for maximizing the allure of your art are widely available, and can be downloaded for little to know cost. Professionals and serious hobbyists tend to use higher-end, powerful editing applications like Adobe Lightroom or Photoshop. But, if you are just beginning in the world of photo editing, you may want to begin with freeware or perform edits online, and see what system works best for your tastes.

If you are not sure where to begin with photo editing, one such free photo editing application is called Irfanview. Make sure to download and install both the program and the “big file” of add-ons.

In whichever application you choose for editing, open your file, and find where the options are listed for editing your image. In Irfanview, they are located in the “Image” window.

You will also want to look for something called “Color Correction,” or an option with a similar name. In Irfanview, the color correction editor can be accessed by using G. Experiment with your various options, which will usually include the ability to make adjustments to the saturation, gamma contrast and brightness, among other qualities. Play around with these until you get the best-looking original photograph you can, and save either the newly-improved photo, or its new settings, depending on what software you are using. Only then should you go into editing. Many of the effects that are popular today really harken back to earlier times – from styles popular in the Renaissance to the mid-1990′s, it seems everything old is new again. Here are some common effects that can lead to uncommon results.

Try Instagram – The big success story of the last few years for photographic effects for the amateur photographer were Instagrams. This system allowed users with mobile devices to take photos, edit them online by adding filters (pre-set effects) and share them with friends and family. The effect, for anyone who has not yet seen it, is like a photo from a SX-70 camera from the 1970′s, combined with the bright technicolor hues of 1960′s TV. Instagram is free on the web at www.Instagram.com.

Don’t be afraid to go back to black and white – The advances in photography since the days of black and white film-driven cameras have been extensive and highly useful. However, once in a while, a picture looks better in black and white than it does in color. This is especially true of snow, mountains, and wide landscapes. Don’t be afraid to channel your inner Ansel Adams, and try editing your color photographs with a stark black and white look.

In this photo of the Alps by Magnus Rosendah, we can see how much more dramatic the image looks in black and white than in color. Public domain image.

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The Light Way to Take Portraits

James Maynard - April 27, 2013 | Lightroom, Lightroom Tips, Photography Gear, Photography Tips, Portrait Photography, Technique, Tips

Lighting your subject plays an essential role in portrait photography. Like taking any other kind of photo, the way light bounces off your subject before entering your camera lens will make a world of difference to the quality of the final photos.

Professional photographers use a number of expensive lights, strobes and flashes to create the perfect lighting conditions. Most of us don’t have that much time, space or money. However, no matter what your level of proficiency, or level of dedication to the hobby, you can take better portraits by taking time to arrange your lights properly. Fortunately, each light serves a single purpose, so you can easily mix-and-match for different shots and conditions.

The main light you will use is called, not surprisingly, the main light, or key light. If you are using a flash, this should usually be considered your main light source. You should get your flash off the camera – portraits taken using a flash that is sitting on a camera tend to look flat and lifeless; the light comes off the camera, bounces directly off the skin of the subject, then directly back into the camera. Flashes attached to camera bodies are also the leading cause of red eye – eliminate both issues with the use of an off-camera cord, preferably 12-24′ long, or by using a wireless flash trigger. By moving the flash off-center, you will be able to bring our bone structure and skin tone in a way impossible to do with a flash attached to a camera.

Great instructional video and gear recommendations

Learn more from ImprovePhotography.com

Try a fill light or reflector – if you have a second light, position it on the opposite side of the camera from your keylight. Aim it so that it softens the shadows from your main light. If you do not have a second light source, you can fill in with a piece of white poster board, with a small hole in the middle, attached to a tripod, and fastened with a washer and nut. Aluminum foil can be used to create an even more reflective surface, and the board can be moved in and out and/or angled toward the model to create different effects.

Most of the time, we want the background behind our subject to be easily passed over by the viewer’s eye. Sometimes, however, the background plays a vital role in the composition of the photograph. If this is the case, the third light you should consider using is called a background light. This lights up just the background, bringing out detail behind the model.

Notice how the well-lit background tells the viewer a lot about what these people are doing, as well as lends us some insight into their life. This picture would not be nearly as intriguing without the well-defined backdrop. Photo by Jon Sullivan. Public Domain Photo.

Some photographers like to use a kicker light, although the use of these lights has fallen out of favor lately. Positioned slightly behind and above the subject, A kicker light will create the halo-like effect that was so prominent in 1980′s school photos.

How you use the lights within these parameters is up to you as the artist, however, there are a few well-established styles which you should explore.

The first of these is called split lighting, and it is created by having your key light off to the side of the subjects face, and about at the same height, while they look down the barrel of the camera. This will create an effect where one side of the face is lit, while the other is in darkness.

Want to get reduce the visibility of wrinkles in an older model? Position your keylight above and behind the camera, which will smooth out imperfections in skin.

Want a scary look? Try lighting from below. This is a classic technique which was extensively used in the silent horror films of the earliest days of movie-making. Here, you may want to forgo the use of a fill light or background light, in order to make the shadows (and thus, the creepiness) even more pronounced.

Or, have the model looking just off-camera, in a 3/4 position, and light the more-exposed side of her face. Although this style of lighting can be flattering for some people, it can tend to add the appearance of pounds, so use wisely.

This is the classic 3/4 pose. Notice how the main light is positioned on the side of her face that is showing more toward the camera. Photo by Paolo Neo. Public domain image.

When in doubt, start with two lights, each positioned 45 degrees above and to either side of the model. This lighting style is known as the Rembrandt effect, which is quite often pleasing to the viewer.

Remember that the angle of incidence is equal to the angle of reflectance, so any light that you aim at the subject will bounce back at the same angle, and could create glare, especially if your model is wearing glasses. Position your lights accordingly.

After taking the shots, then remember to fix the blemishes and light in tools like Adobe Lightroom or Photoshop. The new spot healing tool in Lightroom 5 is great to remove lines under the eyes or stray pieces of hair.

Like everything else in photography, you should experiment and try different things. What works for you in one situation may not work for someone else another time.

Try paying more attention to your lighting the next time you do portrait photography – you may be glad you did!


Outdoor Portrait Tips – Top 9

James Maynard - April 13, 2013 | Outdoor Photography, Photographers, Photography Equipment, Photography Gear, Photography Tips, Portrait Photography, RAW Photos, Technique, Tips

Spring is the time for outdoor portrait photography. With the warmer weather, people are once again heading out of their homes and spending time in the great outdoors. What that means for you as a photographer is that you will be (hopefully!) taking a lot of great photos of people out in nature.

You can get the most of these opportunities just by following a few simple rules of thumb. You will want to follow most of the rules that you would for indoor portrait photography, so be sure to put those bits of advice into practice when you are outdoors, as well.

1) Shoot for the Sun – Most of the time, for outdoor photography, the Sun will be your main (or key) light. Therefore, for most photographic purposes, you will want the Sun to be – almost – at your back.

2) Beware the dangers of shooting with the Sun at your back – with the Sun directly behind you, the lighting can be a little harsh. So, try being a few degrees off of a line created between the Sun, camera and the model. Try to keep the Sun on the opposite side of your camera from the direction your subject is looking, otherwise the bright light could cause squinting.

3) Backlit shots can be dramatic – Menacing silhouette effects can be had by shooting with the light source behind your model, and you can even get some detail showing on your subject by using a flash, preferably held off-camera. Having the Sun to the side of your subject can give a striking effect, called split lighting.

4) Keep your aperture wide open – For outdoor photos, try shooting with your camera set to a very low f/stop – f/2.8 or f/4 are ideal. This will force the camera into having a very shallow depth of field. By doing so, the background (unless it is very close to the model) will go into soft-focus, or even fade into a faded backdrop known as bokeh. This effect will draw attention to your model in the final photograph. Ideally, you would like your bokeh to be full of color and contrast – select backdrops with blue sky showing behind the buds of spring and new leaves to create a surreal effect. (more…)

Cloud Photography: 14 Tips For Taking Radiant Cloud Photos

James Maynard - April 03, 2013 | Cloud Computing, Lightroom, Lightroom Tips, Nature Photography, Photography Gear, Photography Tips, RAW Photos, Technique, Tips

As a cloud storage company for photographers, we love clouds – of all types! And of course we love taking pictures of clouds!

Photographing clouds can be a challenge at times, but it can also produce truly awe-inspiring results. Cloud photos can lead viewers into a nearly-surreal state that naturally strikes conversation. There are many types of clouds that are worth of photography, from puffy white fair-weather clouds to dark storm clouds that portend a coming storm. Clouds are one of the things that connects us as human beings like no other, as we see them all our lives.

But how do you get really great photos of clouds? There are many schools of thought, but there are some which stand out as near-essentials if you are going to be taking photographs of clouds.

1) First, photograph the clouds when they look interesting. Keep your eyes up – especially on partly cloudy days, and look at what the clouds are doing. If they are intriguing, take a photo of them; you can always delete the shots later. (You can you “mist” the shot) Just before a storm rolls in is one of the best times of all to get out there with your camera to photograph clouds at their most exciting.

2) If you do not already have one, you will want to purchase a polarizing filter, which can cut out a lot of the atmospheric glare that will send unwanted light into your camera. The first thing you will notice when you begin to use a polarizer is that it makes the whole sky darker – that is due to the reflected light being absorbed by the filter. Keep in mind, however, that these filters only work when the Sun is at your sides. If the sunlight is coming from either directly ahead of you or behind you, the effects of a polarizing filter will be negligible.

3) Another option is to equip your camera with a graduated filter. The sky can be shaded out, while leaving the ground cover showing brightly. Of course, the trouble with these is that the filter doesn’t know the details of your shot, meaning that some foreground items will be shaded and/or sky left unshaded. A sky filter can also serve the purpose of cutting down ambient light in order to add more detail to your cloud photos. Photo Credit: Colby Brown Photography

4) Another trick is to photograph only the cloud – don’t get any landscape into your photograph. As clouds can often be a couple stops brighter than objects on the land, you risk not being able to expose both land and clouds correctly if you photograph them together. (more…)


Work More Quickly In Lightroom Using These 10 Keyboard Shortcuts

James Maynard - March 28, 2013 | Lightroom, Lightroom Tips, Photography Tips, Technique, Tips, Workflow

Shortcuts for Lightroom make this photo editing software from Adobe quicker and easier than ever before. By learning these ten simple hot keys, the process of turning your photos into great photographs can be a breeze. Try some of the following shortcuts the next time you use Adobe Lightroom, and you will wonder how you ever got along without them. Most of the commands given are usable within the library module, and are the same on either PC’s or Macs, unless noted otherwise.

1) There are five different modules in Adobe Lightroom: library, develop, slideshow, print and web. These can be accessed directly, simply by pressing and a number together on a PC, or and a number on computers manufactured by Apple. These numbers are 1 (library), 2 (develop), 3 (slideshow), 4 (print) and 5 (web). For instance, to get to the develop module on a Mac, select 2. You can also scroll through through the modules by using the left and right arrows, provided you are also holding and on a PC or and on a Macintosh.

2) Library Views – There are several different views available in your library, each of which can be selected with the push of a single button: grid (G), loupe (E), compare (C) and survey (N). While in library view, there are several different other shortcuts you can use in order to better view your images. Grid View – Shortcut = “G” Loupe View – Shortcut = “E” Compare View – Shortcut = “C” Lightroom Survey View – Survey = “N”

3) You can import photos into Lightroom from the Library Module using “Ctrl + Shift + I” PC / “Command + Shift + I” Mac. Likewise, you can easily export your photos from the Library Module “Ctrl + Shift + E” PC/ “Command + Shift + E” Mac. Want to export the photo with its previous settings? Not an issue! Simply add “Alt” to the previous shortcut for PC’s, or “Option” on MAC’s. (more…)

9 Tips For Photographing Water

James Maynard - March 22, 2013 | Photography Gear, Photography Tips, Technique, Tips

How to photograph on the water is one of the challenges presented to photographers at this time of year. As the weather starts to warm up, and we head outside with our cameras, we will find that we start to once again head toward water, for its natural beauty and serenity. There are several areas where you can easily improve the quality of your photos taken of water scenes, just by following these nine simple tips.

1) Pay careful attention to the position of the Sun while you are by the water. When you go out just after sunrise or just before sunset, and you have the sun at your back, trees on the opposite shoreline will reflect in the water, and boats will be best-lit for color and detail. However, facing the Sun will give you the colors in the skies, silhouetted boats and dark, foreboding trees on the distant side of the water. Handled well, this can produce an effect almost like a monochromatic photograph. At dusk or dawn, your picture may be black and blue – at sunset and sunrise, perhaps black and oranges.

2) If you go between these two extremes when the Sun is low in the sky, boats and trees will cast long shadows across the photo, lending a dramatic effect to your image. When the sun is higher in the sky may be your best time to take photos of boats coming toward the camera or going away from it. This is when the shadow of the subject will be at its shortest length, and color and motion become your primary concerns. Try a lot of shots from different angles and see what happens.

3) If you are by the ocean and want to capture the movement in crashing waves, rather than just taking a freeze-frame of the action, simply increase your shutter time to at least 1/10th of a second, while reducing the size of the aperture to compensate for the extra light. Tripods are useful here. (more…)

Photographing Moving Objects To Create Emotion

James Maynard - March 19, 2013 | Photography Equipment, Photography Gear, Photography Tips, Technique, Tips

Photography of high-speed objects can create some exciting effects, and the possibilities are wide open as to the effects that can be created just by adjusting your camera. There are numerous reasons you may want to show some movement in your photos, from showing that an object is moving to conveying emotion. The real art is in finding the best balance between showing the object and showing it in motion.

What makes photography of moving subjects different from taking regular photos is the shutter speed. If you are photographing a NASCAR race, for instance, you will need to have an exceptionally fast shutter speed for the cars not to just show up as blurs across the picture. Most photographers who are also sports fans have tried, with varying degrees of success, to photograph quick movements on the field, from a pitcher releasing a ball to a football coming off the toe of a punter. It is especially challenging to take these types of photos during night games.

As we’ve seen, blurring in the picture can be a good thing, as it shows motion. To give you an idea of what exposure times will do to movement, a shutter speed of 1/1000 of a second would freeze the image of a moving propeller, making it look like it is standing still. Keeping the shutter open for 1/100 of a second will provide a lot of blurring, and erasing any detail painted onto the moving part. However, if you take a photo at around 1/250 of a second, you will get obvious movement in the image, while still retaining some qualities of the object.

These fast shutter speeds are fine, provided that there is a lot of light to be had. But this is not always the case. There are two quick ways of dealing with the lack of light – open the aperture of the lens up more, or by increasing the ISO setting on your camera. Any time you increase the ISO setting of your camera, however, you will also be increasing the graininess of the image, so keep that in mind when you are setting your camera. You may also find that a high ISO setting will cause too much light to enter the camera when taking photos of bright objects at night. (more…)

Winter Photography Tips – Top 11

James Maynard - January 22, 2013 | Photography Gear, Photography Tips, Technique, Tips

Winter is a unique time of year to take photographs and to be a photographer. For those of us in the northern climates, this time of year brings us a landscape covered in snow and ice. Dangling from rooftops, crystals of frozen water glisten in the sun, and the air is still. This brings a whole new feel to the composition of photographs, as well as changes the methods which we use to take the photo.

Here are some simple tips to help you take great photos in the middle of winter.

First – Keep a polarizing filter handy. Not only can it enrich colors and deepen the sky, but they also greatly reduce glare. Sunlight bounces off snow, much like it would off the surface of a still lake. This can be quite a beautiful effect, but it can be challenging to balance the brightness of the reflected light with the (usually backlit) background. This can lead to the reflected sunlight being over-exposed and the rest of your frame being under-exposed and washed-out. One way to prevent this is to use a polarizing filter on your lens, which will block out much of the glare, while retaining most of the light from other sources. A graduated neutral-density filter is another good idea. This will darken the skies in your photos, while leaving foreground objects unaffected.

Winter Sun

Second – Remember that the Sun will be much lower in the sky than normal. This means that during outdoor daytime photography, objects will cast long shadows. If this is not the effect you want, then the best photos will be taken near noon. We must remember though, that this can be the worst time to photograph in almost every other sense, as far as lighting is concerned. But, sometimes the best photos come from breaking the rules. However, long shadows can cast eery effects, providing a foreboding feeling to landscapes and portraits. So, dramatic shots may be taken in the evening during the winter months.

Third – Buy or make a shade for your viewfinder. With the Sun so low in the sky, you may have trouble seeing the scene on the LCD display. Even a simple triangle folded in three pieces and taped to the back of your camera can provide you with enough shade to easily frame your photograph most of the time.

Winter

Fourth – If possible, try shooting with a water-resistant or even an underwater camera if possible. Winter can bring unexpected precipitation, as well as accidental falls and slips, resulting in your camera landing in a snowbank. I have a waterproof camera that I use for winter photography, and bringing it along has proven itself to be a wise choice on more than one occasion.

Fifth – Use this opportunity to frame subjects in shadow. The long, pale casts provide high-contrast situations, which lend a feeling of foreboding and can emote feelings from indecision to evil. This effect was used widely in silent films to provoke fear in the audience without the use of dialog. It still works in photography today.

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Lightroom – What is the Difference Between a Plugin and a Preset?

James Maynard - January 13, 2013 | Lightroom, Lightroom Plugin, Lightroom Presets, Photographers, Technique, Workflow

Lightroom offers a variety of options for photo enthusiasts, but many people are unsure about the differences between plugins and presets. Although it can be easy for people who just starting using Lightroom to confuse the two terms, plugins and presets are two very different things.

Plugins are small programs, or applications (“Lightroom Apps” would be a more modern name), that allow you to do something concrete to your images. Examples of this might be exporting photos to various programs or cloud storage. Plugins are largely designed for use within the library module of Lightoom.

Here are places you can find Lightroom Plugins

One example of a plugin for Lightroom allows a photographer to easily modify and save the metadata attached to the photo. Metadata is not seen by humans, but is picked up by search engines in order to index results. This allows a person to quickly “tag” their photos so that they can easily be found online – a handy addition for anyone selling photos online.

Another type of Lightroom plugins are apps that allow you to sort photos by any number of different criteria. Still others allow Lightroom the ability to publish to Facebook or any number of other social media outlets.

Lightroom Presets, on the other hand, are imported settings to create different effects on your photographs. One popular example of an effect which can be achieved this way are instagrams, which produce a look similar to old SX-70 photographs, with highly-contrasting colors and a lot of saturation. If you want any sort of strange effect in an image and don’t want to do it yourself, you can download the preset for your favorite effect and use it on your images. Presets, therefore, mainly work within the develop module within the program.

Here are some places to find free Lightroom Presets.

Lightroom is a very powerful, highly-useful photo editing program that allows you to do quite a lot with your images. Using a combination of plugins and presets can serve to make Lightroom an even more powerful program.

Let’s say you go on vacation to Greece and arrive home with hundreds of photographs, some of which you want to sell on your blog. Well, first, import the pictures into Lightroom so see which of them you want to edit. You can use various presets to get effects that you want out of images (pictures of ancient Greek buildings done in a mosaic setting, for instance). Other popular presets might include the ability to make your photos look like a daguerreotype picture, or give it the Technicolor feel of a 1960′s sitcom.

Then, within Lightroom, you can edit the photos manually using the tools provided within that program. You can then publish personal pictures to Facebook or other online accounts through the use of plugins. Using a plugin like Metadata Wrangler will allow you to “prime” your photos for search engines before loading them onto your website or e-commerce site for sale.

Remember that you are also going to want to make sure that your photos are safe, so store them on the cloud using a service like Mosaic Archive. You’ll also want to share them with your friends on a number of platforms, something Mosaic View can make happen for you.

If you use Lightroom, you know what a great editing program is already provided to you with the standard software. There is not one plugin which will do everything that you might need, and there is not one preset that will provide an effect that would be great for every photo. But, using a combination of the right plugins and presets, you can customize Lightroom to match your personal tastes, preferences and needs. So, try a few different plugins and presets, and let us know about your experiences.


How to Photograph Comets, PanSTARRS and ISON with a Digital Camera

James Maynard - January 07, 2013 | Nature Photography, Photographers, Photography Equipment, Photography Gear, Photography Tips, Technique, Tips

Comets PanSTARRS and ISON are racing toward Earth and will potentially provide stunning shows for the inhabitants of the planet in spring and late autumn this year. Although the paths and behavior of comets is difficult to predict, comet PANSTARRS, coming in the spring, is currently forecast to be about four times brighter than 1997′s Hale/Bopp comet. And in November and December, Comet ISON should treat observers to a comet over 2000x brighter than 1997′s celestial treat.

Although slim, there exists the possibility that ISON could put on the most spectacular cometary show since 1965, if not become the greatest comet since 1680. As photography aficionados, many of us will want nothing more than to record what could be a once-in a century, if not once-in-a civilization type of event. But, there are many questions about how to photograph comets PanSTARRS and ISON, especially with digital cameras. After all, digital camera technology for consumer use was in its infancy at the time. In this article, we will concentrate on how to take digital photographs of these comets.

Image of comet ISON as seen on September 22, 2012 through a 0.25-m reflector by the Team of observers of Remanzacco Observatory.

As far as equipment goes, you will be well-served to have a DSLR camera, which allow you to change lenses. What focal length of lens to use depends entirely on the size and brightness of the comet at the time you go out, as well as what sort of picture(s) you are looking to achieve. Most people will be tempted to use a telephoto lens, or a lens with a long fixed focal length. These can be just the tool you are looking for if the comet is small and bright, or to photograph the bright head (coma) of the comet. However, if want to photograph the entire comet, particularly with a landscape as a backdrop, you will be better-off using a lens with a very short focal length.

Before the comets get here, try practicing with your camera, taking photographs of various objects in the night sky. Some of the brightest stars will be about as bright as PanSTARRS should become at its brightest, so take lots of photographs of the brightest stars you can see to get used to what your camera will do under these conditions. Since you will (hopefully!) be getting to a dark area in order to take your photographs of the comets of 2013, take your test photos under those same dark skies.

Comet ISON could be about as bright as a quarter-Moon on November 29th, so your natural test subject here will be a quarter Moon! Comet ISON will also be visible low on the western horizon just after sunset. So, go out just as the quarter Moon is rising, early in the evening or after midnight, and photograph our celestial neighbor while it is low in the sky.

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About:

Mosaic was founded by prosumer photographers Andy and Gerard in 2010 because they were frustrated with the existing options for managing their photos. Andy and Gerard are on a mission to make digital asset management easier for photographers, while enabling the anywhere access that we have come to expect. Mosaic is located in the beautiful state of New Hampshire where Andy and Gerard met over 20 years ago.

Blog:

Before and After Review In Lightroom With One Click! James Maynard – May 21, 2013

Working On A Couple Of Lightroom Images From The Road James Maynard – May 16, 2013

How to Zoom in Adobe Lightroom James Maynard – May 15, 2013

.RAW – The Format That Isn’t A Format James Maynard – May 14, 2013

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