Tips and tricks on photography

Vadim Chiline

As mentionned above, if you can, bracket your shots when unsure, so that you can have some underexposed ones, this way, you won't blow the highlights (meaning you lose detail in the brighter parts of images). You easily do this by increase the shutter speed of your camera (hense, exposing the film/digital sensor for less time, and therefore making it darker).

This post made me wanna create a quick little article on 2 basic principle of photography. You can view it here:
http://www.vadimchiline.com/articles/basics.htm

I might update it if you guys like it lots.

I wrote this one on bird photography last year should any of you be interested: http://www.vadimchiline.com/articles/birdtips.cfm

Vadim

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Rob_The_Pom

The most useful thing I've ever learnt about taking pictures is the rule of thirds.
You don't put the main feature of your picture in the middle of the frame, make it intersect a 1/3 line. This isn't always true but is a very useful rule to know.
If we look at these pictures.....

http://www.indiamike.com/photopost/s...cat/500/page/1
http://www.indiamike.com/photopost/s...cat/500/page/7
http://www.indiamike.com/photopost/s...cat/500/page/8

They are at least reasonably effective because the main features are not in the centre.
Also, when photographing snow-capped peaks you should always bracket your shots, as the snow can play tricks on your light meter.

RTP

PS Vadim posted while I was writing this! D'oh!

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Theon

My trick: take as many photos as possible - a few of them are bound to look good! (Using this trick can get expensive if you don't have a digital camera...).

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Vadim Chiline

Theon, it's kinda funny hearing that, but really, that's what many photographers do. They just try to apply some basic rules to how they frame something. When doing wildlife photography, you just shoot until you run out of card space. If you have a good photo op, you can't afford missing it. Same for sports and some journalistic events.

I mean on big event days, I will take around 500+ photos of it.. if not near a 1000. Sick I'd say, but you never know.

Vadim

DoDi

Here's the instant fix I use, although setting exposure etc. would probably be much better. But sometimes you just don't have time to mess around, so...

The quick trick I use when taking a photo in auto mode in bright sunlight is to use the flash. This seems to 'push' away the bright light with, well... a bright light. Somehow it all seems to balance things out. The best results I get is to use flash in bright sun and make sure it's turned off in low light situations.

Hyderabadi

Wow! Where was I when this thread started!

DoDi:
You mean fill-in flash DoDi, a great tip.

If some one can also explain silhouette and negative space..
I'm at my work computer, will have to go search on my home PC if I have any examples.

Thanks Vadim for the expanded explanation of the 'Rule of Thirds'. Never seen it done in such detailed but yet simple way.

Another rule (?) for candid/random photography I like is "f8 and be there." Works in day light. Can't recollect where I read or heard that.

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Merchant

Negative space with partial silhouette (flying kites in Georgetown, Guyana):

abracax

Fill flash is usually only effective for close up objects, like people in portraits. The example attached shows the effect of using flash to highlight subjects in the foreground photographed against a brightly lit background, using a wide aperature to keep everything in focus.

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Vadim Chiline

I've updated my little Photo tips page with Silhouette and negative space

It's found on Page 2 of:
http://www.vadimchiline.com/articles/basics.htm

Vadim

DoDi

Vadim, thank you very much! What a great page... you have just enlightened me regarding two false ideas I have been operating under, and you have helped improve whatever future photos I take.... false idea #1 was that I should always crop away the negative space and #2 false idea was that I tried to place objects in the center of those nine boxes. I never knew that it was on the lines, not in the squares. And the tip about looking for geometric shape is fantastic!

vikasrawat

Another practical observation that I have made is that to make your pictures look lively, as far as possible avoid clicking pictures when the sun is right over the head, i.e. between 11 AM and 2 PM.

The reason behind this is when the sun is right on the top the shadows are really short. The picture really becomes lifeless without the natural shadows of objects such as buildings, trees and plants and whatever else is there in the surrounding.

Pictures become much livelier and depict the life when natural shadows of objects are there in them. Try it!

My experience with outdoor photography in India is the best time to click outdoor shots is between 8 am to 11 am in the morning and 3 pm onwards but an hour before sun set.

pkalra

dont forget to use tripod for nightshots and with longer sutterspeeds
focus on eye for portraits

beach

Thanks a lot for all. Fantastic suggestions and ideas to put in practice.



What would have made this a bit more better ?
(This is a bicycle mount chai shop )


Another thing is about the size of the image. When I download it, the size of each photos is about 1.2 MB or so (in JPG). Then If I just save it as another file name without even doing anything (resize, touching etc ) the size shrinks to an unbelievably small size.

What is happening? Am I losing some ‘quality’ content of the image in this process? Otherwise whys is that it’s stored in such large file sizes in memory sticks (where size of the file really matters)

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lin

If i'm shooting say in the overbright sunlight (in auto mode), the picture comes as 'fade' or someone called it 'burnt'!!

Excellent tread. I had the same problem, Beach had and I use a CANON S45. I noticed that alot of my pictures, espciall the sky are over exposed. After getting back home, I researched more on this subject. All tips given here are valid. But no one has mentioned the use of filters yet. From what I read this is sometimes just as important as setting the correct aperture, shutter speed.... I think the most relavant filter to have is a polarizer which can help to darken the sky and make colors more saturated.

To 'rescue' my shots, I played around with Photoshop and added digital filters, but from my limited experience, allthough they help to make the color nicer but too much would hurt image sharpness. My conclusion is that softwares like PS could make a good shot perfect, but never a poor shot great. The most important thing is to have a good shot to start with.

Back to filters, for those using simple point and shot cameras, it is possible to buy filter adptors which would allow you to put on filters. The filter adptors costs around 50$ and it is also possible to get filters for that price too. But once you get this far, you will have to weigh on if it is worth to invest these added equipment for your existing camera or investing on a totally new camera instead.

So, one year later, I am still using my old CANON s45, but just more smarter on things to avoid to get a good shot.

Hyderabadi

My take on your picture beach, hope you don't mind, a bit of color correction and adjusting brightness/contrast in Photoshop Elements.

Most digital cameras record in .jpg format, but what do you mean when you say the size reduces when you rename the file? What are you changing, the file name and format? Are you opening the picture with any particular program to make the change?