Archive for the ‘Photography’ Category
I made $3
December 17th, 2007
MatthewI know it seems like a small amount to make for a photograph but I have not been into photography since I took a few classes in college. I uploaded a picture I took in Maui a few days ago and somebody purchased a download of it. I need to upload a few more pictures that are great but have not had time. Take a look at the picture by going to http://us.fotolia.com/id/5325307
Basics to Photography
September 18th, 2007
MatthewWhether you take photos to create marketing materials, to track inventory or to post on your Web site, following the basic principles of photography and commanding a basic understanding of the capabilities and limitations of the camera will improve the quality of your photos.
Learn How Your Camera Works
Most compact digitals are usually easy to figure out, with the occasional exception. Their owner’s manuals can be informative, and sometimes include useful tips. The better ones are actually fun to read as you discover and understand the camera.
Read your camera manual and try everything in the manual with the camera. At worse you’ll wear out the batteries and have to recharge them. Digital cameras are ideal to learn how to take better photos. They waste no film, and you can see the results immediately. Learning how to use a digital camera is half the fun of owning one.
The practical application of the knowledge gained from reading the manual is critical. Here are some items to watch out for when experimenting and learning how to use your camera.
Resolution and Compression
A digital camera yields its best images at the highest resolution and least compression. This does not mean that every photo has to be shot in an uncompressed format, but only that an uncompressed format — or one that applies the lowest compression — will produce the highest quality images.
In use however, the uncompressed formats take too long to store each image for an everyday use, since without compression an image at high resolution can have a very large file size. This is why all cameras offer a JPEG format with a minimum compression. Images take less time to store, and in most cases the resulting image is nearly indistinguishable from the uncompressed one.
Regrettably, most cameras are supplied with memory cards that lack the capacity to store more than just a handful of low-compression JPEG photos. To ensure the best image quality is available, purchasing a larger-capacity card should be a top priority.
Basic Functions: Flash Modes and the Effectiveness of the Flash
The vast majority of digital cameras use an "Auto" setting for their built-in flash. If the camera’s meter determines that the ambient light is insufficient for a clear, sharp image, the camera fires the flash. Yet that may not always be the best thing. Here are a few examples where knowing the flash range — the maximum distance the flash’s light will reach and effectively illuminate a subject — will help you decide whether to use the flash:
In a very large room: Without a subject placed within the range of the flash, steady the camera and turn off the flash. However, if the subject is closer than 10-to 3 feet from the camera, then the flash will probably be effective. Another option is to use the Slow-Synch flash mode if the camera has it, and steady the camera. The Slow-Synch mode will capture the foreground with the flash, and the background by allowing a longer exposure time.
Outdoors:Here again, unless the subject is well within the range of the flash, turn it off. The use of the flash forces the camera to use a specific shutter speed (1/30 or 1/60 generally) and that speed is unlikely to be suitable for the scene.
Fireworks: The built-in flash of a camera is hardly likely to help capture a fireworks display. Letting the camera flash will prevent it from using a low shutter speed.
Portraits: Good portraits are very difficult to obtain reliably when using a flash built directly into a camera. Even with systems such as red-eye reduction, the light from the flash is usually too directional and unflattering. Instead, try using daylight, or ambient incandescent lighting. Adjust the camera’s white balance to the dominant light source, and steady the camera before taking the shot. Alternatively, use the fill-in mode to light your subject while retaining a feel for the background.
Photos taken from inside a car or through a window: Unless the window is open, the flash will reflect back at the camera. Turning it off is better.
Program Modes
Whether the camera provides a straightforward Program mode or other modes such as Aperture and Shutter priority modes, learn to use them and apply them appropriately.
A standard Program mode usually provides better control over the camera than does an Auto mode. Many cameras allow the use of exposure compensation and white balance settings in the Program mode, but preclude their use when the camera is in Auto mode.
Aperture priority: This allows control over the depth of field — the zone of relative sharpness that the camera captures at a given aperture. You’ll find that the wider the aperture (small f-numbers such as f1.8, f2.8), the shallower the depth of field and that the smaller the aperture (high f-numbers such as f8, f11), the longer the depth of field. Use aperture priority to blur a distracting background, or to ensure that a scene is sharp from foreground to background.
Shutter priority: This function provides control over the speed at which the shutter operates. Fast action requires high shutter speeds to freeze the movement.
Special Controls
Most cameras provide additional controls and functions. Most important among these are:
Exposure compensation: This serves to correct, or bias the camera’s metering. It sounds complicated, but it really isn’t. The camera’s metering system isn’t infallible, and the manufacturer know this, which is why they provide a means by which the exposure decided by the camera can be adjusted in specific situations. For example, extremely white and reflective subjects can cause the camera to underexpose. Therefore, a positive compensation can help correct the error.
White balance: This is designed to provide a fine control over the way the camera "perceives" white and therefore determines all other colors. Although most cameras are ideally suited to daylight, some types of light throw the white balance off and in turn shift the other colors in the image. One of the best examples of this is fluorescent lighting, often found in many business environments. Adjusting the white balance for an unusual light source is generally preferable to simply leaving the camera to its default "Auto" setting.
Metering: In the vast majority of situations, the standard default metering of the camera will work just fine. However, once in a while, it will not be suitable for the subject. Many cameras provide at least one other metering system while some provide more. A Spot meter function bases the exposure (aperture and shutter speed) on a tiny area of the frame.
With a few camera models, the spot meter can be set to follow the focus point, a handy feature. Center-weighted metering takes into account two zones in the frame, a circular zone in the middle — larger than what the spot meter uses — and the rest of the frame. Usually, the two readings are combined in such a way that the central point receives greater importance than the periphery.
Optical zoom and digital zoom: If your camera provides a digital zoom only or both an optical one and a digital zoom, study their differences. The optical zoom does not change the image size or the resolution. The number of pixels used to describe the image remains constant. Therein lies the difference with the digital zoom.
A digital zoom works by capturing only the central portion of the entire image received by the camera’s sensor. It uses a software algorithm – or interpolation — to increase the size of the image. The interpolation of the original image data can cause the photo to become quite blurred, as the algorithm "invented" pixels to increase the image size.
Backgrounds in Photos
July 31st, 2007
MatthewEver wonder why products in catalogs are always shown without backgrounds? Even majority of clothing models are typically shown on plain white.
Without distracting elements hovering behind the product, a customer is free to see the product itself. Your customers’ eyes will instantly be drawn straight to the product — exactly where you want it to go. The product looks cleaner, especially without the distracting noise of the background. Also, depending on the product, a subtle drop shadow may add more depth to a product picture.
If you take the additional time to set up a product shot, it really pays off in the end. Not only will it need less work done in photoshop, but it will give your website a complete and professional look.
Shoot High Resolution
July 29th, 2007
MatthewOne of the most important reasons for packing a massive memory card is to enable you to shoot at your camera’s highest resolution. If you paid a premium price for a 6 megapixel digicam, then get your money’s worth and shoot at 6 megapixels. And while you’re at it, shoot at your camera’s highest quality compression setting too. Why not squeeze more images on your memory card by shooting a lower resolution and low quality compression settings? Because you never know when you’re going to capture the next great image of the 21st century. And if you take a beautiful picture at the low 640 x 480 resolution, that means you can only make a print about the size of a credit card, not exactly the right dimensions for hanging in the museum. On the other hand, if you recorded the image at 2272 x 1704 (4 megapixels) or larger, then you can make a lovely 8- x 10-inch photo-quality print suitable for framing or even for gracing the cover of Time magazine. And just in case you were able to get as close to the action as you had liked, having those extra pixels enables you to crop your image and still have enough resolution to make a decent sized print. The point is, if you have enough memory (and you know you should), then there’s no reason to shoot at lower resolution and risk missing the opportunity to show off your work in a big way.
Use of light
July 27th, 2007
MatthewThe use of light in a photograph can be the deciding factor of whether that picture will be spectacular or terrible. When you use your camera to automatically chose aperture and shutter speed, what your camera is actually doing is using the built in light meter and measuring how much light is being reflected to the camera.
But that doesn’t mean that’s all there is to it. You should also think about the angle of the light entering the frame, what kind of shadows you want, and whether you want to use fill-in-flash (using flash to light the subject if you have a really bright background). If you are shooting at night you can create all sorts of cool effects like lights in motion, pictures with moonlight, or silhouettes like the one shown here. The following are just some examples of all the possibilities.
The angle of light should be taken into careful consideration whenever you feel like you want to create a specific effect. Shadows can be very powerful when cast over half of someone’s face. In this photo on the left the light is striking the statue’s face from the rear right of the camera and this adds more depth to the picture. It also adds more coloring because if front-lighting was used his face would likely be over exposed, and if back-lighting was used his face would just be black like a silhouette.
The effect of rays of light indoors and outdoors. can be very spectacular. A brilliant part of some great photographs is the ability to see actual rays of light. Whether it be in the setting of a brilliant sunset, light pouring through a window or from artificial lights it can look very impressive. Usually the only way to obtain something like this is a narrow aperture (high f/stop) and a very slow shutter speed.
Silhouettes are another interesting example of using light. The way to create a silhouette is to have significantly brighter light coming from behind the subject. In doing this it is important to take your camera light reading off of the background instead of the subject in order for the camera to adjust for an exposure based on the backlight. If you do this the subject will be successfully underexposed like in the picture at the top of this page.
If you keep experimenting with different ways of using light you will find that you can get very interesting results. The longer the exposure, the more fascinating the results with light most of the time. In the picture on the right, this is a long single exposure and yes that is the same person in two places. If your wondering how this was possible, here’s how.
The shutter speed was set for around 30 seconds, the camera was set on a tripod and someone stood next to the camera with a flashlight. The subject then stood in one place while the flashlight was pointed at him and moved in an up and down motion. After around 15 seconds the flashlight was turned off and the subject was told to move to his left. Then the flashlight was pointed at him again and moved up and down until the camera finished the exposure.
Online Image Editors
July 21st, 2007
MatthewImage Editors Compared
A common request my web team receives is to do some sort of simple image editing for a clients website. I also sometimes hear that someone is getting Photoshop installed so that they can edit images and add them to their web site themselves.
This is crazy when you consider how much Photoshop costs and the learning curve to use it properly.
In this new era of web-based applications I thought it would be worthwhile to see if there were any online image editing tools that would meet these requirements and maybe more.
The Options
I looked at the following online image editors:
Online Photo Tool
Fauxto
Picnik
Snipshot
Cellsea
PXN8
Phixr
VicImager
Picture2Life
NetImager
ImageAuthor
nexImage
LookWow
My Opinion
Overall, I was very impressed with what’s available when it comes to editing images online. By and large the tools were easy to use and had an impressive array of features.
The majority of the tools had solid basic image editing functionality — crop, resize, adjust color, brightness and so on. Some had unlimited levels of undo and redo, which was especially handy.
Some of the features available were up there with full-blown graphics tools. For example, Cellsea included the unsharp mask function for accurately adjusting sharpness.
Two of the image editors (NetImager and nexImage) allowed you to use layers to apply your changes and effects in a non-destructive way, which was a nice feature.
The tools were integrated to varying degress with online image storage services like Flickr and Photobucket. Some also enabled you to view all the images from a web page and then choose which one you wanted to edit, although apart from Cellsea, this was done via a bookmarklet.
The tools had varying capabilities when it came to uploading and saving images from/to different formats. However, between them all you could probably upload and save an image in most of the main file formats (e.g., JPG, GIF, PNG, BMP, TIFF, PDF, EPS).