One of the issues that always comes up for emerging photographers is dealing with contracts and negotiation. Let’s face it – most of us are more “artist” than “businessman”. we just want to make pictures and leave the legalese to someone else.
Of course the reality is that to be a successful *artist* you must be a successful *businessman* as well.
Go to any photography forum on the web and you will invariably find questions such as “how do I make a contract/terms for such and such a job?” or “the client sent me this crazy contract to sign, what do I do?”
In this piece, Bill Cramer of Wonderful Machine, Inc shows an actual contract negotiation he had with an editorial client, including exchanges, contracts and revisions. This is a fantastic read for any photographer and a perfect example of how to do it right. In particular, notice how he responds to the disagreement in contract terms – guiding the exchange to a mutually satisfactory agreement, rather than stonewalling and confronting.
The post Tripod Buying Guide – 6 Vital Features to Look For appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Suzi Pratt.
A tripod is one of the first accessories people like to buy when they get a new camera. But there are hundreds of thousands of tripods out there, all with different features and price points. How do you go about choosing the best tripod for you? This tripod buying guide will highlight 6 features to consider before purchasing a new tripod.
Canon 5D Mark III with Canon 100mm f/2.8 – 1/160 sec, f/7.1, ISO 400
Why use a tripod?
There are a couple of reasons why you might need a tripod in the first place.
First, you should use a tripod if you plan to shoot slow shutter speeds or high f-stops (apertures). Conditions like this are typically real estate, interior, architectural, and landscape photography, where you need your scene to be as sharp as possible, often in low light conditions.
You should also use a tripod when shooting bracketed photos for compositing or HDR in post-production, or when taking selfies or group photos that you want to be a part of.
There are certainly more reasons to consider using a tripod, but hopefully, these give you good examples to start thinking about.
Fujifilm X-T3 with Carl Zeiss Touit 12mm f2.8 WITHOUT Tripod – 1/75 sec, f/2.8, ISO 2500Fujifilm X-T3 with Zeiss 12mm WITH Tripod – 0.8 sec, f/9, ISO 400
1. Payload (or load capacity)
The very first feature to consider when researching tripods is its payload or maximum load capacity. In other words, how much weight is it able to support? The payload is typically found in the product description of each tripod. To come up with this number, consider the heaviest and largest camera setup that you plan to use on the tripod. Camera and lens weights can easily be found via a Google search or examining their respective product descriptions.
For example, my Sony A7rIII camera body alone weighs 23.2 oz (657 grams). My heaviest lens, the Sony 70-200mm f/2.8 weighs 52.16 oz (1480 grams). So together, my heaviest camera setup would be 75.36 ounces (2137 grams). That means I should find a tripod with a payload of at least that amount.
It is also important to look at the payload of the tripod head or the piece that attaches your camera to the tripod legs. Some tripods come with a head included, or you can replace it with a head that you buy separately. Many tripod heads have their own payloads specified, so be sure to consider that number as well.
MeFoto Roadtrip travel tripod. Canon 5D Mark III with Canon 100mm f/2.8 – 1/160 sec, f/7.1, ISO 400
2. Tripod minimum and maximum height
All tripods have a minimum and maximum height expressed in their product descriptions. Some tripods can get ultra-tall, others can get ultra-low to the ground. Think about what kind of subjects you will be photographing, and the optimal height you would want your tripod to be.
If you are tall or plan to shoot tall subjects, aim to get the tallest tripod you can find. However, if you shoot subjects that are lower to the ground, you may want to consider tripods with a low minimum height. There are even new tripods like the upcoming Peak Design Travel Tripod designed to get extremely low, down to 5.5 inches.
Manfrotto 055 tripod. Canon 5D Mark III with Canon 100mm f/2.8 – 1/160 sec, f/7.1, ISO 400
3. How stable is the tripod?
The next quality to consider is how stable the tripod is. First, consider the payload or weight capacity mentioned above – this will give you a good idea of whether the tripod can support your camera and lens combination. But there are other features that can enhance tripod stability.
Some tripods come with retractable or removable spikes in the tripod feet. These provide extra stability by sticking into the dirt or soft ground if you happen to be shooting outside.
Tripods can also come with a retractable hook in the center column of the tripod, allowing you to hang weight to stabilize the tripod. Attaching a heavy sandbag to the hook is often the optimal option, but you can also get creative by using other items like a heavy water bottle or even your camera bag.
MeFoto Roadtrip Travel Tripod. Canon 5D Mark III with Canon 100mm f/2.8 – 1/160 sec, f/7.1, ISO 400Legs of the Manfrotto 055 tripod. Canon 5D Mark III with Canon 100mm f/2.8 – 1/160 sec, f/7.1, ISO 400
4. How easy is it to carry the tripod?
If you plan to travel a lot with your tripod, or use it on the go, it’s important to consider the overall weight and folded length of the tripod. If you opt for a heavy, large tripod, you might get optimal stability, but you will likely struggle to carry that tripod around.
Consider the material the tripod is made from. Most tripods are made of aluminum (cheaper, but heavier) or carbon fiber (lightweight, but more expensive). Many tripod models are available in either construction material, so think about your budget and how important the weight saving is to you.
Also, look at the overall ease of folding the tripod up. Most tripod legs are three sections meaning they get taller with each section you open, but some can be two sections or even five sections. The more leg sections you have to deploy equates to a longer time to set up and put away. Along the lines of tripod legs, look at the mechanism they use to deploy. Most tripods use a twist-lock mechanism, which can get confusing about which direction locks or unlocks the legs. Meanwhile, other tripods have a simple clip lock that is much easier to unlock and lock.
5. Tripod head quality?
Some tripods come with a tripod head, and others require that you buy it separately. In some cases, you may even want to buy your own tripod head if you have a preference in the best type to use.
A ball head is the most common type of tripod head, allowing for 360-degree rotation to position the camera where you want it. However, many ball heads, especially cheap or low-quality ones, will slip over time and be less stable. Thus, it may be worth buying a high-end ball head or looking at another type of head to use on your tripod.
Examples include the Manfrotto 3-Way (my favorite), or a pistol grip tripod head. Pretty much every large tripod allows you to replace the tripod head with one of your choosing.
Standard Arca Swiss type tripod ball head. Canon 5D Mark III with Canon 100mm f/2.8 – 1/160 sec, f/7.1, ISO 400
The final piece of the tripod head to consider is the tripod plate or the piece that mounts directly to your camera. Arca-Swiss type plates are among the most common and universal, but they often come with the need to use an Allen wrench to tighten the plate to your camera.
On the other hand, there are other tripod plates such as those made by Manfrotto or Joby that includes a twist screw that you can easily secure without the need for an extra tool.
6. Extra features?
The last things to consider are any extra features or bells and whistles that come with the tripod. Here are a few examples to look out for:
Tripod to monopod conversion
Some tripods such as those made by MeFoto, allow you to easily convert the tripod into a monopod by simply removing one leg and attaching it to the center column. This is a handy feature if you anticipate needing a monopod.
Tripods with a column that can be positioned at 90 degrees
If you have the need to shoot with a 90-degree column, look for a tripod that offers this feature. My Manfrotto 055 has this feature and it comes in very handy for product or flat lay photography.
Built-in bubble leveler
While many cameras have a built-in leveler, it always helps to have a physical bubble leveler to make sure your camera is straight. Some tripods have bubble levelers built-into the tripod head or the center column of the tripod.
Carrying case
Some tripods come with a carrying case to aid in transportation, and others require the carrying case to be purchased separately.
Manfrotto 3-Way tripod head. Canon 5D Mark III with Canon 100mm f/2.8 – 1/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 2000
In conclusion
There are a plethora of tripods out there and it is not an easy task to find the right one for you. Ultimately, this tripod buying guide is intended to help you think of all of the situations in which you plan to use a tripod and encourage you to carefully research all six features above. And while there are plenty of cheap tripods out there, consider investing in a high-quality tripod to begin with. Your camera equipment is expensive, and you don’t want to risk dropping or damaging it due to placing it on a cheap tripod.
Video
The post Tripod Buying Guide – 6 Vital Features to Look For appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Suzi Pratt.
If you’re going to try, go all the way. Otherwise don’t even start.
This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives, jobs, and maybe your mind.
It could mean not eating for three or four days.
It could mean freezing on a park bench.
It could mean jail. It could mean derision.
It could mean mockery, isolation.
Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance.
Of how much you really want to do it.
And you’ll do it, despite rejection in the worst odds.
And it will be better than anything else you can imagine.
If you’re going to try, go all the way.
There is no other feeling like that.
You will be alone with the gods. And the nights will flame with fire.
When I was looking at reviews of the Elinchrom Ranger Quadra, one of the most common complaints people seemed to have was the fact that they couldn’t mount standard umbrellas on it (Elinchrom uses a 7mm umbrella shaft, while most others in the US use an 8mm shaft).
Now this seemed kind of silly to me – first off, the Quadra head is extremely small and lightweight – hanging anything larger than a *tiny* umbrella off it just seems like a recipe for disaster. Secondly I thought to myself “I mount umbrellas on speedlights all the time and they have no umbrella holder whatsoever – why is the quadra any different?” The solution:
The plain ol’ vanilla Umbrella Swivel. Beloved of “Strobists” everywhere, it provides a secure slot/mount for the umbrella, placing the weight & torque on itself rather than the strobe head. Screw in a post on top, plop the Quadra head on that and good to go. You can even still use the angle of the quadra head itself to hit the sweet spot of the umbrella.
Personally this is just fine for me. works great for my umbrellas, Apollo softboxes and Softliters…but let’s say you need the light more “on axis” with the umbrella shaft (maybe to fit the hole in one of the new PLM diffusion screens for instance…) I found the easiest thing is to simply take a second swivel, and use it to “hang” the head off the umbrella shaft itself. The head is light enough that it doesn’t put undue strain on the shaft (or the swivel).
Kinda kludgy but it works. Personally I don’t bother – mounting it on the swivel itself is quick, easy and gets the job done with hardware that I’m already carrying anyway for my speedlights.
So there you have it: Mounting umbrellas on the Quadra made easy!
Digital cameras have been a great boon to photographers working with off-camera lights. The ability to review an image instantly on an LCD (with histogram!) has obviated the need for tedious polaroiding and exhaustive metering of every inch of a scene to ensure correct light ratios and eliminate unwanted shadows. So much so, in fact, that many photographers have begun to eschew the use of a flash meter entirely – relying on the LCD and histogram via trial and error to set their lights correctly. Now while quick and easy, this method has it’s drawbacks, particularly for young photographers. The question that frequently arises is:
“well, I’m essentially just guessing what power to set my flash on then chimping the exposure and adjusting accordingly but how do I know *where* to start with my flash”
Essentially this comes down to a combination of making an educated guess about the exposure and *knowing how much light your flash will put out*.
The beauty of light is that it is predictable. Whether from the sun, a lightbulb, or a flash, given the same source and conditions, you will always get the same light. We can use this to our advantage!
When working with flash, we have fundamentally 2 variable that we control to determine how much light falls on our subject – power and distance. Power meaning how much actual light our flash is outputting and distance meaning how far away it is from the subject (remember that light falls off predictably according the inverse square law). Since we know that light always behaves the same, we can be certain that at a given power and a given distance from our subject our flash will give the same result every time.
Now also remember that light from a flash behaves linearly – going from 1/4 power to 1/2 power is doubling the amount of light that it puts out and vica versa. Thus if our flash exposes properly at f/8 at 1/8 power, it will give us f/11 at 1/4 power, f/5.6 at 1/16 and so forth (given the same distance to the subject).
Armed with this knowledge, we can quickly and easily estimate a “starting point” for exposure in almost any situation. We do this by establishing a “reference point” at which we *know* the exposure of our flash, and can calculate from there. I like to call this “baselining” the flash. To do this:
start with the flash on a medium power, which gives room to adjust up or down. 1/8 power is a good starting place
now we need to ensure that we can replicate a consistent flash->subject distance. You could carry around a tape measure but a fantastic trick I learned from the inimitable Don Giannatti is to measure using your outstretched arms. Given that the average (male) photographer is probably between 5’5″ and 6’something, your outstretched armspan or “wingspan” is somewhere around 6′, which is a comfortable working distance for lights. This also has the advantage of being quickly and easily reproducable “on set” – you simply stretch our your arms from subject and place the light at the end.
Meter your light at your set power, at “wingspan” – if you don’t have a flash meter, you can approximate by photographing an 18% greycard till the histogram spikes dead center and recording the appropriate aperture.
adjust your light till you get a “comfortable” baseline. Let’s assume that at “wingspan” we find our flash gives us f/8 at 1/8 power. This is our baseline – we write it down (or just remember it).
Now lets put this info to use!
Let’s say we’re in the studio. We want to do a shot with a key and fill light in a 2:1 ratio. We want to shoot at f/11 to give good depth of field for our subject. What do we do? We place our lights in the desired position, both at “wingspan”. We know that each of them gives f/8 at 1/8 power at that distance. f/11 is one stop up from f/8, so we set our main light to 1/4 power (one stop more power). Our main light is now already double the light of our second, so we have our ratio right there – the second light stays at 1/8. We shoot at f/11, and our main light should be spot on with the second 1 stop under. now if we want to “blow out the background” we simply add another light on the background at 1/2 power, giving us an exposure of f/16 – one stop over main. Of course this is not as “exact” as using a meter, but this gives us our starting place and we can adjust the lights from there based on the histogram.
It’s that easy!
This technique becomes particularly powerful when balancing ambient and flash outside. Combined with the sunny/16 rule, we can use our baseline to roughly estimate the combined exposure of flash and ambient without chimping a single frame!
consider the common situation: We are shooting outside and want to drop the ambient by 1 stop. We see that it is mildly overcast – the sunny/16 rule says that our exposure should be approximately f/11@1/100 sec. Again, we know our flash give f/8 at 1/8 power, so we set it at arms length from our subject. In order to drop our ambient by a stop we increase our shutter speed to 1/200 (still at f/11) and adjust our flash up one stop to 1/4 power to give us f/11. Done and Done. Chimp, and adjust as needed. If we are in situation where we can’t drop the ambient by shutter speed (already at sync limit), we can simply adjust the flash power to compensate. Assume the same situation (ambient is f/11). to keep the shutter speed the same and still drop the ambient by 1 stop, we need to shoot at f/16. Again, knowing our flash gives f/8 at 1/8 we simply bump it up 2 stops to 1/2 power (f/8->f/11->f/16 = 1/8->1/4->1/2)
This may sound complicated, but once you are comfortable estimating these exposure, it becomes almost second nature. by using your baseline you will find yourself able to get exposure dead on within 1 or 2 “chimping” shots.
The post How to Edit RAW Portraits in Lightroom appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Kevin Landwer-Johan.
What’s the best way to edit RAW portraits in Lightroom? Is there one correct way to do this?
As with many aspects of photography, there is no right or wrong way. What is most important is being intentional with the edits you do make. Start with a clear idea of what you want the completed photo to look like.
You want to feel satisfied when you’re done. You’ll also want your subject to appreciate the portraits you’ve taken of them.
In this article, I’ll walk you through some Lightroom techniques to help you create well post-processed portraits from your RAW files.
Whenever you start to edit RAW portraits you must decide first the style of photo you want to end up with. RAW files from modern cameras contain a huge amount of data. This data can be manipulated extensively in Lightroom to alter the appearance of the photo.
It’s up to you how you edit. You can aim to work on the RAW file to get the photo looking as realistic as possible. Or you can alter it in such a way it’s transformed into a very different-looking image from the unedited RAW file.
Your intention will guide you to achieve the look you want. If you’re not sure how you want the finished photo to look, you can waste a lot of time messing around.
Keeping in the style of how you lit and composed the portrait is the easiest approach to take.
To edit RAW portraits created with soft light and a warm feeling, you’ll often want to retain the feeling of the photo when you make your adjustments. It would the same for a portrait lit with hard lighting with a more dramatic look.
Editing in Lightroom, you have the opportunity to alter the image to achieve the look you want. Knowing what you want is a good first step – even before you open Lightroom.
To illustrate the process I use, I will aim to produce a natural-looking edit of this portrait.
White balance for correct skin tone
Most of the time, I have my camera’s white balance set to Auto. I find this setting produces photos with correct colors most of the time.
With RAW files, it’s easy to correct the white balance when it’s a little off. I will start with the eyedropper tool and click it in a neutral area. If there’s not suitable white in the photo, I’ll pick a grey area.
In this photo, I needed to adjust the Temp slider towards the left because the eyedropper overcompensated for the slightly cool tone of the original. I have made the adjustment so her skin tone looks as natural as possible.
Crop and straighten
Next, I crop and straighten the photo. I prefer to crop my portraits early in the editing process, so I only see what I want.
This portrait needed very little cropping. There was a bright area on the left that was distracting. I have cropped this out and, in doing so, the model’s right eye is closer to the one-third guideline on the right of the image.
When I crop, I am looking to eliminate parts of the photo that don’t add to it. I also look to improve the shape of the composition.
Correct highlights and shadows
Portraits taken outdoors in the shade, as this one is, often have a limited tone range. They do not contain much difference in tone value between the brightest and darkest areas. This makes them easier to work with than portraits made in hard light.
My model’s hair is very black, but it looks dull. Moving the black slider to the left darkens her hair a little too much. I then use the Shadows adjustment slider and move it to the right. This brings back some of the detail while retaining the blacks.
When you edit RAW portraits, you must consider how the brightest areas of the photo look as well. In this picture, I am happy with the look of the highlights, so I have not made any adjustments to them.
Highlights can be challenging to adjust and keep them looking clean. If you have very overexposed highlights and attempt to adjust them with the Highlights and/or Whites sliders, take care they do not end up looking grey. It’s best only to make adjustments when there is actually detail in those areas.
Removing spots and blemishes
This young woman has beautiful skin and applies her make up very well. There’s not much post-processing required. Often this is not the case. People will often have small blemishes on their skin. Removing them will not change the feel of the portrait, but it will help your subject feel better about themselves.
When I edit RAW portraits in Lightroom, I use the Spot Removal tool and zoom into my photo to the area I want to work on. Adjust the size of the tool so it’s a little larger than the spot you want to remove. Simply click on the spot and Lightroom removes it.
Check to see the area you edit blends well. On smooth skin, Lightroom usually does a great job of this. Sometimes there will be some noticeable contrast in the area you apply the brush too. If it’s too obvious, undo that step, adjust the brush size a little, and try again.
Fine-tune with the adjustment brush
The Adjustment Brush is a powerful tool to use when you edit RAW portraits. You can use it to diminish or remove wrinkles, enhance eyes, whiten teeth and a whole lot more. Here I’ll show you how I use it in some of these ways.
Soften dark bags under eyes
As I begin to paint with the Adjustment Brush, I push the Exposure slider to the far left or right. This allows me to see clearly the area that I am painting over.
Once I have the part of the image painted that I want to work on, it looks pretty terrible, as in this example.
Now, I’ll work with the various sliders to bring up the dark parts I’ve painted over so there’s not so much contrast. Doing this, be careful not to overcompensate and make these shadows look unnaturally light.
Whitening teeth
Paint over the teeth with the adjustment brush. Be as precise as possible and not cover any of the lips or gums.
To make the teeth look clean and white, I use a combination of sliders. I start with the Exposure Slider as it will often make the teeth look good. You can also make use of the Dehaze and Temp sliders. Dehaze will lighten and soften dark areas. Moving the Temp slider to the left will reduce yellowing.
Brightening eyes
It’s important to edit RAW portraits so your subject’s eyes look right. Too much editing, or not being careful enough when you do edit eyes, can ruin a portrait.
In my example portrait, I have made minimal changes. There are so many tutorials available about editing eyes that I will not go into detail for this article.
All I have done on this portrait is to brighten the whites of her eyes using the Adjustment Brush. I have painted the whites of her eyes and boosted the exposure slightly. This was enough.
Dark-colored eyes are more challenging to manipulate than lighter colored eyes. With light eyes, you can alter the color of the iris and control the way the eyes look more than with dark eyes.
Conclusion
The possibilities when you edit RAW portraits are almost limitless. Knowing the look you want helps you keep on track and saves you time.
Duplicating a file in Lightroom allows you to make copies to experiment with. Right-click the photo and choose Create Virtual Copy. Now you’re free to experiment with a completely different look and feel for your photo.
Being intentional as you edit and not pushing any slider to it’s extreme will help you create better-looking portraits in Lightroom.
Do you have any other tips for editing RAW portraits in Lightroom that you’d like to share? Perhaps you’d like to share your resulting images with us? Please do so in the comments!
The post How to Edit RAW Portraits in Lightroom appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Kevin Landwer-Johan.
New look for edzstudios… cleaner and more minimalistic… also galleries changed to a jquery based setup rather than flash (hey gotta be iPad compatible right?) If you are reading this through rss, click on through and check out the new site design. Will be going through a few tweaks in the next few days, but pretty happy with things overall.
The post Helpful Tips for Creating Evergreen Content for your Photography Website appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Charlie Moss.
It’s always hard to know what to write on a photography blog, isn’t it? You start a blog on your photography website because you’ve been told it’s good for SEO, but then you get stuck on what content to create, and your blog gets neglected. So, I’m going to give you some ideas for creating evergreen content that you can put into practice right now to improve your website, help your readers, and start working on your SEO.
Writing blog posts is hard for many photographers because they don’t know where to start.
What is evergreen content?
In the same way that evergreen trees stay green all year round, evergreen blog posts stay relevant to readers for a long time. They should stay relevant to readers no matter the season, and, ideally, stay relevant for several years without any serious updating.
By creating evergreen content, you can create a website that pulls in visitors all year round and encourage search engines to rank you highly.
But what kind of evergreen content can photographers create? That really depends on the audience you’re looking to attract to your website! So once you’ve narrowed that down, you can start to come up with some ideas for evergreen content.
Articles to attract photographers
If you’re the kind of photographer who wants to attract other photographers to your website, then content about photography is the place to start. Just look around this site – Digital Photography Photography School is full of evergreen content that appeals to photographers all year round and for many years.
I write about photography techniques on my blog because I mostly want to attract photographers.
Every photographer knows something that they can teach others, even if they’re a beginner. So start by writing posts teaching other people what you know about taking photos.
You could also write reviews of all the photography equipment that you own. Most photographers love to spend hours researching what they’re buying and read lots of reviews before they spend their money.
By its very nature, evergreen content is often about the topics aimed at beginners to intermediates in the subject matter. It’s content that people will be searching for repeatedly, and that’s what makes beginner content a great place to start when you’re creating your first pieces of evergreen content.
And once you’ve created some engaging content that people are sharing, consider writing a second blog post on the same subject that your visitors might want to read next!
Articles to attract clients
Not everyone wants to attract photographers to their photography website. Some people want to attract more clients if they’re working as a photographer. By creating evergreen content, you can get potential clients to your website and looking at your portfolio.
Many photographers already blog about the shoots they do. It’s really common now for wedding photographers to blog about their client’s big day, or newborn photographers to blog about the cute baby they recently photographed. But those posts are not the ones most likely to get prospective new clients to your site.
Brainstorming a list of ideas for blog posts is always a good idea. Give yourself 15 minutes once a week and write down everything that comes to mind.
When writing a blog the best place to start is almost always with a problem that someone has. So if you are a wedding photographer, think about what your clients might be looking for. They could be asking questions like:
What are the best clothes to wear for an engagement session and how do you pick a color scheme?
What do weddings at (your local venue) look like?
Are veils coming back in fashion for brides, and what unique photo opportunities do they present?
You can answer all of those questions in blogs on your website while filling them with pictures you’ve taken. And the best thing about these kinds of posts is they’ll be shared by more than just your clients, meaning that your images get in front of many new people.
Moreover, you can apply this to all kinds of photography. You can even go beyond photography, which I’ve seen work particularly well in the newborn and maternity niches.
If you photograph newborns and have children yourself, you might use your blog as a way to talk about your own experiences of being a parent, with helpful advice for your readers. And if you’re creating evergreen content that’s useful, you can bet it’ll end up being shared around social media.
What advantages does this bring?
Beyond the pure sharing of posts and getting them in front of new potential clients, evergreen content can bring benefits for the SEO of your website (that’s search engine optimization).
Google, and other search engines, love to see people linking to your content and talking about it. One of the strongest ways that Google determines if you’re a useful and interesting site (and therefore how high you appear in their search listings) is how many backlinks you have to your website.
By creating evergreen content for your blog, your views will go up over time as more and more people link to your website.
By creating evergreen content that is interesting and useful, you’re giving people and businesses reasons to share it on their own social media, or include you in posts on their own blog.
A post about the best time to photograph a newborn baby, for example, is relevant content that lots of different people could share on their own page. It could be shared by other newborn photographers, by parenting websites, or even by small maternity clinics.
It doesn’t matter if these businesses aren’t in the same area as you either, because what’s important is the backlinks and the buzz around your content. But Google and other search engines don’t discriminate – if lots of people are sharing your site because it’s good content, then they’ll also show you higher in the search results when people look for your kind of photography locally.
Get started right now!
There’s no better time to start creating evergreen content for your blog than right now. Sit down and make a list of all the questions that people who you’d like to visit your blog might be asking. And then work out from that list the things that will stay relevant all year round, and that won’t go out of fashion.
The key is to just start somewhere! You can always edit your blog posts somewhere.
Don’t forget, after you’ve spent time creating evergreen content for your blog, you should promote it on social media now and then again in the future. If you’ve created some great and long-lasting evergreen content, you’ll be able to promote it many times over. This means that you’ll always have something to say on social media during quieter times without having to constantly be writing new blog posts or shooting new work.
Do you have any other tips for creating evergreen content you’d like to share with our community? Please do so in the comments section!
The post Helpful Tips for Creating Evergreen Content for your Photography Website appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Charlie Moss.
I’ve always loved hand-colored photos. They have such a great look, very unique, very interesting. For those who don’t know, “hand coloring” refers to any process where a photographer uses pigment, dye or paint of some sort to manually add color to a black and white photo. Historically this was done in the 1800s by photographers using pigment and gum arabic on daguerreotypes! The technique persisted in one form or another throughout the years until it was supplanted by actual color photography. Of course, just because it is no longer necessary to get color in such a way doesn’t mean it can’t be used for asthetic effect.
I shoot a lot of black and white film, which I generally scan and process in lightroom rather than wet printing. Now if you’ve used lightroom, you are probably familiar with the brush tools for things like exposure, clarity or even skin smoothing. However, the oft overlooked “tint” option can be used to easily paint in color to a black and white image for a “hand colored” effect.
let’s take this image.
This was shot on film (with a holga!) during a vintage pin-up shoot. In other words, there is no actual color information in the file etc…
Now I’m going to hand color it to approximate the actual colors of the scene. First we start by going into the lightroom brush tools. Make sure all the adjustment sliders are set to zero (we are just painting on color here, not adjusting the photo itself) Click on the tint box at the bottom right to bring up the color picker.
A little trick with the color picker is that if you hold the mouse button down you can drag the eyedropper out of the little selection window and sample color from *anything* on screen. One useful trick with this is to have a “reference photo” open separately and sample your colors for hand coloring from that.
Since the couch in this shot was a green color, I grab a nice rich green and begin painting my mask. I find it more accurate to paint with the red overlay on (click “O” to toggle the overlay on or off). You’ll want to use a separate mask for each area of color. Here’s the green mask for the couch all done.
yeah, it’s not perfect, but close enough
I then do separate masks for her shirt (pink) and her skin. With hand coloring, I like to leave a portion of the image uncolored which gives it it’s signature b/w+color look, different from “selective coloring”
and the final result:
Now this may be kind of a “niche” technique, and certainly not suited for all photos but it’s quick and easy and yields a very unique effect. Overall it’s a nice trick to have in one’s toolbox.
let’s take this image.
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