Category: Photography

How to Make Dramatic Photos with Backlight

The post How to Make Dramatic Photos with Backlight appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Mat Coker.

Most people don’t notice light. But visual artists do. Light is one of the essential ingredients in your photographs.

Light can be tricky to deal with until you understand camera settings. But once you’re familiar with your camera, light is wonderful to play with in your photos.

Personally, I love backlight. It adds a sense of drama and beauty to your photography.

I’ll show you examples of backlight with food, landscape, and portrait photography (studio and outdoors).

In order to achieve backlight in your photo, have the main light source behind your subject coming toward your camera. In this photo, you can actually see the warm setting sun as the source of backlight.

What is backlight good for?

I love backlight because it adds depth and drama to an otherwise flat, two-dimensional photo.

Backlight helps to bring out the texture of objects that you photograph (sidelight is good for this as well). Texture is created through a combination of highlights and shadows. Since photographs are two dimensional, texture adds depth to your photo.

A strong burst of backlight adds drama to your photo. Think about the bursts of light at a rock concert or other performances. The temperature of the backlight (warm or cool) adds to the drama of the photo.

The backlight source might be in your photo along with your subject (as with the sunset photo above). Or the light source can be outside of the frame (as long as it illuminates your subject).

Any source of backlight can be used creatively, but sunlight, windows, and strobes are among the most popular.

The principals of backlight are the same no matter what camera you’re using, even your phone.

This ice-covered tree is backlit by the sun. Without backlight shining through the branches, this tree would not have stood out so much.

Food

It’s great to begin practicing backlight with food. Backlight can be used to illuminate steam and bring out the texture of the food.

While any light source will work, many photographers love using window light to illuminate food.

The light source is not visible in this photo, but there is a window backlighting the food and making the steam visible.

This food was photographed while still in the oven. The warm backlight is coming from the oven light.

This is an example of soft backlight produced by a large window. I wanted to bring out the texture in the cookies. An iPhone 4s was used to capture the image and Lightroom was used to process it.

Your food photos will be less flat and have more pop to them when you use back (or side) light. Just look for a window or any other light source. Get creative and use the light from fridges, stoves, and lamps.

The great thing about practicing backlight with food is that if you can’t reposition the light source, you can easily reposition yourself and the food.

Landscape and Nature

Once you get the hang of backlight with food, use it to add drama to your landscape photos. In most cases, you won’t be able to reposition your backlight source since it will likely be the sun. However, you can always reposition yourself in relation to the sun and your subject.

I saw this scene as I looked in the rearview mirror. I couldn’t resist pulling over to take a photo. The setting sun is the light source for this scene. You can’t see it in the frame but it’s behind the trees to the left. Notice how the electricity wires are shining and standing out from the dark trees in the background.

The setting sun behind this crab apple tree caught my eye during a walk. I came back with my camera and found a perspective where the sun was visible filtering through the tree. An aperture of f/11 was used to create the starburst effect.

A combination of backlight and water droplets on the lens created this special effect. I don’t recommend letting your lens get wet, I was using a waterproof case. The case was still wet from using my camera underwater.

Portraits

I love to incorporate backlight into portraits to accent the emotion. Beautiful or intense moments are brought out even more with the use of backlight.

Studio

The best part about backlight in a studio is that you can position your light source any way you like.

Two off camera flashes were used to produce this dramatic backlight.

Superheros are dramatic characters by nature. Using harsh backlight instead of soft front light is better for bringing out the nature of the subject.

Natural light

When using natural light, you’ll have to position yourself and your subject according to the light source.

This little guy is backlit by the setting sun, while the big open sky in front of him illuminates his face.

Troubleshooting

One of the biggest problems about backlight is that your photo may turn out as a silhouette when you don’t want it to.

You’re likely using a semi-automatic setting such as aperture or shutter priority. Your camera sees the bright backlight and meters itself accordingly. You can use exposure compensation to help you avoid unwanted silhouettes. Try setting your exposure compensation to +1 or +2. You’ll need to experiment according to the light conditions.

If you’re experienced then manual mode might be the best option for you.

The main light source is the sky in the background. The sun has not risen over the horizon yet.

Practice backlight with everything

Once you get the hang of it, you can introduce backlight into all sorts of situations. Use it to bring out texture and to heighten dramatic moments.

Concerts are a wonderful place to have fun with backlight. The rapidly changing lights will create a challenge for you. Take lots of photos and be happy with the few that work out.

I love how golden hour can add a nostalgic feel to photos.

Use a combination of low angles and backlight to make your photo more exciting.

I always wait until evening to visit the beach. That way the sun isn’t shining straight down onto the sand. Instead it shines down at a lower angle, creating texture through shadow and highlight.

I love my little guy’s hair. There is a window just above him as the source of backlight.

The post How to Make Dramatic Photos with Backlight appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Mat Coker.

Digital Photography School

February 24, 2019
Weekly Photography Challenge – Transport

The post Weekly Photography Challenge – Transport appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Caz Nowaczyk.

This week’s photography challenge topic is TRANSPORT!

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Your photos can include anything includes transport. It could be old decaying transport, trains, buses, scooters, bikes, cars etc. You may want to do some panning or long exposures. They can be color, black and white, moody or bright. You get the picture. Have fun, and I look forward to seeing what you come up with!

© Barry J Brady

Some Inst-piration from some Instagrammers:

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by David Covell (@covell.photos) on Feb 9, 2019 at 11:58am PST

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Ron Mautner (@ron_mautner) on Feb 13, 2019 at 8:12am PST

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Rust Never Sleeps (@jerrylofarorust) on Jan 6, 2019 at 7:14am PST

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Leif Egil Olsen (@leo2048) on Feb 13, 2019 at 2:14pm PST

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Ricardo Heir (@heir_richard) on Feb 13, 2019 at 12:54pm PST

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by ENO (@eeeeeeeno) on Dec 31, 2018 at 2:58am PST

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by ENO (@eeeeeeeno) on Oct 4, 2018 at 5:40am PDT

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by The Battles (@argosyodyssey) on Feb 13, 2019 at 1:51pm PST

Check out some of the articles below that give you tips on this week’s challenge.

Tips for Shooting TRANSPORT

Panning and Other Tips for Adding Motion to Your Street Photography

6 Tips to Master Panning Photography

6 Tips for Shooting Long Exposure Night Photographs

10 Common Mistakes in Long Exposure photography

6 Ways to Improve your Cityscape Photography

How to Use Framing in an Urban Environment

How to Improve the Impact of Your Urban Images Using Lines

Weekly Photography Challenge – TRANSPORT

Simply upload your shot into the comment field (look for the little camera icon in the Disqus comments section) and they’ll get embedded for us all to see or if you’d prefer, upload them to your favorite photo-sharing site and leave the link to them. Show me your best images in this week’s challenge.

Share in the dPS Facebook Group

You can also share your images in the dPS Facebook group as the challenge is posted there each week as well.

If you tag your photos on Flickr, Instagram, Twitter or other sites – tag them as #DPStransport to help others find them. Linking back to this page might also help others know what you’re doing so that they can share in the fun.

The post Weekly Photography Challenge – Transport appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Caz Nowaczyk.

Digital Photography School

February 23, 2019
How to Care for Your Beloved Camera [video]
The post How to Care for Your Beloved Camera appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Caz Nowaczyk.

In another great video from our friends over at COOPH, they show you how to care for your beloved camera to keep her/him in great working order.

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Here’s how to care for your beloved camera

1. Proper cleaning
1. Use a blow brush to take off bigger particles and process both sides of the lens.
2. Add finish with a lens cleaning cloth.
3. Apply a cleaning solution to a cotton bud and clean the contact points.
4. Use a rocket blower to clean the camera sensor. Tilt your camera down and blow.
5. Still not clean enough? Put your camera into cleaning mode for a self-clean.
6. Take out your Gel Stamp and gently stamp the sensor. To clean the gel stamp, use a piece of sticky tape.
7. Lightly push the gel stamp onto the sticky tape, and the dust will transfer to the tape.
8. Finish the job using sensor wipes.
9. Shoot a long exposure against a white background, and when doing so, move the camera in a circular motion.
10. Then check the image on a big screen to ensure the camera lens and sensor are clean.
2. Lens Swapping

No matter how good your jacket, never change lenses in the rain. Jump in your car and take a pit stop. Change the lens then.

3. The UV Filter

The UV Filter protects your camera from UV light and helps to avoid scratches on your lens when you are shooting wildlife in your home…

4. The Hand Strap

Buckle up so you don’t drop it. Carry it in your hand. Don’t use it like a yo-yo as you walk.

5. The Lens Hood

Not the type you wear. A lens hood gives the camera a safety guard for in case you bump the camera.

6. The Dry Bag.

Ziplock bags, along with some Dry Silica packs, make a perfect DIY Dry Bag. Airtight and condensation-proof.

7. The Dust Blocker

Shower Caps are perfect for dust protection and Sahara Safe!

So, be good to your better half and clean them.

You may also find the following articles helpful:

How to Clean Your Tripod and Make it Like New

How to Clean Your Photography Gear and Keep it in Good Shape

How to Spring Clean Your Memory Cards

How to Clean Your Camera Sensor in 3 Easy Steps

How to Take Care of Your Camera in Cold Weather

The post How to Care for Your Beloved Camera appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Caz Nowaczyk.

Digital Photography School
February 22, 2019
Canon EOS 80D DSLR Camera- A Closer Look

The Canon EOS 80D DSLR Camera is the successor to the 70d with several nice improvements. This is a dSLR that has great features to showcase and provide enthusiasts a perfect platform to begin with. It is an ideal mid-range photography and video-making camera. Let us find out in detail what this small monster packs inside… Specifications of Canon EOS Continue Reading

The post Canon EOS 80D DSLR Camera- A Closer Look appeared first on Photodoto.

Photodoto

February 22, 2019
How To Do Astrophotography Using DSLR And Telescope

Growing up, I was one of those kids running around and telling everyone that I’m going to be an astronaut. I had a room that would make you feel like Buzz Lightyear could actually live in it and forget he’s on Earth. So it was pretty obvious that somehow I’d find myself getting into astronomy. Now I never really became Continue Reading

The post How To Do Astrophotography Using DSLR And Telescope appeared first on Photodoto.

Photodoto

February 22, 2019
How to Make Great Photo Invitations in Photoshop

The post How to Make Great Photo Invitations in Photoshop appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Ana Mireles.

Do you have an event coming up? Let’s make it a success!

It doesn’t matter if you’re throwing a birthday party for your kid or organizing a fancy dinner for your clients and coworkers, every event needs an invitation. You want people to know about it, but you also want to get them excited so they want to come. Here are a couple of ideas to do photo invitations to start you off on the right foot.

In this day and age, we are used to expressing ourselves with photos and a party is no exception to that. If you make a Facebook event it asks you to add a cover photo; if you want to do printed invitations, a photo works well too. The idea behind a photo invitation is to communicate more than just when and where. It also sets the tone for the party, so choose your image wisely and incorporate the text creatively.

Text box photo invitations

One idea for your photo invitations is to create a text box within your photo, like the example above. I suggest this idea if you’re going with postcard format, or folding card, where you can put all the practical information on the back or inside. This is because too much text on top of the photo can look messy. However, it can work if you’re using a minimalistic photo.

In any case, you can achieve this effect in just a few steps:

Step 1:

Once you’ve chosen your photo, open it in Photoshop. Then duplicate the layer by going to Menu -> Layer -> Duplicate Layer. You can also do this with the New Layer button at the bottom of the Layers panel if you prefer.

Step 2:

You want the two layers to have different brightness, so depending on the exposure of your image you can either darken the original layer or lighten the new top one. You can do this by adjusting the levels. Go to Menu -> Image -> Adjustments -> Levels, making sure the right layer is selected.

Step 3:

Now go to the top layer. Using the Rectangular Marquee Tool, select the area of the Text Box to the size you require. Once you have it, create a layer mask by clicking on the button at the bottom of the Layers panel. You can also delete the excess image by inverting the selection with Menu -> Select -> Invert and click the backspace key, however with this choice, you can’t adjust it later so I don’t recommend it.

Step 4:

Give the text box a special effect so that it’s clearly separated from the background image. Click on the fx button at the bottom of the Layers panel and choose the one you like, usually an Outer Glow or Drop Shadow should work well.

Step 5:

Finally, click on the Text tool and add your text. Remember that you can personalize the font, size, color, and much more on the top Options Bar. One trick I like to use is to type it twice in different colors, then move one of them a click or two to give it some depth.

There you go. Using the same technique, you can do the invitations to any event from a casual rooftop party with friends to a homey, intimate holiday party and much more. What sets the tone is the photo.

Faded background photo invitations

If you need all the information to be in one place together with the image, you can use a fade effect:

Step 1:

With your image open in Photoshop, create a new layer by clicking the new layer button at the bottom of the Layers panel. Then go to Menu -> Edit -> Fill. Choose the color you want keeping in mind that this becomes the background of the text. However, it also interacts with the image you chose.

Step 2:

Click on the Gradient Tool (if you don’t see it, check under the Fill Tool) and drag across your image to fade in the color layer into the image layer. This process is trial and error, so do it as many times as you need until you’re satisfied. If you need more information on how the Gradient Tool works I recommend you check out my tutorial “How to Customize and Use the Photoshop Gradient Tool.”

Step 3:

Now you just have to include all the information using the text tool as shown in the first example and you’re good to go.

Have fun and feel free to share your invitations with us in the comments section below.

The post How to Make Great Photo Invitations in Photoshop appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Ana Mireles.

Digital Photography School

February 22, 2019
How to Define Your Ideal Photography Client
The post How to Define Your Ideal Photography Client appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Mat Coker.

Many photographers in business struggle because they fail to understand who their ideal photography client is. Your ideal photography client is the person you love to work with and who wants exactly what you offer.

When you understand the sort of person who would want to hire you, you can speak directly to them in your social media and on your website. And when they stumble across your work, they will know that you are the one they want to hire.

After a couple of years of experience in business I began to tailor what I want to offer to the people I wanted to work with.

1. Do they want what you offer?

First, you need to determine what you want to offer as a photographer. What is the end product you want to deliver?

That decision includes digital or prints, the number of photos you wish to deliver, your style, number of hours put into the job, retouching, etc.

You may be deciding between:
- Studio/outdoors (on location)
- Posed vs candid (lifestyle)
- Digital vs print
- Many photos vs few
- Your vision or theirs
- Just photography, or a line of products
First, figure out what you want to offer, then match yourself up with people who want what you offer. Don’t be sidetracked by people who say you should be offering something else. Limit yourself to what you actually want to pursue and deliver (but feel free to experiment too).

I offer outdoor family photo sessions that focus more on candid moments than posed ones. I provide families with a digital gallery of 100+ photos. This is what I like to give. I like to spend time with the family and then give them lots of photos to enjoy.

My ideal family wants a lot of photos that they can turn into photo books, etc. I’m thrilled to spend an hour with a family photographing an adventure and then showing them all the fun photos I made.

When somebody contacts me for one posed print I send them to another photographer who specializes in that.

2. Match your approach with their personality

Your personality and approach to your photography is part of what you’re offering.

It may be the case that people want what you offer, but they don’t like your personality or approach.

Don’t take this personally. After all, there are many potential clients that you wouldn’t want to work with either.

For example, some lifestyle photographers take a photojournalist approach to their sessions and will not interrupt the scene. They give very little direction. While other lifestyle photographers direct and control every aspect of the session. The end product may be a collection of candid-looking photos but one photographer micromanaged every detail of those moments while the other influenced very little.

Whatever your approach to photography is, there will be people who don’t like it. Be clear about your personality and the way you work and you will naturally repel people you wouldn’t want to work with and attract the ones you do.

If you’re assertive and take charge, let people know.

If you need space to work out your vision and don’t want constant input from the client, let them know.

I always let parents know there needs to be room for play and fun in our sessions. It’s hard for some parents to let their kids have fun, but when they do the photos show it.

3. Look below the surface

As you seek to attract your ideal client, don’t assume that your ideal clients will have the details of their lives in common with each other or with you.

My ideal customers are quite different on the surface. Some of them live in the country, others live in big cities. Some are covered in tattoos, others have none. They work in offices, the trades, or are entrepreneurs. Some spend nothing on their wardrobe, some spend more on it than the photos. But it’s not what’s on the surface.

My ideal customers are families who love each other. They are creative and want a playful photo session. They like candid moments. They love the human nature that I portray in my photos. They enjoy receiving a gallery filled with digital photos that they can share online, and make photo books and gifts with. Family is everything to them and to me.

What to do when you’re stuck with terrible clients

No matter what sort of photography business you run, you’re going to end up working with the wrong clients sometimes. That’s okay.

Working with the wrong clients helps to reinforce who the right ones are.

When you can learn to make the wrong clients happy, you’ll do even better with the right ones.

Learning to work with people who don’t share your vision will help you to grow. You may even learn something in the process that you wouldn’t have learned otherwise.

I try my best not to attract clients who are too nervous to have fun, or who only want one or two quick shots, or who are too miserable to enjoy the session. But occasionally those people hire me and I do my best to make them happy anyway.

Who is your worst client?

If you’re not sure who your ideal client is, begin by describing the client you don’t want to work with. Then list the clients you’ve been happiest to work with. What did you like about working with them? What did they like about working with you? What was their personality like? Tailor your marketing toward people like them.

The post How to Define Your Ideal Photography Client appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Mat Coker.

Digital Photography School
February 21, 2019
Photo Finishing – Challenge Yourself to Reveal the Personality in Every Image You Capture

The post Photo Finishing – Challenge Yourself to Reveal the Personality in Every Image You Capture appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Herb Paynter.

Many folks think that photography takes place in the camera, but that’s not the whole truth. Photography is a two-part process that involves 1) capturing the light from a scene, and 2) shaping that captured light into a form that matches what your mind saw when you took the picture. The capture process does happen inside the camera, but the shaping part happens on your computer.

The Capture, or Photo Process

We give the camera credit for things that it doesn’t actually do. Don’t get me wrong, capturing all the light in a scene is a monumental undertaking. Keeping track of millions of points of light is a very critical and specialized responsibility. However, the camera is not so much an artistic tool as it is a capture device with a single purpose – to accurately record the light from the surfaces of objects in a scene. While that purpose can get complicated with lighting challenges, the camera is still just box with a round glass eye and a single function: to record light.

When the light of a scene enters the camera lens, it gets dispersed over the surface of the camera’s image sensor, a postage-size electrical circuit containing millions of individual light receptors. Each receptor measures the strength of the light striking it in a metric called “lumens.” Each receptor on this sensor records its light value as a color pixel.

The camera’s image processor reads the color and intensity of the light striking each photoreceptor and maps each image from those initial values, producing a reasonable facsimile of the original scene. When this bitmap of pixels gets viewed from a distance, the eye perceives the composite as a digital image.

The real magic happens after the storing of light on the memory card. The image that first appears when you open the file is the image processor’s initial attempt at interpreting the data recorded by the camera’s image processor. Most times, the initial (JPEG) image interpretation of this data is an acceptable record of the original scene, though not always.

Presets

Your camera provides several pre-set programs that adjust the three settings in the camera that affect exposure: aperture, shutter speed, and ISO.

Three main controls determine your exposure: the shutter speed, the aperture, and the ISO. The camera presets (A, S, and M) allow you to determine the depth of field and/or speed with which the camera captures the light.

The A (aperture priority) mode allows you to set the size of the lens opening (f-stop) while the camera automatically sets the shutter speed. The S (shutter priority) mode lets you set the duration of the lens opening (shutter speed) while the camera adjusts the size of the lens opening. The letter P (program mode) allows you to determine the best mix of aperture and shutter speed while your camera retains the correct balance of light for the exposure. The letter M (manual mode) gives you complete control over all settings but requires to balance the overall exposure.

Your camera’s variable ISO (International Standards Organization) setting adjusts the light sensitivity of the camera’s image sensor, allowing you to capture scenes in dim or bright light; the higher the number, the more sensitive the light receptors become, allowing you to capture images in lower levels of light.

The Histogram

Your camera provides a small graph that roughly indicates how well the camera is set to correctly capture the light in the current scene.

This graph displays the range of light coming through the lens and approximates the current light distribution that captured under the current settings. By adjusting the three settings mentioned above, you can shift and somewhat distribute this range of light to best record the full range of light.

Color balancing the light

Every scene’s color cast is influenced by the temperature of the light illuminating that scene. When the scene is captured outside, the Sun’s position in the sky and the influence of cloud cover alters the color of the light. Your camera offers at least two ways to compensate for the differences in color temperature (Auto White Balance and Pre-set Color Balance).

Auto White Balance

The Auto White Balance (AWB) sensor in your camera seeks any prominent white or neutral subject in the scene and shifts the entire color balance of the scene in an effort to neutralize that element. But there is an assumption with AWB that you desire the current lighting to be perfectly neutral in color.

Any clouds interfering with the sunlight will have a slight influence on the neutrality of 6500° (natural sunlight) lighting. AWB takes that slight shift out of the equation. Most of the time, this is a great idea. However, to record early morning or late afternoon (golden hour) lighting accurately, AWB will neutralize those warm colors and completely lose that “warm” mood.

Pre-Set White Balance Settings

Your camera offers several pre-sets to offset any known color casts caused by specific lighting situations. These settings appear in every digital camera “Settings” display and may appear in a slightly different order or wording. Daylight sets the camera to record scenes under typical mid-day outdoor lighting. Cloudy/Overcast shifts the colors toward orange to compensate for the bluish cast caused by light filtering through nominal cloud cover.

Shade offers a stronger orange shift to compensate for completely overcast (stormy) skies. Flash provides a very similar color temperature lighting as Daylight and is intended to prepare the image sensor for artificial daylight or “Speed light” type flash devices.

Tungsten/Incandescent shifts the colors toward the blue end of the color range to compensate for the warmer shift of incandescent lights. Fluorescent attempts to compensate for the greenish cast of gas-charged fluorescent lights.

Kelvin/Custom permits the user to set a custom color balance setting, essentially teaching the camera what “neutral” gray color looks like. All of these pre-sets attempt to correct non-neutral lighting conditions.

The Sculpting, or Finishing Process

While the camera does capture the full range of reflected light in a scene, it has no way of knowing the best tonal curve to apply to each image. Many times the five tonal ranges (highlight, quarter, middle, three-quarter, and shadow) need to be reshaped to best interpret the light captured at the scene. This tonal contouring process is the magic of sculpting the light into a meaningful visual image.

This little fella perched outside my front door and caught me off guard. I didn’t have time to fiddle with the controls to optimize the lighting situation. My first click got his attention and the second got this expression. Fortunately, I capture my images in both jpg and RAW formats simultaneously. Doing so allowed me to post-process the tones and display to you what I actually saw that morning.

I use the term “sculpting” when talking about image editing because it best describes the rearranging of tones in a digital image. Only ideal lighting balance looks great when rendered as a “stock” JPEG camera image.

This sculpting or finishing process amounts to the clarification of tones and colors in a digital image; making the image appear in final form the way the human mind perceived it in the original scene. While the color balancing aspect of this process is a bit more obvious, the tonal recovery is actually more critical to the final presentation.

The digital camera cannot capture all of the dynamics of the visible spectrum on a sunny day, nor can it determine the best balance of those tones. The camera’s image sensor simply captures all the light possible and presents the data to the camera’s image processor to sort out. Under perfectly balanced lighting, this works out just fine, but occasionally detail hides in the shadows and gets lost in the highlights, requiring help from the photographer/editor to balance out the tones.

This is where the individual tone-zones come into play, and the sliders available in RAW processing software (Camera Raw, Lightroom, On1 Camera Raw, Exposure X4) are invaluable. The internal contrast of every image (Whites, Highlights, Middle tones, Shadows, Blacks) can be pushed around and adjusted in a very non-linear manner (in no particular order) to reveal detail that otherwise remains hidden.

Conclusion

Photo finishing isn’t complete until both color and tones are correctly adjusted for maximum effect, matching the emotion of the original scene. Only then is your image ready for viewing. Challenge yourself to squeeze the detail and reveal the potential personality out of every image you capture. It’s well worth the extra effort.

The post Photo Finishing – Challenge Yourself to Reveal the Personality in Every Image You Capture appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Herb Paynter.

Digital Photography School

February 21, 2019
How to Set Your Photography Goals (and NOT Fail)
The post How to Set Your Photography Goals (and NOT Fail) appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Mat Coker.

You can spend many years as a stagnant photographer simply because you didn’t set any goals.

But if you set goals, and work toward accomplishing them, you can grow more than you ever imagined.

Photographers encounter two problems when setting goals. The first is not knowing how to set a goal. The second is not knowing how to accomplish it.

Let’s look at how to set a goal and then be sure that you can accomplish it.

If you need inspiration toward growth and learning as a photographer, look to the toddler. They develop more over 2 years than most adults develop over 2 decades.

How to set your photography goals

I’ll share my photography goals with you and explain how to set your own goals.
1. Define my creative vision (no more copying other photographers)
2. Accomplish a photography project I started as an unskilled kid
3. Learn about light from painters
4. Study toddler psychology
5. Help 15 students achieve their photography goals
Five goals seem like a lot, but I accomplished all my major goals last year, so I’m eager to accomplish these goals too.

Toddlers are at one of the crossroads of life. They’re exploding in their abilities but need to have their potential guided by grown-ups and older kids.

You should set your goals based on these 2 questions:
1. What will I have accomplished when I finish this goal?
2. How will this goal help me grow as a photographer?
Accomplishment: When I complete goals 2 and 5, I will have fulfilled a childhood ambition and helped other photographers to grow.

Growth: Goals 1,3 and 5 will help clarify my vision and deepen my understanding of light and toddlers.

Set goals that are meaningful to you. Make them small enough to be achievable but large enough to challenge you.

When you first start setting goals, you should set and focus on one at a time. Once you know what you’re capable of you can set multiple goals that cover an extended period of time.

A toddler with a marker, colors on everything without thought. We can be just as directionless in our photography, snapping photos of anything that grabs our attention. Or, we can be purposeful and move toward intentional accomplishment.

Setting a goal is easy, but how do you accomplish it?

After deciding on your goals, use this method to accomplish it:
1. Describe how life will look when you’ve achieved your goal
2. Understand the consequence of not completing it
3. Plot out the steps toward achieving your goal
4. Create an environment that makes the goal happen by default (so failure isn’t an option)
I’ll use my toddler psychology goal as an example.

How will life look once I’ve achieved this goal? I’ll better understand toddlers, better connect with them during sessions and take more creative photos.

If I don’t complete this goal then I will not have expanded myself as a photographer and I’ll continue to experience the same frustrations during sessions.

The main steps toward achieving this goal will be:
- Finding reliable sources that explain toddler psychology
- Reflecting on my experience as a father and photographer
- Use what I’ve learned to take better photos of toddlers
- Write about what I’ve learned (for myself and others)
Many people fail to reach their goals because their environment works against them.

How can I create an environment that will make this goal achievable?

It’s busy running a photography business and I’m likely to forget my goals. But, I’ve written it on my list of goals so that it won’t be forgotten. I came up with a quick list of sources to begin my research. Research time has been scheduled into my calendar.

Creating your environment to make your goals achievable

This is one of the most important steps. If you set a goal and then have the proper space and time to work on it, you’ll be able to achieve it.

Let’s suppose your goal is to learn how to use your camera off Auto Mode. But 30 days after setting your goal you’ve hardly practiced at all. Your life is hectic and your environment will keep you distracted unless you make it work for you.

You need to set aside a block of time every day that is devoted to using your camera. Write it in a day planner or set an alert. Better yet, carry your camera with you all day. It’s hard to avoid learning when you’ve committed to taking a camera with you everywhere you go.

Rubber boots are a passport to adventure for toddlers. With their boots on they can go anywhere and do anything.

Maybe you’re taking a trip this year and hope to take a lot of great photos. But hoping isn’t the same as setting a goal and plotting out the steps to achieve it. Most trips have a very rushed itinerary which is one way that your environment will work against you. Have you set aside time for photography?

Maybe you want a more efficient post-processing workflow. Is your environment filled with distractions that eat up your time? Turn off the WIFI, your phone, and any other digital distractions. Isolate yourself for a block of time or until the work is finished. Banish everything that distracts your focus.

Your goal should be challenging to achieve, but don’t make it worse by having your environment work against you.

Peeking through the bedroom door.

Tell me YOUR goals

One of the best ways to get started on a goal is to tell somebody what you plan to do.

I would love to hear your photography goal. Leave a comment letting me know what your goals are.

The post How to Set Your Photography Goals (and NOT Fail) appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Mat Coker.

Digital Photography School
February 20, 2019
What Your Camera Can’t See

The post What Your Camera Can’t See appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Herb Paynter.

For all the incredible technology packed into cameras, there is one missing element that will remain missing perhaps forever. The missing element? The combination of human eyesight and the brain’s image processor called the Visual Cortex.

The Visual Cortex

The Visual Cortex is located in the lower rear of your brain. It is here the real color perception magic happens – magic that goes way beyond the analysis capabilities of any camera on the planet. As you understand this human version of the camera’s image processor, your understanding of the photo process will come into clearer focus.

Medical experts tell us that more than 80% of what we experience enters our brain through our vision. Your eyes capture light’s amazing array of colors as the eye’s lens focuses light beams onto the panoramic viewing screen in the back of your eyeball called the retina.

Your brain is very forgiving. It focuses light entering through your eyes, and automatically color corrects almost every lighting condition and color cast en route to the Visual Cortex. Within seconds, your eyes and brain adjust to a wide range of lighting intensities and color influences and deliver very believable images to your mind. And it all happens without you even realizing it. No white balance to set, no color shifts to neutralize. Your brain’s magic intuition and forgiving nature do a crazy-good job of color correction for you.

Your camera records colors a bit more objectively. However, even when shooting RAW files, decisions about color still have to be made in the editing process. Your camera simply doesn’t have cognitive or reasoning skills and thus must be tutored to interpret what it “sees” accurately. You might say that your camera sees, but it doesn’t observe.

White balance and memory colors

When you visually observe a white sheet of paper in a daylight lighting (preferably outside, in natural light), the paper looks… white. Even when you observe that same white paper indoors under tungsten light, your brain recognizes that the paper is really white. This is because the human brain possesses what we call “memory colors;” a basic set of colors that are so familiar that even lighting variances cannot confuse.

Your camera cannot remember what color white is when it is captured under different types of lighting. It must be told every time. What your camera calls “memory” isn’t the same “memory” that your human brain possesses.

When you set your camera’s White Balance to Daylight and take a picture of the white paper outside, it indeed appears white. That is merely the way the camera’s image sensor is biased to record light under daylight (6500° Kelvin) color conditions. However, when you move inside and shoot the same white paper under tungsten lighting (using the same Daylight WB), the paper appears to the camera to be somewhat yellow.

Auto White Balance (left) and Tungsten (right)

Changing the camera’s WB setting to Auto White Balance (AWB) and shooting the paper under a typical table lamp light, the picture still appears slightly yellow. Even when you set the camera’s WB to Tungsten, the paper still fails to appear perfectly neutral white, though it appears much closer to white.

The truth is, there are colors in the visual spectrum that digital cameras record differently than film cameras did in the past. And neither technology captures and records the exact colors that the human eye sees or the mind perceives. This is why most captured images, for all their beauty, still lack the full sense of authenticity and depth that the human mind experiences from light observed in every scene.

Technically (and spectrally), in each case, the camera is telling the truth, just not the “truth” that we perceive with our eyes. This is, of course, a good example of why we shoot in raw format. When captured in raw format, all regimented color categories get ignored. Any color shifts can be corrected and lighting variances addressed in the post-processing stage.

As mentioned earlier, the can’t the camera see the white paper as white (the way our eyes do) regardless of the lighting situation because the camera doesn’t have an onboard reference registry of “memory colors” the way our brains do.

The brain automatically remaps each scene’s color cast to your brain’s “memory colors.” Think of these memory colors as preference presets in your brain’s color interpreter. These memory colors automatically compensate for variable lighting situations. The infinite Look Up Table (LUT) variables that would be needed for a camera to replicate this basic, natural brain function would have to be both immense and incredibly complex. No matter how smart digital devices become, they’ll never replace the magic of human interpretation.

Conclusion

So what have we learned? Your camera, for all its sophistication, cannot automatically correct color casts. It simply isn’t human. That means that your camera ultimately benefits from and makes use of your understanding of the behavior of light and color. Armed with this knowledge, you’ll produce images that more closely replicate color as your mind perceived it. Photography is a two-part process that requires the camera to do its job and for you to do yours. What is defined by the clinical term as “post-processing” is merely finishing the job that your camera started.

Moreover, this is a good thing. Your judgment and interpretation of the colors your mind saw when you captured the image can guide you as you tweak and make minor adjustments to your images. Don’t think of this as a burden. Recognize this as a gift. You, the photographer, are the producer of the image. Your camera is merely a tool that provides all the “raw” materials you’ll need to share what your mind observed when you captured the scene.

This is why photography is an art, and why this art requires an artist. You are that artist.

Celebrate the partnership you have with your camera. Together, you produce visual beauty.

The post What Your Camera Can’t See appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Herb Paynter.

Digital Photography School

February 20, 2019