Category: Photography

  • Top 10 Photo Gadgets of 2014

    If you have ever wondered what to give a creative person that seems to have everything, be sure to check the list of photography devices and accessories we collected here today. Whether you’re looking for a cool New Year’s gift or just want to add some new toys to your photo bag, you will love this collection. The world of Continue Reading

    The post Top 10 Photo Gadgets of 2014 appeared first on Photodoto.


    Photodoto

  • ‘Tis the Season for Flickr Wall Art

    Tis the Season for Flickr Wall Art

    Look what showed up in the mail yesterday: a beautiful 16 x 20 premium photo mounted from Flickr’s new Wall Art service.

    The photo is mounted on a one inch board and looks beautiful both on the wall as well as being held my daughter Kate, whose photo I printed.

    The process of ordering the print was super easy and I was able to order it directly from the Flickr photo page.

    In addition to ordering your own photos as wall art, there is also a huge library of wall art photos that you can purchase from other photographers on Flickr. Flickr recently revised this fine art program and now shares sales proceeds with all photographers involved in their wall art project.

    What a wonderful way for Flickr to partner with their photographers who make the site a more beautiful place.


    Thomas Hawk Digital Connection

  • Restaurant Menu Food Photography Using Natural Light

    There are many ways to approach food and drink photography, from big budget shoots with food stylists and complicated lighting setups, to low budget natural lighting setups. For a formal restaurant photo shoot, which setup would you choose? I’ve had successes doing both types of photo shoots, but in this particular example, I’ll show you super low budget ways to pull off professional, tasty-looking food photos appropriate for a menu.

    restaurant photography tutorial natural lighting

    Client Brief

    Based in Seattle, this client is an American restaurant going in a new direction with the hiring of a new chef and his decision to revamp the menu into one with distinctive Southern and Creole flavor.  This client reached out in need of 10-20 menu photos for use in their press release announcing the rebranding efforts. I had photographed their interiors previously and knew that the multi-room restaurant and bar was vintage themed with diverse backgrounds, patterns, and lighting schemes throughout the restaurant. Based on the budgeted resources for this shoot, I decided against making it a big production with a food stylist and opted for a low budget approach.

    Planned Setup

    Initially, I planned a simple lighting setup using a Canon 580 EX-II Speedlite, a shoot-through umbrella, Pocket Wizards, and a compact Manfrotto 5001B Nano light stand. This is my favorite relatively compact and affordable lighting setup for everything from quick portraits to food and drink photography. However, I realized when I got onsite that I was missing a crucial piece of my setup: the flash and umbrella mounting adapter, meaning I had no way of connecting my flash and umbrella to the lighting stand. Oops…time to improvise!

    Actual Setup

    Since I had photographed the interiors of the venue before and knew that there were two areas that had copious natural lighting: the bar area near the front entrance with huge floor to ceiling windows, and a large room with glass panels for a ceiling. Luckily, it was a typical cloudy day in Seattle, so there was nice diffused natural light flowing through the ceiling, making these two areas the perfect spot for food and drink photography without any flash or external lighting.

    In terms of gear, I shot all of these photos with a Canon 6D camera and a 24-70mm f/2.8 lens. I also used the 580 EXII Speedlite on occasion when I needed some fill light.

    Composing and Shooting

    I photograph a lot of restaurant interiors and as a result I’ve learned that there is a lot of thought and strategy that goes into the design of the space. As a result, I like to find distinct elements of the restaurant to fuse into the food photos that I create. This does two things: 1) it highlights unique features that a designer or architect spent a lot of time working on, and 2) incorporating aspects unique to the restaurant places the dishes in different atmospheres, thus creating more diverse imagery.

    Photos at the Bar

    Cocktail photography

    I started off with two appetizer and cocktail dishes, photographing them at the bar that was naturally lit by the huge floor to ceiling window. The white granite bar top was a nice contrast to the warm colors of the food and drinks. I shot this first image at f/4 to keep the main elements of the glass and bowl of nuts mostly in focus. The first few shots looked like they were missing some depth, so on a whim I moved the pairing in front of a bowl of citrus fruits placed at the bar. The color and placement of the fruits ended up being nice complimenting elements, contributing to the image below.

    restaurant photography tutorial natural lighting

    This second dish that was shot at the bar was presented on a super long wooden cutting board. It was actually too long for such a small appetizer, and I solved this problem by zooming in to the image and shooting at f/3.2 to keep the focus on the main element: the chunky shrimp remoulade topping the bread!

    remoulade photography

    Photos in the Dining Area

    Percy's in Ballard, Seattle, WA

    Another intriguing section of the restaurant that offered nice, albeit darker, lighting was the dining area. Featuring an illuminated mirror behind circular booth seats and a light colored wooden table, this was a great space to utilize for cocktail shots. This particular beverage was shot at f/2.8 to keep the glass and its elements in focus and give a nice blur of the mirror background.

    FINAL-Cocktail

    Photos on the Patio

    FINAL-Percys 01

    Finally, the bulk of the food and drink photos I shot were taken in the aforementioned covered patio area in the back. As you can see from the images below, the space has a huge glass ceiling, brick walls, long colored picnic tables, and a nicely textured wooden floor panels. All of these elements made for great textures and backgrounds for shooting each dish in a variety of settings.

    Final-Kale

    Salads can be a bit tricky to shoot because there can be so many competing elements to focus on. In the case of this kale salad, I chose an aperture of f/5.6 to make sure more parts of the salad were in focus other than the shredded cheese and mustard seeds.

    Final-Chicken

    The winning dish of them all was this epic made-from-scratch fried chicken entree with rice and beans. Again, lots of different parts of this dish competing for attention, so I used an aperture of f/8 to make sure the most important parts were clearly in focus.

    Wrap Up

    Overall, this photo shoot of 10 dishes, each paired with cocktails took me about two hours to photograph. I had a bit of a challenge by forgetting one key piece of my lighting kit, but was able to improvise thanks to copious natural lighting and using my handy 580 EXII Speedlite. All photos received light post-processing treatment and were turned over the next day for the client.

    What do you think? Is a lighting kit essential for professional food photography, or is natural lighting the way to go?

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    tablet_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_tab-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78623” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    mobile_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_mob-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78158” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    The post Restaurant Menu Food Photography Using Natural Light by Suzi Pratt appeared first on Digital Photography School.


    Digital Photography School

  • Tips for Retouching a Night Photograph using Lightroom

    I will show you an experience I had of shooting in the middle of the night after sunset without a tripod. Many monuments don’t allow you to shoot with a tripod but you still want to take a photo. The nicer light in my opinion is usually after sunset or before sunrise, so I will show you how to take and process a photo without a tripod at night.

    dPS-Before-after

    If you have a nice high vantage point to take a beautiful photo but cannot put down your tripod you will see that there
    is something we can do about it. The trick is you must put your camera on a timer, (use the built-in 2-second timer) meaning when you press the shutter it counts to two and then takes a photo. This way when you take the photo you are not pressing the button so there is less vibration.

    Next go into manual mode and put it on 1/20th of a second. Usually it will be blurry, but if you put your arms on your stomach and stop breathing you should get a sharp photo. Then open the lens as much as you can. As you can see the photo is very sharp and I was only at 320 ISO.

    As usual I am always shooting to get the highlights, so what you do is you put your camera at 1/20th of a second, 2 second on timer, approximately f/2.8 aperture (or open as wide as you can), then start going up on the ISO. You take several photos until you see that you have something you like.

    Now let’s see how we are going to retouch this photo. First we are going to open up the shadows; you see how we can see the entire city?

    Screen shot 1
    Now on the white balance. When you are taking a photo of a sunset in a city there is one white balance that I advise you to use, but it is very difficult to get the right white balance right away. What I usually do is go to the shade preset, and add a bit of magenta, that is something I like.

    Then bring down the highlights, and lastly do the white and black points.

    Look how incredible this photo is, I took it without a tripod at night, now the only problem is that I don’t have a long exposure so the cars are very sharp, I don’t have the lighting streak behind the cars that I would have liked but it’s still pretty good.

    Ok, now let’s crop the photo a bit to get it to look more dynamic.

    Screen shot 2

    Next, let’s take a brush, select a warm temperature and add some clarity to it and we will now start painting the photo in specific areas where we want to add color.

    Screen shot 3

    We will now create a graduate filter to accentuate the sunset.

    Screen shot 4
    Create a new graduate filter to add some highlights to parts of the buildings to make them come out a little bit more.

    We will now add a gradient filter on the top of the photo to create more of a blue sky.

    Screen shot 5

    We will remove some clarity on the overall photo. Last but not least let’s add some sharpness, there is almost no noise as I am using this amazing Sony camera, so we will only remove a bit of noise.

    We can now see the end result of this photo that was taken at night without a tripod. I find it quite incredible!

    Before

    After

    For a full walk-through of how this is done check out this video:

    If you enjoyed this tutorial you can find more of Serge’s tips and courses here.

    PhotoSerge

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    tablet_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_tab-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78623” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    mobile_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_mob-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78158” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    The post Tips for Retouching a Night Photograph using Lightroom by Serge Ramelli appeared first on Digital Photography School.


    Digital Photography School

  • Deal 9: Grab Hacking Photography’s 100 Lightroom Presets for just $10 (88% Off)

    On the 9th day of Christmas dPS gave to me – the biggest discount of the year with…

    88% off Hacking Photography’s mega preset deal!

    NewImage

    Yesterday Our Deal Was Big… But Today is Bigger!

    Yesterday we brought back a popular deal from over at SnapnDeals and the response was amazing – over 1000 of you saved 70% on a great course.

    Today’s deal is another of our most popular from SnapnDeals this year and it’s at the biggest discount yet – 88% off the retail price on this great presets bundle.

    For just $ 10 you’ll pick up 100 professionally-developed presets from Mike Newton over at Hacking Photography. That’s just 10 cents per preset!

    With them you’ll be able to convert your photos from average to amazing with just one click, saving you a whole lot of processing time.

    Split into four collections of Lightroom presets, you’ll get:

    • 25 color blast presets – stunning, vivid, rich, buttery colors in every image
    • 25 black and white presets – for a stark, sharp effect that’ll give your images the soul they could be missing
    • 25 old school color presets – roll back the clock for a vintage appearance
    • 25 night color presets – to add different colored street, building and ambient lights

    Don’t know how to use Presets? Fear not! Included in the bundle are instructions on how to download, install and use them.

    We don’t need to say much more than at $ 10 for the next 24 hours, these are an absolute bargain.

    Grab them here before they’re gone.

    PS: as with all our deals this week there’s a money back guarantee on this product. If you find it isn’t suiting your needs simply ask for your money back within 60 days for a full no questions asked refund.

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    tablet_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_tab-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78623” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    mobile_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_mob-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78158” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    The post Deal 9: Grab Hacking Photography’s 100 Lightroom Presets for just $ 10 (88% Off) by Darren Rowse appeared first on Digital Photography School.


    Digital Photography School

  • Deal 8: 70% off Photoshop Artistry: Fine Art Grunge Composition Course

    Today’s deal is perfect for those of you wanting to awaken your creative genius and create some art with your images.

    It is 70% off the Photoshop Artistry: Fine Art Grunge Composition course.

    Photoshop artistry

    We offered this course on our sister site – SnapnDeals – earlier this year and it ended up being our most popular deal of the year, so we convinced it’s creator – Sebastian Michaels – to bring it back for dPS readers today.

    The best thing you can do to learn what this course is about is to head over to the sales page where Sebastian has created a great video run down of what the course covers and why you might consider signing up.

    You get a whole lot with this course including:

    • 68 videos, each averaging over 20 minutes in length
    • Each lesson is accompanied by PDF downloadable cheat sheets
    • Sebastian’s huge texture library (over 5 gigabytes in total is available to you)
    • Sebastian’s custom brush (and edge effect) library
    • Sebastian’s high res vector graphic library

    Photoshop artistry grunge

    Normally this course retails for $ 297 and in January it is set to increase in price but for the next 24 hours it is yours for $ 89.

    Best of all – there’s a 60 day satisfaction guarantee on this course. If you buy it and if you don’t find it meets your needs you’re able to simply ask for a refund and Sebastian will get you your money back.

    Head over to check out full details of what is included here (there are also a heap of previous students testimonials).

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    tablet_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_tab-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78623” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    mobile_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_mob-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78158” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    The post Deal 8: 70% off Photoshop Artistry: Fine Art Grunge Composition Course by Darren Rowse appeared first on Digital Photography School.


    Digital Photography School

  • Writer’s Favorite Lens – The Canon 24-105mm f/4

    I like shooting all manner of outdoor scenes. I am a sucker for landscapes and seascapes, which almost always require a wide-angle lens. I really enjoy exploring new cities with my camera, which also requires a wide-angle lens but can also be helped by a little zoom to capture details. And, of course, I like taking pictures of my family while we are out, which requires portrait focal lengths. My favorite lens, the Canon 24-105mm f/4 does all these things, and does them remarkably well.

    Bernard

    A wide angle allows you to get right behind your subject and also get the background. Shot at 24 mm (1/100, f/8, ISO 200)

    So when the dPS writers began writing about their favorite lenses, I did not need to think more than a second to determine which lens was my favorite. I carry other lenses, like an extreme wide angle, and a longer telephoto zoom, but I find I rarely need to break them out. In fact, perusing my Lightroom library shows me that I actually used the 24-105mm to capture over 60% of all the pictures I have ever taken.

    Canon 24-105mm f/4 L IS

    Image courtesy of Canon

    Here is a quick look at the technical specs for this lens:

    • Local lengths: 24-105 mm (38mm – 168mm on APS-C cameras)
    • Aperture: f/4 (max.) – f/22 (min.)
    • Dimensions: 8.4 cm x 10.7 cm (3.3″ x 4.2″)
    • Weight: 670g (1.47 lb.)
    • Minimum focusing distance: 45 cm

    A Great “Walking-Around” Lens

    Sure, there is a place for prime lenses. But gone are the days when serious photographers needed to carry around a bunch of prime lenses in order to get high quality. Sometimes you want to just carry your camera and one lens. And sometimes you just don’t want to have to change lenses.

    With the 24-105mm, you can carry one lens of high quality and moderate size, and shoot with it all day. It will handle landscapes, urban, street, and people photography really well. As such, it is almost ideal for taking on the family vacation, where you will likely encounter any or all of these scenes. Rather than dig through your bag to find a lens, then change lenses, and then get the shot, you can just walk around with the 24-105mm on your camera and be ready for almost everything.

    London from top of St. Paul's

    The 24-105mm is great for urban shots where you want to zoom out to get the whole scene. It is also nice to walk around with one lens when you have to climb a bunch of stairs, like at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. Zoomed all the way out at 24mm (1/80 sec., f/5.6, ISO 200).

    This is particularly true for full-frame shooters. At full frame, zooming all the way out to 24mm will take a nice wide angle shot, and that is often as wide as you will need to go. Further, at full frame you need to get up to 105mm to cover the portrait focal lengths and get a little bit of telephoto for details. More on that in a second.

    High Quality

    But am I really just advocating for good walk-around lenses in general? I don’t think so. The focal lengths for these sort of lenses are nice, but they have to be of high quality, and the 24-105mm is remarkable in that regard. It is an L-series lens. It is fully weather sealed. It is sharp and has great image quality. It is known for fast and accurate focusing. My personal experience with it has borne this out. But beyond that, any test I have ever seen of this lens has given it high marks. I have honestly never seen a bad review of this lens (or even a luke-warm one).

    Western Lake

    Landscapes and seascapes require a good wide angle. Shot at 28mm (1/30 sec., f/16, ISO 200).

    Compared to Other Mid-Range Zooms

    But don’t most serious photographers use a 24-70mm for their mid-range zoom lens? Perhaps. I believe they are drawn to the aperture of f/2.8 (versus the f/4 for the 24-105mm). There is no question that the wider aperture of such lenses will get you a greater degree of background blur, and the 24-70 is a really nice lens. But I have a few reasons why the 24-105mm is a better choice for many photographers, particularly those shooting full frame:

    1 – Image stabilization

    Although the aperture on the 24-70mm opens up one stop more (f/2.8 versus f/4), the 24-105mm has image stabilization, which actually gives you three extra stops in low-light situations.  So unless you need to stop the action in low light, you will actually get better low-light performance out of the 24-105mm.

    2 – Better for portraits

    If you want to shoot portraits, the 24-70mm is not a good choice despite its wider aperture, at least if you are shooting full frame. The best focal length for portraits is in the range of 80-90mm, which is not included in the range of the 24-70 mm at full frame. It will get there with an APS-C camera since the crop factor will result in an effective focal length of up to 105mm, but not at full frame.

    3 – Price/cost

    The 24-105mm is a relative bargain at $ 1,150, since you will pay almost twice as much for the 24 -70mm f/2.8.

    The price of the 24-105mm becomes even better if you buy it along with a camera, as it is the “kit lens” for some high-end Canon cameras.

    The Importance of Lens Diameter

    One final note on price, and that is to consider the effect of the purchase of filters. I use a lot of filters, as do many outdoor photographers. I carry three different strength neutral density filters, a polarizer, and a graduated neutral density filter kit. Some photographers might add a UV filter to that list as well. So it is worth mentioning that another good thing about the 24-105mm is that its lens diameter of 77 mm is the same as other common Canon lenses (it is the same for the three lenses I use most often).

    Grand Canyon

    When out hiking, you often want to keep your weight down, so a walking around lens like the 24-105 works great. Shot at 58 mm (1/200 sec., f/11, ISO 250).

    Why is that important? Because having the same lens diameter on different lenses means that I can use the same set of filters on all of them. If I had to buy new sets of filters for lenses of different diameters, it would get very expensive, very fast. That is especially true if you are using high-quality filters (and you should be, since it directly affects the optics).

    Lenses that share the 77 mm diameter with the 24-105mm include the:

    • 100 – 400 mm f/4.5 – 5.6
    • 70 – 200 mm f/2.8
    • 17 – 55 mm f/2.8
    • 17 – 40 mm f/4
    • 16 – 35 mm f/4
    • 10 – 22 mm f/3.5 – 4.5

    Not for Everyone

    So I think the 24-105mm f/4 is the perfect combination of great focal lengths, high quality, and reasonable price. It will allow you to take landscapes, urban scenes, street photos, and family pictures. You might never take it off your camera.

    Longhorn

    Sometimes you want to zoom in a bit. Shot at 82 mm (1/100 sec., f/8, ISO 400).

    But, of course, the 24-105mm is not for everyone. Even among those looking for a good walking-around lens, the $ 1,150 price tag might be too strong. In addition, there are a lot of things this lens won’t do, like macro, for example.  It doesn’t have enough reach for sports or wildlife photography. Although the focal length of the 24-105mm does cover the “portrait lengths,” portrait and wedding photographers will doubtlessly want a faster lens. In fact, anyone shooting inside will likely want a faster lens (larger maximum aperture).

    When you are photographing horses, you need to be ready for a variety of focal lengths.  Sometimes they will walk up to you looking for a treat, and sometimes they stay away.  These stayed away, so I needed all 105 mm.  (Shot at 105 mm, 1/160 sec., f/11, ISO 200)

    When you are photographing horses, you need to be ready for a variety of focal lengths. Sometimes they will walk up to you looking for a treat, and sometimes they stay away. These stayed away, so I needed all 105 mm. (Shot at 105 mm, 1/160 sec., f/11, ISO 200)

    Conclusion

    For many, the 24-105mm will be a great choice. Rarely do you see this combination of focal length, quality, and price. I would say that it would make a great addition to your photography bag, except that it is likely that this lens won’t spent much time in your bag (unless your camera is also in your bag). I agree with Bryan Carnahan of The Digital Picture, who writes that “if I had only one lens, this would be the one.”

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    tablet_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_tab-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78623” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    mobile_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_mob-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78158” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    The post Writer’s Favorite Lens – The Canon 24-105mm f/4 by Jim Hamel appeared first on Digital Photography School.


    Digital Photography School

  • Ello vs. Facebook for Photographers

    Ello vs. Facebook

    Are you an artist or photographer? Do care about the integrity of your images? Do you dislike ads and sponsored posts shoved in your face? Do you dislike having 99% of your feed filtered out of view for those who follow you?

    Look at the above and answer this question: where does my photograph of the St. Louis Arch look better, Ello or Facebook?

    By the way, Ello is not just a social network for photographers. I’ve met some amazing creative writers, thinkers, and purveyors of all sorts of culture there.

    There are communities there building on things like finance, tech, science, politics, etc. It’s an open inclusive community.

    It’s also where I spend almost all of my online time these days. So, if you notice I’m quiet on Facebook and other networks, it’s not that I’m being quiet, per se, it’s just that I’m hanging out over there at Ello.

    Like most new communities online or IRL, it takes some time and energy and effort to make Ello work for you, but it’s a far more rewarding experience and worth it and I’m happy about doing my own part to participate in something better.

    If you are new to Ello here are some tips for you.

    You can find me on Ello here.


    Thomas Hawk Digital Connection

  • 6 Tips for Better Portraits on Location

    Whew it’s been a while since I actually wrote a tutorial here on dPS so I thought it was time. Some of my most popular articles are about portrait lighting patterns and other aspects of creating great portraits. In this article I want to give you a few tips to help you take better portraits on location, flatter your subjects and make sure you are all happy with the final results.

    Mayorga Dec14 0018 600px

    My models for this article are my Nicaraguan friend Luis and his fiancé Sonia. He’s been a great help to us on our tours here and has become a good friend so this was win/win for us as they get a nice portrait of themselves (they don’t have a professional one) and I am allowed to use their photos and their session for teaching purposes here.

    Quick summary:

    This is a quick list of the five tips, we’ll cover each in more detail and look at some examples.

    1. Ask your subject’s what they like and want
    2. Look for the light
    3. Find a good background
    4. Pose you subjects to flatter them
    5. Communicate with them
    6. Do something they want, even if it’s not art

    First a note about gear

    A lot of people get hung on up having the top of the line gear, pro lenses, the fancy bells and whistles, and all the extra gizmos. While it is nice to have the best gear, I want to show you it is possible to make great portraits with ANY gear. All the photos in this article were taken in Granada, Nicaragua (where I am currently living/working for 2.5 months) with an Olympus OM-D E-M5 mirrorless camera, and 12-50mm f3.5-6.3 lens (equivalent to a 24-100mm on a full frame camera). NO flash was used only a reflector in a couple situations.

    Tip #1 talk to your subjects before the session

    Knowing what people want for their portrait, and their expectations is essential to making a portrait they will like. Ask them what kind of clothes they’ll be wearing – formal or casual – that may make certain locations a better choice than others. Talk about feel or mood for the portrait. If it’s a couple are they touchy feely or not. You need to know these things going in, not later when they hate their photos or feel uncomfortable doing something that isn’t really “them”.

    For my couple I found out that she liked certain churches here in town, gardens, and the volcano (keep reading to see how I worked some of that into the session). I scouted out a few locations ahead of time with a friend so I could check out the lighting. If you are going to do this, go at the same time of day you want to do the session. I like to work at golden hour with the sun is low and not overhead, which brings us to the next tip.

    Tip #2 Look for the light

    First and foremost photography is about light. If you have no light or bad light it’s really hard to make good photos. Back to golden hour – this is when the sun is low in the sky either right before sunset or after sunrise. Most portrait photographers choose this time of day as the optimal time to work instead of fighting with midday overhead lighting. Do yourself a favour and make your life easier – whenever possible schedule portraits at golden hour. Find out the sunset time for your area and start an hour or so before that.

    Mayorga Dec14 0003 600px

    In the first spot for our session we actually started on the porch of the house we’re renting here. Across the street is a big white church reflecting the light back under the porch. There’s an overhang covering the top so there is no direct overhead light. It is the perfect situation for great portrait light and one I seek out wherever I’m shooting. Just by turning the subject’s faces a little bit you can create different lighting on. Read more about that in my first ever dPS article: 6 Portrait Lighting Patterns Every Photographer Should Know.

    In the image above you can see the direction of light is coming from camera right (their left). See how he is turned away from the light source slightly and has broad lighting, then watch how it is corrected in the next few images.

    Mayorga BTS 0029 600px

    Behind the scenes shot

    Mayorga BTS 0041 600px

    Use an assistant and reflector when you have a chance. Here I had my assistant holding a white reflector to bounce a bit of light into their faces.

    Tip #3 Find a good background

    Everything in photography is subjective. So how do we define a good background from a bad one? Well there are a few things that can help:

    • Watch for bright spots (and areas of high contrast) in behind your subjects it will draw the viewers eye, usually as a distraction, which is not desired.
    • Avoid bright colours in the background for the same reason. You want the viewers eye to go direction to the people, not the stuff behind them. This is often a problem when your subjects request a garden or flowers in for their background. They do not know this stuff, so it is your job to educate them and make a portrait that is both pleasing to the eye, and to them!
    • Make it appropriate for the subject. Again the idea of a portrait is to portray the person, so sometimes you need to show more of the environment to do so. Just make sure it is fitting for them and helps either flatter them or tell their story.
    • Keep it simple and blur it when possible. A busy and sharp background will draw attention. Use the KISS principle and a large enough aperture to get that background out of focus. A longer lens also helps – something which was limited for me in this situation so do the best you can with what you have.

    In the examples below see how I started with the full church in the background and made a few alterations to simplify and get the focus more on the people.

    Mayorga Dec14 0041 600px

    First shot at the church. Notice how the wide angle lens makes their lower bodies and feet look larger? This is also the same church that was bouncing the light in the first setup.

    Mayorga Dec14 0049 600px

    Much better! In this variation I moved back and zoomed in using a longer lens to get less of the background and crop out the lower bodies.

    Mayorga Dec14 0030 600px

    Next angle shooting from the side on the stairs using the nice leading lines. Again the wider lens makes feet or anything closer to the camera look bigger. Not so much desired, but not horrible in this instance.

    Mayorga Dec14 0031 600px

    Once again zooming to focus more on their faces and in this case a slightly higher camera angle, is far more flattering to them.

    Mayorga Dec14 0034 600px

    Lastly try something different. A super high angle and them looking up has a completely different feeling.

    Tip #4 Pose to flatter people

    Posing people is one of the hardest things to learn but also one of the most important. People are nervous about having their photos taken, and that is often reflected in their body position. It is your job to get them to loosen up and to help them look their best.

    The best way I know how to show people a pose is to do it for them, then get them to repeat it. So I’ll go stand in their spot, strike the pose I want them to do and then have them copy me. Or you can face them and have them mirror you.

    Mayorga BTS 0009 600px

    Here I am showing her how to sit and what not to do – stick your butt towards the camera.

    Mayorga BTS 0117 600px

    And how to position their feet – very important! How the feet are positioned makes a difference to how the body looks. Pay attention from head to toe, literally. If you want them to turn their body – tell them to turn their feet, the body will follow.

    Mayorga Dec14 0051 600px Mayorga Dec14 0054 600px

    Here are a few general tips for posing people:

    • If it bends bend it! Get them to shift their weight to one leg (ALWAYS the back one and hip away from the camera) and let one leg bend naturally. Stiff legged = boring = they look nervous and won’t like the photos.
    • Arms too: get them to put a hand in a pocket (but only the fingers not the thumb, that way they won’t shove it too far in there pulling their pant leg funny), hook a thumb in a belt loop, or if you’re working with a couple hold hands and touch. Remember you should already know if they are touchy feely or not (see tip #1 above) so you know what they’ll be comfortable with. Having people who are family, close friends, or couples touch in their portrait helps to add a feeling of connection and usually helps them relax too.
    • Observe their natural body positions and use them. If you see that she sits a certain way, or puts a hand on her hip – get her to do that. Often I’ll give more loose posing directions to start and see what they end up with on their own – then refine it a little if necessary. They’ll relate more to the portrait if it something they do naturally, and you may even get comments like “Oh that is SO me!”
    • Get ladies to cross legs at the ankles not knees. Crossing at the knee is how most of us sit normally but it makes the legs look unnecessarily bulky. Trust me on this – NO woman wants to look bulkier! Ankles crossed looks feminine and makes a nice line for the legs to follow.
    • Posing a couple: If you are dealing with a couple with a large height difference (as I was in this session) get the man to sit and have her drape her arms around him from the side. Or in a standing pose have him widen his stance more. Putting his feet farther apart will actually lower his total height – a neat little trick that really works.
    • Avoid cropping off people’s hands and feet, they end up looking amputated. If you’re going to crop in, come in closer to make it more obvious and crop to the knees (or higher) and elbows.

    Mayorga Dec14 0006 600px
    In this image (above) with her on the left, I felt it wasn’t as flattering when she leaned to the side (exposing more hip area. Remember in the standing pose – hip pushed away from the camera – same with sitting.

    Mayorga Dec14 0015 600px

    Pose better. He looks bigger, which he is, and her pose is more flattering. At top of the article when we talked about light he was turned away from the church (light source) and had broad lighting. Now that is reversed and he has short and she has broad lighting. I didn’t mind it so much and the pose and expressions were great so I went with it. But a slight head turn changes that:

    Mayorga Dec14 0012 600px

    Tip #5 Communicate with them

    Let’s go back to people are nervous getting their portrait done. The best way to help them relax is to talk to them. It’s not rocket science just talk. Tell them what you’re doing, ask them how their day was, find some common ground to talk about while you fuss with your gear. Just talk!

    Novice photographers also being nervous tend to clam up and go about their business setting up their camera, tripod, metering, testing, etc., and forget they have real people standing there waiting for direction. Silence is awkward, build a rapport with them and help them relax at the same time.

    Also show them some of the photos now and then and tell them how great they’re doing and how fantastic they look. When you share with them you think the photo session is going great they almost instantly relax and get into it more. You may even find them wanting to participate more and come up with ideas for photos.

    Mayorga BTS 0035 600px

    Mayorga BTS 0063 600px

    Tip #6 Do one of their ideas

    Sometimes people will throw out ideas at the session or in your initial fact finding discussion. Don’t discount these right away. Often the suggestions will have some meaning to them or just simply show their tastes. Try to incorporate at least one or two of their ideas into the portrait session, even if you know it’s not going to be the best shot or come out as art. Do it to have some fun and let them know they are an important part of the process.

    In this example remember she said she like a couple of the churches, to see the volcano, and gardens. Let’s see how that came out:

    Mayorga Dec14 0075 600px

    The white church was already used in some of the shots above. We worked the location near our house and then just went for a walk to see what else caught our eyes. The main square here has the big yellow cathedral, and giant Nicaraguan flag, and the volcano in the distance. So I tried to get all of those elements into one shot, and somehow manage to see the couple still. The image above is the result. It doesn’t completely suck but they are pretty small and I wasn’t crazy about the candy cane looking light post.

    Once again I zoomed in to a longer focal length and got a bit closer to crop out their feet. Ignoring the annoying cars behind them, I think this is more effective and still shows all the elements. Waiting for the flag to blow was also important to be able to see it. Patience young grasshopper!

    Mayorga Dec14 0090 600px

    We were losing light fast (happens at sunset) but I wanted to get a few more in for them. Next up they liked the gazebo. I tried to get it in the background but there was a guy sitting there and was near impossible to get him out of the shot and too many people wandering through the background. That and the light just wasn’t working, their eyes and faces were way too dark (below left) and there was no light to get with the reflector (too cloudy).

    Mayorga Dec14 0093 600px Mayorga Dec14 0096 600px

    Moving them under an overhanging branch of a large tree (above right) helped block some of the overhead light of the cloudy sky and still allowed a portion of the gazebo to show in the image.

    Finally walking back to our house we noticed a row of plants on the stoop. So I decided to make it work as a garden-like shot. It’s not my first choice for background but they liked it and that’s all that really matters.

    Mayorga Dec14 0125 600px

    Final tips

    Being a portrait photographer is part lighting technician, part psychologist, and juggler. You have to take all the elements and make them work together including technical, aesthetic and work with real live people at the same time. Like I said – juggling!

    If I can give you one tip to sum up doing portraits on location it would be this:

    Don’t be afraid to admit it’s not working and try something else. There are lots of possibilities even in one location

    Mayorga BTS 0089 600px
    Another behind the scenes shot. I didn’t end up liking the result here but I thought you might like to see the street and a bit of the city of Granada.

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    tablet_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_tab-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78623” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    mobile_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_mob-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78158” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    The post 6 Tips for Better Portraits on Location by Darlene Hildebrandt appeared first on Digital Photography School.


    Digital Photography School

  • Weekly Photography Challenge – Festive Food

    Well it’s that time of the year again. We spend days cooking and preparing for the big feast, then we stuff ourselves and retire to the sofa. Yup it’s holiday time.

    Grant Frederiksen

    By Grant Frederiksen

    Whichever religion or faith you practice, and wherever you live – there is likely some sort of festivities going on this month. I’m spending the holidays in Nicaragua so it will be very different that back home in Canada with my family. I’m sure we’ll have a big meal but it may not be the traditional turkey with all the trimmings – it could look like grilled meat of some kind with rice and beans.

    View this set of mouthwatering holiday food photos on dPS.

    Your job this go around for the weekly photography challenge is to photograph your festive food.

    We have lots of great articles here on dPS to help you out with food photography tips including:

    • 10 Tips to Improve Your Food Photography
    • Using Focus Creatively with Food Photography
    • 5 Tips to Seriously Improve Your Food Photography Techniques
    • 8 Steps to Create Mouth Watering Food Photography
    • 11 Quick Food Photography Tips to Make Mouth Watering Images

    Need more examples?

    FLORENTIN Marius

    By FLORENTIN Marius

    Randy OHC

    By Randy OHC

    FLORENTIN Marius

    By FLORENTIN Marius

    Guilherme Kardel

    By Guilherme Kardel

    Orangejon

    By orangejon

    Sabina\?????? Panayotova\??????????

    By Sabina\?????? Panayotova\??????????

    Share your festive food images here:

    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 favourite photo sharing site and leave the link to them. Show me your best images in this week’s challenge. Sometimes it takes a while for an image to appear so be patient and try not to post the same image twice.

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    tablet_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_tab-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78623” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    googletag.cmd.push(function() {
    mobile_slots.push( googletag.defineSlot( “/1005424/_dPSv4_mob-all-article-bottom_(300×250)”, [300, 250], “pb-ad-78158” ).addService( googletag.pubads() ) ); } );

    The post Weekly Photography Challenge – Festive Food by Darlene Hildebrandt appeared first on Digital Photography School.


    Digital Photography School