Category: Photography

Black and White Conversions: An Introduction to Luminosity

A Guest Post by Nick Rains.

Warning – the following is quite advanced (even geeky) and I must assume the reader has a working knowledge of channels, levels, curves, blending modes, tools etc as well as how the main color models work (RGB, Lab, HSB).

Much has been written about converting colour to Black and White: we all know that there are a great many different ways to do this, some more effective than others. Differences between the various methods are usually explained in terms of visual appeal or the ability to blend the various colour channels to emulate traditional B+W filters. What has not been mentioned is exactly why different greyscale conversions give different results, and more importantly, the fact that this principle can be used to make more accurate adjustments to colour images.

This last point seems quite contradictory; what has greyscale conversion got to do with colour adjustments? Well, quite a lot really when you remember that all RGB colour images are comprised of three different ‘channels’ of greyscale information, each of which represents the lightness values of each of the three colours and that it’s the relationship between them which give us the illusion of ‘colour’.

If you alter a colour image by, say, using the dodging or burning tools, you are actually altering 3 greyscale channels at the same time and unless the relationship between those 3 channels stays exactly the same, there will be a shift of hue or saturation which is of course not the aim of the adjustment. Many of Photoshop’s tools, used at face value, operate on a composite of all three channels – not an ideal situation.

How we see Luminosity

Photoshop very rarely uses the term Luminosity. It is not Brightness in the Hue, Saturation, Brightness (HSB) colour model. It is not the Lightness channel in Lab mode and it is not the K value when you use the colour picker in Greyscale mode.

Luminosity is the perceived brightness of a colour, not it’s numerical or measured value under the above colour models. Look at this image – 3 patches of full strength RGB. Each has a 100% Brightness and a 100% Saturation, all that differs between them is the Hue. However, I think all would agree that the green is perceptually lighter, or more luminous, than the red which is in turn lighter than the blue. So, whilst the numbers show a 100% Brightness, you see quite different tones.

Here is the same image converted to B+W using Image > Adjust > Desaturate. All the colour contrast disappears because the Hue (colour) is removed and the new lightness of the greys in the top row is exactly 50% (127) because the Saturation and Brightness are both equal.

Here is the image converted another simple way : Image > Mode > Greyscale. This is better because the conversion is a little more like our eye sees colour with an emphasis on the Green. In fact the colour weighting is very close to 60%G 30%R and 10%B where the Green lightness as double that of the Red, much like our eyes see and tipping a nod to the fact that there are double the number of Green sensels on a camera’s Bayer array as compared to Red and Blue. The conversion still looks a little lacking in contrast however, and good B+W images really need good impact or contrast to look their best.

Even the Lightness channel in Lab, shown below, does not really depict the relative tones of the colours as we experience them. It is actually a lot closer to the perceived luminance but is perceptually ‘lighter’ overall than the simple Mode > Greyscale conversion.

The most accurate conversion is via the Channel Mixer using these values taken from the sRGB definitions developed by Hewlett Packard (http://www.w3.org/Graphics/Color/sRGB)

71%G 21%R and 8%B.

This gives a slightly more punchy look and it is a good starting point for converting your images to B+W. The Red looks a little dark to my eye, and the Blue a bit dark, but since there is very little pure colour in nature, this combination works well in the real world.

So why the fuss? Why do we need to know all these different methods?

The point to understand is that when you are removing colour information and having your image rely only on greyscale tones you need to control how those tones relate to one another. Do you want the blue of the sky to become a darker greyscale tone than the green grass? Or vice versa.

As an example, for the Australian flag – which greyscale version looks better?

There is no definitively correct answer – it’s the one which looks best. Personally, I think the one with the darker blue looks best because it maintains the perceived brightness of the blue as well as keeping good contrast between the blue and the red.

You need to take control and make sure the colours in the original capture translate to good meaningful contrast in the B+W version. This is the secret of good B+W conversions – not the precise method, but being aware of the tonal distributions and which greyscale value a colour is converted to relative to the other colours’ subsequent greyscale values.

Just to leave you with an advanced ‘teaser’…

What if you duplicated a colour layer and added a monochrome channel mixer adjustment layer to that new layer? You could then change the new layer’s Blend Mode to Luminosity and use the Channel Mixer to adjust the Brightness and Saturation of the colours in the image without affecting the Hue in any way.

If you try doing this directly with Curves or Levels you’ll get a small Hue shift as you adjust the Brightness and Saturation. If you don’t believe me try setting the Info Tool to HSB instead of RGB and read off colours as you make a direct Curves adjustment. You’ll see all three numbers change, including the Hue.

I’ll discuss this further in a future article.

In converting to B+W the green of the jacket and the blue of the cap have darkened whilst the red skin tones have slightly lightened. The face and hands now stand out far better – a good example of a situation where the colours in the original were simply a distraction, adding nothing to the shot, and so were removed.

Nick Rains is a Queensland based photographer who has been shooting professionally since 1983 and has seen first hand many changes in the photographic industry, from manual to auto focus in the late 1980s through to the shift to digital in the past decade or so.

Nick currently shoots feature work for companies like Australian Geographic and Orion Expeditions as well as writing for magazines and blogs around the world. Nick is both a Canon training consultant and a Leica Ambassador, as well as a Master Photographer with the AIPP and a national judge. You can see more of his work at www.nickrains.com or add him to your circles on Google Plus.

For more in-depth photography writing, try Nick’s iPad app “Photique”. It’s a free download.

Post originally from: Digital Photography Tips.

Check out our more Photography Tips at Photography Tips for Beginners, Portrait Photography Tips and Wedding Photography Tips.

Black and White Conversions: An Introduction to Luminosity

Digital Photography School

June 6, 2013
Canadian Travelogue – Newfoundland – Spillars Cove

Spillars Cove lies at the tip of Cape Bonavista, with Bonavista Bay behind you and Trinity Bay ahead as you face east awaiting sunrise. For most of my many visits there the weather has been unbelievable: hurricane force-winds, driving rain and sleet — did I mention wind? Only a handful of times have I been blessed with a calm day, with bright sunny skies and temperatures hovering around 20 degrees; you know, the kind of day that is great for mosquitoes. I’ll take the wind, thank you very much.

In fact, the stronger the winds the better. This mean and rugged coastline lies generally northwest to southeast —perfect for photographs of the sunrise—and strong winds only add to the beauty. Use from two to four stops of graduated filter of various colours to add even more drama to the sky, or, alternatively, underexpose your bracketed frames in full-stop increments for masking via several post production techniques. This incredible shoreline is typically far enough distant to permit lens apertures of f/5.6, to give shutter speeds high enough to keep the crashing waves from blurring while maintaining an acceptable depth of field.

When the light or weather is not cooperating you have to dig deep into that bag of tricks. In this case I have used a tungsten colour correcting filter (80A) to add some colour to an otherwise grey day.

There are several access roads leaving the Trans-Canada Highway between Clarenville and Port Blandford that meander toward Cape Bonavista, and if time is not a concern you should explore the bi-ways that will usually always lead to salt water and a tranquil and quaint fishing village. Once you reach the township of Bonavista be prepared to get lost, planned urban development and ease of transport were unheard of in the 17^th century – streets simply followed the coastline and houses were built … wherever. But this is a part of the charm of rural Newfoundland. If you follow your nose and a few scattered signs you should easily find the lighthouse. A few hundred metres before the ocean sentinel there is the gravel Lance Cove Road to your right that leads to “The Dungeon,” a provincial natural attraction. Take this road and drive south east for about two kilometres along the coast and you will see the Spillars Cove shoreline, as seen above, unfold in the distance.

Should the wind be blowing hard—and it often is—keep your tripod as close to the ground as you can, to minimize camera movement. Once you have composed the image in your viewfinder you can use your body as a wind shield during the exposure. Should the wind be particularly aggressive, the coastline here is firm enough that you can drive your vehicle close to the edge and position it as a wind block to ensure the tripod mounted camera is rock steady. Back absolutely certain the marsh is dry enough to support your car first, and stay safely back from the edge of the cliff however by walking it first.

Another great nearby location for incredible seacoast images is Cable John Cove. From the Dungeon continue driving the gravel road south for another ¾ kilometre until you reach the paved Highway 235 (Bonavista Bay Hwy), and turn left, heading east. Simply drive this road for about one kilometre until the road ends, at which time you can walk the additional 200 metres to the shoreline. Once at the water’s edge simply continue walking the coastline to your left and once atop the little knoll you will see a large and impressive sea stack that begs to be photographed. Be careful when walking along this shoreline – the moss and rocks can get slippery if wet, and the fall to the depths below will be unforgiving.

Certainly not an award winning image, but a snapshot to show what can potentially await the adventuring photographer. As seen from atop the highlands of Cable John Cove.

Another great side trip should be to nearby Elliston. Once in the community ask anyone for directions to the puffin site at Elliston Point. There are about 300 nesting pair of Atlantic puffin at this site and if the wind is blowing in the right direction you should easily be able to striking portraits with a 200mm lens.

If you happen to really lucky and are in this area in early summer ask the locals if they know of any icebergs in the area. You shouldn’t be surprised if there are a couple hidden in some cove; you are, after all, on the banks of Iceberg Alley.

Post originally from: Digital Photography Tips.

Check out our more Photography Tips at Photography Tips for Beginners, Portrait Photography Tips and Wedding Photography Tips.

Canadian Travelogue – Newfoundland – Spillars Cove

Digital Photography School

June 6, 2013
Why Aren’t Search Engines Making Better Use of Their Social Networks for Image Search?

One thing I’ve noticed more and more over the past few years is what a poor job traditional image search engines do vs. social networks.

By using social information around photos (likes, faves, comments, +1s, etc.), social networks typically produce much superior image search results than traditional image search.

Take this search of Coachella 2013 for example.

Yahoo Image Search: “Coachella 2013″

Google Image Search: “Coachella 2013″

Flickr Image Search: “Coachella 2013″

The first image comes from Yahoo (or is it Microsoft these days, I can’t keep it all straight). It’s not very good. It shows too many images of just the lineup vs. actual fun interesting photos of the event itself.

Google’s image search results are better, but still not as good as many of the images I find on social networks.

Now I may be biased (as I shot this particular event) but I think Flickr’s search results are *far* better than either Google or Yahoo Image search.

I’m working on a project right now to photograph the 100 largest American cities. When I’m researching things to photograph in these cities I almost always go first to Flickr (because it’s the largest database of highly organized quality photos on the web). I will also look at Google+ too, sometimes. Google+ doesn’t have as many high quality images in the total database as Flickr, yet, but I find some pretty good stuff there sometimes still. Most of Flickr’s advantage here over Google+ just has to do with the fact that they are older and have more images indexed.

Lately I’ve also played around with graph search on Facebook for images — I haven’t been very impressed there at all though.

The one place I hardly ever go is to the actual Google or Yahoo image search engines — because the results are so inferior.

Here’s what I don’t get: *why* are the results at Yahoo and Google Image search inferior? Google and Yahoo have access to proprietary internal social data around photos in their social networks, why isn’t that coming through better in the signal for high quality images.

On my example search using Coachella 2013, not a single Flickr photo appears on Yahoo’s first page image search and not a single Google+ image appears on Google’s first page image search.

Shouldn’t these search engines be better mining organically and socially ranked superior content? It’s not that these engines don’t index it, they do, it’s just not ranking well.

Beyond just better image search, Google and Yahoo *should* have another significant incentive to better include their social images into image search.

All things being equal, assuming you could improve image search results, wouldn’t you want to drive more traffic to your own internal social network, rather than to some unrelated destination — and wouldn’t you want to reward the best photographers on your social network with more traffic vs. some random SEO rigged site somewhere?

Why aren’t image search engines doing a better job with social?

Another added benefit to driving image search traffic to your social network, is that the presentation there is usually better, more uniform and consistent. When I’m tempted to go further on an image from Yahoo or Google, I may end up at some odd sized photo, in some odd format. With a G+ or Flickr result I get a strong consistent image experience that I’m familiar with.

As an unrelated topic dealing with image search on Flickr — the best social image search on the web today — Flickr needs to give us the ability to block certain users from our search results. Many popular photographers will pollute image search on Flickr by falsely tagging things that are not in their popular photos, just to try to garner traffic.

Take this search on Flickr for dog for example. So many of the first page results are not photos of dogs at all. Flickr should allow us to block certain users from our search results in order to better refine them. When we block people from our search results, this should also be a signal to Flickr that this user should rank much worse in search. If users get the message that they will be penalized for purposely mistagging their photos, they will be less likely to try and game the system this way, resulting in better image search on Flickr for all of us.

Thomas Hawk Digital Connection

June 6, 2013
Mastering Photoshop Textures to Create Powerful Imagery

Photoshop has done for photography what the road did for the wheel! That’s quite a bit in case you’re wondering… This union has made photography the worlds 2nd most popular past time… Because let’s face it; creating exciting images is indeed thrilling, and most of all, highly addictive! One such addiction is a single technique: Simple to grasp,hard to master! Continue Reading

The post Mastering Photoshop Textures to Create Powerful Imagery appeared first on Photodoto.

Photodoto

June 5, 2013
Snapsation Launched Today at LeWeb

Congratulations to my good pal Chris Chabot on the launch of his new photography services internet site today at LeWeb, Snapsation. Snapsation is an innovative new site that matches photographers and clients looking to hire photographers.

If you are a professional photographer or just an amateur looking to buy a few new lenses, either way you will want to check out this new place to market you and your work. You can find me there at http://snapsation.com/thomashawk

Thomas Hawk Digital Connection

June 5, 2013
The Yukon’s Northern Lights – Behind the Scenes

A guest post by Phil Hart – author of the Shooting Stars eBook (use code DPSTARS for a 25% discount).

My three favourite things in the world are mountains, aurora and snow. In early 2012 I got all three of them in spades when I spent nine weeks in the frozen north of Canada’s Yukon Territory.

With four cameras and dozens of lenses, tripods and a truck full of extreme cold weather gear, I journeyed across the Yukon and chased every gap in the clouds I could find. Three terabytes and a long learning curve later, this video is short, fast and high-impact two minute compilation of some of the best footage I captured during my aurora adventures.

In this post, let me share some of the ‘behind the scenes’ work that went into producing it. First the video, which you really do have to watch in full-screen with the lights down and the music up!

The Yukon’s Northern Lights from Phil Hart on Vimeo.

Camera Gear

Cameras: 2 * Canon 5D Mark II and a Canon 1100D (aka Rebel T3).

Lenses: Canon 24mm f1.4L (I & II) and 14mm f2.8L with the full-frame cameras and Canon 10-22mm f3.5-5.6 and 15-85mm f3.5-5.6 with the cropped sensor camera.

Tripods: Various Manfrotto and Induro tripods with mainly ball-heads. The grease in the Manfrotto heads froze at around -25 ºC (~15 ºF) but were still workable.

Remote Releases: I was using both programmable and simpler push-button cable releases. Most often I simply had the camera in Manual mode, set with a particular aperture, ISO and exposure duration. With the camera set to Continuous Shooting mode (aka Sports mode) I could lock the button down on the cable release and the camera would fire off a long sequence of images with the same setting (and almost no gap in between) until I came back to stop the sequence (or the battery ran flat).

Dew Heaters: Dew is a common problem for night sky photography, but in sub-arctic climates like that in the Yukon, the air is so dry that it is less of a problem (although it forms as frost, not dew with the temperature well below freezing). Some nights when the cameras were running on long sequences, I did need a little protection from frost on the lenses, and was generally using little 2-inch heater straps from from Dew-Not.

Power Supplies: 12 volt lithium-ion batteries to power dew-heaters, motion control (below) and also one of the cameras via a DC-power adapter for long all-night sequences. Lithium-ion is about the only type of widely available battery-chemistry that can cope with extremely cold temperatures. While their capacity did drop, I could still get 1 hour of continuous operation out of my Canon 5D Mark II even at temperatures down to -40 degrees and a very respectable 2 hours at milder temperatures of -15 ºC (~0 ºF).

Setting Up Gear in the Cold

Exposure Settings

The aurora can vary enormously in brightness. When it is quiet, it can be as faint or fainter than the Milky Way, requiring 30 seconds with a high ISO setting (~1600-3200) to capture it nicely (like the final aurora sequences in the video). However, when it is bright it can be as bright as the Full Moon. On those few nights of the greatest aurora storms (like the two main sequences in the video), exposures of just 2-4 seconds can be enough (still with the aperture wide open and a high ISO).

The other challenge with aurora is how fast it can move. Generally there is a balance here with the brightness. Faint aurora displays are usually also quiet in terms of movement, so longer exposures do not blur out too much of the movement. The fast moving auroras also tend to be bright, and the curtains and rays move rapidly, enough to cause them to blur significantly even in 8-10 second exposures. So it’s important to keep carefully balancing the trade-off in this regard. You get more experienced at this quite quickly, but fast lenses also help a lot, which is why I particularly valued the 24mm f1.4 lenses I was using extensively during this trip for images like this one:

Fast and Bright Aurora: 2 second exposure with 24mm lens at f1.4, ISO3200.

Focus

Focus at night is difficult already, but with timelapse you have the additional complexity of often incorporating some foreground elements without the daytime luxury of stopping the lens down to provide high depth-of-field. In most cases this can be avoided by trying to work with large foreground elements that can be kept a couple of meters away from the camera. Although focus on the stars and the foreground is not perfectly the same, at this distance the difference is not significant enough for most people to notice or object to. The eye is also a lot more forgiving of these kind of compromises in video than it is high with a large format still image.

Motion Control

Vixen Polarie: A compact little mount designed for taking tracked long-exposures of the stars but which can also be easily used as a simple panning mount when the motorized axis is pointed vertically.

Dynamic Perception Stage Zero Dolly: A six-foot long aluminium dolly rail with controller, used to provide the sliding sequences in the video. The LCD screen on this was very difficult to read and slow to update in extreme cold conditions.

Custom controller: Developed jointly with Fred Vanderhaven, this provided pan/tilt motion control and almost fully automated day-to-night twilight exposure control. It was only used for two of the clips in this video and the functionality in that case was similar to the Vixen Polarie.

One of the strongest sequences in the video (as the music really kicks in) has the camera moving in between two trees, with aurora on the left and moonrise on the right. Here is the scene as that sequence was being captured:

Dynamic Perception Dolly in Action

And here is a still from the resulting image sequence:

Still image from sequence captured on Dynamic Perception Dolly as shown in previous image

Image Processing and Video Editing

My workflow for editing timelapse video from the RAW image sequences has improved a lot, but it is still a very time-consuming process. And while I am very experienced at using Lightroom and Photoshop to process astrophotography images, I am still a relative beginner at video editing.

I do the most significant development of the RAW files in Lightroom, choosing one frame that is representative of the sequence and then sync the settings across all the images so that they have the same processing. In some cases, where there is a big change in brightness (which happens a lot with aurora) I use Gunther Wegner’s LRTimelapse software to interpolate development settings between keyframes in the sequence, to cope with large changes.

After saving the settings to the Metadata for the images, I then I import the sequences into Adobe After Effects, and use that to render the sequence of RAW files to a loss-less intermediate video file. One of the most common effects I apply in After Effects is to use the Neat Video noise reduction plug-in. This has a ‘neat’ temporal noise reduction algorithm which compares changes between frames to help reduce noise (which varies between frames) without smearing out real detail (which is constant, but perhaps moving between frames). The Neat Video plug-in makes a significant difference to the quality of the end-result.

The other plug-in that I made some use of is the Granite Bay Deflicker plug-in. This was essential for smoothing out flicker that is present in the evening and morning twilight sequences, and was also used in the moonset clip.

The final video was compiled from the individual sequences using Adobe Premier Pro.

Composition: Reflections and Mountains

Many classic and beautiful images of the northern lights involve reflections in the foreground. The problem for me was that there is very little open water anywhere in the Yukon in the back half of winter, with the temperature having dropped as cold as -40 ºC (~40 ºF). The only place I found was an artificial deep water outlet from Fish Lake, near the capital Whitehorse. The night that I was there the aurora was very quiet but I did manage to capture a short sequence late in the night.

Fish Lake Aurora Reflections

Aside from that, one of my favourite locations was along Annie Lake Road which offered a nice mix of trees, open areas and mountain views as well. In this image, the reflections are in some relatively clean flat ice that had been cleared of snow by wind and some early spring sunshine during the day.

Annie Lake Aurora Reflections in Ice

One of the reasons I was keen to be in the Yukon rather than the even more desolate and flat Northwest Territories (where the weather and aurora prospects may be better) is the more interesting terrain. However, with very few roads and even less open in winter getting access to interesting locations was quite a challenge.

The image below is the most spectacular mountain view I captured (technically in the northern part of British Columbia), looking south from the road between Haines Junction and Haines Alaska. However, except on the biggest storm nights, the aurora was generally viewed to the north. So I never saw aurora over these mountains but they did make for a great sunrise sequences to end the video with. Aside from that, my favourite mountain location was way up north in Tombstone Park, which you can see in the image of ‘fast and bright aurora’ above.

Mountains viewed from the Haines Alaska Road

Music

Timelapse videos without music can still be interesting to watch, but are hardly captivating. Good music brings them alive, although it’s hard to suit everyone’s tastes. There are several online sites offering stock audio clips, but the images and the story flow so much stronger with music that is composed and produced to match the visuals. In this case, I again set my talented friend Dean Roberts (of ‘The Dirt Floor‘) the challenge of recording music for the video. Aside from watching the video the previous day, he recorded and edited the track for this in one (long) day. I hope you enjoy the rockin’ soundtrack he came up with.

If you’ve read this far and not watched the video yet, have a look – I know you’ll enjoy it! And if you’ve got a taste for aurora, you can read more about my adventures in the Yukon and see more videos on my blog: philhart.com/tag/yukon-aurora

Post originally from: Digital Photography Tips.

Check out our more Photography Tips at Photography Tips for Beginners, Portrait Photography Tips and Wedding Photography Tips.

The Yukon’s Northern Lights – Behind the Scenes

Digital Photography School

June 5, 2013
Yahoo Running Television Commercials for the New Flickr

Lest anyone doubt Marissa Mayer and Yahoo’s new commitment to photo sharing site Flickr, apparently Yahoo is now running a paid television commercial for the photo sharing site — the first of its kind as far as I’m aware. Following some of the tweets on the commercial spot, it sounds like it may have begun running yesterday on NBC programming.

The advertisement, which features the Bright Eyes song, “The First Day of My Life,” shows a photo montage of pug dogs, among other images. You can watch the commercial yourself above from Yahoo’s corporate YouTube account.

The commercial comes out a few weeks after a successful new redesign of the site that gave all Flickr users a free terabyte of high res photo space.

I posted previously on an informal statistic of uploads being up 71% at Flickr since the redesign, these statistics would seem to be in line with other metrics that Yahoo is also seeing internally, according to Flickr Community Manager Thea Lampkin.

“[W]e have a lot of data already and are measuring traffic to all the new pages (don’t worry, it’s all anonymous),” writes Lampkin. “So far the metrics have been overwhelmingly positive, and we’re very happy with how Flickr members everywhere are interacting with the new site. Sets in particular are getting more traffic than ever before.”

Thomas Hawk Digital Connection

June 5, 2013
Women Posing Guide in Action: 7 Sample Poses – 21 Different Photos

A post by Kaspars Grinvalds from Posing App.

Previously published articles in the Posing Guide series contained hand illustrated posing samples as a guide or reference during your photo shoots. Based upon feedback and questions I received about these guides, I wanted to describe the process in a little more detail and show some real photos created while using these posing techniques.

I’d like to begin by stating once again – the main purpose of using posing samples is only to get your model into some starting point. That’s it. You don’t need to (and quite often you wouldn’t be able to) precisely recreate even the simplified illustrated pose.

This will be a three part series looking at standing, sitting and laying down poses for female models. For the the first article I chose seven sample standing poses and by slightly adjusting each pose I got 21 different photos. Now, let’s take a look at this process.

Pose 1

It is a good idea to start your photo shoot with some very basic, easy pose. That’s why I chose this one to begin with. It’s easy to describe and easy to understand – “portrait shot from a side”. So you might start with saying to your model “Ok, turn with your side towards me, turn your head to me and look right over the shoulder at the camera. Straighten your spine and keep hands loose by sides.”

Photo 1 – With these instructions you should get something like the first picture. The next thing without changing the pose, is to “find” the face expression you’re looking for. You may want to try moving from very subtle smirks to stronger smiles or even laughter. And once you have the expression (or different ones) you’re after, tell and show it to the model. Thereby it will be easy for the model to learn and repeat it.

Photo 2 – After I got the simple and kind expression I was looking for, I slightly changed my position and asked the model to keep looking back over her shoulder to the camera. Exactly the same pose, just taken from another angle and you already have a slightly different photo.

Photo 3 – Also many different looking directions and head tilts are possible. In this particular example I asked the model to look back down her body. This look works very well in many posing situations, creating yet another variation just by slightly adjusting the starting pose.

Pose 2

Seeing this sample illustration you should grab only the basic idea – “portrait shot with hands around the face”. That’s all you need for playing around with initial sample pose. Eventually you will come up with some nice variations of your own.

Photo 4 – Before getting to the hands, ask the model to stand facing the camera and support her body weight on just one leg. This instantly curves her body and her shoulder line is shifted. After that ask her to gently move her hands around the face and in the hair. Generally look for asymmetrical hand placements, but as you can imagine – many variations are possible.

Photo 5 – In this shot the only difference is slight tilting of the head and putting one hand behind the hair.

Photo 6 – To differentiate the look and feel, I once again asked the model to look down her own body and cropped tighter around the face. And again with only minor adjustments from one pose we’ve got 3 different photos.

Pose 3

Another easy pose with very simple idea – “hands connected on the chest”. Notice that hands are not really “crossed”, but “connected”. Also you should warn your model not to grip them too tight or press upper arms against the body. Simply put, the posture should feel comfortable and subtle.

Photo 7 – Before taking this shot, I showed the model the sample illustration and she tried to recreate it. This is as close as you usually get if you recreate the sample pose.

Photo 8 – The outlines don’t and won’t match perfectly. In this particular example I took a shot from higher angle aiming slightly down because I saw that this angle works better for the model.

Photo 9 – Another simple way of transforming the pose is simply mirroring it the other way around. And to even more differentiate it from the first shot, I asked the model to lean against a wall.

And then I moved closer and took a head shot for just another variation of the same pose.

Pose 4

This simple pose is again self-explanatory – “the model turned to the side with one hand on the waist”. That’s all I tried to recreate.

Photo 10 – Here I started straight away with mirroring the sample pose because this was the better looking side for my model. Remember that it is different for each person. If you are not sure, take both variations and ask your model which one she prefers.

Photo 11 – From side view I followed to 45 degree position and asked the model to keep looking to the camera.

Photo 12 – Lastly, I just moved farther away for wider frame. The same pose, but these minor variations provide you with greater choice of images to select from in post.

Pose 5

This pose provides simple yet elegant at the wall concept – “standing at the wall with hands behind the back”.

Photo 13 – Start with asking your model to support herself at the wall with her back. After that the first thing to take care of is shifting her body weight on one leg with the other crossed over it. Even if the legs are not visible in the frame, it is critical for forming the model’s body in S shape. Then ask her to place her hands behind her back asymmetrically. Finally ask her to lean forward slightly away from the wall with her upper body part.

Photo 14 – As usual I tried changing my shooting angle and took the next shot more from a side.

Photo 15 – And I continued to experiment with slightly different hand placement and head tilt. These images might be very similar, but most probably your subjects will be grateful for this kind of choice.

Pose 6

Another at the wall pose but this time with the model facing the wall. Easy to describe and recreate. Both hands are gently placed on the wall right in front of her just below the breast line.

Photo 16 – With the previous instructions the model easily achieved the described pose. And again I chose mirroring the sample illustration which already is one variation for any pose.

Photo 17 – Here I changed the shooting angle nearly parallel to the wall and cropped for a portrait shot.

Photo 18 – Finally the model changed the hand placement asymmetrically for just another variation.

Pose 7

This is a bit more challenging pose than the previous ones, so definitely some guidance for the model is required in order to recreate it.

Photo 19 – The trick for the model here is to stand slightly off the wall and support herself against the wall with the front shoulder only. Front hand is loosened by the wall. After that the model should support the body weight on the outer leg, kicking the hip out with the inner leg crossed over. The back arm rests on the hip and the elbow is pulled behind her back.

Photo 20 – After managing the starting pose I started to variate it. Here I moved closer for tighter crop and asked the model to lean slightly forward along the wall.

Photo 21 – And finally I asked the model to turn sideways, supporting against the wall with both shoulders. And to further differentiate the shots I asked her to look down her body.

So, that’s it. Out of 7 sample poses we managed to get 21 different shots. And as you can easily imagine, even these are only samples, adjustments and variations are indeed endless.

All of these illustrations and many more posing samples are available on Posing App for your mobile devices.

Kaspars Grinvalds is a photographer working and living in Riga, Latvia. He is the author of Posing App where more poses and tips about people photography are available.

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Post originally from: Digital Photography Tips.

Check out our more Photography Tips at Photography Tips for Beginners, Portrait Photography Tips and Wedding Photography Tips.

Women Posing Guide in Action: 7 Sample Poses – 21 Different Photos

Digital Photography School

June 4, 2013
Studio Lighting Tips For Beginners
Even as a new photographer you’ll no doubt be aware of the not-so-secret ingredient to creating stunning photographs – lighting. But there are so many things to consider so where do you start? This article will hopefully ‘shed some light’ on some basic but important techniques to improve your shots.

Choose the best light source

Remember that your lighting setup should depend on the purpose of your shoot, the time of day (if you want natural light), and what you’re capturing. Your first task therefore is to choose the right type for the job. So without further ado here’s a breakdown of the main lighting sources and what they’re best for:
- Continuous light sources, as the name implies, stay lit continuously much like a lightbulb or tube. They’re a great option for beginners on a budget as they’re generally much cheaper than flash lights. A big benefit is that they immediately show you where shadows will appear in the studio. Be wary that such lighting tends to release a lot of heat – not ideal for photographing human subjects for long periods.
- Flash lighting tends to be a lot more powerful than continuous equipment and is great for capturing quick-moving subjects – for instance when you’re shooting a family session in your studio with energetic children running about.
- Natural light isn’t for everyone. It can boost portraiture shots with a realistic, natural quality when there’s plenty of it (and vastly reduces the strength of catch light in the eyes). However, if there isn’t enough, it can have an adverse effect on your subjects – giving them a dull, dark look. If your studio allows for a good amount of natural light though, I do recommend you at least give it a try.
Portrait photography ideas

An excellent way of brightening up your portraits without using harsh lighting is by utilising a reflector. Simply sit your subject near a window and place a reflector up to a metre from their face – the natural light bounces off, illuminating the portrait and filling up unwanted shadows. Don’t want to spend lots on a reflector? Make your own! Simply use a sheet of card covered in tin foil. You’ll be surprised how effective it is.

Also, try experimenting with the angles of the light source in relation to your subject. Small angle adjustments can make big differences to the look of your photos. As a general guide, lighting from a person’s side produces more of a shadow-heavy yet dramatic style, whilst placing the light behind creates a silhouette. To emphasise your subject even more, or to highlight a particular aspect (such as their hair), try experimenting with a second flash light. We do of course recommend you master a one-flash set up first before taking on two.

Photographing children

As we suggested before, using continuous light sources near people can sometimes cause discomfort due to the high amount of heat they emit, and is even more of a concern for young children. If there’s sufficient natural light available, it’s best to use that. Otherwise, opt for a softbox attachment. For movement-heavy shoots, go for flash.

For older children I suggest utilising both flash and continuous. Softboxes help brighten children’s already cute faces and you may want to try large umbrellas to really enhance the catch lights.

–

Lisa Gill is a professional photographer who also teaches a range of courses from her studio in Buckinghamshire, UK.
http://www.lisagillphotography.co.uk

dslrBlog
June 4, 2013
Critique Yourself: Weekly Photography Challenge

This week we published a post by Lynsey Peterson in which she shared 5 of her own images that she feels could have been better.

It was a brave move by Lynsey to share that post and got me thinking about the topic of self critique.

My own experience of photography is that going through the process of critiquing your own work to see how you might improve is actually a very valuable process and as a result I’d like to encourage others to do the same as this weeks photography challenge.

Your challenge is to share a photo that you’ve taken recently and share with us how you’d improve it if you could shoot it again.

Would you change the composition, use different gear, pose your subject differently, shoot at a different time of day, use a different approach to lighting…. or something else?

There’s no need to write a long essay critique (although feel free). Just a few points on what you’d do to improve your shot next time is fine.

Once you’ve worked out which shot you want to critique upload it to your favourite photo sharing site either share a link to them even better – embed them in the comments using the our new tool to do so.

If you tag your photos on Flickr, Instagram, Twitter or other sites with Tagging tag them as #DPSCRITIQUE 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.

Also – don’t forget to check out some of the great shots posted in last weeks Spirit challenge – there were some great shots submitted.

Post originally from: Digital Photography Tips.

Check out our more Photography Tips at Photography Tips for Beginners, Portrait Photography Tips and Wedding Photography Tips.

Critique Yourself: Weekly Photography Challenge

Digital Photography School

June 4, 2013