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Posts Tagged ‘Photos’

How to Take Great Photos with Your iPhone

03 May

The post How to Take Great Photos with Your iPhone appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Sandra Roussy.

Camera phones have certainly come a long way. A few years ago it was impossible to try to achieve good photos with the camera that came with your smartphone. The quality and resolution were so low that we didn’t even think about post-processing and posting our photos.

The iPhone has had steady updates with new features added over the years including constant improvements to the camera quality. When the iPhone 8Plus came onto the market, photographers were finally ready to take photos that they could be proud of editing and posting. Many professional photographers are now using their smartphone cameras to snap photos during their travels or even on assignments.

Of course, the iPhone is limited and can’t provide all the creative features that a DSLR with interchangeable lenses can. But some days, carrying bulky camera gear is impossible, so the iPhone provides a great alternative.

Learn how to use your iPhone to its full potential, and you too will be taking great photos with your camera phone! We’ll take a look at the iPhone 8plus and newer models in this article because they have some great new photo features like Portrait Mode.

Super helpful tip: Use the slide-left feature from your lock screen to get quick access to your camera.

Learn the settings

Set to highest quality

Your iPhone camera can offer some high-quality photos and videos. If you intend to store hundreds of photos on your phone without downloading or transferring them into a cloud-based platform, then you may want to shoot in low resolution, so your phone doesn’t get full.

When you do want to shoot something important and want to edit the photos afterward, it’s best to shoot in the highest quality possible.

Set your focus point

The iPhone has a feature that you can use to set your exact focus point, and it’s quite important to use it to achieve tack sharp images.

  • Compose your shot
  • Tap your screen where you want the focus to be.
  • Slide the exposure up or down (The little yellow sun icon).
  • Press and hold to lock the focus point and recompose your photo if you wish (AE/AF LOCK).
  • Take your photo.

About HDR

HDR means High Dynamic Range and what it does is help provide evenly exposed images. The camera takes 3 shots when you take a photo and stacks them to provide a perfectly exposed image with all components having details in both the highlights and shadows.

Go to your camera setting and toggle off Auto HDR and Keep Normal Photo toggled on. While shooting you will see the HDR icon at the top. If there is a line through it, simply tap it to activate.

Helpful Tip: Your iPhone gives you the option to preserve your last shoot settings. This is especially useful when you plan to do the same type of photography. If these are not toggled on, the iPhone goes back to its default setting every time.

Use the grid lines

Nothing says amateur like a crooked horizon line. One of our pet peeves as photographers is to see a beautiful landscape where the ocean seems to be sliding down the side of the photograph.

Tilt your head to look at the photo? No.

Better, apply grid lines on your iPhone so that you can align the horizon line to get a perfectly straight horizon.

How-to: Go to settings and toggle the Grid option on.

Composition tips and tricks

Rule of thirds

Rule of Thirds is the main composition rule of photography that allows the viewer’s eye to flow easily over a photo. This is a good guideline to follow but it is not always the best composition for every situation.

Tip: Having the Grid Lines toggled on will help you achieve the rule of thirds better.

Keep it simple

Sometimes less is more. When you cram too much info into a photograph, the viewer doesn’t know where to look and may not capture your intent. Keep white space and focus on a single subject. This will bring attention to the subject and give your photo more creative meaning.

Get down and raise it up

Shooting from the same perspective and position will most probably create some pretty boring and repetitious photos. Try getting down on the ground and see how the perspective changes. This can sometimes add some drama to your subjects. Also, look up! Look at the contrasts with the sky, buildings, trees, and clouds.

Move in close

Sometimes a small detail can take a photograph from good to WOW!

Observe light, colors, and shadows

Learning to observe how light affects objects and changes throughout the day is key to improving your photos. Observe how shadows get created and how the light hits particular objects and capture those unique events.

Look for contrasts of color or a single color pop in a monotone environment.

Photo modes and special features

The iPhone comes with photo modes for you to choose from. The best feature to have come out in the last few years is Portrait Mode.

Portrait Mode

As of the introduction of the iPhone 8 plus, Portrait Mode has been accessible and has provided some broader creative possibilities. The iPhone Xs and iPhone Xr have the option to adjust the depth of field while shooting in Portrait Mode. Portrait Mode makes great portraits, of course, but can also be used for so much more. Try setting to portrait mode when you want a bokeh effect or a blurry background in your photos.

 

Square

This mode is useful if you want to post on Instagram while keeping your composition intact.

 

Pano

Shoot some panoramic photos to show a greater angle of a landscape.

Special features

Burst Mode: Burst mode is great when you want to capture some action shots. Press and hold the shutter button, and the camera takes a series of photos.

Live Photo: Live photo is a fun feature that records 3-second videos before and after you have pressed the shutter. When viewing your photo, press and hold the photo to see the effect in action. You can activate or deactivate this feature in your camera mode.

Loop, Bounce, Long Exposure: Swipe up on your Live Photo to gain access to a few more features that let you loop the live photo effect, bounce it, or create a long exposure.

Zoom or no zoom – Attachable lens options

  • The newer versions of the iPhone have two lenses that allow you to zoom into your subject without moving in closer. This is practical when photographing wildlife or even when doing portraits.
  • Click on the 1X at the bottom of the camera screen. The zoom will go to 2X. Click your photo. You can pinch your screen and zoom even further, but this can cause shake in your photo and probably create blur.

Attachable lenses have hit the market and can offer some fun alternatives when shooting. They come in a variety of prices and quality. Macro lenses and fish-eye lenses seem to be the most popular.

Try photo apps and filters

Photo editing apps and software are very popular with amateurs and professional photographers alike. Some apps let you add filters to create moods, while others give you access to features that let you edit and fine-tune your iPhone photos.

Some of these apps even let you get out of the automatic iPhone mode and into manual shooting mode. They let you adjust your shutter speed, ISO, and aperture as you wish.

Here is a list of some of our favorite apps available for your iPhone.

Pro Camera

You can shoot in Manual, Semi-automatic, or Automatic modes with Pro Camera. It contains RAW capture, live histogram, and an anti-shake feature. Pro Camera is the app that allows you to achieve super sharp images with your iPhone.

Snapseed

Snapseed is a popular go-to app for every level photographer. It’s one of the most complete free apps offering a variety of functions to edit your photos.

VSCO

VSCO is one of those apps, that when downloaded, allows you to shoot from your camera phone with the option of controlling the ISO, white balance, shutter speed, and other customizable camera functions.

Like a DSLR, you adjust your exposure components before you shoot to get your desired outcome. You can create long exposure photographs and fine-tune your focus points.

There’s a useful active tilt meter to level your phone to achieve a perfectly straight horizon line.

Have some fun with your iPhone

Even if you own an expensive DSLR and shoot in Manual mode, you can still get some great shots with your iPhone. The latest generation iPhones have stepped up the game regarding the cameras, lenses, and shooting options.

Keep in mind a few helpful tips to achieve beautiful compositions and don’t forget to add some useful photo-editing apps on your iPhone.

Your iPhone photos will look more professional, and you’ll be proud to post and show them off.

Feel free to share some with us in the comments section below.

 

The post How to Take Great Photos with Your iPhone appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Sandra Roussy.


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Think Tank Photo’s Stash Master 13L is a modular travel cube for your camera gear

03 May

Think Tank Photo has announced the release of the Stash Master 13L, a travel cube designed to safely store camera equipment in a package that can be used on its own or added to any large backpack to instantly turn it into a camera bag.

Think Tank Photo specifically designed the Stash Master 13L so it was large enough to fit the ‘holy trinity’ of lenses — a 70-200mm F2.8, a 24-70mm F2.8 and a 16-35mm F2.8 (or equivalents — alongside a gripped camera body. While the internal baffles can be customized, it should be good to go out of the box to fit all three lenses, a camera body and a decent selection of accessories.

The travel cube is constructed of a 100D rip-stop nylon and features DWR coating to keep moisture away from camera gear. It features YKK RC-Fuse zippers a tuck away front flap with foam panel that can be removed in the event you want to keep the gear more accessible when the cube is stored inside a backpack.

On both the top and bottom of the camera bag are a pair of carrying straps and the side features webbing loops so a shoulder strap can be attached, making for a modular sling-style bag. Think Tank Photo also notes the bag is a perfect match for its recently-released BackLight Elite 45L backpack, where it can be stored inside for back-panel access.

Below are a few gear setup examples Think Tank Photo has provided for what can fit inside:

• One gripped DSLR with lenses attached up to a 70-200mm f/2.8 plus, 2–3 standard zoom lenses and a flash.
• Two ungripped DSLRs with lenses attached up to a 70–200mm f/2.8 and 1–2 standard zoom lenses.
• Two gripped mirrorless bodies with lenses attached up to a 70–200mm f/2.8 plus 3–5 additional lenses.

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The external dimensions of the travel cube are 31cm x 31cm x 19cm (12.2in x 12.2in x 7.5in), its internal dimensions are 30cm x 30cm x 18cm (11.8in x 11.8in x 7.1in) and it weighs just 400g (0.9lbs). The Stash Master 13L is currently listed on Think Tank Photo’s website for $ 59.99, but is labeled as ‘Out of Stock’ at the time of posting this article.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
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How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time – Part Three – Post-Processing for Exposure Optimization

26 Apr

The post How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time – Part Three – Post-Processing for Exposure Optimization appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Kevin Landwer-Johan.

Digital photography allows us an incredible scope to work on our computers to enhance and manipulate images. Optimizing your exposures during post-processing can make a dull, flat-looking photograph into a much more vibrant and interesting one.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every TimeMarket Guy

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

My approach to post-processing most of the time is to make my photos look as they did when I captured them or with some variation to the background tone. Because our eyes see more dynamic range than our cameras, this means I am working to balance my exposure and the way the light looks in the photo.

RAW or Jpg?

If your photos are saved only as jpg’s, your camera will have made certain tweaks to them already. It may have added some sharpening, color balance, contrast tweaks and possibly manipulated them in other ways. Jpg images as designed to look good straight out of your camera and may require little or no post-processing.

If you do decide to work on your jpg files, you will face limitations because of the file quality. As your camera saves jpg files, it compresses them and discards some of the information from the photos. Jpgs are technically lower quality which means they do not stand up to as much post-processing as RAW files do.

RAW files contain all the information your camera captured when you pressed the shutter release. They do not look great when you first see them because the camera has not altered them at all during the capturing and saving process.

To make a RAW file look good you must make some adjustments manually or use a preset or Action to make them for you. The technical quality of a RAW file is superior because there is no data lost from what your camera recorded. You have a greater capacity to be able to manipulate these files without losing quality.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Temple and Big Sky

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Choose your best photos

From each series of photographs you make I hope that you will have a number of exposure options to choose from when you sit down at your computer. Picking the best images to work on is the first part of post-processing.

Naturally, you’ll be wanting to pay most attention to the main subject in your photo. Is it exposed the way you want it to be? Can you see that there’s sufficient detail in those areas of your composition?

In some cases, such as when you’ve made a silhouette or are using low-key lighting and high contrast, you may have little or no detail in your subject. This is okay if that’s what you want.

However, if exposing for detail was your intention, and there’s not enough in your photo, look at the pictures where you used different exposure settings.

Your background exposure is also important. Does it enhance and support your main subject? Is it too bright or too dark? Again, look to see if there is detail. When there’s no detail, because of overexposure or underexposure, it will be more difficult to manipulate these areas.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Attractive Young Photographer

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Make use of the histogram

Your histogram gives you information about the tonal values in your images. It shows you where the most detail is and if you have lost detail in the bright or dark parts of your compositions.

If your histogram is bunched up to the left or the right of the chart, with the graphic touching the top, this means there will be no detail recorded in those areas.

If you can see a histogram bunched to the right and hitting the top, you will have lost detail in the highlights. If it’s bunched to the left and hitting the top, you have lost detail in the dark areas.

If your main subject is within this range and you wanted it to contain detail, you will need to choose a photo with a different exposure setting to work on.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Hill Tribe Girl

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Using presets or manual manipulation

Lightroom and Photoshop come with presets and Actions. These can be used to help balance your exposure. You can also download many more or make and save your own. These tools can enhance and speed up your post-processing workflow.

I often chose one of a variety of presets as I begin to post process a photograph. Rarely do I apply a preset without then tweaking it further. Every exposure you make is different, so to get your photos looking their best some manual manipulation is usually best.

Working your highlights and shadows

Having been careful to expose your main subject well, you may already be happy with its tone value. However, some parts of your composition may still need tweaking to get them looking the way you want.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Happy Hat Wearer

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Your intention is the most important. How do you want your photograph to look?

Here are two examples of different manipulations made to the same RAW file.

Example one: Dark background

I wanted to make the background darker so the roses would stand out. Using a preset I made in Lightroom, I then made further manual adjustments. I controlled the Blacks, Dehaze, Contrast, and Shadows sliders.

When making this kind of adjustment to manipulate the background of your image, pay attention to your main subject also. These sliders make universal changes to your photos so affect your main subject as well.

With a light-toned main subject and a predominantly dark background, the changes I made did not have much effect on the roses.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Lightroom Dark

I then opened the photo, with the Lightroom adjustments, in Photoshop. At this stage, I darkened the lightest part of the photo to lower the overall tone range.

There are many techniques you can darken or lighten specific areas of a photo. I prefer to use the Dodge and Burn tools set to a low exposure to do this. I also used the Patch tool to remove a few of the brighter areas in the background.

As a result, the background is darker, and the highlights on the rose are not so bright.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time

Example Two: Light Background

To render a lighter, softer look, I took the Dehaze slider towards the left, and the Shadows towards the right. I added a little more Black and some Contrast, otherwise the image looked too flat.

Next, using Photoshop, I tweaked the highlights a little so they were not so bright.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Roses

In both of these examples, my main objective was to enhance the roses because they are my main subject.

The background tone is also important. Between the two examples, there is the most difference in the tone of the background. This has a large impact on the overall feel of the photo.

Conclusion

As with all post-processing, there are a variety of methods you can use to gain similar results. Here I have demonstrated a few techniques I am comfortable using.

Concentrating primarily on the tone of your main subject in relation to the background is a good place to start when post-processing. Once you have made adjustments you are satisfied with, you can then move on and make other changes to your photos if you wish.

Aim to expose your main subject the way you want at the time of making your photos. Doing so allows you more flexibility to make changes in post-production and not lose quality. If you are stuck working with a main subject that’s either underexposed or overexposed, you will be limited in how much you can achieve.

Experimentation is the best way to discover how you like to work with photo manipulation software. There is no right or wrong way to work with your photos so long as you achieve the result you want.

You may also like

  • How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time. Part 1 – Seeing the Light
  • How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time. Part Two: Managing Your Exposure

 

The post How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time – Part Three – Post-Processing for Exposure Optimization appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Kevin Landwer-Johan.


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Report: iOS 13 will be able to import photos directly into apps from external storage

25 Apr

As powerful as iPads have become over the past few years, one of the most limiting factors of the device is its operating system. Apple has incrementally updated iOS, but overall has left much to be desired from the creative world, most notably in the area of storage. That might just change, however, according to the latest reports from 9to5Mac.

At its World Wide Developer’s Conference (WWDC19) in June, Apple is expected to announce iOS 13, which 9to5Mac says will finally include the ability for third-party applications, such as Adobe Lightroom CC and Affinity Photo, to import photos directly from external storage.

Until now, it was only possible to import photos into Lightroom CC and other post-production apps after the photos had been imported to the iOS Camera Roll. This not only effectively doubled the time it took to start processing photos, but also doubled the amount of space the images took up, at least until the photos were entirely imported to Lightroom CC and deleted from the Camera Roll.

According to the reports, which 9to5Mac has had a solid history of getting right on the iOS front, it will now be possible to plug in a memory card via the iPad Pro’s USB-C port and skip the Photos app altogether. Combined with the ability to now add various docks and hubs to the iPad Pro via its USB-C port, it could make for a pretty capable mobile setup.

There’s no definitive word on whether or not external HDDs and SSDs will be supported in terms of storing Lightroom CC libraries and other media elsewhere, but that too is one area that needs to be addressed for many photo professionals and hobbyists alike to make the jump to working off an iPad Pro exclusively.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
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Instagram is considering hiding the like counts on photos

20 Apr

Instagram boasts one billion active monthly users. One is its defining features is the ability to like posts. Recent studies indicate that addiction to social media, and the number of likes received on content, is akin to drug use. Instagram is currently working on a prototype design that will conceal the number of likes on posts. Likes will only be visible to the person who made the post.

This testing in design change was discovered by Jane Manchun Wong, a prominent reverse-engineering expert who has uncovered many of Instagram’s planned features before they were announced or launched. Wong spotted the tweaks in the Instagram Android code base and has generated the following screenshots:

The screenshots clearly display the adjustments in design as likes are not visible on the public interface. There is also a ‘View Likes’ button which lists the users who liked a specific post.

Wong says the test states that Instagram ‘want(s) your followers to focus on what you share, not how many likes your posts get. During this test, only the person who shares a post will see the total number of likes it gets.’

Instagram claims it has not tested the feature. In a statement to The Verge, a spokesperson for the company said: ‘We’re not testing this at the moment, but exploring ways to reduce pressure on Instagram is something we’re always thinking about.’

Wong has also discovered testing for new stickers in Instagram’s Direct Messaging service.

Instagram has faced a series of challenges this year. Facebook recently revealed that millions, not tens of thousands, of Instagram users had their passwords stored in plaintext. The services co-founders, Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, also parted ways last September over disagreements with Mark Zuckerberg on the app’s future.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
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The Real Reason You Need to Print Your Photos

19 Apr

The post The Real Reason You Need to Print Your Photos appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Mat Coker.

Each creative pursuit has its own fulfillment. It is that moment when we can stop and see that our finished creation. A play is written and performed – a score is composed and played by musicians – poems written and then read out loud. The fulfillment of our creative pursuit as photographers is a printed photograph.

When you print a photograph, it becomes physical. A print is the embodiment of the digital file. As a print, it becomes part of our daily physical existence. As a constant part of our life the print comes to play a role in our life, perhaps effecting us in ways we didn’t expect.

Making small prints

A few prints that I stumbled across from my childhood. Each time I come across these memories, I’m reminded of my place in my family as a son, a grandson, and now a father myself.

Coming to life

When something lives in the digital world, it is easily scrolled past, or swiped away and forgotten forever. Digital photos live a ghostly existence.

We experience digital photos like a dream. Just as a dream vanishes when we wake up, a digital photo vanishes as we scroll past it or close the file. But as a print, your photograph becomes part of the real world and a part of your life.

One day I saw one of my digital images – a headshot – on a huge billboard. I was so surprised I had to circle the block just to see it again! I had seen that same image on the internet many times, but to see it in the real world brought on emotions that had never arisen when viewing the photo online.

Yes, “an image is an image” whether it is digital or printed. But a printed image has a different existence – a bodily existence – and becomes part of your world as something physical rather than ghostly or dreamlike.

Printing photo books

Before setting out for the East Coast, I knew that I wanted to make a photo book after the trip. Part of the fun was anticipating the project, then living the adventure as we traveled. But the creative experience was not complete until I had finished the book. A lot of the fun was selecting the paper, the lay-flat style and the dimensions.

Daily life

Consider the difference in the way we normally experience digital and print photographs.

A print is displayed somewhere and might remain for a very long time. However, a digital photo is at your mercy – only viewed on your whim and dismissed almost immediately. If you do not wish to see them, they are gone. A digital photo is not ever-present as a print is. Digital photos count on you to come looking for them.

A digital photo is given a physical existence when printed. When it is displayed at home or in our studio, it becomes part of our daily life.

Display your prints

Most people are quite tactile – collecting books, rocks, and small keepsakes. Our family often brings home a jar of dirt from the new lands we visit.

Inspired and called

When printed, our photographs are ever-present reminders of what is important in life.

Unlike the fleeting excitement that digital photos bring as we scroll past them, the inspiration of a printed photograph is always there to view.

When you’re bored of the flow of digital photos, you shut them off. However, you don’t turn off a print; it is there whether or not you wish to see it at that moment. This is important because when we choose our prints carefully, they can be sources of encouragement when we need it most.

An ever-changing sea of digital images is part of your daily landscape. Images pound you like waves, only to disappear once they’ve made contact. They exhaust you as they hit all day long. You live in a chaotic world where you are most likely to forget what is important in life.

You should print photos that inspire you and call you to a good life. The portraits you hang can remind you of who is important in life. Even the landscape you print can calm and inspire you in tough moments.

Print and frame your digital photos

In my son’s room, there is a picture of him and my grandmother together. It has been there for years. It’s also on my computer. I can tell you the exact folder it’s in, but I haven’t seen the digital file since I made the print. I made the print for my grandmother and received it back when she died. It once reminded her of the joy of her great grandchildren and now it reminds me of the joy of my grandparents.

A stronger experience

While I can hardly recall any of the images I just scrolled through online, I can still remember some of the images in the photography magazines I read as a kid.

When I knew a new issue of Photo Life was due out, I’d check the mailbox every day until it came. I knew the feel of it when I reached into the mailbox. The cover photo would strike me first, then the smell of the brand new magazine. I suppose I did all but taste those photographs!

Imagine the life of those photos. The photographers would conceive their ideas and work away until they had their collection of images. The photographs were developed, culled, and selected by an editor. Once printed, the magazine was shipped around the world. Finally, it would get carried by post for photography lovers to grab from the mailbox or snatch from a newsstand. We’d carry them with us, reread them, and add them to our collection of back issues.

Print versus digital photos

You can close a photo book and put it away, much like swiping away a photo. But a book is placed on the shelf, while a digital photo is swiped away and obliterated into 1’s and 0’s.

The digital world is a gift

Digital photos are important – just as imagination, thoughts and dreams are. But dreams disappear, thoughts are forgotten, and imagination begs to come to life in the real world.

There are many gifts that the digital world has given us. Perhaps most of all the digital world gives us a place to play and experiment before we decide which photos to make real. We have transcended many of the limits of film (although many of those limits may have been healthy for our creativity).

Even though our creative activity is not complete until we have made a print, we don’t need to print all of our digital photos – only the ones that deserve to rise up and become worthy of embodiment.

Create something that becomes real

While there is joy in taking photos and viewing them digitally, our satisfaction is not properly realized until we have printed our photos. A photo that isn’t printed is like a script that is never performed, or a musical composition that is never played. There is still value in the digital photo, just as there is value in a script or musical composition. But the value is mainly the hope that one day the digital photo will be printed and share a bodily life with us – to inspire us, cheer us, and remind us.

The post The Real Reason You Need to Print Your Photos appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Mat Coker.


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How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time. Part Two: Managing Your Exposure

11 Apr

The post How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time. Part Two: Managing Your Exposure appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Kevin Landwer-Johan.

Part Two – Managing Your Exposure

This is the second article in a series of three discussing how to make well-exposed photographs. The first article covers subject choice, some common misconceptions about exposure and the photographer’s intention.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Thai Dancer

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Having identified your subject, managing your exposure then matters most. These things will influence how your photograph is exposed:

  • Point of view
  • Lens choice
  • Timing
  • Reading the light
  • Exposure settings

You’ll notice that I’ve placed ‘Exposure settings’ at the bottom of this list. This is because it’s the most obvious aspect of managing your exposure. I want you to consider how the other items on the list affect your exposure setting choices.

Point of view

Where you choose to take your photo from can significantly affect your exposure. Is the light behind you? Behind your subject? To one side?

By changing your position you can manage what you see in the background and how it impacts the amount of light entering your lens.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Giant Soap Bubbles

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

In this photo, the reflection off the water makes up a large portion of the background. Had I not been careful with my exposure my subject may have been underexposed. In this photo, I compensated for the bright background by adding some fill flash.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Giant Soap Bubbles

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Changing my point of view so I no longer included the lake in the background meant I could expose my subject well. The reflected light off the water surface no longer affected my exposure. In this photo, I did not need to use my flash as there was no strong backlight to compensate for.

Lens choice

Composition is partly governed by your choice of lens. Using a telephoto lens will include less background. In doing this, you can restrict light sources and bright areas of your composition more easily. With a wider lens, you are more likely to include more sky or other bright areas which can have some effect on your exposure.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Rice Fields

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Had I used a wider lens for my photo of these rice fields I would have included the setting sun in my composition. This would definitely have a strong impact on my exposure and the whole look and feel of my photo.

I could have eliminated the effect of the sun altogether by using a lens focal length that was slightly longer. I could have also tilted my camera down slightly, but the foreground was unattractive, and I like the sunburst.

Timing

The time you choose to make your photograph can also influence your exposure. It may mean waiting until the sun is in a different place in the sky for a landscape photo. Or you may have to calculate when to press your shutter release to avoid bright headlights of a passing car. This was the case when I photographed the image below.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time On the Iron Bridge

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

The timing for blue hour photos is particularly important. You must wait for the ambient light to balance with any other light source you have in your frame. This amount of time will vary depending on your proximity to the equator.

In Chiang Mai, Thailand, we have about ten minutes each evening to capture a rich blue sky with the electric lights included in the composition.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Chiang Mai Iron Bridge

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Reading the light

To be able to set your exposure you must use an exposure meter or let your camera make the calculations and settings for you.

Leaving this choice completely up to your camera is rarely best as your camera does not know what you are photographing. Your photos will potentially lack creativity.

Your camera has amazing artificial intelligence built into it, but it cannot see the way you see and discern what your main subject is. By leaving your camera settings so the meter is set to take an averaged reading and is on any auto or semi-auto mode, your camera is in control. You can use exposure compensation or set your camera manually to take control of your exposure.

One of the easiest ways to read the light is by using live view and looking at your monitor. Some cameras do not have this capability, so you need to consult your manual and do some testing to discover if you can use this method.

Checking your exposure with live view works when you have your camera set to manual mode. It’s easy to watch the light values on your monitor changes as you alter your aperture, shutter speed, and ISO. Using this method in conjunction with your histogram is recommended so you can check if there’s any clipping happening.

Using your exposure meter set so it takes a reading from the entire frame and then calculates an average exposure is okay when the light and tone is even.

When there’s any amount of contrast in the scene it’s good to take a spot meter reading directly from your subject. This will provide you with the specific information about the light reflecting off the most important part of your composition.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Opening the Windows

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

For this photograph, I took a spot meter reading from the Buddhist nun, as I wanted her exposed well. Had I left my meter on the averaging mode it would have included the bright light outside and the dark interior into its calculations. This would most likely indicate a setting which would have rendered my main subject underexposed.

Exposure settings

Once you have made your exposure reading and ascertained how the light is affecting your composition, you need to set your exposure.

You may decide your subject will be well exposed by setting your aperture, shutter speed, and ISO so the meter reads zero. You may prefer to have it read overexposed or underexposed, depending on the tone value of your subject and your creative expression.

When your subject is very dark or very light, you may want to alter your exposure settings to compensate. When you take a spot meter reading the camera is calibrated to see the thing as being middle gray. This means a black or a white subject will both appear gray in your photo if your meter is reading zero.

You must decide the tone you want your main subject to be. Do you want a clearly exposed subject? Will it look better if it appears brighter than it really is? Do you want a silhouette?

For this photo of pink orchid flowers, I chose to overexpose from the reading my spot meter was giving me. I did this to produce a softer feeling in the image.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Pink Flowers

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Had I been making the photograph to document the flower and its color accurately, I would not have overexposed it. My intent was not to make a technically accurate representation of the flower.

If technical accuracy is what I wanted I would have changed my point of view to avoid the backlighting. I would have set my exposure so the color and tone rendered correctly to how the flower looked to my eyes.

Try it out and see for yourself

Find a white or black subject to photograph. Make a spot meter reading and set your exposure so that the meter is at zero. Take a photo.

Now, for a black subject, change your setting so the spot metering indicates it is two stops underexposed. For a white subject make your settings so it’s two stops overexposed.

Which photograph is most appealing? The ‘correctly’ exposed photo, or the under or overexposed photo?

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Laughing Lady

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Conclusion

Experimentation is always good when lighting and subject material are challenging. If you’re not 100% certain you have a perfect exposure, (I never am,) make a series of photos whenever you can.

Tweak your aperture and/or shutter speed settings between each exposure. Don’t make huge shifts in these settings, but just enough so you have a few options to look at when it comes to post-process them.

I’d love you to leave your comments below letting me know if this article has helped you understand exposure better.

The next article in this series will cover post-processing techniques which will enhance your exposure choices.

The post How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time. Part Two: Managing Your Exposure appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Kevin Landwer-Johan.


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How to Post Photos to Instagram from your Computer using Bluestacks

09 Apr

The post How to Post Photos to Instagram from your Computer using Bluestacks appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Ian Johnson.

Instagram. Ever heard of it? It is the ever-present, popular social media platform to show off your photography to over a billion users. Savvy users may rapidly spread the impact and influence of their images, message, and brand making it a preferred platform for many photographers. Sounds amazing right? So what is the catch? The catch with any social media is that it takes time to curate and post your work which takes time away from other photography tasks. Instagram can exacerbate that because its platform is proprietary to phones and mobile devices making it tedious to post your professionally-edited work from your computer. If you agree with that, I have great news! Bluestacks Android Emulator can access and post to Instagram from your computer.

I want to start this article by saying Bluestacks did not solicit or pay me in any way to do this. When researching for solutions to post to Instagram from your computer, I came across Bluestacks and have been using it for a year. I have written this article from my experience using their software. I review its usage for Instagram, some cons, and some pros.

Safety

One of my main concerns when initially installing Bluestacks was its security. You may be concerned about putting your passwords into it, or that Bluestacks may contain spyware. They guarantee that no spyware or malware is packaged with their software. After doing much searching online, I found the consensus was that Bluestacks was secure overall and that entering your password information for Instagram was no different than entering it into the Instagram app on your phone.

Usage

Booting Up

You can follow the installation steps from Bluestacks to get started. In short :

  1. Download Bluestacks Emulator from bluestacks.com and run the installer.
  2. Open up Bluestacks and sign in with your Google Account like you would on your cell phone.
  3. Open up the Google Play Store and install Instagram. You will be familiar with this as it is the same as your phone’s app store. Note: if you have two-step verification installed for Instagram you will have to temporarily disable it to sign into Instagram on Bluestacks. You can re-enable it once you have signed into Instagram.

Using Instagram

Using Instagram through Bluestacks is simple. Export your images from your editing software. Use Bluestacks’ “Media Manager” to import the image into Bluestacks. This will make the image available for use on Instagram.

Bluestacks, Usage, Photography

Use Bluestacks’ media manager to import your exported image on your computer.

Bluestacks, usage, photography

I like to store my exported images in a separate location than the RAW files. Bluestacks remembers this location to make it easy to access the images.

Open up Instagram to make your post. Assuming you already use Instagram, you will go through the same steps you use on your phone. You will appreciate being able to make the post using your keyboard!

Instagram, Photography, Bluestacks, usage, steps

To create a post open up Instagram in Bluestacks. Create the post using the same steps you would on your phone.

Thoughts and Review

I hope the steps above demonstrate how easy Bluestacks is to set up and use. After using Bluestacks for a year, I have appreciated the ease in creating posts and responding to users on Instagram. I like knowing I am using my time as efficiently as possible! I’ll break down the pros and cons of Bluestacks as I see them.

Pros

Bluestacks makes it efficient to post your edited photos to Instagram. In contrast to other solutions such as posting from Lightroom, you can interact with all of Instagram’s features and respond to comments and followers. I appreciate knowing I can spend more time photographing and editing with less time spent on social media. I also like using Instagram on a large screen and the ability to type using a keyboard.

One efficiency you should use is storing your common hashtags in a notepad document. You can simply copy and paste them into Instagram in Bluestacks. No more worries about mistyping or missing your most productive hashtags!

Hashtags, Instagram, Bluestacks,

I keep a list of commonly used hashtags in a notepad file. This allows me to copy and paste them into my post on Instagram.

Cons

There are some cons to the Bluestacks software that I’ve encountered. First, it is a RAM and graphic-heavy software. You may get speed performance issues with Bluestacks if you have moderately low ram (e.g., 8Gb). This is prevalent when you have multiple programs open eating up lots of RAM on your computer.

Second, there have been some bugs in Bluestacks which I have found workarounds for. I already mentioned the two-step verification bug. Another bug I have encountered is Instagram closes after starting it and will not open again until you reboot the software. This is not common and I’m not sure what triggers it, but you simply need to be aware of it.

Last, Bluestacks is a third-party app. At this time I trust the software’s security and commitment to no malware in their software. However, those terms could change in the future and you should always be conscious of what is contained in software updates.

The Bottom Line

I hope you like the Bluestacks solution and start to use it to improve your social media efficiency so you can spend more time working on your photography! As I always say, “Pixels are cheap.” I hope you make more pixels and spend less time on Instagram thanks to Bluestacks’s efficiencies!

Do you have other solutions that you would like to share? If so, feel free to comment below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The post How to Post Photos to Instagram from your Computer using Bluestacks appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Ian Johnson.


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Skylum’s new Luminar Flex plugin brings AI features to Adobe apps, Photos on Mac

04 Apr

Skylum has announced Luminar Flex, a new plugin that enables photographers to leverage Luminar’s features while using editing software from other companies. Luminar Flex joins Luminar 3 to offer the company’s AI-powered features, including Accent AI and AI Sky Enhancer, as well as Looks, Foliage Enhancer, Details Enhancer and more.

In addition to offering the Luminar array of AI-powered features, the Luminar Flex plugin also brings Workspaces, the collections of filters designed for different types of photography. Skylum has introduced a new set of Workspaces specifically for Flex users, including Drone & Aerial, Film Lab, Expert, Black & White, Image Aware, Intensify, Relight and Color and Portrait.

The Luminar Flex plugin supports Adobe Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, Lightroom Classic, and Photos for macOS.

For Lightroom users, Luminar Flex brings support for Layers and Blending modes, enabling users to apply filters to layers, and both filters and textures to blending modes. Luminar Flex supports Smart Objects in Photoshop, as well. Ultimately, Skylum says it recommends Luminar Flex to photographers who want access to Luminar’s features as part of their existing workflow rather than transitioning to Luminar 3.

Skylum has given Luminar Flex its own development roadmap separate from the existing Luminar product. Both existing Luminar 3 and Luminar 2018 product owners will get Luminar Flex for free in their accounts starting April 4. For everyone else, the new plugin costs $ 59 / €59 / £54.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
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How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time. Part 1 – Seeing the Light

03 Apr

The post How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time. Part 1 – Seeing the Light appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Kevin Landwer-Johan.

Part One – Seeing the Light

Opinions about what a correctly exposed photograph is must be about as numerous as what people choose to take pictures of. Some opinions are more common than others.

‘Every photograph must contain an even range of tone with no details lost in the highlight or shadow areas.’ This is the one I encounter most frequently. It’s probably been learned from technical books and academics.

Durian How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Performing a quick Google search on this topic brings up the Canon Australia website with this:

“The act of having ‘correct’ exposure means your combination of settings between aperture, shutter speed, and ISO speed have produced a perfectly exposed image. When nothing is blown out (highlights) or lost in shadow in an image, it has achieved correct exposure.”

I’m not including this quote to get at Canon users or Aussies, (even though I am a Nikon user and a Kiwi,) but because it represents a purely technical approach to exposure choice.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Flower and Moss

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

How can creative expression be judged as correct?

Photography, at its best, is a creative expression of how we perceive what we see. Our world view is unique. Each of us has the ability to interpret and convey our experience through the photographs we capture.

Freedom to expose our photos so some parts of our compositions have no recorded detail is a natural part of this art form. If our minds are boxed in by technical restraints such as are expressed on the Canon Australia website, our expression is inhibited.

I’m not suggesting we disregard technical quality – this would be like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I am recommending you reach beyond purely technical restraints to expose your photos so that they are more expressive of what they are about, not just what they are of.

Conforming to the opinion that photographs are best when no details get lost due to exposure choice can provide documentation of what you are photographing. This approach to taking pictures will not often infuse your photographs with much life, emotion, or energy, apart from what your subject may naturally provide.

Histogram bells taste like Vanilla ice cream

Vanilla ice cream – enjoyable sometimes – but plain nonetheless. You are likely to get bored with it if that’s all you eat. It’s not the most exciting flavor at the ice cream parlor.

A bell-shaped histogram indicates your camera has recorded a lot of mid-range tones and little or no extreme dark or light ones.

Striving for a bell-shaped histogram is not going to produce the most flavorsome photographs. At times you’ll make a great image that’s got a bell-shaped histogram, but not often.

I believe it’s a common myth that the ideal histogram is bell-shaped.

 

Even Exposure Buddha Statue How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time

You can see that the histogram for this image is reasonably balanced. There are no spikes to the left or right. This indicates we will see detail in the darkest and brightest parts of the composition.

I took the photo mid-afternoon on an overcast day. Because the light was soft and even, and the tones in my composition are all fairly neutral, I have obtained a ‘correct’ exposure.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Contrast-Buddha-Statue

Subscribing to the ideal of the bell shape, you might look at this histogram and think the photo is extremely underexposed. You might even consider deleting such an image based on this information alone.

It is the same statue photographed on a sunny day in the mid-afternoon. It’s a much more appealing photograph than the one made on the overcast afternoon.

It was my intention to lose shadow detail. I wanted to isolate the statue from the dull background and add some drama.

Exposure choices are as personal as ice cream preferences

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Chocolate Ice Cream

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Seeking to only create photos with an even exposure throughout the tone range is like choosing to eat just vanilla ice cream and always ignoring all the other flavors.

Great photographs express what the photographer sees and experiences. Sometimes they are technically correct, many times they aren’t. It all comes back to the intent of the photographer.

Choosing to let most of your composition fall into darkness is your choice. If you want to use the shadow areas to enhance your subject, then do it. If light streaming into your lens from behind your subject creates softness and depth of feeling, let it happen.

Don’t just focus on the technical details. You will usually end up with photos containing little or no feeling.

Before you bring your camera up to your eye, you need to see the light. Consider the brightest parts of a scene. Are they important? Do you need to show detail in them to convey what you want to with your photo?

Likewise for the dark areas of your photo – if there are a lot of distracting elements in the shadow areas – let them be buried in the darkness.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Woman Tourist with an Elephant

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

Behind the woman and elephant was a large, open building casting a helpful shadow over its messy interior. By positioning myself so I could only see the shaded area behind my subjects, I knew I could isolate them. I set my exposure for the woman’s face, as it’s the most important part of my composition.

The fact that the background is dark and contains no detail helps make my photo stronger.

Understanding light and tone will help you make more interesting exposures. Knowing how your camera evaluates and records light and tone is equally as important. How to manage your exposure is the topic of the next article in this series.

What’s the most important element in your composition?

Recognizing your key subject is an important early decision in taking a photo. Most often it will be your first.

This will be what you focus on and what you want to expose well, (usually). If your subject has a wide tonal range – say a bride in a white dress and a groom in a black suit – be careful. Your camera will not be able to render detail both in the dress and the suit because the tones are extremely different.

Likewise, if part of your subject is in bright sun and part is in the shade, you will need to choose your exposure carefully. The contrast created by sunlight and shade is also extreme.

Discerning your primary subject helps you compose everything in your frame around it. Exposing it well helps make it the center of attention in your photograph.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Fancy Kaftan

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

What mood do you want to capture or create?

To me, the answer to this question is more important to focus on than trying to obtain a full tonal range in my photographs.

The type of light you’re photographing in will influence the feeling in your photographs. So will your exposure choice. Is the light bright and hard, or soft and gentle? Should you set your exposure so you can see all the detail in the shadows or chose to let them become very dark and contain little or no detail?

Letting your camera make these choices for you, by not controlling your exposure, your photos may become flat and somewhat lifeless. By taking control and exposing your main subject well you can infuse story, drama, and imagination.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Karen Grandpa

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

I have a mantra of sorts. Look. Think. Click.

Look at what you want to photograph. See what is before you. Your subject, it’s surroundings and the background. The light.

Think about how you want to portray your subject. What is your intention?

How much or how little do you want to include? What will fill your frame?

What quality is the light and how will it affect your photo?

Where will you stand or position yourself?

When will be the best time to take your photo?

Which exposure settings will you choose to best suit your intention?

Click. This should only happen once you have thought these things through.

How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time Chedi

© Kevin Landwer-Johan

It may seem a whole lot to do before taking a photograph, but this is what makes the difference between a snapshot and an image you may want to have framed and hang on your wall.

In the next article in this series, I will cover how to manage your camera settings to match your intent.

The post How to Make Well Exposed Photos Every Time. Part 1 – Seeing the Light appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Kevin Landwer-Johan.


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