Tutorials
DOF Tutorial
Depth of field (DOF) is probably a term you have heard used in photography often enough, but what does it really mean, and how can you use it to make your digital pictures better?
The term depth of field refers to how much of your picture is in sharp focus. For example, in portrait shots you will notice that the background is often blurry, while the subject is clear and sharp. Pictures like this have a shallow depth of field.
You have probably also noticed that in landscape shots everything in the picture is often sharp and clear, all the way from the dead tree in the foreground to the mountains in the distance... Read More
ISO Tutorial
What does ISO stand for, you ask? ISO stands for International Standards Organization, which refers to the group that set the standards for film speed. Luckily, this doesn’t have anything to do with what you need to know about ISO.
ISO, as it relates to digital photography, is an indicator of how sensitive to light your camera’s sensor is, and most digital cameras allow you to adjust this sensitivity. The majority of low to mid-range digital cameras have an ISO range that goes from somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 or 100 up to around 400 to 800... Read More
Shutter Speed Tutorial
Shutter speed is perhaps the most creative adjustment available to the digital photographer. It allows us to freeze action or use motion blur to create a variety of effects, and is expressed in seconds or fractions of seconds depending on the length of exposure.
A high shutter speed (1/1000 of a second or higher) can freeze even very fast moving objects dead in their tracks. However, you will need to keep a couple of things in mind:
1.) You are going to need a brightly lit subject as shutter speeds this high don’t allow your camera much time to gather light for exposure... Read More
Silhouette Tutorial
“Never shoot towards the light.” We’ve probably all heard this old photography “rule,” but, for now, let’s treat it more as a general guideline. If you want to shoot some photos that really pop, that really jump out and grab you—shoot towards the light.
Silhouettes are photos where your subject is dark against a bright background. We have probably all taken shots like this by mistake—when taking a picture of a friend or relative who was standing in front of a window, or standing with the sun behind them, etc... Read More
Composition and Cropping Tutorial
Composition and cropping are very basic digital photography tools that you can use hand-in-hand to produce stunning results. First you use composition to arrange the main elements of your photo in a pleasing manner. Then you use cropping to fine-tune the image by removing unwanted elements and further adjusting the composition. With practice, you can refine your shots to look as good as you imagined them when you pushed the shutter button.
First, let’s take a look at the most basic rule of composition, the rule of thirds: Imagine your viewfinder having a grid on it that looks like a tic-tac-toe game... Read More
Exposure Bracketing Tutorial
A great way to practice getting perfect exposure is to try a method called exposure bracketing. I was taught this by Sally Brown, a photojournalist. It’s a good technique for ensuring correct exposure.
Exposure bracketing or “bracketing” can be explained as the photographer taking numerous photos of the same thing using a variety of different camera settings. Bracketing is great when you are struggling to get a shot with exposure you like and that suits the image generally and helps ensure correct exposure of a photo when lighting in a scene is difficult... Read More
