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Find a Photographer or Photographers in hampshire based in aldershot, andover, basingstoke, brockenhurst,
eastleigh, fareham, farnborough, lyndhurst, portsmouth,romsey, southampton and winchester. |
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Free Photography Tips
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1 |
Selection
Select only the best of your pictures to show to others and leave the rest in the
drawer. Showing someone every picture you have taken dilutes the effect of the best
pictures and gets very boring. You may want to show twenty pictures of little Johnny
at the park because they are all quite good and you can't decide which are the best
but, trust me, you will be better off making that decision and showing only the
few good ones.
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2 |
Turn the Camera on it's Side
At first it feels awkward holding the camera on it's side, but it is worth getting
used to. If the shape of your subject, a person or a building, fits into an upright
rectangle, you waste so much picture space if you shoot in landscape. You paid for
all those millions of pixels, don't waste them.
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3 |
Framing
One of the easiest ways to improve your photography is with careful attention to
framing. Look into the corners of the viewfinder to see what is there. Do you need
all that background? Can you get closer to your subject or zoom in? |
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4 |
Direction of Lighting
Photography is all about light, the direction of the light falling on your subject
is most important, you must look at your subject carefully and see how the shadows
fall.
If you are able to choose the time of day to shoot your pictures, try to pick a
time when the sun is low in the sky, either shoot in the early morning or late afternoon.
Shooting pictures of people with the sun too high in the sky, tends to mean the
subject's eyes will be in shadow and/or your subject will be squinting in the strong
light, both of which tend to look horrible. A nice side effect of shooting in the
early morning or late afternoon is that the colour of the light is 'warmer', reds
and yellows are stronger which generally gives a more pleasing effect.
If you are photographing in sunlight, try to position yourself so that the sun hits
your subject from the side, this will give you nice 'modelling' and help create
a 3D effect in the picture.
Sunlight behind the subject can give a very pleasing 'backlight' effect but be careful
that you are not getting 'flare' in the lens, which degrades the contrast of the
image.
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5 |
Direction of Lighting (2)
The very worst kind of lighting is provided by the little flash fitted into all
modern cameras. Not only does it give your subjects the dreaded red eyes, but also
flattens all faces into shadowless featureless blobs. Use the in camera flashlight
only in an emergency, when there is no other choice.
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6 |
In Camera Flash
When you have to use the in camera flash, keep your subject(s) away from
walls, especially light coloured ones, if at all possible, and avoid that ugly black
shadow which looks like an outline. This will not show up against a dark background.
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7 |
Exposure
Using auto exposure to your advantage.
If you have a modern camera, the chances are that the default metering system is
'centre weighted average', which means that, although it takes an average reading
of the whole scene, it takes more notice of what is in the middle of the frame.
Which is good news for us. The other good news is that it takes this reading at
the time when you take 'first pressure' on the button to take your picture. When
you push it halfway down and it beeps at you, not only is the focus now set (on
an auto focus camera) but the exposure reading is taken and the aperture and shutter
speed are set. So, if your main point of interest is not in the centre of the frame,
it's a good idea to put it there temporarily while you focus and take your light
reading, then move the camera whilst still holding the button halfway down and compose
the picture the way you want it to be. A common use for this technique is when you
are taking a close up shot of two people and there is space between their heads,
if you're not careful the camera will focus on the wall or trees behind them. If
the background is very dark or very light this can alter the exposure significantly
and result in faces that are too dark or too light.
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8 |
Shutter Speeds
When the shutter speed is important as with moving objects, it's a good idea to
set the camera to 'Shutter Speed Priority' mode. This is where you select the shutter
speed and the camera selects the appropriate aperture according to the light reading.
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9 |
Apertures
If depth of field is important to either make sure everything is in focus or to
throw some things out of focus, select the 'Aperture Priority' mode on your camera.
In this mode you select the aperture and the camera selects the shutter speed according
to the available light.
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10 |
Neutral Density Filters
If you are shooting in bright light and want to restrict the depth of field, use
a neutral density filter in front of the lens to reduce the light entering the lens.
These are available in different densities, 2x, 4x, 8x etc. each one cutting the
light in half, quarter, eighth etc. In extreme circumstances you can screw a couple
of them together. Although they are 'neutral density' filters and should not effect
the colour balance, if you use two or more together you might need a little colour
correction at the printing stage.
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