Sometimes you are presented with a good photographic opportunity, out of the blue. You are just having fun walking around the river bank with some pals, while suddenly you hear loud bang and beautiful lights filling up the night sky. You take out your camera and prepare to take the next one (you always bring your camera with you, right? ). You set your camera to aperture priority and tried to take some shots, but because of the low light (heck, the sky is pitch black) your camera set the shutter to 2 seconds to compensate. You got the shot, but its totally blurry. You then change to setting to shutter priority to 1/50 second to avoid camera shake. But all you are getting is pitch black images. You wonder what you should do now?
I reckon most of you have experienced that type of event before. Now we will explore several options you can try to (hopefully) get a decent night shoot without using tripod.
Increase the ISO rating
Maybe its just me, but I think grainy images is much better than no usable image at all.
ISO 400 1.6" f16 - My first try of the night. I was bracing againts a light pole to gain stability. Notice the fireworks are sharp but the background lights are very blurry. Which give this image a little bit more additional impact.
Bracing Your Camera/Your Body Against Something Solid
There is two way of doing this. If you are using SLR without swivel screen, the it will be lots of trial and error. But if you have point and shoot with swivel, this will be easier. This is fairly easy. Just put your camera on the ground/fence/car or anything solid, but pointed up to the fireworks, with your right hand on the shutter, but bracing on the solid object. Usually with some practice you can get pretty good steady images.
ISO 400 f4.5 1/2" - I brace my camera on the fence to get this shot. Set the focus manually to infinity, then we are good to go.
The other way is to brace your body against a big solid object. Maybe a solid wall or a electric pole. Make sure you dont destroy it
Well, thats it for now? Do you have any other tips you would like to share? Drop em in the comment area.
The rule of thirds is a very useful tool for composing images in photography. And to top it off, it’s free! Doesn’t require any add on equipment to your camera, any shoe mounts, anything like that! This article will attempt to demystify the mysterious Rule of Thirds. This post is a follow up from my basic photography tutorial and tips for point and shoot camera.
To follow this rule, simply take a photo and divide it up into three sections vertically and three sections horizontally. Now, as you can see from doing this there are three boxes on the top, three in the middle, and three at the bottom. The box in the middle of all of them is the center. This compositional rules basically advises you not to take pictures in that middle box. When you put the object smack bang in the middle, not only it look amateurish, but it is also boring.
Put the object into intersection of thirds
What this does is makes you have to try and position the subject so that he/she or it is not dead center. This creates more visually interesting images.
When you take a photo of a person, the main focal point will be the eyes. Now, you can take a photo of a person dead center, however, follow the rule still! Put the eyes anywhere but the middle box. You can put the eyes in the top box instead. Their body will be dead center but their face will be in the upper area.
Photo from DPS rule of thirds tutorial
Now, when you follow this rule you also need to be careful to leave plenty of head room when shooting people. This room is space around the head and will make your photo not look claustrophobic. Also, if your person is looking towards the left, leave plenty of room at the left side of the photo and less on the right.
Osprey (Pandion haliaetus) on the thirds
So what software can you use to help you with this?
Lightroom is always my favourite post processing software. When you use the crop tool in lightroom, you will be presented with the rule of thirds helper to let you crop better.
Lightroom helps you compose better with rule of thirds
So even if you forgot to compose the rule of thirds, you can have that peace of mind knowing that Lightroom can fix it for you later. However, do not grow dependent on it, as you lose pixels/resolution every time you crop.
Digital cameras are one of the biggest inventions of modern times. We are so fortunate to have this modern gadget called Digital Photography. To be able to capture a precious moment or wonderful scene at the click of a button, is something we should not take for granted.No matter whichever camera you have or you are planning to own,you need to have a proper knowledge about the digital photography. There are certain tips below,which i hope will be useful for you to take better wedding photographs.
Know your camera. One of the biggest drawbacks you can make is not providing time to learn about the parts of your camera. Leave being lazy,read your instruction manual carefully.
When shooting sunny outdoor shots,try adjusting your white balance setting from auto to cloudy. The auto setting will make your shots appear too cold. When you switch it to cloudy,it will increase the warmth of your pictures.
If you are desiring for superior image quality,the ability to use a variety of lenses and print large high quality snaps,then consider a Digital SLR Camera.
If possible then do use your flash outside also. On a sunny day you require flash when the sun is directly upon your head or behind the subject. This causes dark shadows to appear on the face of the subject. The flash will help you to reduce this.
Sometimes if you simply turn your camera and take vertical shots,it’ll make a world of difference. So you should always experiment with vertical picture taking.
Do not put your subjects directly in the center of your shot. Keep your subject off center to fuel in more life into your photos.
If possible then join online photography communities. You need to get active and ask questions.
Never ever copy the work of others,try to create your own unique style.
Post your photographs in online forums and always be ready to take any type of criticism.
If you have a problem of shaky hands then you should go and invest a tripod. It will solve your problem and will also give you better results.
DigitalWeddingSecrets.com offers one of the most comprehensive wedding photography ebook. They also have a 10 part email based course that you should definitely join. The best part is that its free!
Article by Dave Beckerman
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). You set your camera to aperture priority and tried to take some shots, but because of the low light (heck, the sky is pitch black) your camera set the shutter to 2 seconds to compensate. You got the shot, but its totally blurry. You then change to setting to shutter priority to 1/50 second to avoid camera shake. But all you are getting is pitch black images. You wonder what you should do now?
