photography important lessons

8/2/2019 Photography Important Lessons

1/15

Ph o t o g r a p h y im p o r t a n t le s s o n s

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2/15

Lesson 1 Intent

Why do you want to take pictures? You may want to share with others how you see the world around you,you may want to document your life and that of the people you love, you may have a desire to create imagesthat blow other people away. There are so many excellent reasons to get into photography and why you do so

is up to you.I ve put this section first because when I learned photography it was technique first and art second. That is atime honoured way of learning photography. But now that I ve done it for 30 years I think it was a backwardsway of learning photography.

Photography is an art and you are the artist. If you re thinking you could never be an artist I have good newsfor you you already are. Even just taking the time to read this page you ve shown you have the desire makeimages that give you pleasure and can affect others that is art.

Now comes the fun part think about why you want to take pictures. Write down a list of:

1. Things you like about photography. Do you love the moment of seeing the images in prints or on yourscreen? Is it the challenge of making the photo? Is it the sharing the images with your friends? Is it thememories you get when you look at your photos later? Whatever it is you like about taking pictures,write it down.

2. What you want to achieve with photography. Do you want to remember what your kids are like at eachstage of their growing up? Do you like flowers or architecture or mountains and want to documentthem? Do you want to show the human condition? Do you want to pursue a career in photography?Write down what you want your photography to do.

3. What subjects you want to shoot. Flowers, dogs, kids, models, food, people s feet, whatever. Writedown those things you find catch your eye or make you wish you had your camera when you see it.

4. How you feel about those subjects. Do you love it, hate it, feel afraid of it, laugh at it, wish it wasyours? This is actually the most important section of the lesson. When you understand what you feeltowards something, you ll find your photography of it improves automatically.

Now grab your pen and start writing. Once you re done, put it on the wall, throw it into your camera bag orput it somewhere you can easily review it. Add or change it as you grow as a photographer. But once youhave the list, you have a great tool to make your photography better.



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3/15

Lesson 2 Exposure (Basic)

As a point of reference, these are the typical whole stops for exposure;

Aperture: f1.8,2.8,4,5.6,8,11,16 and22.Shutter: 1 second,1/2 second,1/4,1/8,1/15,1/30,1/60,1/125,1/250,1/500,1/1000,1/2000,1/4000.Many cameras have more stops at either end of these scales, but these are typical. As well, most moderncameras have half stops or third stops. These make learning a little more difficult, but keep the above numbers

in mind to do proper exposures.

Note: Completing this lesson requires a camera capable of manually setting exposure.

What is the right exposure? Not to make this complicated, but exposure is a choice you have to make. Theexposure you choose determines how the image looks. But, we ll start with a basic understanding and work upfrom there.

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4/15

Exposure consists of four factors:

1. how much light is in front of you which can be changed by adding lights or flash,2. how sensitive the film is to light called ISO (remember, I use the word film to refer to whatever

medium used for capturing the image, whether it is the Digital Camera s sensor or actually film,)3. the amount of light going through a lens called the aperture, 4. how long the film is exposed called the shutter speed .

For the moment, we ll set an average exposure on an average scene.

If you re camera does not have a built in meter its really old. But, that s okay. You ll just have to buy a handheld meter. If you have an SLR or advanced point and shoot digital camera, spend some time with the manualto find out how to bring up the Histogram which graphically shows the amount of light in an exposure.

First exercise set your ISO to 100, set your camera to 16 and the shutter to 1/125th of a second. (Somedigital cameras are limited to ISO 200 which means you have to cut your exposure by one stop, i.e. use1/250th instead of 1/125th of a second) With this setting, take your camera out during a sunny day, put the sunbehind you and shoot anything you ll have a well exposed image. This is called the Sunny 16 rule.

To make life interesting, and your photography more creative, you can change the setting and still have the

same exposure. These are equivalent exposures: Try going to 11 at 1/250th of a second. Push it a littlefurther at 8 at 1/500th of a second. These are all the same exposure because the same total amount of light ishitting the film.

Of course, you re not always going to shoot with the sun behind you on a sunny day. For other situations youneed to be able to find out your exposure with a meter. This can be in your camera or hand held.

Looking at any scene, your meter will give you a suggestion as to what exposure to use. Most of the time thisis fairly accurate.

Using your meter, take a reading off of something with mixed tones in shade on a sunny day you ll find theexposure is two or three stops slower than the Sunny 16.

Second exercise

One of the best things to do for more accurate exposure is to meter the light hitting the specific subject you reshooting. Find a place where there is a small patch of light such as a break in a wall, light coming directlythrough a window, etc. Take a picture from far enough back you get lots of the shadow area. You ll probablyfind the patch of light is way too bright in the picture. Walk right up to the patch of light and see what themeter suggests you use there. Then, go back to where you re taking the picture from and with the camera inmanual set the exposure to what was suggested.

You can also use your hand to help determine exposure in a variety of situations. First on a sunny day, dothe f16 rule, setting the camera to f16 at 1/125 of a second. Hold your hand in the sunlight and meter it. You llprobably notice the meter says you should change the exposure. Note how much the meter says your hand isoff from the f16 rule and keep that in mind. Lets say the meter said you should expose your hand at f22. Thatis one stop darker than what is actually needed. Now walk into the shade and meter off your hand again. If itsays f11, you know that is one stop too dark, so set your camera to f8.

Knowing what your hand is for exposure can help you set exposure in most situations just make sure yourhand is in the same kind of light as the subject you re shooting.

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5/15

A little more accurate way to do exposures is to buy an 18 per cent grey card. Most camera stores and photodepartments should have these. To use it, just put it beside the subject you re shooting, and meter off of it. If

you re further away than is practical to walk up to the subject set the card in the same kind of light as thesubject and again meter off the card.

Third exercise

either with an 18 per cent grey card, or using your hand as described above, metersomething in dark shade and find out the exposure there.

A final note A meter is very handy for getting your exposure, but it does have a limitation. As said earlier,the meter thinks the world is 18 per cent grey. Most of the world is kind of like 18 per cent grey, but not all of it.

Look at what you re shooting. If its black (or very dark), your meter will try to make it grey and make theexposure too light. Conversely, if you re subject is white, the meter will try to make it darker or 18 per centgrey.

There are two more lessons on high key and low key photos which will help you handle more



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6/15

Lesson 3 Exposure: High Key

A high-key photo is basically white on white. This style of photography conveys a feeling of lightness andclarity. Typically what happens is the camera wants to make the white of the photo without dark areas to balance the exposure too dark. So your white s become gray. You may have seen this particularly whenshooting a snowy field on a gray day. However, exposing for high key is fairly easy.

With an in camera meter, you can measure the light hitting a white area, and open up two stops such aschanging the aperture from 11 to 5.6.

Exercise: Put a large piece of white paper or white fabric on a table beside a large north facing window, placean egg in the middle. Take a picture with the exposure the in camera meter suggests. You may have to use atripod to keep the camera still if the shutter speed is too slow.

Next, meter off a white area and open up two stops as described at the top of the this page. Compare theimages.

This can work well for other scenarios where exposure is a tricky thing like weddings where the bride iswearing white and the groom is in black. Quite often, the dress winds up blown out with no detail in the dress.By metering off the dress and opening up two stops you can prevent this from happening.

You can also use a hand held meter to measure the light hitting the subject, which will be more accurate thanthe in-camera meter.

Note: Be aware that some digital cameras have exposure compensation built in to prevent overexposure. If exposure is too bright the highlights could be blown out and detail lost int the brightest parts of the image.

By artificially darkening the image, the camera makers try to make sure the exposures aren t too bright.This doesn t affect all cameras but it does seem to be the case for some. That means that the exposure needed in lessons 2, 3 and 4 may be slightly higher than suggested in the lessons. You might use the expose to the

right

method.



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7/15

Lesson 4 Exposure: Low Key

This is the opposite of the previous lesson. A low key photo is pretty much black on black, or at least verydark on dark. This kind of photo can create a sense of intimacy, foreboding, sadness, and / or heaviness. Youmight have a face or object rimmed with light in a silhouette, but dark on the side towards the camera anddark background.

The problem with shooting dark on dark is that the camera will try to lighten the image up making the picturelook washed out and grey.

For this shot you ll need a really dark cloth, preferably black, and an object that is dark or has some dark tonesin it. You could shoot a portrait of a dark haired person in dark clothing against a black or dark backgroundfor a low-key portrait.

Note: Shooting an object or person that is very light or white against black has a different effect and is notreally considered low key , although it can be striking image anyways.

Exercise: First, shoot the image with what you camera says is the right exposure. Very few in-camera meterswill render this scene accurately. Now, take a meter reading on something dark/black that has the light hittingit and close the aperture two stops (i.e. if it is 1.8 you ll want to go to 4.)



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8/15

Lesson 5 Depth of Field

Depth of field also sometimes known as depth of focus (although that does has a different technical meaning some people use that term) is an area many photographers feel some confusion over.

By changing the aperture in the lens, you can make the resulting picture have more of the picture in focusfrom near to far, or you can limit the picture s focus on one place.

At 1.8, the focus point will be much more defined with things in front of and behind the subject becomingsofter looking the further from the subject they are. This is a very nice way to bring attention to the subject.

At 22, the focus will seem to be sharp from very close to the camera to pretty much infinity. This is great forgiving a sense of the place you shot the image, or for including many people in the image and keepingeveryone clearly in focus.

However, there are limits to how that will appear in the final image.

Exercise: Find a subject/object that is still or will be in one place for a couple of minutes. Stand about 2 feetfrom the subject and focus on it. Set your stop to 1.8 (or a close as possible to that based on the light) and setthe shutter speed to get a proper exposure according to your meter. You can set the camera to ExposurePriority (AV mode) and let the camera set the shutter speed automatically. You should be using 50 mm lensor a zoom lens set to about 50 mm.

Now set your stop to 16 and change the shutter as needed.

Step back to about 10 feet from your subject and re do the above settings

first at 1.8 then at 16.To really push this exercise, try all the above steps with different lenses or at different lengths if you have azoom lens i.e.. try it at 35 mm and at 200mm, or whatever your zoom lens range is.



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9/15

Lesson 6 Shutter Effects

You ve probably seen those pictures of a race car or bike rider where the subject is in fairly sharp focus butthe background is blurry with streaks denoting speed. Perhaps you ve seen a waterfall that looks like flowingsilk. Or you seen a picture with someone totally frozen in place during an athletic moment.

These are a result of creatively using the shutter on the camera. High shutter speeds, such as 1/500th,1/1000th, 1/2000th or higher (remember these are fractions of a second) create a stopped motion.

Alternatively, slow shutter speeds such as 1/15th, 1/4, or even whole seconds, creates a sense of motionthrough blurring of some part of the picture.

One of the issues is quite often if the shutter speed is too slow, an image can be blurry from motion blur which can detract from an image if the effect isn t intentional.

Exercise: This is best done on a lightly clouded day that isn t too dark or too bright. Find a friend with abicycle or who likes to run. Go to an open area and set up your position. Have your friend ride or run past youmany many times. You ll need to do lots of exposures to get the shots.

First set your shutter speed as high as you can for the light hopefully around 1/500 to 1/2000 with theaperture as open as you can set (i.e. 1.8).

As your friend moves past you, keep him or her in the viewfinder, turning yourself at the waist to constantlypoint your camera at your friend. Take lots of pictures for several passes. This is known as panning. Youmight want to try a couple of passes without tripping the shutter and practicing keeping your friend in theviewfinder as he or she goes past you.

Now, set your shutter speed as low as you can I d suggest around 1/30, remembering to set the aperture as

high as you can for the light. Repeat the above panning motion to keep your friend in the viewfinder. Takelots more pictures, remembering to keep turning yourself at the waist as your friend goes by.

PS to keep your images acceptably sharp, the rule-of-thumb is to keep your shutter speed at least the sameas your focal length ie a 50 mm lens should be used with a shutter speed of 1/50 of a second or faster.However, I find with most digital cameras you want to add another 50 % to that so you want to shoot at 1/80or faster (The one third of a stop equivalent of 1/75).

For sharp pictures a tripod is a very handy tool to free up your choice of shutter speeds.

Alternatively, you can hand hold a camera to surprisingly extended times with good technique: place thebottom of the camera body in your left hand and support its weight with that hand, then tuck your left elbow

basically into your lower left rib cage. Finally hold the viewfinder close to your eye and use your right hand totrigger the shutter and further stabilize the camera. Breath in and let your breath out slowly while squeezingthe shutter.



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10/15

Lesson 7 Rule of Thirds

The most used lesson in artistic composition is the rule of thirds. While there are lots of ways to compose pictures, this short cut always makes an image moreinteresting than most where the subject is dead center. If you re shooting a close up of a person s face or otherobject, putting it in the center is the thing to do. But, if you have a picture with a person in the center and lotsof scenery around him or her well, it could be improved.

Exercise: Take a piece of paper and draw two horizontal lines dividing the paper into thirds.

Draw two vertical lines again diving the paper into thirds.

Note the four places where lines intersect each other.

Now go take a picture of anything placing the main subject at one of those four positions one third of the

way from the top or bottom and one third of the way from the side. In fact, try placing the same subject at allfour intersection positions. Take a look at the pictures.



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11/15

Lesson 8 Diagonal Lines

A nice dynamic method of composing a photo is to have a diagonal line running throughhe photo, from corner to corner or from 1/3 down from the top to 1/3 up from the bottom. The line could be astreet, a fence rail, a road or a shoreline. Anything which creates a line or division in the picture.

Whether the line rises or falls creates different feelings about the photo. Typically, for English speakingpeople and others with left to right direction of writing, if an line descends into the picture from top left tobottom right it appears to be entering the picture. If the line rises from bottom left to top right, it appears to beleaving the picture.

You can use those concepts to create specific feelings in your picture. Such as, a person standing beside a lakeshore if the line descends, it would suggest the person is entering the picture and thus would be, perhaps,happier and more inclusive. If the line is rising it would suggest the person is leaving and is thus more distantand removed.

Diagonal lines in photos can be used for what is called a leading line which helps the view be lead throughthe image in directed manner. Typically you d have the lines pointing at the main subject of your photo which puts the leading lines into the Negative Space (you ll come across more about Negative Space inLesson 11.)

Exercise: Find a location where you can use a line to run diagonally through a picture. Take two pictures, onewith the line descending into the picture from the left, and the other rising to right.



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12/15

Lesson 9 S Curves

Another dynamic composition tool is to include a S curve. As the name suggests, amajor element of the composition would be an object such as a stream, path, railing, or other curved objectthat creates an S.

If the S is right facing and starts in the lower left corner and exits the upper right corner the feeling for mostEnglish speaking people is that the picture is moving away from the viewer.

If the S is reversed, and starts in the upper left corner coming down to the lower right, the picture seems to

be coming towards the viewer. This effect is from, I believe, learning to read left to right.

Exercise: Go out and find an S Curve to photograph. Explore right facing and left facing curves and see howthey feel to you.



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13/15

Lesson 10 Balance

There are a few ways to achieve balance in photos.

The first is through symmetry where you have equal size subjects on either side of thephoto. This creates a static, solid look with little movement.

The second is to place dissimilar size objects on either side, but to use the center of thephoto as a balance point in an asymmetrical composition. Just like an adult and a child on a teeter-toter, theadult has to be much closer to the center balance point for the child not to be held way up in the air the wholetime. If you have a grouping of objects on one side, you ll need something further out on the other side tocreate balance. An asymmetrical composition creates a sense of movement and action, even if the subject is astone.

Exercise collect a bunch of rocks, some similar size and some dissimilar. On the sidewalk or other handy

surface, try creating several symmetric and asymmetric compositions, taking pictures of each.

This exercise is based on exercises in Drawing on the Artist Within. This is an excellent book for learningabout creating art the basics are taught through drawing but are applicable to all art forms and just great forlearning to be creative. I highly recommend it. (click on the cover image to purchase from Amazon.com)



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14/15

Lesson 11 Negative Space

One way of making sure your composition is strong is to pay attention to thepositive and negative spaces.

The primary subject of your photo, a person, building, toy car, whatever, is the positive space.

Negative space is everything else. Something you see in a lot of photography is things sticking out of heads,wires across the scene you didn t see when taking the picture, and so on. This is just from paying so muchattention to the subject that photographers forget what is in the background or surrounding the subject.

Exercise: take pictures of three different subjects outside. Doesn t matter what they are, a person, a car, abuilding. While taking the picture, don t worry about the subject, just pay attention to what is around andbehind the subject.

Use the background to compose the shot for this exercise, the actual subject is not important. If thebackground is not working for you, move around until it is zoom in or zoom out to change perspective, getlow, or go higher. Whatever makes the background a pleasing photo.



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15/15

Lesson 12 Pick A Subject

The absolute best way to improve as a photographer is to DO photography get out and shoot. A great way topush yourself into better photos is by concentrating on one subject over a period of time. Each time youphotograph your subject, whether its a person, plant, place or thing, find a new way to photograph it. It could

be from a different angle, different time of day, different light whatever you can do to see the subject in anew way.

For this lesson, pick something near by you can photograph on a regular basis. It could be: your car, your cat,your significant other , your guitar, what you see while walking through the neighbourhood, objects thatlook like numbers, rusty objects, etc.

Anything that you like to look at.

Exercise:

Every day for the next 10 days take some pictures of it. Look for different ways of seeing the same subject.Place your subject in different places, different light situations, try some of the different exercises incomposition find an S curve in the subject, or place your subject into an S curve, same with diagonal lines,etc. Just keep shooting and learning about the same subject.

What you learn from this simple exercise will carry through into most things you shoot.


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