Losing Your (White) Balance
Light has color.
We describe the color of light in as having a specific color temperature. Color temperature is measured on the kelvin (K) scale and temperatures on this scale are called kelvins.
The white balance setting on your camera deals with the color of light and each of the icons that represent your white balance settings [...]
You Can Photograph Anything
If you have a good understanding of photography and understand how to use your camera you can photograph anything you want.
Low light photography, sports, portraits, landscapes, whatever.
It’s all about understanding your subject as light and using you camera as a light recording tool.
If you can use your camera in manual mode, all the better.
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Bored With Your Photography?
Are you bored of seeing the same things to photograph or do you feel that you need to go to a new place to breathe life back into your photography?
The problem isn’t that you’re seeing the same things over and over again.
The problem is that you’re seeing the same things in the same way.
If you [...]
How (Exposure) Times Have Changed
Today we make photographs with exposures in fractions of seconds.
The first photograph, created in 1826 by Joseph-Nicephore Niepce, required an 8 hour exposure.
Read more here.
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Why Aren’t Your Pictures Better?
If you want your pictures to be better you should examine the following:
Do you know enough?
Do you care enough?
Are you afraid?
Knowing enough is easy to fix. Learn more.
Caring enough is easy to fix too. Make sure that you photograph things that interest you.
Fear is the killer. Whatever you’re afraid of is holding you back. Fear keeps the [...]
Camera Centric Vs. Light Centric
When you start to learn photography you also start to learn how to work your camera.
You get caught up in learning how to use your camera to create a photograph.
You pay attention to camera operation and equipment
At this point you are camera centric.
While it’s important be camera centric for a period of time, there comes a time when being camera centric [...]
Do You Know Your Camera?
Do you know what your camera does and how it does it?
Your camera has many features and does a lot, but in my opinion there are three primary things that you should know how to do with your camera. You should know how to focus, meter and expose.
If you aren’t doing these things, your camera [...]
It All Comes Down To Metering And Exposure
Imagine that you’re looking through the viewfinder of your camera.
You’ve framed the content of your photograph perfectly, you’ve put a lot of effort and thought into this photograph.
Your subject is just where it should be, the light is perfect, this picture is going to be AMAZING!!
You press the shutter release to make your exposure when everything is [...]
Taking Responsibility For Your Photography
You are ultimately responsible for your photography, but you can choose to be totally responsible for your photograph or partially responsible for your photograph.
If you work your camera in an automatic exposure mode you are responsible for working your camera in auto exposure mode.
In automatic exposure mode you have chosen to have your camera pick your [...]
Photographing What You See And Photographing How You See
There’s photographing WHAT you see and then there’s photographing HOW you see .
It’s easy to create a photograph based on what you see.
Photographing what you see involves getting an average exposure for what you see and framing it.
Anyone could photograph what they see with a point and shoot camera while working in an automatic exposure [...]
Photography As A Way Of Meditation?
Meditation means awareness. It could be an awareness of your breath or it could be an awareness of the sound of the train that you are riding on your way to work. As long as these activities are free from any other distraction to your mind, you are meditating effectively. Anything you do with awareness [...]
Passion And Certainty
As a photographer you should have a passion about about what you are photographing and a certainty in your vision.
Passion comes from your heart. Certainty in your vision comes from your ability to apply craft to get the photograph that you want.
When you combine passion and certainty you produce a strong photograph that is uniquely [...]
Use Your White Balance Creatively
If you’ve been using the “automatic” white balance setting on your you’ve been missing an easy and effective way to create more interesting photographs.
It does’nt matter if you use a point and shoot or an SLR, as long as you can pick a white balance setting (instead of automatic WB) you can use the white balance [...]
There Are Always At Least Two People In A Photograph
There are always at least two people in a photograph.
The first person is the photographer who created the photograph.
The second person is the person viewing the photograph.
As the photographer creating the photograph, it’s up to you to effectively visually communicate whatever you were experiencing that made you want to make the photograph in the first place. That’s how [...]
When You Make A Picture
When you make a picture in an auto mode your camera will get you an average exposure based on whatever you are metering. Your picture may be good enough in terms of exposure but is probably lacking in the very thing that takes a picture beyond good enough; you, the photographer, are what’s lacking.
When you make a [...]
Are You Seeing In Color?
Are You Seeing Color? Of course you are, color is everywhere. But, as a photographer, are you “really” seeing color and using it effectively as a compositional element in your work?
Used thoughtlessly color can get in the way of our photograph…read more
Finding Inspiration In The Ordinary
Not feeling inspired by the ordinary?
We tend to overlook the ordinary in search for something extraordinary.
If you take a moment and look closer at the ordinary you will see something extraordinary.
When you see something extraordinary in the ordinary, photograph it.
The top of a traffic cone, a fork in a plate, a lightbulb in a lamp shade.
Try this with anything, it [...]
A Good Photograph Involves A Good Thought Process
A good question came up in a recent photography class. I’m paraphrasing here: “If you create photographs in a RAW file format, since a raw file holds no white balance or color space, why do you bother setting white balance or color space?”
I set color space just in case I decide to capture in a [...]
You Get What You Give
If you give your photography the thought process that involves working your camera in fully manual exposure mode you’ll get a photograph that is thoughtfully composed and reflects you, the photographer.
If you give your photography the thought process that involves an automatic exposure mode you’ll get a photograph that lacks thoughtful composition and reflects your camera, a [...]
How Does A Camera Work?
Your camera primarily does three things to create a photograph
Your camera focuses light (This is really done with your lens).
Your camera measures light.
Your camera exposes light sensitive material to light.
That’s it!!
If you’ve been working your camera in an automatic mode your camera has been doing these things for you.
If you want to create photographs that are uniquely [...]
Taking Versus Making
When you work your camera in an automatic exposure mode you are taking pictures.
In an automatic exposure mode your camera picks an aperture, a shutter speed and an ISO for you, so you TAKE what you get as a photograph.
When you work your camera in fully manual exposure mode you are making pictures.
In fully manual [...]
Photograph Manipulations Before Photoshop
Photographers were manipulating photographs long before Photoshop.
Go see the show Faking It: Manipulated Photography before Photoshop, at the National Gallery of Art.
The show runs from February 17–May 5, 2013.
White Balance: White Shoud Be White. Right?
The white balance settings on your camera represent the Kelvin temperatures of various light sources.
The Kelvin temperature of a light source describes the color of that light source.
I imagine it’s called white balance because white should look white. If white looks blue, or red, or purple or whatever color, we often perceive this as undesirable [...]
Change Your Mind And Become A Nimble Photographer
While in the process of creating a photograph you may realize that you can’t get the picture that you visualize. After evaluating the light and considering the limitations of your equipment, you just can’t get the picture that you want.
You have a couple of choices. You can choose to not make a photograph or you can practice what I [...]
