Digital Photography Tips

Yeah, this is that sweet innocent look!

Should we do this photo shoot together?

Yeah right . . .

I’m getting the feeling this isn’t gonna be a professional shoot . . .

Having too much fun to stop laughing . . .

Uh huh . . .

Hey I can do this shoot without you! (grin)

Are they leaving with my monopod? Hey come back here! Hello?

Sometimes it isn’t about the photo shoot or the quality of the shots. Sometimes it is just about having fun and enjoying the moment.

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2009 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

Have you ever found yourself in a total slump with your photography? Times when no matter how many pictures you take, they all seem to start looking the same? You just can’t quite find shots that stand out above the rest? Nothing seems to tell the story of what you’re seeing?

Find a photography friend to shoot with for a day!

You will learn more in just a few hours than you have in months of shooting on your own. Seeing the approach another photographer takes to the same scenes, the angles they take, and how they deal with lighting issues will have your mind whirling wanting to learn more.

The following shots were taken by Robert Barrett of Barrett Photo Art. All this time I have found myself completely filling the frame with the subject. While that can make for some stunning shots, sometimes backing up, showing more of the scene surrounding your subject tells more of the story, adding feeling to the photos.

WOW! It is beautiful here . . .

I am not looking at the hot guy . . .

Oh my gosh! He was soooo hot! . . .

Where did the ducks go?

Toto? I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore . . .

Oh yeah! I think I could get used to Austin!

It is just so peaceful here . . .

Simply beautiful . . .

“Don’t shoot what it looks like. Shoot what it feels like.”
(David Alan Harvey)

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2009 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

As most of you already know, I am a major fan of black and white photos. I have a habit of checking just about every picture I really like, to see how it would look as a black and white. Sometimes the results are stunning, and other times the results are just okay. This time I was pretty pleased with the black and white conversions.

I didn’t use a lot of fancy image editing for these pictures, just some basic adjustments using the unsharp mask and the use of the Virtual Photographer plugin (with some custom settings) to convert them to black and white. This is one of my favorite plugins!

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2009 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

Winners of the V7N Angles Photography Challenge!

Angles Photography Challenge Winner, Jeffrey of Warrior Poet

Angles Photography Challenge Winner, KristysKnots of Hemp Jewelry

Angles Photography Challenge Winner, Thomas of I’m Just Serious

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2008 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

Winners of the V7N Without a Face Photography Challenge!

Without a Face Photography Challenge Winner, Ejingram of Dyerville

Without a Face Challenge Winner, Amy Sue of My Happy Crazy Life

Without a Face Challenge Winner, 3ncryptabl3_lick of OpticalDevotee

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2008 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

Winners of the V7N Black and White Photography Challenge!

Black & White Photography Challenge Winner, Todd of ToddW Blog

Black & White Challenge Winner, Suzanne of SKJordan Web Designs

 
Black & White Photography Challenge Winner, V7N Member, Lively

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2008 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

There are some wonderful photography challenges posted in the Digital Photography section of V7N right now that you will definitely want to take part in. Use this as an opportunity to share your photography, get some recognition, and just plain have some fun!

Go ahead and do it. You know dang well ya want to!

1. Photography Challenge: Angles
2. Photography Challenge: Black and White
3. Photography Challenge: People Without a Face

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2008 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

 Another example of blending layers in Paint Shop Pro Photo X2.

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2008 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

One of my favorite photo effects is editing an image to give it the look of a black and white image with just a hint of color.

There are probably hundreds of different ways that you can accomplish this, but one of the easiest is by blending layers using an image editor.

The original of the photo above had quite a bit of black and white in the scene already, so the results were a bit more dramatic.

It is really a matter of playing in your editor until you like what you see but this tutorial should help point you in the right direction.

Although this tutorial was written for Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2, you will find that this process is very similar in many image editors, including previous versions of Paint Shop Pro.

Start by making a copy of the original full color photo.

To do this, simply right click on the image and select, Copy.

Then right click again, and select, Paste > Paste as New Image.

You should now have two identical color photos.

The next stage is to convert one of the color photographs to black and white. The number of ways that you can do this are almost unlimited.

You may want to download Virtual Photographer Plugin Filter Effects if you prefer dramatic black and white photo effects.

However, with Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 you will find multiple options already available by default within the program.

From the menu select, Effects > Photo Effects > Black and White Film

You can then either choose the Suggest Color option, or you can experiment until you are happy with the results.

Make a copy of the black and white image, by once again right clicking and selecting, Copy. Now, click on the tab for the color image and select, Paste > Paste as New Layer.

You should now see both the color and the black and white image in your layer palette on the right side of the program.

If you do not see it, as shown in the screenshot below, you may need to enable it by selecting, View > Palettes > Layers, or by selecting F8 on your keyboard, as a shortcut.

Click thumbnail image above to view full size screenshot.

Click on the black and white thumbnail in the layers palette on your right, to make sure you are working from the raster layer.

Near the top of the layers palette you will see a number that is probably set at 100, with a small triangle arrow below it.

Slide that arrow to the left by left clicking on it (keep holding it down) and dragging the arrow to the left until you are happy with the results. The smaller the number you choose, the more color you will see.

For this particular photograph, I left in quite a bit of color, while still softening the results to my liking.

Once you are satisfied with the results, merge the two layers by selecting, Layers > Merge > Merge All (Flatten).

You are now ready to resize and optimize the photo for web use.

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2008 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

I promised a few folks that I would start sharing basic steps that I use to edit my photos using Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2.

The photograph above is a good example of a quick and easy edit you can add to spruce up your images using the glamour photo effect.

This was the original image (shadow added for display) with nothing more done to the photo beyond applying the unsharp mask.

Although I felt the photo was fine, it seemed to be missing something, so I decided to add some minor photo effects, in this case, a little bit of glamour to add some romance to the shot.

Select: Effects > Photo Effects > Film and Filters

Click thumbnail image above to view full size screenshot.

A new smaller window will open. Next to film looks, select glamour from the drop down menu and then click ok.

That is all there is to it. The entire process, including resizing and optimizing for the web, takes less than 2 minutes.

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2008 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

Occasionally I find some good shots hiding in everyday type snapshots that I have taken just for the fun of it. Most of the time I discover them by playing with the photographs in an image editor, just experimenting until I find something that really jumps off the page for me.

This is an original (sized for displaying on the web) snapshot that I really liked, but there was so much going on in the picture that it distracted the look I was going for. I wanted people to see the look of peace that I was seeing on Haley’s face, while she waited on these steps for me to catch up to her.

By cropping and editing snapshots, we can change the focus of what our eye is naturally drawn to within the shot. As you see above, I have removed a lot of the distractions, and brought the focus in on her, but it still wasn’t quite right for me. The shot was still missing something.

The key was cropping the image down to the expression on her face. This natural photograph above, happens to be my personal favorite.

Some folks prefer a warmer and softer look (glamour effect) for these types of pictures, as seen in the example above. I accomplished this just by using a few effects within Corel’s Paint Shop Pro Photo X2.

I like the more tradional classic approach of a basic black and white photograph, as long as it doesn’t lose the vivid personality in the eyes.

If you are going for a dramatic look you can add some clarifying effects and play around a bit with the shadows within the shot.

In the end it all comes down to experimenting until you find the effect that portrays the look you were going for.

Which effect do you like best for this snapshot?

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2008 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

Displaying photos on the internet is similar to how you might display them when decorating in your own home. Usually, we don’t just tack photographs up on the wall.

We like to frame them and make them stand out from the wall a bit. When we are displaying photographs on our websites though, the frames we find in image editing programs tend to distract from the photos, rather than making them stand out.

Simply framing the picture with a soft shadow can solve this issue. This technique allows the focus to remain on the photograph itself, while still standing out from the page.

This very professional photograph (below) does not render as well on the web as it does in print, and it ends up losing something on the pages of a website.

By adding a very small amount of clarification to the image, along with a gentle shadow we can once again make this photograph almost pop off the page.

Adding these tiny details to photos displayed on your website, can make a huge difference in the overall visual appeal of your site. Sometimes those tiny deatails add up to increasing your sales!

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2008 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved
 
 A very special thank you to Laura Thomas of Purrinlot Persians for allowing me to use photographs from her website as examples for this tutorial. Now I want a kitty! (grin)

Sometimes no matter what I do, I just don’t end up with the shot that I saw in my mind when I was taking the picture. Today, I was standing on the side of the road trying to get a quick photo of an old barn.

There was an icy cold wind, the natural light was just about gone, and I was too cold and cranky to spend the time getting the shot.

Salvaging Bad Photographs
Of course, I was more than disappointed with the result above, but that doesn’t mean I automatically delete these types of pictures.

If the quality of the image is good enough, I am very likely to open Corel’s Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 and experiment. More often than not, I end up salvaging bad photographs into something useable.

Lighten and Clarify
This is the exact same photograph as above, but I decided to lighten and over clarify the image to give it a more dramatic effect. You may also noticed that I have cropped and straightened the photo.

Lighten, Clarify, and Sepia Toning
Again, this is still the exact same picture as above, but I added sepia toning to the final image for an almost spooky effect, ending up with a photograph that I truly like.

When All Else Fails . . .
When all else fails, I just go back to shooting photographs of my daughter and I know everything will turn out just fine!

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2008 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

Several people have asked me recently how to shoot quality portrait style shots. Since I am not a professional studio photographer, most of the time for me, it is a matter of pure luck and a lot of trial and error.

Copyright © 2007 Mississippi Photo Gallery

The odds of ending up with a great picture greatly increase in direct correlation with the number of pictures I take, so I take a ton of them!

My best photographs are usually the result of taking hundreds of pictures in a short period of time and not being afraid to experiment with several different camera settings for the same scene until I find exactly what I am looking for.

For these types of shots, like the one in this article, I adjust my camera settings for a shallow depth of field, blurring the background, while keeping the subject in focus, and I move in pretty close.

Later in the image editor, I used a basic filter (adding a few tweaks) because I personally preferred it in a soft black and white.

I usually take my photos outside, with natural lighting. This also allows me the freedom to enjoy outside activities and end up with much more candid shots instead of heavily posed scenes.

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2007 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

Over the last few days I have learned that photography is every bit as much about attitude as it is about skill, maybe even more so.

Similar to what writers go through now and then when they are faced with the challenge of writers’ block, I have had a few months here where I simply stopped seeing the beauty in the world around me.

I found it very difficult to even pick up my camera, let alone get out there and actually take some decent shots. The longer I waited to get back out there with my camera, the harder it became.

Fortunately, a good friend of mine challenged me to make a commitment to take one or more pictures every day for a while.

For some reason, if I didn’t look at it as a whole photo shoot, it suddenly seemed like something I could do. Heck yeah! I can promise just to take one or more pictures every day for a while.

As I headed out the door, I reminded myself it was no big deal. I could get one picture in about 5 minutes flat and be done with it.

My favorite person in the world to photograph is my daughter. She is a natural in front of the camera, and above all she has the patience of a saint when I get in a groove and want to keep on shooting, so I figured she would be perfect for this day.

We headed to the park in town and just started talking. Eventually I pulled out my camera and started looking at the world through my lens again, while she played on the jungle gym.

My promise to myself to take at least one picture turned into more than an hour as I began to remember how much I enjoy seeing my daughter smirk at me through the viewfinder while I keep trying for
the perfect outdoor portrait.

At least one photo a day, for 30 days. I can do this.

Small Business Marketing Consultant and Scenic Photographer
Copyright © 2007 J. Walker of Mississippi Photo Gallery All Rights Reserved

UPDATE:Click below to follow each day of this challenge.

Our Photo Journey