Sensitivity Training
The ISO capabilities of current camera models is remarkable. Sometimes I’ll go out late at night just for the fun of shooting at 25,600. But while it’s great to have the possibility of capturing a low-light shot that would not have been possible only a few years ago, many people overestimate the implications. While an expanded ISO range allows us to capitalize on a lower quantity of light, this does nothing to help us toward better quality of light. Case in point: I was asked to take a few photos at a Sunday...
read moreA Before & After
For the photo below, I had found a high vantage point that allowed me a downward view of the concrete staircase. This was important to the composition because it allowed me to exclude many other background elements along the grassy hillside, such as trees and other people. This greatly simplified the composition, but it still contained no real center of interest. So I waited with my camera poised until this guy came along. I took a few shots as he passed through the scene, but this is the one I liked best. So now my photograph contains a...
read moreGet In Close
Long before I was a photographer, I watched the movie Sabrina. Not the old one, but the one starring Harrison Ford as Linus and Julia Ormond as Sabrina. In the movie, Sabrina is something of an amateur photographer and Linus asks her to take a few shots of his apartment for sale. So she asks him what shots he wants, and he says something like, “Everything. All of it.” I never forgot her response: “You know, sometimes MORE isn’t better. Sometimes it’s just MORE.” I didn’t know that one day I would be applying the same principle to...
read more10 Things You Need To Learn About Photoshop
I’m obsessive about telling photographers to approach Photoshop AS photographers. About 90% of the stuff in there is not going to be very useful to you, so start by learning a handful of things that WILL be. This makes the process of learning much more manageable. Imagine learning arithmetic by throwing in a couple of trigonometry problems here and there. Another upshot is that once you’ve got a handle on some fundamentals, you’ll be more comfortable working with the interface, and you can then explore a little more easily on your own....
read moreTop 10 Keyboard Shortcuts For Photoshop
I used to think that learning keyboard shortcuts was a waste of time because I didn’t believe they could actually speed up my work in Photoshop. But once I took the time to learn a couple, I realized that they aren’t difficult to remember and they really are fast when you find yourself running a particular command repeatedly. While PS allows you to create custom keyboard shortcuts for your most-used commands, I’ve found the default ones to be about all I need, and I’ve compiled a list of my top 10 shortcuts to share with you because...
read moreKeep It Simple
Starting out in photography can be difficult when your head is spinning with concepts and techniques whose relationships you haven’t even begun to understand yet. Shutter speed, f-stop, focal length, depth-of-field, composition… Trying to put all the pieces together into one photograph can be overwhelming, so here’s my advice: Don’t bother. Try breaking all of this down into projects and spend a chunk of time on each concept. If you’re trying to get a handle on depth-of-field, for example, spin your mode dial to Av and go for a walk....
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