| From Photoworkshop.com Wisdom and Inspiration Tips for shooting around the globe as well as in your own neighborhood
Think outside the box. It’s easy to get locked into thinking about using telephoto lenses for wildlife photographs and portraits, and wide-angle lenses for landscapes and street shots. But I like to think out of the box when it comes to lenses. Then do just the opposite when the situation calls for it, and when you want to be more creative. I used a full-frame, 15mm fish-eye lens for this environmental portrait (a subject in its environment) of a marine iguana. To get everything in the scene in focus, I use a small aperture (f/11) and, using the camera’s focus lock, set the focus 1/3 into the scene. This is a basic technique that pros use for getting great depth-of-field. To create a curved horizon line, I tilted the lens down slightly. If you can’t get to Galapagos to photograph the marine iguanas with a super-wide-angle lens, try this technique on your cat or dog for a more creative shot.
Be prepared. As photographers, we need to be prepared for unexpected photo opportunities, such as when this short-ear owl flew across the lava, and with one swift bite to the neck, caught and killed a dove. I’m always prepared with two digital SLRs hanging from each shoulder—one with a telephoto zoom and one with a wide-angle zoom. Both cameras were set on aperture priority, my f-stop was f/8, and the ISO on each camera was set on 400. That set-up basically lets me point and shoot in an instant, so at least I get a shot. Then if there is time, I adjust the aperture for the desired depth of field, and I use the exposure compensation to dial in the correct exposure. I took this shot with my 70-200mm lens set at 200mm. Being prepared also means always being on the lookout for pictures. Being prepared—perhaps most important—has a lot to do with being aware.
Expose for the highlights. This might be one of the most important tips in this article. When setting the exposure, it’s super important not to have any areas of the scene overexposed, such as the white feathers on this blue-footed booby’s breast. Sure, we can rescue an overexposed area up to one stop in Camera RAW, but why take a chance in not capturing all the detail. (Shoot JPEGs, and you’re sunk if the highlights are washed out.) Checking your camera’s overexposed warning and histogram can help ensure a correct exposure. But learning how to see the light (the difference between the light and dark areas of a scene) is the key to setting the correct exposure. I shoot digital images like I used to shoot slide film, which has a relatively narrow exposure latitude. I set the exposure for the brightest part of the scene.
Dead center is deadly. Here’s an easy one: placing the subject in the dead center of the frame appears static, as far as composition goes. That’s why I composed this picture of a masked booby with the bird off-center. Now you might think that my cropped picture of the Galapagos hawk shows the animal in the center of the frame. Well, it actually fills the frame, and the most important part of the picture, the animal’s head, is off center— same for my owl and booby bird photographs.
Tell a story. I like pictures that tell a story. Sure, portraits of animals and people are nice, but pictures that show some behavior or interaction are usually more interesting to look at. So I look for those types of scenes. This picture tells a story of a “mommy” seal and her pup relaxing on the beach after the pup finished nursing.
Be aware of the background. I used to tell my workshop students that the background is almost as important as the main subject. These days, I tell them it is every bit as important, because it can make or break the scene. So, when I am composing a picture, I am always asking myself, “How will the background affect my picture?” In this picture of several sea lions relaxing on the beach, the lone sea lion in the background adds a nice element to the image. I have many other pictures of resting sea lions, but this is my favorite.
Capture the peak of action. Okay, I agree that a photograph of one of the slowest moving animals on the planet lifting its head as high as it can is not really considered capturing the “action.” But relatively speaking, this is about as action-packed as you get when it comes to the Galapagos tortoise! Try to anticipate the peak of action of an animal in the wild or a sports player on the field. Shoot at the peak of action. Use a 1/500th of a second shutter speed to “freeze” the motion.
Envision your final cropping. Check out this picture of Sullivan Bay. I cropped out the dead space in the scene—the plain sky and the sand in the foreground. This image is how I envisioned the end result. If we envision the end result, we can compose the scene accordingly. By the way, I like to crop my pictures in Camera RAW as the first step in the image enhancement process. That way, when I am playing around with Levels and Curves, those adjustments (and my eyes) are not affected by the areas to be cropped out.
Pack a polarizing filter. Sure, we have many different filter effects (in Photoshop and with Plug-ins) that we can apply digitally to our pictures. But one effect that can’t be duplicated 100 percent is a polarizing filter: no digital polarizing filter can reduce glare on water and let us see through water like a glass polarizing filter does (although the Polarizing filter in Nik Software's Color Efex Pro 2.0 (www.niksoftware.com) does a good job of darkening a blue sky and making white clouds look whiter, as does a polarizing filter). Use a polarizer (which is only effective when the sun is positioned to your left or right), and you’ll get better outdoor images. Compare the difference of the image with polarizing filter on the left, as opposed to the image without a filter on the right.
The eyes have it. If the eyes are not in focus and well lit in your animal and people portraits, you’ve missed the shot. I use the focus lock on my camera to lock in the focus on the subject’s eyes before I shoot, as I did for this photograph of a Sally light-foot crab. I also often use a flash to brighten the subject’s face, and to add some “catch lights” to the subject’s eyes. Well, those are my top in-camera photo tips. However, here is one more: Have fun! After all, you picked up a camera to have fun, right? Don’t get too caught up in all the technical aspects of picture-taking that you miss the fun. And of course, continue that fun when using Photoshop. Rick Sammon has published 30 books, including Exploring the Light – Making the Very Best In-Camera Exposures, Face to Face – The Complete Guide to Photographing People, Idea to Image, Rick Sammon's Travel and Nature Photography, Rick Sammon’s Complete Guide to Digital Photography 2.0, Rick Sammon’s Digital Imaging Workshops and Flying Flowers – the beauty of the butterfly. Rick, who has photographed in almost 100 countries around the world, gives more than two dozen photography workshops (including private workshops) and presentations around the world each year. He also gives presentations at Photoshop World, which Rick says is a “blast.” Obviously, Rick loves teaching and sharing his knowledge of photography. Rick is also the author of the Canon Digital Rebel XT lessons on the Canon Digital Learning Center, and is a Canon Explorer of Light. Rick hosts five shows on kelbytraining.com. He’s also been spotted giving presentations at Apple stores in New York City and in San Francisco. When asked about his photo specialty, Rick says, “My specialty is not specializing.” Go to www.ricksammon.com for more information. Contact Rick at: 914.271.6132 or email: ricksammon@mac.com. © Copyright 2002 by Photoworkshop.com |
