Did You Get the Shot?

You're driving down the road and all of a sudden you see the Goodyear Blimp landing in a local shopping center parking lot. I dunno, maybe it was an emergency, or maybe it was a scheduled promotional visit, but whatever the case...did you get the shot?

Time after time, the answer to that question for me has been NO! When something amazing happens, I never seem to have my camera with me. I've got a quick fix to this problem. BRING YOUR CAMERA EVERYWHERE!!!

This topic might not seem very instructional, and granted it isn't. I do however feel it's an important topic to cover.

Some of the best photographs that are taken aren't planned. When something rare happens, it's nice to have a camera with you, at least giving you the chance to capture the event. Whether you do a good job of taking the photo goes back to your ability to adjust settings on the fly and quickly find a good compositional location. A photograph can lack in quality to some extent, if the event is rare enough. The rarity of a photo can cause it to become an iconic image that will be widely viewed and known.

I know it seems stupid and tedious to carry a camera to the grocery store, the bank, to work, to lunch, etc....however, it's often these times when something amazing happens on the way. To get the point across, let me list a few things big or small, that I've missed by not being prepared:

• Air Force One flying right over my head multiple times as it did touch and go's at the local airport
• Extreme sunsets and sunrises
• A field full of hot air balloons lifting off
• A local business on fire
• Interesting looking people - photojournalism
• Lightning storms

Some things I've managed to capture at odd times by having a camera available:

• Bald eagle perched on a stick in the middle of a lake beside my hotel
• Bridge opening with a battleship passing through at night
• My brother's deployment (ok perhaps most people have cameras at these things, but the images I got were more than just the standard family images)
• A lot of aerial photographs
• Interesting paint schemes on aircraft

I understand that lugging a heavy DSLR with all the equipment can be tiresome and nerve racking so at the least, buy yourself an inexpensive point and shoot that will fit in your pocket, purse, or wherever. A camera phone is better than no camera at all.

Here's a shot I got by using a camera phone. If it weren't for that, I would have missed this relatively rare photo:

Coleman Bridge opening during the day with a battleship passing through

So here is a good tip for travelling! Always bring your camera in your carry-on. This serves multiple purposes. For one, you have your camera available if something photo worthy happens during your flight. Secondly, it will prevent damage or loss from being in checked luggage. As a pilot, I have my camera on me all the time. I never know where my job will take me. I do find it annoying to carry an extra piece of luggage for my camera equipment, but I've had the opportunity to fly to some unique locations and was very glad I had it with me. I recommend a backpack style camera bag. This is one less thing you have to hold in your hands, and most backpacks fit in overhead bins or on the floor in front of your feet.

Might I add that the other 2 things I really find to be useful, but not nearly as practical are a tripod and at least one strobe type flash. I feel like I miss alot of things after dark because of my inability to lug the items around the country with me. When I'm home however, I always keep them in my car.

I hope everyone takes the extra time and effort to pack a camera of some sorts on their future ventures, near or far! I'll close this post with a few of the photos I took at my brother's deployment, mentioned above.

"Rucksacks & Body Armor"

"Please Come Home Safe" - That's my brother in the middle with the orange thing on his rucksack

"The Buses Await"

This has been, how to not miss the shot "From the Ground Up!"

View the full post here...

I'll Take My Photos RAW Please!

This entry is about how your camera saves a file to the memory card when you take a photo.

I'll try to keep this at the most basic level possible. This blog is intended to help new comers to photography, and I don't want to scare you away from the post with a load of technical jargon and somewhat unpractical information.

There are 3 basic options for saving your image to the card in most modern DSLR cameras. These options are:

JPG

RAW

RAW + JPG

What is a JPG(JPEG), and what is a RAW?

For starters, the image sensor in the average DSLR is gathering information in either 12 or 14 bits of data. Basically this allows the camera to save between 4,096 and 16,384 brightness levels depending on whether it's a 12 or 14 bit camera.

A JPG file is a standard image format that saves the file with lossy image compression. What this means is that of the 4,096 - 16,384 brightness levels available from your cameras sensor, the image is compressed to reduce the file size down to 8 bits of data which equivocate to 256 brightness levels. Additionally, all the saturation, contrast, white balance data, sharpening levels, and other camera settings are permanently assigned to the file.

The photo at the top of this post is a side by side comparison of what happens as a photo becomes compressed. The photo on the left is a JPEG file with some compression. As the photo is edited multiple times and re-saved multiple times, the compression becomes more and more apparent by artifacting (image quality loss due to compression) as seen in the right hand photo. Both versions of the photo show some compression artifacts upon careful examination, but the one on the right is far more degraded. It's easiest to notice the artifacts in the sky area of the photo.

A RAW file is an image format that saves the file with no compression or lossless compression (compression with no quality loss). RAW files save all the data originally taken from the sensor so that in the final file, one has the full 12-14 bits of data to play with. This allows you to change the exposure to a further degree after the image is already taken because instead of only having 256 brightness levels, you have up to 16,384 levels to play with. The settings you have in the camera at the time the photo is taken is saved to the file as well, but it doesn't save ONLY that information like JPG's. It saves all the other information available as if you had shot the photo with different settings.

For example, if you had shot a photo in JPG and the Shade white balance setting was chosen, you would be essentially stuck with that choice forever in the JPG file. If you shot the photo in RAW, you can go back and choose any of the white balance settings that were originally available to you at the time the photo was taken.

Let me interject that I'm not advocating using RAW as an excuse to not set the correct setting from the get go. I am saying, however, that if you do make a mistake, you have the chance to save the photo by changing the original settings slightly to salvage what would have been unsalvageable before RAW came along.

The more you get right on camera, the less work you have to do in post processing. When you shoot a wedding with 100-200 keepable photos, you don't want to have to edit every setting in post processing. This will add a lot of time to your processing work, whereas you could have saved loads of time by taking a few extra seconds at the time of the shoot to get the settings right.

The above options for saving a file are pretty self explanatory. If you choose JPG in your camera menu, the photo will be written as a JPG. If you choose RAW, the image will be saved as a RAW. The third option is to shoot in RAW & JPG, essentially saving 2 copies of each photo to the memory card, 1 in each file format.

Additionally, when you convert the RAW file into a TIFF file or a PSD file in photoshop or other image editing program, it is able to spread the 12-14 bits into 16 bits of information, or 65,536 brightness levels to work with.

A JPG file will often look just as nice in print as a RAW file converted to TIFF or PSD would have. The difference comes with the pros and cons listed below.

PROS & CONS

JPG PROS

• Smaller file size aka fit more files on memory card
• Shoot photos faster on camera because the small file size allows the images to be written to the card much faster
• If you don't like to do a lot of post processing to your images, the JPG file will eliminate much of the post processing work

JPG CONS

• Smaller file size from compression causes JPG artifacts (a noticeable image quality loss)
• Every time you re-save your JPG after editing it, the file is further compressed and the image quality gets worse and worse due to increasing compression artifacts.
• Lose most of the ability to recover under or over exposed photos.
• Can't change white balance after the fact, which can make a photo very unusable if you had a very wrong setting in camera.

RAW PROS

• Ability to bring change white balance after the fact
• Ability to recover detail from blown highlights and underexposed shadow areas
• No quality loss due to compression (no artifacts)
• Larger range of color data available to you in the 12 or 14 bit RAW file.

RAW CONS

• Larger file size
• Slower writing to memory card, therefore reducing how rapidly the camera can fire shots
• More post processing work

Different camera companies use different file extensions for RAW formats. For example, the Canon brand uses .CR2 file format in many of its cameras, whereas Sony uses .ARW. The RAW format has not been standardized into one file extension yet. The downside to this is that, one RAW converter (a program that converts your RAW to .JPG, .TIFF, .PSD, etc) won't necessarily be able to open up and edit all RAW file types. The good news is that your camera likely came with a converter for its associated file format. Additionally, Adobes latest Photoshop products like Photoshop CS4, Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2, etc, have the ability to read and edit most RAW formats from across the board. The program built into these products is called Adobe Camera RAW. It is even downloadable for many of the older versions of Photoshop that didn't originally include the feature. It is also worth mentioning that even though there isn't one file format directly from the manufacturers, Adobe Camera RAW lets you optionally convert the original RAW file to a .DNG raw file(Adobe's RAW file format). This file format, similar to the .PNG file will likely maintain support by Adobe for many many years to come, whereas your native file format may lose support as new formats come out in the future.

To wrap this up, I just want to add that shooting RAW may not be the right choice for everybody. It sure can save your butt when you have a paid photo-shoot, and for whatever unexpected and unexplained reason, you botched the shoot and under exposed all the photos or had a terrible white balance setting. You'll likely be able to fix your mistakes and your customer will have a nice series of photos in there photo album for years to come.

I hope you have a better understanding of the common file formats as this has been RAW files "From The Ground Up!"

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Patterns and Colors

QUICK TIP!

Look around. Look for patterns, shapes, colors, angles, etc. In this example, I noticed a pattern and a wide array of bright colors. To add a bit to the shot, I angled the camera.

Btw, this was a dog collar booth at the 2009 Daffodil Festival in Gloucester, Va. I should have bought one for my dog Fez.

View the full post here...

The Quickest Way To Improving Your Photography!!! COMPOSITION!

Ok, so this post is one that will apply to everyone who uses a camera. That includes DSLR, point and shoot, camera phone, whatever. By following a few basic "rules" of composition, you can drastically improve the way your photos look.

1. "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" - Leonardo Da Vinci

2. The Rule of Thirds

3. Level Horizons

4. Natural Framing

5. Lead-In Lines

6. Is that pole growing out of your head?

7. Diagonals, Curves, and Triangles

8. Fill the Frame

9. Look into, not out of the photo.

10. Odd Numbers

11. Break the Rules

1. Simplicity

• keep it simple, stupid (KISS)
• avoid distracting backgrounds
• we've learned that a large aperture opening (small F number) can help blur a background, therefore eliminating distractions!
• get rid of unnecessary elements in your photos (anything that distracts you from the main subject)

If you look at the very beginning of the post, you'll see my example for simplicity. There's no unnecessary distractions. It's very serene and simple. It's not cluttered with objects or subjects that prevent your eye from finding the main subject.

2. The Rule of Thirds

• perhaps the most important rule in photography
• divide your photo into 1/3 sections
• attempt to place your key subject(s) on a third line, or better yet on an intersection of the third lines
• the rule of thirds gives a photo alot more compositional strength and makes it more dynamic
• with portraits, the eyes should be on a third line
• with landscapes, the horizon should be on the third line
• with sunsets, the sun should be on a third line

As you can see, both the bird is on a third line intersection and the water edge is on a horizontal third line.

With the bird centered, the photo loses a lot of interest.

The bird on the third line makes for a greater dynamic photograph.

3. Level Horizons

• this simple compositional rule is one of the most often overlooked
• a slight slant of the horizon or major line of interest can take away so much from a photo
• if you're going for an off level, or diagonal look, go extreme.
• a slight slant shows you missed it in post processing, or can show laziness
• a big diagonal makes a statement and shows that you intended to do it
• it's not always easy to get a perfectly horizontal horizon in camera, however it is a very easy fix in post processing if you have photoshop, photoshop elements, lightroom, or any other basic post processing program

The below photo has a slightly slanted horizon

Even only a slight slant makes a difference

In the following photo, the slant was fixed and the horizon was leveled

4. Natural Framing

• when you have a natural frame, use it to your disposal
• natural framing brings your eye into the main subject
• examples of natural frames may be a window or door frame, the edge of trees, strong lines surrounding the subject
• basically anything that will surround your subject and draw your eye to it

The following photo gives an example of using many natural objects to frame the subject

The edge of the trees, the rock slope, and the fence frames the old broken down shack (main subject)

5. Lead-In Lines

• look for strong or dark lines that lead your eyes into, not out of the photo.
• look for vanishing points
• examples could be: a curvy stream that leads the eye off into the distance, a straight road that disappears into the center of the photo at a vanishing point, a sea shore that curves away into the distance
• if a strong line in your photo immediately shoots out of the edge of the photo, your eye follows it and distracts from your key subject

The below photo is an extreme example of using lead-in lines that meet at the vanishing point

This photo has a curving lead line that leads your eye from the foreground around the edge of the photo to the background area

6. Is that pole growing out of your head?

• it is always strange to see an object in the background that appears to be growing out of someone or something like a mutant appendage.
• an example may be a person with a telephone pole behind him or her that's lined up in such away that it looks like it's shooting right out of his or her head.

In this example the birds lined up in such a way that it looks like this guy (or girl...I'm not sure) has 4 wings.

7. Diagonals, Curves, and Triangles

• it has been said that diagonal lines make for stronger photos, compositionally.
• curves add a dynamic element to photo composition as well
• i can't recall the source of where I first learned this, but triangles are also very strong compositional tools

This photo has a nice mix of curves and diagonals

The following portrait contains a large number of triangles

8. Fill the Frame

• pretty simple...why have unnecessary empty space in a photo if it doesn't add anything to the photo.

Alot of wasted space with boring sky

The frame is filled with little wasted space. Greater detail can be seen in the aircraft.

9. Look into, not out of the photo.

• if your subject is on the left side of the photo, they generally should be looking to the right side of the photo and visa versa.
• if the subject is on the left and is looking to the left edge, your eyes tend to follow where there eyes are going. Your eyes then shoot right off the edge of the photo.

Looking out of the photo (try to stay away from this)

Looking into the photo (typically preferable)

10. Odd Numbers

• even number (2 or 4) are weaker compositionally
• odd numbers (1, 3, 5 etc) add to strong compostion
• for example, 3 candles in a photo would make a stronger composition than 2 or 4.
• this is partially why triangles make strong compositions

11. BREAK THE RULES

• rules are made to be broken
• there's a huge difference in breaking the rules intentionally and not understanding good compostion
• an example of when to break the rules is reflections in water. Instead of putting the main line on a third, symmetry will work better thus allowing for the line to be smack dab down the center
• extreme diagonals can be a good way to break the rules
• shooting down on children or up on adults you exaggerates their height (makes kids look smaller and inferior, and shooting up on adults makes them look far to large). However, this can sometimes be a fun one to break depending on the intended mood of the photo.

Here's an example of the main line down the center and a landscape being turned diagonally.

You are all now on your way to better photos due to your now never ending knowledge of photo composition (well maybe not never ending)

I hope you've enjoyed composition "From the Ground Up!"

View the full post here...

White Balance!------ Tungsten and Sunshine and Snow OH MY!

I'm hoping I can keep this entry shorter than the rest. Again, I'm going to snag my explanation of White Balance from the post about shooting Automatic vs. Manual.

White Balance - refers to the representation of colors in your image. Different light sources cast different colors on your subject. Lets say for example you had a piece of white notebook paper on the table and it was lit by a tungsten bulb (normal lamp). If there was no white balance adjustment, the image will appear to be very warm and orangey in color due to the color cast from the lamp. Your white paper won't look so white. Lets say it was under the light of a fluorescent lamp. These lights cast a blue color on your subject. The image will look cool and blue in color. Who wants blue or orange paper...or anything in between? Well you may want a color cast if you're going for an artistic effect, but by adjusting white balance whether automatically, or manually, the camera will warm up or cool down the image to bring that paper back to a nice white color.

Ok so lets start by going through some of the available white balance settings on many modern cameras.

AWB -Auto White Balance does it's best to detect what type of lighting is present and to correct for it. (ok for most situations, but far from perfect)

- then there's all the manual settings. I'll list the names of most and it should be pretty self explanatory. You're basically just telling the camera what lighting is present.

Sunshine, Shade, Cloudy, Tungsten, Fluorescent, Camera Flash

There is also a Kelvin option and a Custom W.B. option.

Kelvin is typically a measure of temperature. In this case how warm or cool the photo is measured in Kelvin.

With photography, the scale we use ranges from approx. 1,000 degrees kelvin (candlelight) to 10,000 degrees kelvin (north sky [blue light]). In between we have sunshine at about 5,500 degrees, household lightbulbs at about 2,500 degrees, early sunlight at about 2,000 degrees, and overcast daylight at about 7,000 degrees. These are just a few of the light sources and an approximation as where they fall on the Kelvin scale. So by choosing the Kelvin option on your camera you can manually set the color temperature of the photo. I typically don't use this, however there are times when I intentionally want to warm up or cool down a photo. You may want to warm up a sunset or sunrise or in the example below I wanted a unique color for my sky so I bumped up the Kelvin to I believe somewhere around 9,500k.

The option I use 95% of the time is custom white balance. To achieve a custom white balance, you first need a white balance target. The one I have is made by Photovision. You'll see a picture of it below. With this type of target you basically just take a photo of the target with the white side closest to your light source, set your WB to custom, then depending on your camera, go into the menu and choose custom white balance. It will likely bring up the last photo you took (of the target) and ask if you want to use this photo to set your custom white balance. You hit ok or whatever on your camera and presto, you've just corrected those incorrect colors with amazing accuracy. There are many other white balance targets on the market. For example, one you put over the end of your lens, aim at the light source, and proceed to follow the same instructions above.

Below is a before and after of a tungsten bulb in my hotel room. I've also included a relatively white sheet of paper to see the effects on white itself. It should be noted that the before photos were taken while using the Auto White Balance function, so as you can see, AWB is faaaarrrr from perfect.

White balance target by Photovision

Before W.B. adjustment

Target photo that we use to set our custom W.B. with

A shot of the target after setting the custom W.B.

After W.B. adjustment

I want to add a quick note about snow. If you're using AWB on snow, the combination of the snows reflectivity and the actual light can trick the camera into rendering the snow blue. In some cases this can be very extreme. If you don't have a WB target, you can point the camera at the whitest patch of snow (avoid shadows), take the photo, and then use it to set a custom white balance with. You're basically telling the camera that what's in the photo is true white. From then on, your snow photos should be much more color accurate.

And there you have it. White Balance in a nutshell. (or errr "From The Ground Up!)

View the full post here...

Aperture & Shutter Speed (A Beautiful Relationship)

So today I want to hit a bit more on aperture and shutter speed.

As I said in the last post...

Aperture = Size of hole in the lens. Bigger hole equals more light. Smaller hole means less light. Bigger hole means shallower depth of field (less in focus in front of and behind your subject). Smaller hole means larger depth of field (more in focus in front of and behind your subject).

Lets add a bit to what we've already learned. The size of the aperture is referred to as an F-stop.

This is the confusing part... This will be tough for many people to wrap your heads around. I know it was for me at first

The larger the F-stop number (ex. F/22), the smaller the hole opening.

The smaller the F-stop number (ex. F/2.8), the larger the hole opening.

Let's lay this out in a table of sorts:

• Little number, Shallow DOF, More light
• F/2.8
• F/4
• F/5.6
• F/8
• F/11
• F/16
• F/22
• Big number, Large DOF, Less light

if you set your camera to manual and read the instructions on how to change aperture...

scroll through the numbers by changing the aperture. you'll notice there are other numbers between these that I have listed. i didn't list them because the numbers above are 1 full stop of light each. just know that you can change the F/number in smaller increments perhaps 1/3 a stop by using one of these other numbers.

So now what is a stop or an F stop?

A stop is how we measure how much light is being allowed to hit the sensor through the cameras aperture.

So lets say we shot a photo and it was really bright and overexposed. One way of fixing this is changing the size of the aperture, perhaps reducing it one stop of light (meaning a bigger F/number). This would in turn reduce the size of the aperture opening allowing less light to reach the sensor.

Shutter Speed - Length of time the shutter is open allowing a given amount of light to pass through the aperture opening to your cameras sensor. Slower shutter speed means more light. Faster shutter speed means less light. Slower shutter speed blurs movement. Faster shutter speed freezes the movement.

Again with the confusing part. When referring to shutter speed, a seemingly large number (1/1000) is actually a lesser amount of time than a seemingly smaller number (1/15). One one thousandths of a second is a very short period of time whereas one fifteenth of a second is a considerably longer amount of time. Keep this in mind.

• Small Number, Shorter period of time, Less light, Freezes action
• 1/1000 of a second
• 1/500
• 1/250
• 1/125
• 1/60
• 1/30
• 1/15
• 1/2
• 1 second
• Bigger number, Longer period of time, More light, Blurs movement

again each number in the table above represents one full stop of light. your camera settings will likely show numbers between these numbers but they are in increments of 1/3 of a stop.

So how does aperture and shutter speed relate to each other. It's rather genius really...

To keep a set exposure, but change the artistic effects, you can change either the aperture or shutter speed to reach the desired effect. If you change either of these things you will throw your exposure off soooooo: If you reduced the aperture by one stop to get a desired effect, you can increase the shutter speed by one stop to maintain the proper exposure. So what you do to one, you have to do the opposite to the other!!

Lets say you have a photo where you've nailed down the exposure. It's really great. The only problem is that the photo is blurring the movement and you really want to capture that car moving by freezing the action:

Sample Settings for desired exposure: 1/30th second & F/11

If you refer to the above table you'll see that you change your shutter speed to something more suitable for a moving car say... 1/250th of a second. That's 3 stops of light. You must then drop the F/stop down by 3 stops. The trusty table above will show the appropriate F/number to maintain your exposure is F/4.

We've just changed the artistic effect without hindering our desired exposure.

Another example:

You have a portrait and you'd like the background to be blurrier or more out of focus (OOF).

Current settings: 1/30th second & F/8

We want to make the f-number smaller or the hole larger (don't forget that trickery). To do this we may stop down the F-number to something like F/4. Conveniently F/4 is exactly 2 stops of light less than F/8. To maintain our desired exposure we should then increase the shutter speed by two stops. Trusty table above says 2 stops of light difference would be 1/125th of a second.

So again we've changed the artistic effect without changing our shutter speed.

it should also be noted that since your camera allows you to choose stops in 1/3 increments as mentioned above....three clicks of the wheel in either direction would adjust your setting 1 full stop. so if you want to decrease you're aperture one full stop you'd click the aperture wheel 3 clicks to the left. in turn, you'd click the shutter speed wheel 3 clicks to the right to maintain that desired exposure.

To wrap this up, let's take a glance at a few examples of the artistic effects available with aperture and shutter speed.

Desired Effect: Blur everything closer than and beyond our focal point (the little knob sticking out of the tree). We need a large aperture opening to gain the desired effect aka a small F/number.

F/4, 1/80th second

Desired effect: Subject (people) and background in focus. We need a small aperture opening (large number) to gain this desired effect.

F/22, 1/100th second

Desired effect: Freeze the action. We need a fast shutter speed.

F/2.8 1/4000th second

Desired Effect: Blur the movement. We need a slower or longer shutter speed.

F/4.5, 1/25th second

In conclusion: Whatever you change in either aperture or shutter speed, you must then change the other in the opposite direction to maintain a desired exposure.

This has been aperture and shutter speed "From The Ground Up!"

View the full post here...

Automatic Vs. Manual

So you've just gone out and bought yourself a shiny new DSLR (digital single-lens reflex) camera to replace that point and shoot you've been using for the longest time. Sweet better photos are on the way.

Or are they?

That will greatly depend on a few things...mainly if you intend to use your DSLR as a fancy point and shoot.

Some aspects of your photos will likely improve just with the purchase of your DSLR. Some of these things include:

-Better Image Sensors (better resolution [Megapixels], color accuracy, tonal range, etc)

-Better Dynamic Range (better ratio of light to dark to capture more detail in the highlights and shadows in the same photo)

-No Shutter Lag (helps to not miss that once in a life time shot due to a delay from your camera)

-More Frames Per Second (more photos shot in a short period of time - up to 10 fps in some camera models)

But aside from these few things, if you shoot on automatic mode with your DSLR, you're losing out on the best features built into your new toy.

Automatic modes choose all your in camera settings for you in an attempt to get a properly exposed photo every shot. Wow! That's great! Exactly what I want! Or is it?

By doing this, the photographer (you) loses control of the artistic effects that you'd be capable of achieving by shooting in manual mode.

With that said, lets define the different things that the camera is deciding for you.

Aperture - The opening in your cameras lens through which light passes through that in turn reaches the image sensor. The size of the hole is adjustable to let more or less light reach the sensor. In addition to changing the amount of light coming in, it also has an added artistic effect. The bigger the hole, or the wider the aperture, the more blur will be added in front of and behind your focal point. The smaller the hole, or the smaller the aperture, the more that will be in focus in front of and behind your focal point. This matter of focus in front of and behind your subject is referred to as Depth of Field (DOF).

Shutter Speed - For starters, the shutter is the mechanism in your camera that blocks light from hitting the sensor when a photo is not being taken. When you click the shutter button, you send a signal to open the shutter for a preset amount of time to allow light to pass through the aperture to reach the sensor. When this preset amount of time elapses, the shutter closes, blocking further light from reaching the sensor. The amount of time the shutter is open is referred to as shutter speed. The shorter amount of time the shutter is open, the less light is allowed to reach the sensor. The longer it's open, the more light reaches the sensor. Faster shutter speeds (1/250, 1/500, 1/1000, 1/4000, etc) allow you to capture something moving and prevent motion blur from occurring. Slower shutter speeds (1/25, 1/8, 1/2, 1 sec, 30 sec, etc) allow motion blur to occur. The fractions above are fractions of a second.

ISO - or International Organization for Standardization, refers to the sensors sensitivity to a given amount of light. This relates to film speed in non-digital cameras. The higher the number the faster the film. 100 being low speed, and 800 or more considered high speed film. By increasing the sensitivity of the image sensor, you are making it more sensitive to a given amount of light. So for example lets say you need to take a photograph in a dark room. You may start by trying to make the aperture it's largest possible size to let the most light reach the sensor. You may then try to make the shutter speed longer to get the light you need. Well if you have the shutter speed to slow (or open longer) you may capture the image at a proper exposure but your image will likely be blurred if you were hand holding the camera (as opposed to mounting it on a tripod). So what can you do about that? Increase the sensitivity of the sensor. By bumping up the ISO to a higher number, one can shoot at a shutter speed that wont cause any motion blur. Without adjusting the ISO, the image will look dark and underexposed. By increasing the ISO, the light that is available in the room will seem more apparent in your photos because of the increased sensitivity to light.

White Balance - refers to the representation of colors in your image. Different light sources cast different colors on your subject. Lets say for example you had a piece of white notebook paper on the table and it was lit by a tungsten bulb (normal lamp). If there was no white balance adjustment, the image will appear to be very warm and orangey in color due to the color cast from the lamp. Your white paper won't look so white. Lets say it was under the light of a fluorescent lamp. These lights cast a blue color on your subject. The image will look cool and blue in color. Who wants blue or orange paper...or anything in between? Well you may want a color cast if you're going for an artistic effect, but by adjusting white balance whether automatically, or manually, the camera will warm up or cool down the image to bring that paper back to a nice white color.

So in automatic mode, the camera is making all of these choices for you. In manual mode you have the power to change these things individually and render the artistic effect that you desire in your images.

But this all sounds so hard. There's to many options and I'll likely mess up the image because I took to long to make the choices, or I made the wrong choices. Well let me say... you're probably right. You're going to make mistakes with your images when you first start using Manual exposure modes. That's the great thing about digital! You get instant feedback without wasting money as you screw up images. With film cameras you had to pay for the film and it was costly to make mistakes. I'm not advocating that if you choose to shoot film cameras, you should do everything on the automatic modes it may or may not give you. I'm just saying you have the ability to learn from your mistakes in an instant so why not shoot manual.

It will give you a better appreciation of your own images when you capture them well. You'll likely become a better photographer for doing so.

Well my dads reunion is tomorrow and I just got this DSLR and I can't afford to mess up the shots...Ok so shoot on automatic early on if it's vital that you at least capture keepable images from the event. But everywhere else, you should be striving to shoot manual. Before you know it you'll be able to dial in the desired settings in not much more time than it would have taken you to shoot the photo in manual.

Up until this point I've been referring to your cameras ability to choose how the photo is exposed. Another thing to think about is Automatic vs. Manual focusing.

To be quite honest, the Auto focus systems on cameras have come a long way. I shoot on Automatic focus 90% of the time. You may choose to do otherwise but I just wanted to explain the differences and let you decide for yourself.

There's not necessarily any right or wrong image to use manual focus on.

However, there are instances when manual focus will be a great benefit to you.

In my opinion, macro photography (close-up photography) is much easier by using manual focus. The DOF (depth of field) is so narrow that a slight hairs length of movement can cause the desired part of the image to be completely out of focus. This sounds hard to do by hand but it can be harder using auto focus. Auto focus in these situations tends to focus on an undesired point on your subject.

Another instance would be shooting through glass. I often find when shooting through glass, the auto focus system tends to pick up on dirt and reflections in the glass making it nearly impossible to get a subject on the other side of the glass in focus.

Fast moving subjects, or action photography can be much easier using manual focus. Let's say you're at an air show and the planes are going left to right at the same distance away from you. By setting the focus to manual and then getting your subject in focus, you'll find that every shot is in focus and you don't have to wait for your auto focus system to hunt back and forth looking for the subject every time it passes at 500-mph.

Low-light photography can prove to be a good time to shoot on manual. Many auto focus systems have trouble finding the subject to focus on in dimly lit conditions. By switching to manual, you can get the subject in focus without the headache of an unusable auto focus system.

So there you have it. Now you know the advantages to shooting with manual modes as opposed to automatic modes.

When I got my first DSLR, I just told myself to pretend that the automatic modes were broken. I never let myself resort to the automatic modes. I came home with alot of crappy photos, but when I got one right, it felt soooo good. Now manual mode is second nature to me and I couldn't even imagine shooting with an automatic exposure mode.

I encourage you to pretend your auto exposure mode is broken as well.

From now on, my entries will be based around shooting with a Digital SLR camera in full manual exposure mode.

The next entries will be going into more detail on aperture, shutter speed, ISO, white-balance, etc.

This has been Automatic Vs. Manual . . . "From The Ground Up!"

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And It Starts...

Welcome to Marc Payne Photography - From The Ground Up!

Over the course of almost a year, my knowledge of digital photography has skyrocketed. I thought it only proper to share the wealth. The knowledge I've attained has been from going to photography club meetings (Tidewater Digital Photography Club - TDPC), reading, talking to other photographers, and just getting out and using my camera. A great majority of my knowledge has come from the reading aspect of my learning methods. As a pilot who's away from home for 2 weeks at a time and has nothing but time, I found it easiest to read everything from magazines to online articles and everything in between. When the weather isn't fighting me, I like to go outside and try to apply what I've learned right away to help seal it in my memory.

These methods of learning were all very influential to me, but I've been feeling like I'm missing something. That something is writing. I find that I retain knowledge the best when I write down what I've learned. With that said, this blog will hopefully serve all of you loyal readers and have the added benefit of helping me build my knowledge and continue growing as a photographer.

Some of you may think, well who is this guy to teach me anything about photography? Has he ever been published? Is he making money on his photos? Etc, Etc... Well to answer that question I'd like to say that I've never been published in anything big. I've had a handful of shots published in the local newspaper as well as a few of my photos used in a few E-articles on www.nowpublic.com. As for making money, I'd first like to say that photography doesn't have to be a source of income for you. A lot of people find that involving money will only make photography less fun. However, I am shooting (no pun intended) to make photography a supplemental income to my career as a pilot. If you know anything about aviation, you'll know that pilots that are still paying there dues barely make enough money to live off of. So with that said, my first paid photo-shoot is coming up towards the end of this month. This isn't because my work hasn't been of quality until now, rather it's all in the marketing. I am horrible at marketing and have just recently really started trying to develop my marketing knowledge and build a client base.

To give you a few examples of my early work compared to my recent work, please take a second to glance at a few photo comparisons from then and now. I personally feel I have much to learn but I also feel like I have a great understanding of the fundamentals and merely need to hone my photography skills.

Portraits Example:

Before -

After -

The 1st photo is ok but it has alot of harsh shadows on her face from the sun. The second photo still keeps the golden light from the sun in the photo but the face is well illuminated and most importantly her eye(s) aren't in the shadows. Composition is mediocre on the first shot. There's alot of empty space above her head. The second photo makes better use of the background without wasting space unnecessarily.

Skyline Example:

Before -

After -

The first photo is very bland and it doesn't pop. There is to much space above and below the buildings themselves. There's no detail in this space so it compresses the look of the skyline and makes it look smaller. It could use a much tighter crop. The second photo has a tighter crop making the buildings look bigger in the photo. The colors and detail in the second photo far exceed that of the first photo. The second photo is much sharper as well.

Pet Photography Example:

Before -

After -

The first photo looks more like a snapshot. The on camera built in flash was used, making the photo look washed out. In the second photo, no flash was used. The first photo has alot of distracting background elements where the second photo the background fades into darkness. Granted the second photo is black and white and the first is color, but the principles are the same.

So these are just a few examples I've tried to come up with to show the difference in quality just a few basic techniques can make. I could go more in depth on each photo but instead I'll start my next post with the basics "From The Ground Up!"

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