Depth of Field Photography Tips

Some of the most essential photography tips for managing the “look” of your images center around choosing proper depth of field. In this article, we’re going to take a look at a few photography tips to help you control the depth of field in your photographs and the effects that it can have.

What is depth of field?

When you’re attempting to draw your viewer’s eye to your subject, composition is perhaps the single most important element. However, choosing a suitable depth of field is also a very powerful way to center your viewer’s focus on certain aspects within your image while making others less engaging. Think of the depth of field as a line of sight extending from your eye all the way through to the far reaches of your composition. This is “depth”. What we manipulate with depth of field is which elements of that composition are in focus and which are not.

Levels of depth

As we discuss photography tips for managing depth of field, it’s also important to understand its spectrum. When we refer to a shallow depth of field, we’re alluding to a primary subject (most often in our foreground) which is in focus while the rest of the composition is not. To the contrary, a deep depth of field typically refers to a composition in which all elements from the foreground to the background of the image are in focus.

Photography tips for controlling depth of field

Before we talk about how to control and manage depth of field in your images, let’s look at the functional elements of your camera that contribute to it. The camera’s aperture, or f stop, setting is the most important determining factor in arranging depth of field in an image. When we widen the aperture by using a smaller f stop setting, we allow a greater amount of light into the lens and thereby shallow the depth of field. This sharpens the focus on the subject within the composition in the foreground while blurring the background. Alternatively, closing down your aperture will increase focus throughout the entire composition from front to back.

The second way of controlling depth of field is manipulating the distance between the camera and the subject. It’s really no different from how the human eye works. When you move the camera closer to the subject, you lessen the focal sharpness on the background elements. When you move further away from your subject, the camera brings more of the background elements into focus.

The last of our photography tips for controlling depth of field surround the focal length of the lens you use. For any given aperture, as you add focal length to the lens, you lessen the depth of field. And again, alternatively, shorter focal lengths at a given aperture will increase depth of field. By using various focal lengths and aperture settings, you can drastically alter depth of field.

Experiment with these photography tips for controlling depth of field the next time you’re out for your next shoot and you’ll find interesting ways of engaging your viewer’s eye.

Portrait Photography Tips

Capturing intriguing images of people is an art form and in this article, we’ll explore some basic portrait photography tips to help you achieve success in portraiture.

Composition and Setting 

While we could explore hundreds of photography tips for getting better shots of people which draw out a subject’s personality or features, nothing is more important in taking pictures of human subjects than composition and setting.

When you are setting up composition for a portrait, there are a couple of things to consider. The first is how close you want to be to your subject and subsequently, how much of the frame you want to fill with your subject. Do you want to capture subtle details of facial expressions or interesting physical features unique to the person you are capturing? If so, then finding a way to fill the frame with the subject’s face or body is key. Take some time to think about why you want to capture an image of a particular person and what is intriguing and interesting about them. This will determine how you set up a shot.

This also leads into the next of our portrait photography tips: proper contextual setting. I have long had a fascination with trains and more precisely, the railroad employees who travel the rail lines along secluded paths throughout the world. I was able to find an engineer stationed with a rail company near my home and spoke with him about capturing some images of him. The man had a weathered and traveled look about him from his many years riding the rails. However, there would have been no context within the images had I not asked to meet him at a rail yard where the opportunity to tell the story of his years of service to the transportation industry was made real by the presence of diesel engines and rail cars.

Eye Contact

After setting up your shot, you can also experiment with the inclusion of direct eye contact versus having your subject look away from the camera. Direct eye contact in a portrait portrays intensity of personality while having your subject look away from the camera toward a distant spot can either draw out a feelings of contemplation, brooding, or desire. It can also draw your viewers’ attention to other elements of the photograph as I did with the railway engineer. Watching him stare deep into the composition at a long line of rail cars produced an image which reflected his great sense of responsibility for making safe passage across the country with hundreds of thousands of tons of speeding cargo and told the story of how this burden weighed on him personally.

Lighting

There are several photography disciplines in which lighting plays a critical role and portraiture is among them. Finding unique and interesting ways to light your subject’s features can have a dramatic impact on your portraits. Experiment with light from the side of a subject or from below his or her face to produce shadows which draw out the facial and body features which belong to your subject alone.

Experimenting with these portrait photography tips can lead to rewarding images that portray the essence of human nature and the role we play in our environments.

Holding a Camera the Right Way

We all can learn and relearn certain rules that we may have taken for granted in the past about photography. The most basic of which is how to hold your unit the right way.  Holding the camera the right way will prevent a lot of errors on your part. First off, it prevents camera jitters which in turn will cause blurs in your pictures.

Small compact cameras are actually more difficult to hold than larger DSLR units. Whereas DSLR units have grips which your hands can be placed in, most compact cameras don’t. To add to this, some compacts don’t often have a viewfinder but a large LCD display which serves as the finder, so one will have to be careful not to cover it. LCD displays force the user to hold the camera far away from the body to see well which will be subject to more jitters since there isn’t a steady hold on the unit. Hands which aren’t propped on a body art will most likely jitter unnecessarily even if the owner hasn’t noticed it yet.

The Right Position for holding the camera

Your hands shouldn’t be ‘floating’ when holding a camera. Keep those elbows firmly planted on your body’s side to provide more stability. If there are more stabilizers in the area such as a tree, a table, a chair or anything of the sort, prop the camera there or gain support from the object. This way, your hands will be more comfortable and less likely to jitter.

When taking portrait shots, place the camera on your left hand and support it with the right hand. Check several times if it covers the lens and the flash of the camera before clicking.

Use your Legs as Tripod

Like a tripod, your legs have to be wide apart, so they can be more stable in holding your body weight and the camera. The steadier your stance is, the more able you are in holding your camera. Furthermore, take a deep breath before holding down that shutter button. Even when kneeling, prop your elbows on your knees for a more stable posture.

Use the Viewfinder

Most digital cameras have viewfinders and live LCD displays. Use the viewfinder anyway. This will keep the unit close to your face, which will support the compact camera. Grasp the unit with both fingers in order to prevent any slippages and damages.

Photography Tips for Effective Use of Natural Light

Most photographers will tell you they prefer natural light within their photographs. In this article, we’ll explore a few photography tips for making the best use of natural light.

What is Natural Lighting?

Natural lighting is also sometimes referred to as “existing light” in photography and technically speaking, it is defined as any light source available within an environment that does not require the use of a flash or other artificial light source by the photographer. This can include indoor overhead lighting, neon signs, street lights, and of course, sunlight, which we will be primarily discussing in the following photography tips.

Timing is Critical

As we have referred to may times in past Photography Tips articles, using the soft sunlight of morning and evening hours is by far and away going to yield the best results when shooting with natural lighting. While the use of indirect sunlight indoors can be effective at mid-day, if you plan to shoot outside your best bet is going to be in the morning or at dusk.

What if I Have to Shoot During Mid-Day?

You will obviously come across times when it will be necessary to capture your outdoor images in the middle of the day. Perhaps you plan to be out on a hike then or will be attending a wedding in the middle of the day. If this is the case, try to find spots where the lighting is more even, such as in the shade, or use trees or building structures to block the harsh glare of the sun.

Using Reflectors

Again, if you will be in a situation where you need to have the ability to manipulate direct sunlight, you might also want to consider using reflectors to shift the lighting. Most of these folding reflectors come with multiple surface tones for a variety of effects. Black is useful for blocking light, white will assist to fill in shadowy areas, translucent surfaces will provide a softening effect, gold will produce a rich tone, and silver surfaces will enhance contrast.

Learn to Love Weather

If you find that you will be shooting on a cloudy day, consider yourself in luck. Clouds will help to soften and diffuse sunlight during any time of day and can provide nice, even lighting throughout your composition.

Learning to properly use natural lighting can be a challenge at times, but if you stick to these photography tips, you’ll find that you can effectively use existing light to produce outstanding images with no need for extra lighting equipment.

Best 5 digital cameras

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(Updated September 20, 2011 9:17 AM PDT)

Lori Grunin
Senior editor

As the name implies, here's where you find the best of the best, our top digital cameras across the board. To make it here, a camera really has to blow our socks off. That doesn't happen very often. If it did, our notion of "best" wouldn't mean much, would it? So check back periodically to see if any new models have left us barefoot and speechless.

Nikon D7000 (body only) 

An excellent dSLR for experienced shooters or Nikon professionals looking for a relatively cheap option, the Nikon D7000 delivers on almost all counts, including the company's best shooting design to date.

Price: $949.95 - $1,199.95 (check prices)

4 stars

Excellent

Read full review

Canon PowerShot S95

Though we'd like it to perform better, dSLR shooters looking for a sidekick camera will find the Canon PowerShot S95's top-flight photos and a full manual feature set worth the tradeoff of its compact size.

Price: $319.99 - $419.95 (check prices)

4 stars

Excellent

Read full review

Olympus E-PL2 (Black, with 14-42mm lens)

A great interchangeable-lens model if you're looking for better photo quality and/or a more advanced feature set than your current point-and-shoot offers, the Olympus PEN E-PL2 still doesn't satisfy for photographing active kids and pets.

Price: $549.99 - $669.99 (check prices)

4 stars

Very good

Read full review

Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX9V (Black)

Feature junkies in search of a compact megazoom should get the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX9V.

Price: $328.00 - $349.99 (check prices)

4 stars

Excellent

Read full review

Photography

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either electronically by means of an image sensor or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film.^[1] Typically, a lens is used to focus the light reflected or emitted from objects into a real image on the light-sensitive surface inside a camera during a timed exposure. The result in an electronic image sensor is an electrical charge at each pixel, which is electronically processed and stored in a digital image file for subsequent display or processing. The result in a photographic emulsion is an invisible latent image, which is later chemically developed into a visible image, eithernegative or positive depending on the purpose of the photographic material and the method of processing. A negative image on film is traditionally used to photographically create a positive image on a paper base, known as a print, either by using an enlarger or by contact printing.

Photography has many uses for business, science, manufacturing (f.i. Photolithography), art, and recreational purposes.

Lens and mounting of a large-format camera.

The Contax S of 1949 — the firstpentaprism SLR.

Nikon F of 1959 — the first 35mm filmsystem camera.

Late Production Minox B camera with later style "honeycomb" selenium light meter.

A modern digital camera.

A portable folding reflector positioned to "bounce" sunlight onto a model.

As far as can be ascertained, it was Sir John Herschel in a lecture before the Royal Society of London, on March 14, 1839 who made the word "photography" known to the world. But in an article published on February 25 of the same year in a German newspaper called the Vossische Zeitung, Johann von Maedler, a Berlin astronomer, had used the word photography already.^[2] The word photography is based on the Greekφῶς (photos) "light" and γραφή (graphé) "representation by means of lines" or "drawing", together meaning "drawing with light".^[3]