These pictures simulate the effects of common lighting types that can be corrected with the white balance pre-sets in most digital cameras.
Using Geographic Tools to Find Great Shooting Locations
If you’re planning a shooting trip to a new location and want to maximise the time for taking pictures, a little pre-trip research can help you to locate the best vantage points beforehand. Two of the best tools for doing this are topographic maps and Google Earth. In this feature we’ll provide some tips on how to use them.
Using Aperture-Priority Mode on a Digital Camera
Aperture priority – which is usually denoted by A or Av – is one of the most useful shooting modes on any camera, analogue or digital, because it’s the best tool for controlling depth of field. In this mode, the photographer sets the lens aperture, leaving the camera’s auto exposure (AE) system to set the shutter speed. By selecting an appropriate aperture setting you can change the appearance of a picture from having everything in it sharp, no matter how far it is from the lens, to having a narrow plane of sharpness that isolates your subject from background details.
The Indecisive Moment
From the Archive: Don’s Editorial, Photo Review Issue 2 Dec/Jan 2002.
Ten Tips for Better Landscape Photography
By definition, a landscape photograph is one in which natural scenery dominates the image. People and/or animals may be included, although they make up a relatively small part of the image and have been included in the composition to show scale. The same applies to buildings and other man-made structures.
Ten Bad Habits to Avoid
Taking digital photographs can make even experienced photographers let some aspects of their practice slip occasionally. Being able to shoot and review on the spot, and the enormous scope for post-capture tweaking of images can make digital photographers careless. Standards slip and before long you find the shots on those memory cards don’t meet your expectations. Or maybe, there aren’t any shots at all!
Take Great Holiday Photos
Simple tips to improve your holiday photos.
Street Photography Guidelines
Summer weather brings people out onto the streets, parks, sports fields, beaches and other public places. Given the proliferation of digital cameras and camera phones, it’s inevitable that lots of pictures will be taken. But few photographers understand what they can and cannot photograph and how they are entitled to use their pictures. In this feature we will provide some easily-understood guidelines.
Spot Metering with a Digital Camera
All but the most basic of digital cameras offer a selection of metering modes, usually multi-pattern evaluative, centre-weighted and spot metering. Unfortunately, many photographers don’t know how to take advantage of these ‘advanced’ settings and leave their cameras set on the default multi-pattern mode. While this mode works well for a wide range of subjects, there are times when spot metering can deliver much better exposures because of the greater precision it provides for controlling which parts of a subject are captured with full detail.
