Indigo Skye Photography

Week Four - Tips For Better Photos

How many of you are actually reading these Photo Tips? How many are learning anything from these tips? I would love to hear back from some of you to let me know if these tips are helping to improve your photography. So who wants to be the first to share any recent pictures they have taken since reading these tips. Email me your photos and I will post them on the blog with the weekly photo tips.

Last week I promised that we would work on different aspects of photographic compisition. Last week we started with three good but easy ones. This week's tips are also easy, but often overlooked or never thought of in the first place by most people.

Here we go, here are your next three compisition tips:

1) Zoom In. Fill your frame with the subject of your photo. We all love to photograph the wonderful things we see in life. You know what I am talking about, those beautiful beach or mountain scenes when on vacation, or those sweet moments when your child (or grandchild) is doing something cute and unexpected. The natural inclination is to photograph the entire scene or person as we see it, because we a re afraid that we will lose something if we don't. If you take a more long-distance view of the scene, you may lose the obvious visual interest in the surroundings. Zooming in close to your subject, especially when photographing a person, will make your photo more personal and you will find the beauty in the details. When you take a photograph, decide what your subject is. The person or the beach is not good enough. You need to go deeper and look to the details of the person or beach. The emotion on the face of the person or the way the light reflects off of the shells on the beach -- something that activates your senses, that you can touch, feel, smell, or taste. This process is the most overlooked step in photography. Although it may be tempting to simply snap your photos and rush on, I encourage you to take time to visually explore the subject and see what appeals to you. Ask yourself: 'What is the purpose of this photograph?' and 'What is the reaction I want a person who sees it to have?'

In the two photos beach photos below, see how zooming in can make a difference. The first one is nice but the second one make you feel more of the scene. You can almost smell the salt water and hear the waves breaking against the pier and the seagulls that would be flying around waiting for a chance to snag a meal from an unsuspecting fisherman.

In this photo, the details in her eyes and her cute little teeth would have been lost if I hadn't zoomed in. So it is perfectly acceptable to crop off the top of the head if zooming in for a closer shot like this.

2) Don't amputate your subject. Beware that you don't cut off arms and legs at a wierd place, such as around any joints. It is better if you crop them off between the joints, so instead of cutting them off at the knees or elbows - try cropping them off at the thighs or upper arms.

3) Verticle Vs. Horizontal. Changing your camera orientation came make a world of difference in your photos. Whether to shoot your photograph horizontally or vertically is among the most basic decisions that you face in composing any photograph. Because cameras are rectangular and are more comfortable to hold horizontally, that's how most people shoot their pictures. Turning the camera on end makes handling a bit awkward, but the effort can add power and visual variety to your pictures. Many subjects cry out to be framed in a particular way. As a rule, tall subjects (like trees or people) stand more comfortably in a vertical frame (but this isn't always the case). Framing a scene vertically forces the eye to scan the photograph from bottom to top where horizontally forces the eye to scan it from side to side. For many subjects, either format will work; choosing the best framing is then largely a matter of instinct. If deciding which format looks best becomes difficult, photograph it both ways and decide later; it's often easier to grasp the full impact from a print than it is when you're looking through the viewfinder.

The portraits below are shown in both portrait (verticle) modes and landscape (horizontal) modes. They are all great shots, but each presentation of the image offers a different feel or emotion to the portrait.

I have given you guys a few more things to think about for taking better photos. I was serious when I said that I would love to hear back from you guys to let me know if these tips are helping you. And if you want to share your photos with others just email me a copy and I will showcase them here on the blog. Have Fun!!

Week Three - Tip For Better Photos

I hope everyone is learning something from these weekly tips. I know that the last two week's tips were kind of boring, but they really are a necessary evil in taking better photos. For the next few weeks I will cover different aspects of photographic compisition. These range from the really obvious (but often over looked) tip to something that that takes a little more thought to remember.

Here we go, here are you first three compisition tips:

1) Change Your Vantage Point

One of the most effective ways to make your images more interesting to the eye is to change the angle that you’re shooting from. This is one place that you get to be darning. Take your photo from an unusual angle. Get down on the ground and look up, get on a chair and look down, etc. The point is, instead of doing the obvious, look at your subject from all sorts of views and find one that stands out. Change your position to emphasize or exaggerate how big or small your subject is. Crouch down and shoot up at someone and that person towers over you. Shoot down on your pet and it seems so comically small. You can also move your camera right or left only a few feet to change the composition dramatically.

This is a photo that my son Ian took.  This is a great example of taking a photo at a really unusual angle.  By getting down on the ground and looking up at the tulips, he has totally changed the way these flowers normally look.  They now look like giant flowers.  Also by chosing this angle, he has given these tulips a very beautiful background vs. the normal backgrouds of other flowers and grass.

2) Hold your camera at the subject's eye level.

This one is really important when photographing children and animals. There is always an exception to the rule, but generally speaking it looks better when you get down on their level with them.

3) Watch out for what is in the background.

Before taking that perfect shot, check to be sure there are no distracing clutter or objects sticking out of your subjects head (trees, plants, poles, ect.). A plain background or one that has been blurred to become very soft is much less distracting and will put more emphasis on the subject. You can see a great example of this in the two images below. Although the first portrait is very nice, there are the distracting trees in the background sticking out of the little guys head. In the second portrait, just by moving over a little bit I was able to make a HUGE differrence in the outcome by getting rid of the background distraction.

So now it is your time to try. Let's see what you can do. Shall I make a game of it? The first person to email me their photos (to post on the Blog as inspiration to others) using these three tips, as well as the tips from the last two weeks, will win a FREE MEMBERSHIP into our Club Indigo portrait program. This is a $250 value, with a life time of great discounts and even a few free sessions.

Good Luck and Happy Shooting!

Open House Tonight!

Just a quick reminder that we are having our Open House tonight. You are all invited, and your family, friends and children are welcome to come as well.

There will be some FABULOUS give a ways from us as well as a few from some of the wonderful business in downtown Greer.

Here is a list of what we will be giving away tonight:

*a free studio session (a $125 value)

*the "Alex" from our Indigo Collection ($660 value)

*a free membership to our Club Indigo (a $250 value)

*a 16x20 Framed Wall Portrait

*a 20x24 Gallery Wrap Wall Portrait

Also to celebrate today's Open House, we are offering our memberships into the Club Indigo Program for $200. That is a $50 savings, and it is only for today! For those of you that are unable to come celebrate with us tonight can take advantage of this special offer until 5pm tonight. Just give us a CALL to join.

I won't have time to check emails today, so if anyone needs directions or has any questions, you can reach us at the studio at 801-1131 or on my cell at 275-7979.

I am looking forward to seeing everyone tonight!

Tips For Better Photos: Week Two

First a little reminder, our Open House is this Friday and I hope that you can drop in and see us and the new studio. There will be some delicious hors d'oeuvres and wine, not to mention some fantastic give a ways! You won't want to miss out, so plan to stop by.

Okay, now on to the nitty gritty. So how many of you got your manuals out and read them? I doubt very many of you really did this, but I am telling you, this is one of the quickest and easieast ways to improve your photo skills. I realize that it is not on Opraha's Book Club list, but I promise it is well worth the effort.

Okay, so enough preaching. Time for Tip Number 2: How to Decide the Best Settings For Image Quality? There are many factors that can effect your image quality, but I am just going to talk about only one of them: Image Resolution. Nearly all digital cameras these days offer the user a choice in Resolution settings. For example the Canon PowerShot S5 has settings ranging from 640x480 pixels (smallest) to 3264x2448 pixels (largest), with many options in between.

So which do you want to pick? Well that will depend upon what you want to do with the photos, as well as how much in-camera and computer storage you have, not to mention the question of how important is image quality to you. Basically, the higher the resolution you choose, the better the image quality your photos will have and the more room it will take up in your camera's and computer's memory. Higher resolution also means you can print larger images with it as well as have the ability to crop an existing photo down smaller. Keep in mind that the more megapixels that your camera has, the more room it will require for storage space when using a larger resolution setting. Now if you are only wanting to take a few snapshots from your vacation and only want them in 4x6 size so that you can put them in your album, then you don't need a higher resolution. In this case, choosing a lower resolution will allow yo uto get more images on your digital media. But if you are planning a little family portrait in hopes of printing a nice 8x10 to give to Grandma for Mother's Day, then you will want to chose your camera's largest resolution setting.

Here are a few side by side examples of High and Low Resolution Images. When viewed full frame side by side, you can see the slight difference between the two. But when they are croppped in close, you can really see the difference.

So, now what do you do? Get out your manuals (for those of you that didn't already do it) and READ IT!!! Then take so photos in the various resolution settings, put them on your computer and see how different they will look. Especially if you are zooming and cropping in on them.

Tips For Better Photos : Week 1

Some of you may remember when I started these last year. There are several new subscribers to the Blog that have expressed interest in me resuming them again. So I thought that the best place to start would be back at the beginning. So here we go....

Week 1: Tips For Better Photos

Most everyone has a camera. And nearly everyone with a camera really enjoys taking photos. But let's face it, most of the images that are taken never come out the way we thought they would. There are few things that can be done to assure you that your photos will have a better than average chance of not ending up in the trash or being deleated from your computer.

Tip #1) This is a really easy one. Get intimate with your camera. Seriously, get to know your camera. Where are all the buttons? What do all of these buttons do? Find out what bells and whistles your camera has. You bought this camera for a reason, whether it was for the ease of a point and shoot or one with more manual features to allow you to be more creative. The best way to get to know your camera is to read your camera's manual! You will never know what your camera's is truely cabaple of if you don't read the manual. (well I guess you could, but it would be with alot of trial and error and alot of time) Don't get me wrong, you don't have to read the manual in order to just point and shoot. But you will never know how to use all the unique features that your camera has. Reading the manual will not only help you to enjoy using your camera more, it will also enable you to take better photos. When using a point and shoot camera, I have found that the automatic settings are not always the best choice. There are so many things that can confuse your camera's automatic settings and end up affecting your photos. Things such as backlighting, a subject that is moving and the different types of lighting that you may be in and don't even realize it because our eyes will automatically adjust accordingly to such lighting.

Now that you have at least glanced through you camera's manual, get your camera out and take some photos to see how your camera behaves in different situations. Take photos of something close up and then something far away. Take photos inside in low lighting (with and without a flash) and then outside in the sunshine as well as in the shade (again with and without a flash). Speaking of flashes, one of the first things you should know about your camera is how to turn your flash on AND off. Alot of cameras will automatically control the flash for you, but you may not need to use it at that time. This comes back to the fact that automatic settings may not always be the right or best choice! Now I hope that when you take these trial photos, you will try out at least some of the fancy bells and whistles that your camera came with. This is the time to learn how to use these settings. That way when you go to take the real important photos of the memories that you are trying to capture, you will be more familiar with both what your camera can do and what you can do with your camera. Have fun!

Don't forget to come back for next week for How To Take Better Photos~Tip #2: deciding the best Image Resolution to use for your photos. And if anyone has any questions or ideas of what they would like to learn that will help you take better photos, feel free to email me or comment back to this blog.

Also, I have had a few people email me to let me know that they are interested in a photo workshop. This would be an in person workshop to take place here in my studio and then later going around town to try out what you learn. I need some more people to be interested in this in order for me to do the workshop. So if you are interested or know someone that is or would be, please email me or comment back to the blog to let me know so that I can set up the date and time.

And last but not least... remember that next Friday, April 18th is our Open House here at the studio and you are all invited! There will be some fantastic Give Aways that you won't want to miss out on. So plan on coming by between 5 and 9, friends, family and kids are welcome as well.

Save The Date!

I hope to see all of you at our Open House. Some of the great prizes we are giving away are a Club Indigo Membership, a wall portrait and a portrait collection valued at over $600! If you have any questions or need directions just give us a call.

Another Sneak Peak!

A few days ago I had the pleasure of photographing the McCarty boys again. We had fun (well, I did anyway) in Falls Park when we had a few great days of beautiful weather. So here you go Cindy, here is your sneak peak!

Stay tuned for information about our open house coming soon! Also to come soon, after several requests and expressed interest, will be our start up of Tips For Better Photos.