We reported a while ago when Adorama’s AIRC (Adorama Imaging Resource Center) started its 100 in 100: 100 Photography Tips in 100 Days program. Currently, the latest tips is tip #57 - Zoo Photo Safari.
The tips are written by experts but in plain English so pretty much everyone from novice to expert in photography should be able to learn something. It only takes about a minute to read each of the tips. You can find the tips here.
While you are there, you may also want to check out their Adorama Imaging Resource Center (AIRC), which has many other useful and nicely written tips and articles about photography.
When shooting a close-up of people’s face, it is highly desirable to have their eyes in sharp focus and at the same time render the background blurry to avoid distractions. This situation typically requires accurate focus and large lens aperture. Here are some tips on how to focus on the eyes.
Focus-and-recompose technique should typically work fairly. On many cameras, the center focus point is the most sensitive and accurate. Therefore it may be the best option to simply focus on the eyes and recompose the frame. Be aware that focus-and-recomposes can have some pitfalls.
If you are concerned about focus accuracy using focus-and-recompose technique, another way is to use a off-center focusing sensor point. Many cameras have multiple focusing sensor points. Choose the one that’s right over the eye when the desired composition is achieved. If no focusing sensor point is exactly over the eyes, just select the one that is nearest to the eyes then do the focus-and-recompose. This will minimize the focusing error. Or you can compose loosely so there is a focus sensor point over the eyes, then crop the photo to desired composition.
Finally, you can always try manual focus if the light is not too dim.
If you still cannot get a good focus on the eyes, you may need to increase the depth of field (DOF) by stopping down the aperture. What may happen then is the shutter speed becomes too slow. In this case, you will need to either increase the ISO or shoot with flash.
Posted in
Tips and techniques on October 29th, 2007.
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This is a very well presented video tutorial of the important photography concept depth of field (DOF). Enjoy!
Posted in
Tips and techniques on October 25th, 2007.
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The Tamron AF 17-50mm f/2.8 SP XR Di II LD Aspherical IF lens has received some good reviews (see review by PhotoZone.de) and appear to be a nice low-cost alternative to more expensive offerings from larger camera and lens manufacturers like Canon and Nikon. However there have been quite a few complains (including myself) of the lens overexposing in flash photography, especially in Nikon TTL-BL mode. Here are some threads I found on the Internet. Read More…
Posted in
Flash photography,
Lens on October 24th, 2007.
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Nikon shooters with Vibration Reduction (VR) lens may be interested in knowing if the lens VR function was on or off for a particular photo. It is recorded by the camera in the photo but many if not most software do not report this information. The one that works is the new Nikon ViewNX. Nikon ViewNX is rumored to be the replacement of the old Nikon View but the exact status is unclear.
Another option is the more powerful software ExifTool, which was featured earlier. This is mostly a Perl library and a command-line application for power users. It can report a lot more information than a typical software. You can find an example after the jump. Read More…
For some unknown reasons, Nikon decided to skip the automatic exposure bracketing feature on the D40 and D40X DSLR cameras. For people who are interested in high dynamic range (HDR) photography using D40/D40X, this is a convenient feature that is missing. However you can still do HDR photography without it using D40/D40X. Here are two ways of doing that. Read More…
Posted in
Beginner Tips on October 21st, 2007.
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Reversing a lens is one of the easiest and cost-effective ways of getting into macro photography. This article discusses the choice of lens for reverse, different options of using reversed lens, and advantages/disadvantages of reversed lens macro photography. Read More…
Posted in
Tips and techniques on October 18th, 2007.
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What you see is not what you get. When it comes to shooting with a SLR camera, this is usually true. The camera keeps the lens at its widest aperture for metering and focus operations. It only stops down the lens to the aperture you want when the shutter release is pressed to take the picture. This is typically desired because the viewfinder would otherwise be too dark and the auto-focus sensor would have trouble acquiring focus.
The problem is that the depth of field (DOF) is directly related to the lens aperture. How could the photographer know if the end result will have the subject captured in acceptable sharpness before taking the picture? To solve this problem, most SLR cameras are designed to have a depth of field preview button that allows the photographer to stop down the lens temporarily to preview the depth of field. Is depth of field preview the only function of this button? Read More…
Posted in
Tips and techniques on October 14th, 2007.
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