Tuesday's Tip....make your eyes 'pop'

Have you ever wondered how some people post pictures online where the eyes of the subject just 'pop'?  Well, I am going to teach you one way of doing that to your pictures.  I work in Adobe CS3, so if you are working with a older or newer version, your screen may look a little different than mine.  And there are several different ways of doing this, but this is the quickest way for me :) 
First, open the picture in photoshop that you want to work with...



Next, zoom in on the eyes to make it easier to see what you're doing...and click on your 'lasso' tool.  trace around the first eye (it doesn't have to be perfect), then while holding down the 'shift' key, lasso the other eye.  So now both eyes should have a moving dotted line around them.  Now, right click on your mouse and select 'feather'.



and put your radius at 10 and click ok.



Next, go to your 'filter' tab on top of your screen and choose 'sharpen', then 'unsharp mask'



 
Play around with this a bit until you get the look you want.  You can check the box that says preview to see the difference before you ok it.


But be careful you don't over-do it....you can end up with some scary looking eyes!
Here is a picture of the before and after....

Tuesday Tip....What is ISO?

If you are just switching over to shooting in manual from automatic, you may be wondering....what does ISO mean??  Well hopefully today's tutorial helps you and you are able to become more familiar with it!
The ISO on a digital camera is the same thing as 'film speed' on a film camera.  If you wanted to shoot with different film speeds on a film camera, you had to change your film to do so.  With digital camera's, you are able to change the ISO (film speed), and do it while never changing out your memory card.
The ISO determines how sensitive the image sensor is to light.  The lower your ISO, the better quality picture you are going to get.  The higher ISO you go, the more grainy or noisy your picture becomes.  On a bright sunshine-y day outdoors, you probably won't need to set your ISO higher than 200.  But when you start getting darker or are indoors without a flash with low light, you will need to set your ISO higher. 
This series of pictures of Lindsey shows you the difference in ISO settings.  They are all taken at a shutter speed of 1/100, and an f-stop of 2.8.  The sun had just set so it wasn't very bright out.
Starting with my ISO at 100:


and my ISO at 320

and my ISO at 500



and my ISO at 640


and my ISO at 1250


and at 1600


and another picture of Lindsey with the ISO at 1600 indoors with low light and no flash...  Notice this picture is a little more 'noisy'.  (It might be a little hard to tell here)



When your digital camera is in automatic mode, the ISO speed is chosen
for you to suit the level of light available at that particular time.
If you set your camera mode to "P" (program AE),  you can choose your own ISO and your camera will then set the shutter speed and aperture automatically.
In manual mode, to change the ISO setting on your SLR camera, press the ISO button then
use the up/down or left/right buttons to change the speed.
Hopefully this tip was helpful for some of you! 
have a great Tuesday!  And feel free to let me know if any of you have any photography/camera questions you would like to see answered on here!  (Or you may also email me privately)

Tuesday Tip...shooting in Manual

If you own a DSLR, and are shooting in fully automatic...this week I challenge you to switch over and practice with shooting in manual! Once you see how much better you can make your pictures by being in control of your shutter speed, ISO, and f-stop (aperture), you will never go back to shooting in automatic! 
What does f-stop (aperture) mean?
The aperture and how it works can be confusing to some of you.
The aperture is the part of a lens that determines how much light is
let through to the sensor.  If it’s wide open, lots of light gets through. If it’s closed
down, only a little light gets through.  Aperture settings are expressed as decimal numbers, and work opposite to the way you’d think... a higher number will let in less light than a lower number.  Each aperture has an Open, and a
Closed – the most and least light it will let in. In between it is what is known as the
f-stops, or aperture settings – numbers like f1.6, f2.8, f6.0, f16.0, with many in between.  And not all lenses will have the same apertures....for example.. a cheaper lens may only open to
f3.5 or a f4.0, not letting in as much light as a more expensive lens that will open all the way to an f1.6.
When you change the f-stop, it will affect your "depth of field"
In these two pictures you can see the difference.  the lower f -stop (I had it at 2.8) causes the background to really be blurred.



and with the higher f-stop (this one was set at 8.0) the background isn't so blurred.



What is shutter speed?
The shutter is what determines the length of time the sensor is exposed to light.
Shutter speed is usually expressed as a fraction – 1/2, 1/30, 1/80, 1/125,
etc. Some professional cameras go as high as 1/2000, or even higher.  
The longer the shutter is open, the more light is hitting the sensor.  A shutter speed of 1/4 means that the shutter is open for one quarter of a second, while a shutter speed of 1/2000
means it is open for only one two thousandth of a second. 
A slow shutter speed picks up camera motion, and is one of the primary causes of blurry pictures.  A safe rule for most situations is that you want a shutter speed of at least 1/50 or 1/60, but the faster, the better.  If you go much lower than that, you will need a tripod, or you will have a blurry picture.  But keep in mind, that if you are using a tripod, it will still blur a moving object.  This picture was taken with a tripod with the shutter open for 2 seconds.  Notice that the lights in the water are blurry because the water was 'moving'.   

 While practicing with shutter speed, Anita got this great picture....and with a tripod she could have gotten the greener and rocks around it to be a lot sharper.  Anita, do you remember what your shutter speed was for this?


And one more picture....just shows a difference between automatic and manual....  This was taken in open shade, and they are straight out of the camera.  The one on the left was taken in automatic, and the right is manual.  Much nicer picture in manual! 


Maybe next week I will touch a little bit on ISO, but for now, practice with these two things.  And let me know how you do :)

Tuesday Tip....Backlighting and sun flare...

A lot of beginner photographers are given the advice to shoot a subject with the light coming from behind the camera, lighting up the subject.  And maybe many of you (I know I was when first starting out) are pretty intimidated to shoot into the light.  Once you practice enough and get the hang of shooting into the sun or another light source, you will find that you can create some stunning images!

When taking a picture of a subject with the sun behind, you will most always need to use fill flash to light up the subject's face.  Backlighting is wonderful in the way that it separates the subject from the background! 





Although in the picture of this aspen, I did not use fill flash....  In this case I bumped up my ISO a tad, and overexposed it by 1 stop.



It is really difficult to take a picture in automatic settings with your subject being properly exposed with a bright light behind it.  Your camera will want to expose for the bright sky and it will leave your subject dark unless you are using flash.  Using automatic settings, your camera will take what it THINKS you want it to take....but to get the picture that YOU want, you will usually have to use manual settings.
I am also a big fan of sun flare in pictures, but I do recognize that it is not desirable in all situations.  When I go out on a photo shoot with you, I will always be watching for an opportunity to get an awesome picture with sun flare! 

Tuesday Tip...Night time Deep Blue Sky...

  We have been asked many times, how do you get the Deep Blue Sky pictures in your night scenes. It is all in the timing. See you next week for the next tip.
 Just kidding of course.
  It is all in the timing though. Too get the deep blue in the sky with a night scene first you need to take the picture at night. After sunset there is about a half of an hour where it is still bright out. Towards the end of that half hour it starts getting pretty dark out but if you look at the sky you will see that it is still pretty light. What you need to do is wait until the sun goes down below the horizon far enough that it is dark outside but still a hint of light still in the sky. (when I say a hint of light, I mean just a hint. The sky at this time will look dark to your eyes probably.) So now the sun has set and we have waited half an hour. It is looking pretty dark out and now you have about fifteen minutes to get your night time blue sky photo. If you wait more than that there will be no light shining into the sky from the recently set sun to light the sky blue and your sky will turn out black.
  You will need a tripod or some thing to set your camera on to compose your image. You will not be able to hand hold the camera for this because of the slow shutter speed you will need.

 For this photograph of Tempe Town Lake I used our 5d with a 17-35mm sigma lens @ 17mm. I held the shutter open for two seconds with an f-stop of 9. I had my iso at 400. I could have gone with a higher iso and lower f-stop so I could speed up the shutter but I wanted the lights from ASU stadium (on the far left of the image) and the tall buildings next to it in focus and the bridge as sharp as possible.
If you have a question regarding your camera or photography in general, feel free to ask it here, or shoot us an email!

Tuesday's Tip....Fill flash...

Back on August 3rd, on my blog about how to "take a better picture", I mentioned using fill flash.  A few of you had questions about this. 

---Appreciate the info Jenny - now can you explain the fill flash on the camera to me?

Posted by:
Karen Johnson

I will try to explain this the best that I can!
Fill flash is used to supplement existing light in a scene.  It's generally not the primary light source (as a flash often is in low light situations) but fills in light where natural light doesn't go.  It helps to eliminate shadows cast by facial features (under eyes, noses, chins) especially when light is shining down from above.  It will also help to add a "sparkle" to the eyes of the person you are photographing. 
In most point and shoot cameras the main button to look for will be the
one with the lightning bolt (flash) on or near it. Press this multiple
times and it will cycle you through the different options for flash (on,
off, automatic, red eye reduction are the main four). Some point and
shoot cameras even have a ‘fill flash’ option that ramps back the
strength of the flash a little which is ideal.

Some more advanced digital cameras will allow you to experiment with the
strength of the flash you use. This will enable you to tailor your
flash to the situation you’re in.
Rieno posted this question:

--Can you force all cameras to flash if it tells you it is bright enough without a flash?

Posted by:
Reino Kuoppala

Reino posted this question, and then called us and we walked him through how to use fill flash with his point and shoot camera. 

When he tried to pop up the flash with the camera in the automatic setting, the flash popped up but did not fire when he took a picture.

Then we told him to set his camera on manual, so he set his aperature at 1/60th of a second, and his f stop was 5.6.  He then popped up the flash again, and with the camera on manual settings, the flash fired this time.

Notice the flash filled in light on the plants, without having to "blow out" the background.

Thank you Reino for the pictures!

Hopefully this helped you!

Have a great Tuesday everyone!

Raw Vs Jjpeg...

If you shoot with a digital SLR, what do you prefer, shooting in raw or Jpeg?  I will shoot in Jpeg if I am limited on memory card space, but otherwise, I pretty much always shoot in Raw.  I am often asked why I do, and what are the pros/cons to raw vs. jpeg.  Here are a few: 
pros for RAW format:
1.  RAW is a digital negative that holds all of your data that is captured by your camera.  You are able to make edits to your photo in processing without losing any quality (lossless)
2.  Raw file software (I use Adobe CS3) allows you to quickly and easily change the output of your image such as exposure, white balance, noise reduction, levels, saturation, contrast, sharpness, etc
3.  RAW file software editors allow you to load saved adjustment
settings and you are even able to batch process a group
of photos instead of making changes to just one at a time
Cons for RAW format:
1.  Raw files take up more space on your memory cards and hard drive than other formats
2.  Raw file require post processing to convert them to an editable file for printing, online display, etc...
3.  Raw file software takes a bit to learn and may seem intimidating to some
Pros for JPEG:
1.  Jpeg files are easy and simple to view on most programs
2.  Jpeg's take up less space on your memory card
3.  Most DSLR's allow you to take your JPEG in S (small), M (medium), or L (large) format
Cons for JPEG:
1.  JPEG's are a Lossy file format.  What this means, is that everytime the file is edited or saved, it is compressed and loses data.
2.  A JPEG file
3.  JPEG files reflect a one-time interpretation of your subject
based on the settings of your camera (white balance, exposure
settings, etc.). Changing these settings and recreating your file, as you can with a RAW file, is not
possible. So basically, What you capture is what you get.  Like my kids say, "You get what you get, and don't throw a fit!"
Here are two pictures that I took of myself to show you how much more you can do with a raw file.  They are both taken with the same settings, but one in RAW and one in JPEG
If I had only taken this in JPEG, this picture would have automatically been deleted.  But taken in RAW, it isn't such a bad picture....it just shows the difference between editing a JPEG and then editing a RAW.  You have a much better chance of "saving" a bad picture in RAW.  
Jpeg:

and this one in RAW:

Did any of this make any sense? 
There are advantages to both ways, I just much prefer RAW.  Now that I know how to use my RAW editing program, it is really easy!

Tuesday's Tip...take a better picture

Good Tuesday morning everyone! 
I thought I would use today to share a few tips on how to "take a better picture".  Most of you probably know all or several of these basic "rules", but it doesn't hurt to be reminded of them does it?  :) 
If you follow these few basic things, you could be hearing from all your friends..."wow, I love your pictures, you must have a good camera!"  When in fact, it's not the camera that makes a great photo, it's the person behind the lens that makes a great photo!  Happy clicking :)
1.  GET DOWN ON THEIR LEVEL...

Whatever level they are at...get down to it. 
This picture is much more pleasing and inviting when taken at her level.  In this case the subject is in the water...so I was too...(just be careful if your camera is not waterproof!!!)   I was able to capture the smile on her face and the twinkle in her eye much better than if I would have taken it from up above.   You may feel like a total dork when you are crawling around on the floor...but your picture will be worth the extra effort!
2.  USE A PLAIN BACKGROUND...
Always watch for distracting objects in the background of your photos.  If you'll see in these next two pictures, the pole between the couple is very distracting.  I moved just a tad to the left, and it looks so much better.  Especially watch for poles, tree branches, etc sticking out of the top of peoples heads.  A minor adjustment makes a big difference!




3.  USE FILL FLASH...
Remember to use your fill flash even outdoors to lighten up a shaded face.  When the sun is behind or directly above you, you will have shadows under the eyes, etc, and the flash will fill these in to make the subject much more attractive.  Even use your fill flash on a cloudy day, as it will help in separating your subject from the background. 
In this picture, a fill flash would have filled in all the distracting shadows and eliminated the racoon eyes
4.  MOVE IN CLOSER...
Your photo will be way more impact-ful if you fill the viewfinder with the subject.  You will eliminate distracting background and be able to focus on the beauty of your subject.  For smaller objects use the camera's macro or 'flower' setting to get sharper close-ups
While both of these of Conner are cute, the close up one is much more dramatic. 


and just because I can't resist one of my girl :)  Close-up is fun!!


5.  MOVE IT FROM THE MIDDLE...
Think of your viewfinder as a tic-tac-toe grid.  Now move your subject to one of the intersections of the grid.  Your photos will come to life just by moving the subject from the center.

Those are my top 5 tips, hopefully some of you found them useful!  There are more tips, but 5 is all you're getting today :)  Practice these things the next time you bring your camera out, and you will find that your pictures are so much better! 
What are some other Photography/camera/editing tips that you would like to read about here in the future?

Tuesday Tip.....Back button focus

Back button focus....what did I ever do before I knew about you???  Before I knew about this great function, I struggled mightly with my focus on moving subjects.  For example, a processional or recessional at a wedding.  I had a hard time getting my subjects to focus while using the shutter button as my focus button.  Well, those days are done thanks to this tip I learned, so thought I would share it with you here.


I shoot with the Canon 5D, and to set your camera:
1. under custom function #4 set it to #1: AE lock/AF (setting 0 is default)
2. turn your AF setting Al Servo and leave it there!
Normally, I try to put the focal point on the eye of my subject.  However, with a moving subject I like to focus on the largest part of the body, with a high contrast area.  For example, during processionals and recessionals  I will focus on the man's torso area between his black tux and white shirt.  


I love that the shutter button is no longer my "focus" button!  And I love that when I am shooting a stationary subject, I can lock in the focus (push the * button with the focal point on the spot that I want in focus) and shoot away, even recomposing, and the focus will stay dead on.
Practice with this before you go out on a photo shoot!  It took me a little bit to get used to, but now I am much more confident that my pictures are in focus!!
Hopefully someone out there found this helpful! :)
photo of the camera and tip from Melissa Jill