Month: December 2014

Photo Tips – Getting Great Exposures the Easy Way

Always shooting in Automatic mode? Here’s an easy way to improve your photographs without having to bother with all the technical details.

If you’re a person who’s interested in just taking pictures and don’t want to be bothered with all the technical details, you are probably photographing with your camera set to automatic mode. Often times automatic mode is indicated by a green box. Probably the handiest feature of automatic mode is that the camera makes all the decisions for you. All you have to think about is getting the people you’re photographing in the frame and pressing the shutter. The camera does everything else.

But the problem is that the camera doesn’t always get it right. Often times it will overexpose parts of the image making them look washed out. But there’s a simple way to avoid this without mastering all the complicated technical details of shooting in manual mode. And that is P mode.

Using P Mode

The P and P mode stands for Programmed Automatic. In P mode the camera allows you to make some of the decisions while it makes the rest. You get to choose whether or not to use flash, and set the ISO, exposure compensation and white balance. The camera sets the f-stop and shutter speed.

Let’s take these controls one by one. Let’s start with flash. You can decide whether you want to use flash or not. If you’re shooting in bright daylight or even on a cloudy day you probably don’t need flash. But if it’s a little darker you can always choose to turn the flash on. If you don’t know how to turn your flash on or off you’ll need to consult your camera’s manual.

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Making a Photograph – Personal Style

Discover your personal style and use it to improve your photography.

Personal style. What is it? I like to bring up the topic of personal style in my workshops. I think it’s important to understand that each of us has a personal style whether we know it or not. It comes from the fact that each of us is a unique individual and sees the world in our own personal way. Our skill levels are different. Our life experiences are different. Our interests are different. And that leads to each of us having our own individual world view.

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Naturally Speaking

To type or talk? That is the question. Dragon – affordable natural language softare that lets you dictate your documents. It does the typing for you.

I have something really exciting to share. I like to do a lot of writing as you may have already guessed but I found over the years that typing and speaking are two different things. Often when I speak I’m more creative than when I type, that things just come out better when I speak.

Years ago I saw that Windows had a natural language recognition function. I tried that out with a lot of anticipation, hoping it would work. But it didn’t. I spent more time correcting its mistakes than I would have if I just typed it. So it didn’t take long for me to abandon it.

But a couple of weeks ago in OfficeMax I saw this software that other people have said worked really well. The name of the software is Dragon Naturally Speaking. It’s published by Nuance. I was going to buy it from the local OfficeMax. It was on sale. But they didn’t have any in stock. They offered to order it for me but I said, “No, that’s okay. It was an impulse buy anyway.”

But last week over the Thanksgiving break we were in Fort Collins, Colorado with her daughter. And we needed to make an OfficeMax run to pick up a wireless router and ink for her printer. And while there I just checked to see if they had Dragon. They did. But they were selling it at the full retail price. I checked online and Nuance was selling it at a $50 discount. I asked the sales guy if he would give me the discount and he said he would. So I got it for $50 off.

I had no idea how well it would work and it wasn’t until I got home and installed it on my desktop computer that I was able to give it a try. In a word, it is “extraordinary!” This morning I tried it out for the first time. I dictated about three pages into Microsoft Word. I threw some pretty tough words had it and it handled them flawlessly. I’m dictating now and watching what comes up and it hasn’t made a mistake yet. So I’m impressed.

So, if you’re like me and find it easier to talk than type, I wholeheartedly recommend Dragon. It is a phenomenal piece of software, better even than Siri.

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