Everyone Can Take a Picture but Few Can Make a Photograph

Making a photograph involves much more than ‘point and shoot.’

“Anything that excites me for any reason, I will photograph; not searching for unusual subject matter, but making the commonplace unusual.”

~ Edward Weston

There are millions of pictures taken every day, every hour even.  They are fun and spontaneous.  They record moments in peoples’ lives.  They are shared on social media and sent in emails. And when viewed later, they bring back memories.

It’s easy to take a picture.  The dominant camera is the smart phone.  Just hold it up and tap the red button.  It takes no time at all and the reward is instantaneous.  It requires no particular skills or training.  It’s easy; anyone can do it.

These pictures will fill the internet’s networks and some may even end up on peoples’ walls or in scrapbooks.  But mostly when shared face to face, it’s from the smart phone’s camera roll.

Making a photograph is not at all like taking a picture.  It’s not easy.  It requires training, experience, special skills and patience.  The rewards are not instantaneous and not everyone can do it.

Continue reading “Everyone Can Take a Picture but Few Can Make a Photograph”

(102)

Photographing Death Valley National Park

Enjoy some of the photographic wonders of Death Valley National Park on an exciting photography workshop.

People sometimes ask me if there’s anything to photograph in Death Valley.  At 5,262 square miles of desert and mountains, it’s one of the largest national parks.  The valley itself is 140 miles long.  Think of it.  It takes three hours to drive from one end to the other.  And surely, in all that space there should be something to photograph.  And yet, most of it is desert.  In fact, the valley itself is the hottest, driest place on earth. It’s also the lowest spot in North America at 282 feet below sea level.  So what’s to photograph?

Mesquite Flats Dunes

Death valley dunes 2011

Being a desert you might expect sand dunes and you would be right.  The Mesquite Flats Dunes are in the middle of the valley near Stovepipe Wells.  While not excessively high, they cover a large area and provide wonderful photographic opportunities at both sunrise and sunset.  I prefer sunrise which means heading out across the desert while it’s still dark to arrive at the dunes just as it’s starting to get light.  I go to a place that’s not heavily visited.  It’s an exciting experience.

Zabriskie Point

Zabriskie point pano 140211

Zabriskie Point is one of the most visited places in Death Valley.  It attracts photographers and tourists alike.  At first it looks like an inhospitable badlands with not much to offer the photographer except a lot of tan wilderness.  But at the right time of day these ‘bad’ lands become extraordinarily beautiful.

Zabriskie collage

It’s all a matter of being there at the right time.

Continue reading “Photographing Death Valley National Park”

(200)

Five Tips for Successful Hand-Held Photography

These five tips will help you improve your hand-held photography and bring home photographs you will be proud of.

japanese tea garden, golden gate park

As landscape photographers, we prefer to shoot from a tripod. There are a lot of good reasons for this.  Tripods help to ensure a sharp image.  They slow you down so you’re more likely to think through your shot.  They can also keep you from taking so-so shots; if it’s not worth the effort to set up a tripod it’s not worth taking.  And you can dial in very precise compositions.

But when spontaneity is appropriate, tripods simply don’t work. Shooting hand-held gives you the freedom and spontaneity that is required in some situations but it also presents challenges that you don’t even think about when shooting from a tripod.  Fortunately, there are several things you can do to overcome these challenges and create great photographs.

1. Shutter Speed

japanese tea garden, golden gate park

With a tripod we don’t worry about shutter speed.  It doesn’t matter if it’s 1/1000 second or 30 seconds.  But when shooting hand-held, the right shutter speed is essential for a sharp image.  If the camera moves ever so slightly while the shutter is open, you have a blur.

Fortunately, there’s a simple way for you to determine what shutter speed will give you a sharp image and it depends on the focal length of your lens.  The formula is simple: 1 / focal length.  If your focal length is 60 mm then a shutter speed of 1/60 second or shorter will give you a sharp image.  But if your focal length is 100 mm then you need a shutter speed of 1/100 second or shorter.

If you have a crop sensor camera then you need to use the effective focal length.  Using a crop sensor Nikon as an example, the conversion factor is 1.5.  In other words, if the lens says 100 mm the effective focal length is 100 x 1.5 or 150 mm.  So, the shutter speed needs to be 1/150 second or shorter.

This photograph above was taken at the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco.  It’s an extraordinary experience, especially early in the morning when the crowds are light.  The focal length was 47 mm so a shutter speed of 1/50 second would have been fast enough to get a sharp image.  However,  with image stabilization I was able to shoot it at 1/25 sec.  ISO was bumped to 1600 because of the dark conditions.  And an aperture of f/11 ensured enough depth of field for everything to be sharp.

You still want to hold the camera as steady as possible when taking your shot.  It’s the combination of a steady camera and an appropriate shutter speed that will give you a sharp image.

Continue reading “Five Tips for Successful Hand-Held Photography”

(156)