Tag: sharpness

Mastering Your Camera

There are only 12 skills you need to learn to master your camera. Check out what they are.

I’m not the only one that contends that mastering your camera is an important first step in mastering photography. You’ll see it in blog posts, articles and videos.

Let’s take a deeper, more detailed look at what it means to master your camera and show that it’s not an impossible task, as intimidating as it may seem when you first start.

It starts with the question, “What does a camera do?” The hundreds of pages in the camera’s user manual and a similar number of options in its menus make it look like mastering it is a massive if not impossible task.  It appears daunting, especially if you are not technically inclined.  But in reality, what you need the camera to do comes down to just two things – control the exposure and control sharpness. Let’s see what core skills are required to master these two things.

Control Exposure

The purpose of exposure control is to ensure the right amount of light enters the camera so that the sensor can record the image you are photographing.  You and the camera need to respond to both bright and dark scenes.  The exposure controls are what makes it possible to match the exposure to the kinds of lighting conditions you encounter.

Tell Me More About Exposure….

There are three variables that can be adjusted to respond to the amount of light in the scene – ISO, aperture and shutter speed. These three variables form the famous exposure triangle.

Tell Me More About the Exposure Triangle….

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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.

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Tripod or Hand-Held

Take a closer look at the advantages of hand-held photography versus shooting from a tripod,

I was talking with a friend the other day in Joshua Tree about the differences between shooting landscape photography from a tripod versus hand-held.  He had been faithfully photographing from a tripod but did some shooting hand-held, apparently for the first time, and was excited with the sense of freedom he experienced.  We had a brief conversation on the advantages and disadvantages of both methods.  I’d like to share the conversation with you.

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Making a Photograph – Two Sides of the Coin

Landscape photography in the digital age requires an unlikely but necessary blending of technical and creative skills. But keep life simple; don’t let the technical drown out the creative.

I recently read an article by William Neill in the September Outdoor Photography magazine titled “Need to Know” that really resonated with me.  His main point is, don’t let the acquisition of gear and techniques interfere with the experience.  There’s so much information out there, so many people offering advice on techniques for composing, exposing and post processing.  But in Neill’s journey he has developed what he calls, ‘… a simple but effective tool set.”

A foundation of gear and technique is important in capturing the experience.  But it is the experience that is what we’re out there for, not histograms or depth of field or leading lines.

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Is That What Your Camera Saw?

Should photographic art be what the camera sees? Or something else…?

Occasionally at art festivals a visitor to my booth will point to one of my photographs and ask, “Is that what your camera saw?”  This question points out a common misunderstanding about the physics and art of photography.

Those of us who are serious about our photography capture our digital images in RAW file format.  That’s a format that does a minimal amount of processing on the image before it saves it to the memory card.  It is more like what the camera sees.

The other format is  JPEG and is not what the camera sees but rather a highly processed image that is controlled to a large extent by the settings the photographer sets in the camera – settings like sharpness, contrast and saturation.  So if the photographer likes saturation he just has to up the saturation setting in the camera.

JPEG is much closer to the photographs that were captured in the wonderful days of film.  Each different type of file had its own unique way of responding to the scene.  Kodachrome film was great for reds while Ektachrome was perfect for blues.  Fujichrome was prized for its treatment of greens and its high contrast.

So what did the film camera see?  The question is really, “What did the film see?”  Was it a faithful documentation of reality?  Not in the least.  The same can be said for JPEG digital files.  They are no more a faithful documentation of reality than film was.

The fact is, RAW files are closer to what the camera saw than film or JPEG files ever were or will be.  And, as one workshop participant put it to me, “I don’t like shooting in RAW because the photographs are so plain and uninteresting.”  There you go.  What the camera sees, exactly what the camera sees, is often plain and uninteresting.

So the physics of digital images captured in RAW format is that the images are the closest to what the camera sees.  But from an artistic point of view, these images generally do not speak to us.  These are documentation but that’s not art; art is interpretation.

Now, a RAW file is the perfect starting point from which to create art.  It is neutral, unbiased and open to the artist to express what she saw, what she experienced that inspired her to set up the camera and compose the image, that led to the decisive moment that the shutter was pressed.

In the days of film we relied on our selection of the type of film that would do the best job of rendering particular situations.  In the digital era we have much more powerful tools that we ever had with film – Lightroom, Photoshop, Photomatix and all the wonderful software that we have access to that allows us to express our vision, our interpretation of reality.

So, are my photographs what the camera saw?  Not at all.  They are what I saw.

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Mastering Sharpness – Fuzzy Photos

How many things can go wrong that can render an image fuzzy.

How many times have you returned from a shoot with some photographs you are really excited about only to find out they are out of focus.  That’s always very disappointing and often frustrating.  And it happens all too often to me.  At the Joshua Tree Gathering this past March someone asked the question, ”How many ways can a photograph be out of focus,” and that got me thinking.  This would be a fun article to write.

But let’s get something straight from the start.  Not all ‘out of focus’ photographs are out of focus.  They may not be sharp but that can come from two causes.  They can actually be out of focus or they can be blurry.  This may seem like a subtle distinction but it’s an important one.  So let’s take them one by one and explore their causes and solutions.

But before we do, I want to make another very important point.  A photograph that is out of focus or blurry is not always a bad thing.  Often times the artist does it intentionally because that is his or her artistic vision.  When it’s done intentionally to create an expressive photograph then it’s not only OK, it’s necessary.  It’s when it’s unintentional that we get frustrated and loose great moments.

But now, let’s get into the details.  We’ll talk about blurs first.

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Ten Reasons to Take a Photography Workshop

Ten good reasons to take a photogrpahy workshop.

We all love photography.  Perhaps you are a casual photographer, using your smart phone or point-and-shoot camera to capture the precious moments in life you cherish and want to remember.  Perhaps you admire the work of others and would like to be able to capture scenes or moments like they do.  Or maybe you are skilled and have been passionate about your own photography for quite some time now.

For those that seek to develop themselves as photographers there are a couple of approaches you can take.  You can learn on your own by reading and photographing.  And if you are able to devote the time and energy to this process you will surely be successful.  However, it is more of a trial-and-error approach to learning photography and, let’s face it, we don’t all have the time or energy to adequately feed our passion.

Or, you can learn from someone who has already mastered the challenges you encounter along the way.  And one of the most effective and affordable ways of accomplishing this is through a workshop.

So I would like to share with you my top ten reasons for attending a workshop.

1.     Inspiration

Photography workshops give you the opportunity to focus just on photography and capturing the beauty that surrounds you.  The complications of your busy life are left at home or at work and for several stimulating days your existence is focused on one thing – capturing the beauty that surrounds you.

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Mastering Light – Dawn

Read about the key to capturing spectacular sunrise photographs.

Not long ago I was photographing dawn in Joshua Tree National Park.  I must confess, dawn is my favorite time of day.  And I have thrilled to more spectacular dawns in Joshua Tree than anywhere else.  There are ;often clouds that ignite as the sun approaches.  And the other morning was no exception.

I’d like to share with you three photographs taken that morning.  The alarm went off at 4:30 and we left the motel in Twentynine Palms a 5:30, an hour and a half before sunrise.  There were clouds in the morning sky, the first ingredient for a spectacular sunrise but by no means a guarantee.  I selected Sheep Pass at the west end of Queen Valley because it offered both Joshua Trees and some impressive granite outcrops for an interesting foreground.  We arrived about 45 minutes before sunrise.  It was still dark with the barest glimmer of light in the east.

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Making a Photograph – The Four Pillars

Explore the four things that make a great landscape photograph – Fantastic Light, Strong Composition, Appropriate Sharpness and Optimum Exposure.

I’ve been giving a lot of thought recently to what goes in to making a great landscape photograph. It turns out there are four things, four pillars if you will.  Four, that’s a good number.  There are the four legs of a table or the four wheels of a car.  And not to forget the four sacred directions of the Native Americans.

In landscape photography the four pillars are evenly divided between the aesthetics and the technical.  So what are they?  The two aesthetic pillars are Fantastic Light and Strong Composition.  No surprise there.  The two technical pillars are Appropriate Sharpness and Optimum Exposure.  No surprise there either.  If just one of those pillars is missing, well, the table collapses, the image suffers.

Let’s look at them one by one….

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Joshua Tree Spring Sunrise (2011)
(click on the images to enlarge them)

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