Photography: How To Shot People?

A. There are few steps to follow........

They are as under..............

STEP 1: PLAN THE SHOT

Begin by communicating with your subject. Learn exactly what is expected from the portrait session, and how the pictures you shoot will be used. Next, find out about the setting that you will be shooting in ahead of time. This will guide you in your choice of lights and background materials. Arrange ahead of time the kind of clothing the subject will wear. It is best if they avoid pure white or black; very light or dark clothing can make lighting much more difficult. 

STEP 2: SET UP THE LIGHTS AND BACKGROUND

In addition to your camera, you will need some lighting equipment. This can be as simple as a couple of off-camera flash units with umbrellas, or a couple of tungsten lights. In addition to the lights, you will also need a tripod and a background cloth. If you are shooting a busy executive, you may want to have someone else stand in while you adjust your lights and test your initial exposures. Set your main light at a 45-degree angle, and bounce it into a white umbrella. Set a second light up behind and to one side of your subject. This light will give your subject some definition against a dark background. Use a fill card on the opposite side of the main light to balance the light on the subjects face but keep the ratio of light between the main source and the fill uneven for a more interesting portrait. If the background is distracting, hang a black cloth several feet behind where the subject will sit. Test your exposures, adjust the power output of your strobes, and shoot a few frames. 

STEP 3: ADJUST YOUR CAMERA

If you are using flash units, you will need to set up your camera to synchronize with them. We decided to work with both the flash and camera on manual, letting the photographer make all the exposure decisions. Switch your flash units to manual mode and turn off your internal flash. Choose a fast shutter speed to minimize any effect of ambient (room) light, and adjust your aperture to give a good exposure. This will be a function of the amount of light your flash units put out; reviewing a few test shots should show you the correct exposure. Be sure to set your color balance to match the electronic flash. If you are using incandescent (hot) lights, adjust your colour balance to match those lights. Set your camera to aperture priority mode, and choose a starting f-stop one stop down from wide open. If your camera has a portrait mode, you should experiment with that too. If your camera allows you to alter the degree of sharpening, use the normal or soft mode. 

STEP 4: POSE THE SUBJECT

Engage your subject in a conversation as you work. Evaluate the person’s look, and compensate with your lights and the camera angle you choose. For  example, if a person has a very thin face, have them look straight into the camera, while if they have a round face, try a 3/4 pose, and lift your camera angle a bit. If they have a lot of wrinkles, use softer wrapping light by bringing your umbrella closer. A large nose can be minimized by having it face directly into the camera with the chin raised slightly. A small nose can be given more emphasis with a side view. Watch out for reflections on eyeglasses, have them turned away from the lights, or raise your lights until the reflection goes away. 

STEP 5: TAKE THE PHOTOGRAPH

Be sure the focus is sharpest on the eyes. That’s the first place people look when examining a portrait. If your camera lets you zoom in when you are in review or play back mode, you can use that feature to check for sharp catch lights in the eyes. Catch lights are reflections of the light source that give life to the person’s eyes and make the portrait look natural. If you can think of any humorous stories, share them as a natural smile can add warmth to a formal portrait. Review your images as you work, and make sure you have good expressions as well as good exposures before you end the session.

Profesor AZii................

waiting for your comments....

Q. How to Do Photography of Still Life

A. there are few steps any photographer can take to do the task...

here they are........................

STEP 1: CREATE A BASIC SHOOTING SET

Begin by creating a set on which to photograph your still life. Move a table next to a wall. Lay a piece of white mat board or foam board on the top of the table. This board will become your shooting platform. Place an additional board up against the wall. Now position the camera and adjust the zoom lens so the viewfinder just covers all the white area. If you plan to shoot objects that are tall, consider constructing your set on the floor instead of a table. This height allows you to work at a more comfortable and better shooting angle than if you had to extend your tripod and maybe even stand on a chair to see the LCD monitor.

STEP 2: POSITION OBJECTS TO PHOTOGRAPH

■ Now you can get creative. Place the objects on the set, taking into account the way the shadows will fall and the relationship of objects to each other. Refer to Technique 7 to review some basic composition tips.

STEP 3: SET UP A LIGHT

For this side light technique you will work with only a single light source.

■ Begin by mounting the flash on a light stand and set it to the side of your table. You can use an adaptor like the Bogen Swivel Umbrella Adapter

■ Next, connect your flash unit to your digital camera. Some manufacturers, like Nikon, make proprietary connectors that require special adapters or flash cords. For example, Nikon’s cords are the SC-17, SC-18, and SC-19, and the shoe adapter is the AS-10. Check your user manual, or the Web site of the company that made your camera, to see which cords and adapters are needed for the particular model of camera you own.

STEP 4: POSITION THE CAMERA AND SELECT CAMERA SETTINGS

■ Attach your camera to your tripod. Adjust the height and angle to eliminate any background and keep the composition simple. If the camera has an LCD monitor that folds out, adjust it so you can clearly see the composition as you move your camera. If the LCD monitor does not move independently of the camera body, you may have to stand on a stool or chair to get a good look at it as you work to create a balanced composition.

■ Adjust the camera’s exposure mode, choosing manual exposure. This exposure allows you to modify the exposure to match the light being produced by the flash unit. Select a high shutter speed setting, like 1/1000 of a second. This setting reduces the effect of any ambient light in the room. Next, adjust the aperture setting to a middle f-stop, such as f/5.6.You will be opening up or closing down the aperture depending on the results of the first few test shots. If you are shooting very small items, or need to get in close for good composition, you may want to shoot in macro mode. If your flash has adjustable output settings, you will have much more control over the depth-of-field (the area that will be in sharp focus) in your picture. Reducing the light output allows you to use a wider aperture (smaller numbered f-stop), letting you selectively focus on a specific part of your subject and allowing other parts to be softly out of focus. Increasing the amount of light from your flash unit allows the aperture to be closed down (larger numbered f-stop), which increases the depth-of-field.

STEP 5: SHOOT AND REVIEW

■ Now shoot a few test photos. Because you are shooting in manual exposure mode, bracket the exposures by adjusting the f-stop or flash output power level, using flash exposure compensation. To get the best review of your photos, download the image files to a computer and check the composition, focus, and exposure.

What is Digital Photography?

Q: What is Digital Photography and How to Become A Digital Photographer?

A:

Digital cameras are only a few years old and are just now beginning to make serious inroads into photography. They have yet to be fully accepted by some photographers. However, despite some current limitations, digital cameras are the wave of the future and it's only a matter of time before most photographs are taken with these kinds of cameras rather than traditional film-based cameras.

Photographers who don't accept digital cameras generally base their arguments on the fact that the images are not as good as film-based cameras. Yet these same photographers most likely use 35 mm SLR cameras that are not as good as 8 x 10 view cameras. And if they do use 8 x 10 cameras, they don't use the even better mammoth glass plate view cameras used by Jackson and Muybridge after the Civil War. If they really wanted quality, they'd be using mules to carry their equipment. So much for their argument being based on the quality of the image.

The sad truth is that the quality of images has hardly improved at all since the first daguerreotypes of the 1840's and albumen and platinum prints of the late 1800s. What's happened is that both cameras and photographic processes have become easier and more convenient. Digital cameras are just another step along this path. Images captured with these cameras are admittedly different, but you'd be hard pressed to prove they are inferior. Many of the arguments you hear today about digital cameras are but echoes of the sentiments expressed when the 35mm Leica was introduced in 1925. Suddenly there was a camera that was easy to handle in the most difficult situations and with a long roll of motion picture film, capable of capturing one image after another. It may have used a much smaller negative, and hence been "inferior," but photographers who held onto their big, awkward box cameras were soon bypassed by history.

Another argument against digital cameras is that they are mainly of the point and shoot variety. That means they are fully automatic and don't have the controls that photographers have traditionally used to get great photos. This implies they are used for vacation pictures or photographs are taken as documents of family events. However, there is a certain elitism and snobbishness about this point of view. In general, the photographer brings more to a great photograph than the camera does.

But even if objections to image quality and lack of controls were true, these will change over time as more sophisticated, yet still affordable, cameras are introduced. Image quality already rivals or exceeds 35 mm film in high-end cameras. And these cameras also have the same controls as a professional 35 mm SLR.

Their only drawback is their price, but prices are falling rapidly now that image sensors are solid state and Moore's Law is at work. In the meantime, you can get good pictures with point and shoot cameras, but to get great ones you still need to understand what the camera is doing for you automatically. If you understand the basic functions of your digital camera, you’ll find it easier to expand and improve your photography. It's this understanding that gives you the creative control you need to record a scene realistically, just the way you saw it, or to instead capture the feeling or mood instead of the details making up the scene. Your understanding of a few basic principles makes it possible to take a photograph that bestexpresses what you want to convey.

Like artists in other mediums, as a photographer you have a set of "tools" that can make your photographs not only exciting and interesting to others but also unique to your own, very personal view of the world around you. The basic tools you have to work with are the way sharpness, tone, and color interact in the scene being photographed, the vantage point from which to take the picture, and the light under which it’s photographed.

You can choose to keep everything in a scene sharp for maximum detail or to blur it all for an impressionistic portrayal. You can keep some parts sharp and dramatic while letting others appear soft and undistracting. You can use black-and-white to emphasize tone, the innumerable shades of light and dark in every scene, or color to capture bright and powerful or soft and romantic colors. You can photograph the same subject at dawn, noon, dusk, or at night, in sun, rain, snow, or fog. Each of these variables will influence the image you get.

All of this is possible by adjusting only three controls on your camera: focus, shutter speed, and aperture. These three controls, however, when combined with patience, experience, and your own personal view of the world, lend themselves to an infinite variety of possibilities, which makes photography a life-long interest and challenge for even the most experienced professionals.

When learning and practicing photography, remember that there are no "rules," no "best" way to make a picture. Great photographs come from experimenting and trying new approaches even with old subjects.