Photoscout

• Photographing Stationary Scenes

  If you’ve ever taken a photograph in your life, you might have come across a photo that you’ve capture that may look a little something like the horizon being tilted in such a way that you might swear that if you didn’t know any better, you thought the entire scene would fall off the frame. Here are some tips on how to avoid a tilting horizon.One of the best things that you should remember is to use a tripod. This will come in very handy whenever you’re photographing seascapes and landscapes. It also keeps your camera steady so that you could also experiment with some night photography shots. Plus, with a tripod you can easily compose your pictures even more precisely.

  There are some SLR cameras which have interchangeable viewfinder screens. These things are especially useful if you have the architectural style grid which have etched lines for both horizontal and vertical lines which essentially assist in lining up horizons and other compositional guides that you may find in your scene.

  In the tripods that are commercially sold, you will find that there is a bubble reading at the point where you have the handle which extends the tripod. This comes in very handy as you try to compose your horizon. It also alerts you to any tilting that may be present during the composition of your shot. It would be best that you remember that the bubble reading is also not foolproof as you cannot just rely on it for a perfect horizontal composition.

  There are times that you will find that your camera is level according to the bubble reading but when you look into the viewfinder, the horizon will look slanted. In these occasions, you would be better off to trust your eye instead. Assuming that your viewfinder isn’t defective or fogged up, the viewer’s eye will always be best when it comes to assessing horizons. The best thing to do is to angle or slant the camera slightly in order to correct the tilted horizon. Technically, you shouldn’t be able to slanted lines if the bubble reading is correct but there are a few times that you will find that this is untrue.

  So you have the unenviable task of trusting and doubting your eyes as part of photographing horizons. May you always get leveled photographs of seascapes and landscapes. With a little practice, you’ll eventually find yourself getting better each time.

  Posted in Outdoor Photography

  December 13th, 2007 / No Comments

• Simplicity In Your Photographs

  One of the first things that you have to remember whenever you’re composing your photograph is that you should make it as simple as possible. Try to find different ways in giving the center of interest in your picture the most visual attention. One of the ways to do this is to select uncomplicated backgrounds which will not take away attention from your subjects.

  If, let’s say, you’re taking a picture of a scene with a public payphone but along with the background, you have a cactus and a bridge that’s in the frame. How do you know now what subject to focus on? If you’re taking a picture of the whole scenery with a wide angle view, you’re going to lose the attention of the viewer because you’re essentially leading them to so many potential subjects.

  The best thing to do in this type of situation is to frame the subject close enough so that you’ll be able to have the viewer focus on one subject. One of the best subjects that you could probably focus on would be the cactus since you’d be framing it against the sky which would be devoid of any particular distraction. The output is that you have a simplified and improved appearance in your photograph.

  One other scenario is if you’re taking a picture of a bird perched on top of a lamp post. What you could avoid is taking a closely cropped picture of a bird that is against some tree leaves. If you do that, you might have a busy background that will eventually bother the viewer the longer he or she stares at the bird. You could employ the same technique by simply adjusting your point of view by getting the bird in front of a blue sky instead of the busy background given by the trees.

  One of the things that you need to remember when composing your photograph is when someone looks at a picture that you’ve taken, they should immediately know the reason why you took that picture. It should be clearly seen. Arrange the other parts of the picture in such a way that they will complement your center of interest. You should know how much of your subject you should include and whether it should be framed horizontally or vertically. You are faced with so many decisions when it comes to composition so it would be a very challenging decision to keep it simple.

  Posted in Tips & Techniques

  December 6th, 2007 / No Comments