All the beautiful people!

There's a common perception that everyone else looks so much better in photos. Many seem to think they can't look good, except for that one photo they use for everything because they feel that this one portrays them the way they are. Let me tell you; everyone can look great in photos!

They joy in the eyes, of a  person who is satisfied with the photos you've shot of them, is priceless!

My dear friend, Astrid
EXIF: f/2 - 1/100 - ISO100 - 50mm - WB/cloudy

The portrait on the right is of my dear friend, Astrid. She's one of the strongest and also most loving persons I know. I wanted to portray her, powerful and feminine. In other portraits I might have worked with a higher f-number, but I really wanted her to stand out from the background. In this shot I have used the Sigma EX DG HSM 50mm lense, a great lense for portraits.

In the post Starting to think within the frames I talked a bit about placing the eyes on the line 1/3 from the top. In this shot you can see she stares straight to the right in this line level.

Complementary colors are good in any photos, and her golden colors stands in wonderful contrast to the ice blue sky.

Bridal journeymen
EXIF: f/4.5 - 1/160 - ISO200 - 80mm - WB/cloudy

Now, if you want to learn how to shot great portraits from scratch there are some guidelines to follow. First of all you need to create a relaxing atmosphere between you and the person you will portray. You need to make the person trust you and you must keep your body language positive. People feel very fragile when someone is moving this close to them, so it's very important that you treat them with respect and show them that you are trustworthy. Smalltalk and keeping eye contact is alfa and omega.

EXIF: f/4.5 - 1/160 - ISO200 - 50mm - WB/sun

Photographing kids is so much fun! You really never know what you'll get. Kids are so natural in fromt of the camera, and they often completely take over the direction of the shoot. To photograph kids you'll have to know how to play. 

I'll talk about baby photography in a later post

When talking about portraits, there is one thing I haven't mentioned yet, but is very important. If you want to take great people photographs you have to get rid of the pop-up flash. Please. The pop-up flash is the cruelest invention in the history of digital photography. So many great shots have been ruined because of this! The pop-up flash creates a merciless flash that flattens the dept, highlights and destroys everything in it's way. Turn it off. Buy a directional flash. Or, at least cover it with a diffuser. To create great portraits you need soft and indirect light. Natural daylight is of course best, but with a directional flash you can shot the flash up in the ceiling to spread the light.

EXIF: f/ 5.6 - 1/200 - 70mm - ISO100 - WB/sun

Pay attention, because this is important! People tend to always look at the other persons eyes. In portaits the old saying, the eyes are the mirror of the soul, couldn't be more true. So, focus on the eyes. Always make the eyes razor sharp! 

If the person is staring into the camera, and their eyes are sharp, it is almost like there's some kind of communication going on. Try it out!

None of my examples this time has been shots with f/11. f/11 is the ultimate aperture for classic portrait shots. At f/11 you get the whole head of the person in focus, but to use this you need a lot of light. In my next post about portraits I will show you some classic f/11 shots.

'Till next time; take care!

Starting to think within the frames

-A bit more about sections and composition

EXIF: f/20 - 1/60 - 60mm- ISO200 - Flash/compulsory

I can't pinpoint the day, or shoot when it really hit me how important it is to compose the photos. This knowledge grew on me, and in the beginning I composed purely on intuition. Later on I have read the theory, and see that many of my good intuitive shots are following the rules of sectioning and composition. And the bad...well, bad intuition.

Now, I can't help my self for thinking in frames no matter what I look at. Any of you seen Alice in Wonderland the Tim Burton version? I love that film, but what makes this film interesting in this case is the unique use of absolute thoroughly convincing picture frames from start to finish! It's a study in composition and sectioning. 

In pop music it's pretty obvious that you have to compose to create a great melody, but you also have to follow a set of rules -you have the verses, the chorus and maybe a bridge. 

The river Glomma at it's end in Fredrikstad, Norway
EXIF: f/9 - 1/60 - 20mm - ISO200 -WB/Cloudy

In the post "Diagonal Flower Power" I talked about the use of diagonals as a trick to lead the viewers eye through the shot. In landscape photography you can use roads, or rivers to make diagonals or to take the viewer straight into the photo.

Somehow I think diagonals from bottom left to top right works better than bottom right to top left. I don't know why, maybe it's because I am used to read from left to right? Any of you have theories on this I'll be happy to hear from you.

In the waterglass photo on top, the diagonal is "cut". It moves from the center of the shot to the top left. This works better than a diagonal that moves all the way.

Repetition is also a trick to remember when it comes to photo composition. To repeat shape, or elements in a certain order will make the image look more graphic. I think this photo from Pierre Andrews Flickr photostream is a great example of both diagonal thinking and repetition. There's a whole group on Flickr dedicated to pattern photography if you need inspiration.

EXIF: f/5 - 1/60 - 50mm - ISO100- WB/shadow

Many times, however, you are set to photograph one single item; a flower, a person or a car. This is the times you decide where to put the "object" in the frame. Take a look at the portrait to the right. Why did I cut the top of the head of the model? And why does it work? In this case I have used two different rules. First I have placed the model within 2/3 of the shot from left to right. The last 1/3 is "empty", or air as I like to call it. And second, and this is why I can cut my models head top off and get away with it, I have placed her eye precicely in the center on the 1/3 line from the top.

If you don't believe me, look at the lines in the photo to the right.

The trick with the eye is just a fraction of what you need to know about portraits of course, but it's such a great tip that I know you'll test it. You can of course place the eye in the line crossing on either side as well.

One last thing; as you've been reading this blog you've probably started to get that photography is not about "snaps" or "clicks". Photography is about carefully planning everything from light, section, frames, dept of field and a number of other things that I haven't talked about yet. So let's get rid of the therms "clicks" and "snaps" once and for all when talking about photography. Am I right?

So there you have it- my friday blog post about thinking within the frame!

Have a great friday!

Diagonal Flower Power

EXIF: f/6.3 - 1/100 sec - iso100- 60mm-sun-no flash

I love shooting photos of flowers, and I never lose my amazement of the variety of color and shape of these wonderful miracles of nature. Think this is why almost every person who have a camera, tries to capture the beauty and color of flowers.

To photograph the essence of a flower is not difficult, but one has to have a plan of execution.

Of course everyone has their own photo style. I like to think that it's pretty easy for other photographers who know me to recognize my photos.

If your eye is not trained to study photography, your creative brain takes over and sort of fills in the gap between a poor picture of a flower and your own experience of how this flower really looks like.

You like it, because you like the color or that kind of flower, -you might even have one in your own garden.

Many can relate to this when talking of cute puppies or kittens. A picture of a kitten or a puppy can be a blurry, trerrible wrong cut piece of crap -photography wise, but because you like kittens and puppies you still like the way the picture makes you feel. Kittens and puppies are cute.

Still, to make a good quality photo of a flower, or a puppy for that matter, it takes more than just a snap with camera set on auto. You need to think section, focalpoint, section and dept of field.

Initially want all my photos to be razor sharp and focused. If I publish a photo that isn't sharp, it's only because I have decided to blur or glow it. I am my own worst critic, both when it comes to sharpness, section and expression.

EXIF: f/5.6 - 1/80 -iso100-60mm-shadow-no flash

The problem with sharpness in photos is often due to light conditions. If you set your camera to auto, the camera will compensate the dof to get more light.

Fact: The lower f-number - the more light gets through - the narrower dept of field .

Example of very low f. See how narrow the sharp area is.

Above you see two very different flower photos.The pink peony is a macro shot directly from above and, as you can see, I have done quite a bit editing to it after. In an earlier post I talked about sections. In this photo I have used both the rule of thirds and another trick; diagonals. I love diagonals. You can get away with a lot as long as you have a strong diagonal in your shot. The purpose of the diagonal is to lead the eye through the photo. I'm not very fond of selective color, but sometimes it works. I think it turned out ok in this photo because the BW in this particular case is the wood. Wood has such a great texture in it self. By making a photograph like this, you show off the flower in all it's beauty, and also play with the ideas of popart.

The photo of the bud is a very different photo. This particular bud is a delphinium. The photo was shot after some heavy summer rain last summer and, as you can see, from a very different angle. If you want to shoot great flower photos you can't be afraid of getting your knees dirty. You can of course have a little spray bottle with you if you want droplets on your flower, even if it's dry.

As you see the background is smooth against the wet bud. This is due to the aperture setting and the distance to the background. I think the droplets really make all the difference in this photo. It makes the little bud look a bit sad and melancolic. I guess you can spot the diagonal? Yes, it's in this photo as well. The flower stem makes a quite natural diagonal through the photo.

EXIF: f/7.1 - 1/160sec - iso100 - 60mm -shadow -no flash

Remember it's always fun to shoot photos from different angles. The last photo I will like to show you today is this single dahlia . When inspecting the flower I noticed the very strong stripes in the petals, and decided to pick the flower and hold it up against the sky when photographing it.

In this shot the eye moves from the center of the shot and out, due to all the lines pointing outwards.

So there you have it; my three very different angles to flower photography!

A stare into the empty

Sometimes you know intstantly what dept of field you want to go with in your photo, but many times you need to try and fail a bit to get the shot you're after.

I like to shoot everyday obects from different angles and test out dof to make abstract photos of ordinary things. Like this emty red vine bottle, for instance.

I tried without the water droplets in the first shot, but decided the bottleneck needed some more "light catchers".

Shiny things, water, different textures, angled lighting is always good in still life macros; it brings life into the photo.

The placing of the object, how to pick the right section, is also crusial. This is straight out of camera, which means that I have not edited the image or cropped it. In such cases one must be very careful to place the object within the photo frame before shoting the photo. It is a great way to learn how to think photography.

As you can see, the circular bottleneck is not placed in the centre of the image. This is to lead the viewers eye through the photo. In this case I have used the rule of thirds.theory.

EXIF: f/5 ~ 1/80 sec. ~ ISO100 ~ WB/sun (Click photo for larger version)

So, there you have it; my emty wine bottle!

Have a great Saturday! I know I will.

Zynne