Rediscovering Photography

Cameras are literally everywhere at the moment. If we don’t own a digital camera, we have one on hand built into our phone. And the amount of pictures we can take has changed too. We can buy memory cards with several gig of memory that allow us to take thousands of photos, should we be so inclined.

The trouble is, with the amount of cameras around and their ease of use, most people don’t exercise restraint any more. They just point their phone and click, safe in the knowledge it will not cost them extra on their O2 or Orange contracts. They seize every opportunity or simply take photos for the sake of it.

As much as digital photography has revolutionized the ‘Kodak moment’, in a way it might have been better back in the days when there was only a certain amount of film available on a cartridge. You had to choose wisely which moments you decided to capture. And this thought behind the action made them more personal.

When you next celebrate a special occasion with your friends, go out on the town with the girls or get together with your extended family, try and hold back on the photography. Not indefinitely. Just long enough that you can really think about what pictures you want to take. Deliberate over where it ought be taken, who should be in it and why. The phrase ‘less is more’ counts with photography too.

This is not to say that spontaneity is a bad thing. On the contrary, the point-and-click method can work wonders. However, excessive clicking amounts to hundreds of photos that are too blurry, not in focus, have bad lighting or show someone in an unflattering way. And you end up discarding them without a second thought anyway.

The point is, we appear to be losing the technique behind the perfect photo. And that is a shame.

Taking ‘professional’ quality photos of room interiors has gotten much easier since the advent of digital photography. One of the nice things about using online photography resources is the amount of information that is available to help you learn about taking good digital pictures.

In days of old, you assumed that to get good interior photography shots you needed a van load of lighting equipment and all the associated paraphernalia to properly light a room and get good quality photos. Now, with the ability to receive instant feedback from your camera, you can make shots that would have been difficult to take with film in the past.

Recently I was visiting a friend who is a professional kitchen designer. He mentioned that he had just completed a nice kitchen project that turned out very well. He said he would have liked to submit photos of the job to his local association’s design contest but the submission deadline was only a few days away and he didn’t have time to have the photos professionally shot.

Of course when I heard that I immediately said “I’ve got my camera with me. Let’s run over and give it a go!”

(In the future I will have to remember to look before I leap.)

We arrived at the home in the middle of an extremely hot and bright June day. And the kitchen had a large southern facing window above the sink that did not have any type of blinds. One part of the room was as bright as a supernova and the other corners seemed terribly dark by comparison.

I spent quite a bit of time trying to get some decent shots thinking that I could use my flash to ‘over power’ the sun. But a SpeedLite is no match for midday sunlight.

Finally I decided to try something different. We found a few pieces of cardboard and blocked the window as best we could. Then we turned on all the room lights to their highest settings. I mounted the camera on my tripod and took a number of shots at low ISO and an F11 stop without using the flash.

While the results would probably make a pro laugh, I was fairly amazed at how the photos turned out. The shot above (click on the picture for a larger view) was shot at a setting of 15 seconds at F11, ISO 100. The bright kitchen window is just off to the right. And even though it looks like you see the regular sun reflected in the range hood, this was just the amount of bright sun that sneaked by the edges of the cardboard during that long exposure.

So here’s a way to manipulate lighting without carrying around a ton of lighting equipment. Instead of trying to add light to even things out, take it away and use a longer exposure. If I would have had more time that day, I can see now how I could have adjusted the lighting for any part of  the interior shot by ‘taking away’ light.

If you have to do an interior photography shot ‘on the spur of the moment’, use whatever you have a available to block light that is too bright to even out your light sources and you’ll come away with a nice result. Don’t worry about how dark it gets. The camera doesn’t care and it’s just a matter of taking a longer exposure. In my opinion, the cost for roll of masking tape and some cardboard sure beats the price of big set of lighting gear. And it’s a lot easier to carry around!

There is an old story about a young newcomer to New York City who stopped a stranger on the street and asked ‘Can you tell me how to get to Carnegie Hall’?. The stranger thought for a moment and then replied, ‘Practice Son, Practice’. The same is true with your camera. You can take better digital pictures with a little bit of practice.

• Take lots and lots of shots. The change to digital photos from film in photography has given anyone who wants to improve their photo skills a tremendous gift. Learning how to take good pictures with a digital camera is much easier than it would have been in the old days of film. When you’re taking pictures don’t just stop at the standard snapshots that are normally taken. Walk around, experiment, try anything. Since there is no film to buy or processing to wait for you can see your results as soon as you download your pictures. Carefully go through your shots looking at what is good and what is bad. You can learn a lot from the immediate feedback you get with digital.
• Look at the LCD or through the viewfinder before you click the shutter. An old friend of mine that taught me a lot about photography had a saying, ‘Look, then click’. If you remember this one piece of advice I guarantee the quality of your photos will immediately improve. Really ‘look’ at the picture you are going to take. This is especially true if you’re taking a picture of a person or a group of people, look at the whole picture before you take the shot. Too many times we focus on our subject and forget about everything else. Make sure the background and foreground don’t have items or objects that will ruin the shot.
• Always be on the lookout for a good photo. Keep your camera handy and as many times as you can during the day try to look at things as a camera would see them. And when your ‘camera eye’ says this would be a great shot, do it. Every photo you take, even if it doesn’t turn out to be as good as you thought it would, gives you feedback and the opportunity to learn for your future photos.
• Get in closer. Yes, I know every thing you read about photography repeats this over and over. But it is so true. If you are at the Grand Canyon with a group of people decide first if you want pictures of the scenery or of the people. If you want to take a photo of the group, use your best skills to pose them nicely and then get up close and take their photos. The photo will show the scenery a little in the background, but your aim was to record the people. If you want to show that the group of people are at the Grand Canyon and you want to include a large shot of the scenery, pose them differently so that they are included in the picture but acting naturally enjoying their experience and go for the ‘large view’ shot without worrying about getting everyone’s faces or smiles. (You’ll have that in the close up.)
• And finally, read your camera manual. I know you did that when you first got the camera. Now dig it out and read it again. You will be surprised by what new and interesting information you will find. Do it now, trust me. Things that you skimmed or didn’t completely understand or remember when you first looked at the manual will now make sense. Most people don’t use many of the excellent features and options that are available on modern digital cameras just because they look at the manual once and never again. Learn the tool that is your camera. It’s a wonderful machine.

So try some of the ideas above out. And if you want a few more, here is an earlier post I wrote about taking good digital pictures. I was so happily amazed when I first had the realization of how much faster and easier it was to improve my photos skills when I changed to digital.

If you’ve got some good tips you’d like to share or questions about some of these ideas, leave a note in the comments. I’d love to hear from you.