Photo Courtesy of AlzoDigital.com

This is a great video series on what to buy when it comes to studio lighting equipment. It doesn’t give specific recommendations, but it does explain in detail all about the basics of lighting and the different types of studio lighting equipment. The explanation is thorough and you get to see each piece of equipment so it makes it clear and easy to understand….I thought it was very well done. This video series was created by Digital Photography 1 on 1.

The first video gives an introduction to the video series on what to buy when it comes to studio lighting equipment. It then goes into some basic principles of lighting. You can see the first video here: Intro Studio Lighting video

The next three videos explain in detail the different types of studio lighting equipment and how they’re used.

Video Episode 4a: Introduces the three categories of lighting equipment : grip, light modifiers and light sources.

Video Episode 4b: Talks about things you can use to control where the light falls.

Video Episode 4c: Talks all about light sources.

This video series is great for someone wanting to learn more about studio lighting so they can master the art of taking portraits. And once you start taking incredible portraits with your new found lighting knowledge, don’t forget to frame them in one of our wood gallery picture frames

Although you can’t learn everything in one post about photography (and nor would I try),  this post is written to give you a taste of four important digital photography tips  that can be helpful in improving almost any picture.

Have Enough Resolution

With most people using digital cameras, often people end up with poor quality pictures when they go to enlarge them.  Often times, the problem is that the image doesn’t have a high enough resolution.

If you’re going to print out your pictures, make sure you use your camera’s highest resolution.  However, if you want more information on resolution, check out our blog post All About Resolution. Just remember, that if you’re shooting with high resolution, you can always resize the picture to a smaller size.

Have the Right Kind of Light

Good lighting is critical if you want great pictures. However, sometimes people think they have to spend a lot of money on lighting equipment in order to get quality light. Although this post is not about the basics of lighting, if you’re on a budget and want great lighting simply go outside.

Natural lighting is best when you choose specific times of the day such as the hour after dawn or the hour before sunset. Both of these times give soft light compared to the harsh shadows and bad bright glare of the sun at high noon. Obviously you want to avoid direct bright light (such as noon time) like the plague as it will wash out your pictures and generally give you bad results.

Composing Your Pictures

With photo composition there is lot to learn but one helpful tip you can start using right away is to “fill the frame.” Filling the frame means that you want to have the subject of your photo be the focus and have it take up the majority of the image. This allows your subject to be the focus and will usually result in a photo with more impact.

Often times, people will include a lot of extraneous “stuff” around the subject that is later cropped out. For example, if you’re taking a picture of Suzy swinging in the yard, you should zoom in on Suzy swinging and ignore all of the other activity in the yard like Grandpa barbequing or the dog playing with his toy. Simply by using this techniques you’ll start to see a noticeable difference in the appeal of your pictures. And once you’ve learned that, you can always learn other composition techniques like the “rule of thirds.”

Keep it Steady

It doesn’t take much movement to create a blurry picture and is a common problem with many pictures. With digital cameras, there is usually a delay from the time you press the shutter release and the time the picture is actually taken. This is called shutter lag and varies with each camera. So, the best trick to avoid blurry pictures is the following:

• Use a Tripod when using a slow shutter speed to make sure the camera is steady.
• Get used to the delay with your camera and keep the camera still until the green light on your camera flashes.
• Steady yourself by keeping your elbows down close to your body and your feet evenly planted on the ground.

Hopefully these tips will help you get improved results with your camera so you’ll have more pictures that you can enjoy displaying on your picture frame wall.

With most people using digital cameras, often people end up with poor quality pictures when they go to enlarge them. Often times, the problem is that the image doesn’t have a high enough resolution. But, before we can talk about the basics of good resolution for printing pictures, we first have to start with the basics.

What is Resolution?

Resolution is the number of dots per linear inch in a printed photograph or could be the number of pixels on a display screen.So, when you hear the word “mega pixel” it’s referring to the number of pixels which ultimately impacts the quality of your resolution.

Either way, when you take a digital picture you want high enough resolution so you can have crisp and clear pictures especially when printing out pictures.

The problem is that sometimes people don’t realize the importance of resolution and are instead concerned with taking as many pictures as possible on their memory card.  That’s why many people shoot images in low resolution because it takes more memory to shoot in high resolution. And more memory requires more memory cards and ultimately costs more.

However, if you want to print out pictures for giving as a gift or for displaying in a picture frame you should be shooting in high (or at least medium) resolution.

Image Resolution

The best advice for getting high quality pictures is to use the highest possible resolution on your camera. As technology continues to improve, the resolution of digital cameras will continue to get better.  So, instead of giving specific mega pixels for printing different sizes of pictures, simply set your camera to the highest resolution possible (or the largest number of mega pixels) and you should be able to print a quality picture up to common photo sizes like 8×10 or possibly even larger.

Taking pictures in high resolution simply gives you more options for what you can do with your pictures. If you have a high resolution picture, you can always resize the picture for a smaller print. So, if you want to be sure that your photos will look good in a beautiful picture frame then make sure you’re always shooting your pictures in the highest possible resolution.

Photo Courtesy of UnderwaterCamerasPlus.com

I love the ocean and have always been fascinated with underwater wildlife.  I once tried to take some pictures underwater but didn’t have much luck.

So, when I saw this great article on taking underwater pictures I couldn’t resist. This article from the website, Underwater Cameras Plus, gives some great tips on underwater photography.  If you’re interesting in learning how to take great underwater pictures, then you should check out this underwater photography article. This article offers some practical tips to avoiding the following common problems that many underwater pictures have:

• Lack of vibrant colors- pictures have a blue or blue-green tint to them
• White circles or dots that look like snow covering the image
• Fuzzy or blurry pictures
• No sharpness between the subject and the background

If you’re interested in underwater photography, then this underwater photography article can certainly offer you some practical advice.

And, sorry about the fuzzy picture of the Dragon Moray Eel but I couldn’t resist his smile

Getting your children involved in taking pictures can be a fun way for your kids to express their creativity and learn some great life lessons.

For me, I got my first camera when I was five years old. It was a little Kodak Instamatic X-15F camera. I not only learned how to take pictures, but I also learned a lot of important lessons. At that time, not many children had cameras so it really helped teach me responsibility and to appreciate my belongings.

These days, kids are more accustomed to cameras so choosing a camera for a child is a lot different. These days, many kids are more concerned with how the camera looks than the sheer joy of taking pictures.

So, here are a few things to consider when shopping for a camera for your child:

• Ease of use
• Camera size
• Camera features

When choosing a camera for your child, the age of your child really makes a huge difference. The younger your child, the simpler the camera should be with large easy to use buttons. The size should also be something the child can easily handle. For younger children, a little larger camera is better while with older kids smaller cameras are better. That’s because as kids gets older their fine motor control improves. In terms of camera features, you should choose a camera with very few features for a young child, but the older the child is the more features it can have. And since kids these days are so comfortable with technology, they should have no problem learning how to use a camera.