Photography Tutorials

Landscape Photography Post-Processing Tutorial in Lightroom

Mar

2010

March 4, 2010

In this tutorial, I will show you how to transform boring landscape pictures to vibrant and beautiful images in Lightroom in quick and easy steps. I will show you the real benefits of using the RAW image format and just some of the possibilities it gives you to non-destructively enhance your photographs without ever leaving Lightroom. I personally use this technique for post-processing my landscape photography all the time and I hope you find it useful.

Read on if you want to be able to take an image like this (original, as came out of the camera):

Original

and transform it to an image like this:

Final

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Filed Under: Photography Tutorials Tagged With: Landscape Photography, Nikon, Photography Tips

What is White Balance?

Feb

2010

February 14, 2010

By Nasim Mansurov 26 Comments

Ever wondered why your subjects turn out yellow when photographing them in indoor environments? Or why your camera flash can make them appear blue? Thoroughly understanding the concept of white balance and how it works is very important in digital photography, because setting it incorrectly could ruin a picture, adding all kinds of unwanted color casts and causing skin tones to look very unnatural. In this article, I will explain how you can adjust it on your camera or post-production to get accurate colors.

1) What is White Balance?

Simply put, white balance in digital photography means adjusting colors so that the image looks more natural. We go through the process of adjusting colors to primarily get rid of color casts, in order to match the picture with what we saw when we took it. Why do we have to do this? Because most light sources (the sun, light bulbs, flashlights, etc) do not emit purely white color and have a certain “color temperature“. The human brain processes the information that comes from our eyes and automatically adjusts the color temperature, so we normally see the colors correctly. If you took a white sheet of paper and looked at it outside, it would most likely look as white as if you were to look at it indoors. What most people do not realize, however, is that there is a huge difference in color temperature between bright sunlight and indoors tungsten light.

Understanding Metering and Metering Modes

Feb

2010

February 4, 2010

By Nasim Mansurov 84 Comments

Every modern DSLR has something called “Metering Mode”, also known as “Camera Metering”, “Exposure Metering” or simply “Metering”. Knowing how metering works and what each of the metering modes does is important in photography, because it helps photographers control their exposure with minimum effort and take better pictures in unusual lighting situations. In this understanding metering modes article, I will explain what metering is, how it works and how you can use it for your digital photography.

When I got my first DSLR (Nikon D80), one of my frustrations was that some images would come out too bright or too dark. I had no idea how to fix it, until one day, when I learned about camera metering modes.

1) What is Metering?

Metering is how your camera determines what the correct shutter speed and aperture should be, depending on the amount of light that goes into the camera and the sensitivity of the sensor. Back in the old days of photography, cameras were not equipped with a light “meter”, which is a sensor that measures the amount and intensity of light. Photographers had to use hand-held light meters to determine the optimal exposure. Obviously, because the work was shot on film, they could not preview or see the results immediately, which is why they religiously relied on those light meters.

Today, every DSLR has an integrated light meter that automatically measures the reflected light and determines the optimal exposure. The most common metering modes in digital cameras today are:

Matrix Metering (Nikon), also known as Evaluative Metering (Canon)
Center-weighted Metering
Spot Metering (Nikon), also known as Partial Metering (Canon)

You can see the camera meter in action when you shoot in Manual Mode – look inside the viewfinder and you will see bars going left or right, with a zero in the middle, as illustrated below.

Metering shown in Nikon Viewfinder

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Filed Under: Photography Tutorials Tagged With: Canon, DSLR Camera, Nikon, Photography Tips, Tips for Beginners

RAW vs JPEG

Jan

2010

January 26, 2010

By Nasim Mansurov 76 Comments

The RAW vs JPEG topic seems like a never ending debate in photography. Some photographers say shoot RAW, while others say shoot JPEG. What is RAW format in digital photography? What are the advantages and disadvantages of RAW versus JPEG and why? Should you shoot in RAW or JPEG? Will shooting in RAW complicate your post-production and workflow? These are some of the most common questions that people ask after they buy their first DSLR camera and go through the camera options. Having a thorough understanding of advantages and disadvantages is essential for photographers to make the right decision on whether to use RAW format for their work.

Sand Dunes - Shot in RAW

I remember my first time going through the camera options and reading the Nikon D80 manual, wondering about what RAW does and why I should consider using it. JPEG is a no-brainer – it’s the default image format that is used in most point and shoot cameras and we all got used to it and know it very well, seeing and sharing JPEG images online and downloading/uploading them from and to our mobile devices. But there was something about RAW that I wanted to find out about immediately. Maybe it was the word “raw” that sounded intriguing, maybe it was the immediate desire to get the sharpest, highest quality and best pictures ever without knowing much about the camera…whatever it was, I went ahead and changed my camera settings to RAW and tried to take a picture. The first thing I noticed, was how small all of a sudden my memory card became. Wait a second! How come the number of pictures went down from over 700 to under 200? The image looked exactly the same on the LCD and yet it consumed more than three times more memory? Bummer. Then, I took the memory card and inserted it into my laptop. To my surprise, I couldn’t even open the darn thing! Worthless, I thought and changed my camera settings back to JPEG.

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Filed Under: Photography Tutorials Tagged With: Photography Tips, RAW Files, Tips for Beginners

DNG vs RAW

Jan

2010

January 25, 2010

By Nasim Mansurov 68 Comments

Should you use DNG or RAW format? This is one of the most important questions that you as a photographer need to ask yourself, because it will definitely affect your digital photography workflow. Every photographer has their own say on whether to use DNG or RAW, but it is important to know the key differences between the two, along with their advantages and disadvantages. In this article, I will provide as much information as I can about both formats, in addition to my opinion and workflow. If you are looking for more information about how RAW images compare to JPEG images, then please read my “RAW vs JPEG” article.

1) What is RAW?

RAW images, also known as “digital negatives” are truly “raw”, meaning they are almost unprocessed data coming directly from the camera sensor. Unlike JPEG files that can be easily opened, viewed and printed by most image-viewing/editing programs, RAW is a proprietary format that is tied to the camera manufacturer and sensor, and therefore is not supported by all software products. RAW files preserve the most amount of information about an image and generally contain more colors and dynamic range than other formats.

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Filed Under: Photography Tutorials Tagged With: DNG Files, Photography Tips, RAW Files, Tips for Beginners

How to Organize Pictures

Jan

2010

January 24, 2010

By Nasim Mansurov 9 Comments

I wrote this basic guide on how to organize pictures for those, who occasionally take pictures with digital cameras and who are looking for ways to organize images on their computers. This is NOT a guide for serious photographers with large catalogs of photographs. If you are a photographer looking for ways to organize your photo library, please see my “how to organize pictures in Lightroom” guide written specifically for serious photography work.

During the last 10 years, all kinds of digital cameras have flooded both traditional and online stores. Today, the market is over-saturated with a wide array of digital cameras for personal and professional use and tough competition among the manufacturers pushed the prices so low, that most US households now own one or more digital cameras. Digital cameras have gotten so popular, that they made their way into our phones and other electronic devices as well. With such a wide array of sources where pictures come from, how do we keep them organized?

Most people do not even bother organizing pictures. They take pictures, leave them on their cameras and mobile devices and use them when needed – to share a picture via Facebook or to send the latest pic to their friends and family. As a result, many pictures get lost and memories are gone forever. So, what should you do to keep your pictures organized and saved?

1) First, find all of your photographs

Start with your computer and try to locate every single picture. Common places to look for photographs are in your “My Documents” or “My Pictures” folders, but you might have pictures in other folders as well. Just search your computer for all files with “JPG” extension and see what it finds. Create a local folder on your desktop and move all your pictures there. If you have other computers/laptops at home, perform the same search and try to find every single picture. Next, go through your mobile devices (iPhone, iPod, Zune, etc) and see if you have any pictures stored there too. Copy them all to your main PC, into the same folder that you created earlier.

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Filed Under: Photography Tutorials Tagged With: Photography Tips, Tips for Beginners

Low Light Photography Tips

Jan

2010

January 21, 2010

By Nasim Mansurov 65 Comments

Low light photography is not necessarily just night photography, as many people assume. There could be different amounts of light coming from various sources and whatever is less than daytime light outside, I consider low-light. Indoors photography without much ambient light (as in many of our homes) as well as the light that is barely visible to our eyes at night, is also considered to be low-light. In this article, I will provide tips on how to take pictures in various low-light environments, whether indoors or outdoors.

Antelope Canyon, 5 second exposure @ f/10, ISO 200

Three levels of low-light

Before we go any further, let’s first identify the varying levels of low-light and categorize them, so that we could refer to them in examples. Although it is very hard to categorize the amount of light, due to the fact that it is a long range of light between very bright and pitch black, just for the sake of making it easier to explain and refer to, I still decided to divide it into three categories:

Visible: in daylight, when you happen to be in shadow areas behind buildings, under large trees or bridges.
Low Light: after sunset, when you can still clearly see everything around you, but you can tell that it is getting dark or when you are indoors.
Dark: at night, when you can only see the brightest objects.

Understanding ISO, Shutter Speed and Aperture – A Beginner’s Guide

Jan

2010

January 12, 2010

By Nasim Mansurov 81 Comments

It is difficult to take good pictures without having a solid understanding of ISO, Shutter Speed and Aperture – the Three Kings of Photography, also known as the “Exposure Triangle”. While most new DSLRs have “Auto” modes that automatically pick the right shutter speed, aperture and even ISO for your exposure, using an Auto mode puts limits on what you can achieve with your camera. In many cases, the camera has to guess what the right exposure should be by evaluating the amount of light that passes through the lens. Thoroughly understanding how ISO, shutter speed and aperture work together allows photographers to fully take charge of the situation by manually controlling the camera. Knowing how to adjust the settings of the camera when needed, helps to get the best out of your camera and push it to its limits to take great photographs.

Understanding Digital Camera Modes

Jan

2010

January 5, 2010

By Nasim Mansurov 69 Comments

Having a good understanding of the digital camera modes is essential to control the exposure in photography. Whether you are a beginner or an advanced amateur, you should know what each camera mode does and when it should be used, under what circumstances.

1) What are Digital Camera Modes?

Digital Camera Modes allow photographers to control the parameters of an exposure, specifically, Shutter Speed, Aperture and ISO. While certain modes can fully automate the camera exposure, there are other modes that let the photographer manually control some or all parameters of the exposure.

Back in the old days, there was no such thing as a camera mode – everything was manual. Photographers had to manually set the aperture, shutter speed and choose the right type of film for their cameras. To evaluate the intensity and the amount of light, they used to carry special light metering devices that measured the light and provided the exposure information, which they would then use in their cameras. In 1938, Kodak introduced a film camera with an integrated light meter and in 1962, a Japanese company called “Topcon” introduced the first SLR camera that measured the light coming through the lens into the camera. What this meant, was that photographers no longer needed to carry special light meters with them – the camera would do it for them. New “Automatic” camera modes started appearing on cameras, which would evaluate the amount of light that passed through the lens and would automatically pick the right exposure parameters to produce a properly-exposed picture.

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Filed Under: Photography Tutorials Tagged With: Howto, Photography Tips, Tips for Beginners

How to Photograph Children

Jan

2010

January 4, 2010

By Lola Mansurov 39 Comments

Photographing children can sometimes be a challenging task, since children typically do not like posing for the camera (especially when they are too busy doing something they like). Everything happens way too fast, making it extremely difficult for the photographer to capture the moment. Because of that, many of us end up with blurry and out-of-focus photographs and wonder how we can improve our photography skills to get better results. After learning much about child photography, taking pictures of my two boys and doing some work on the field, I decided to write an article and provide tips and pointers on how you can successfully photograph children.

Powerful child portraits are much different than “look at the camera and smile” pictures. A true portrait will reflect a child’s personality, energy and uniqueness that every one of the bundle of joys have.

Landscape Photography Post-Processing Tutorial in Lightroom