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Welcome to Amazing Portraits, Part of the Shoot Yourself Photographic Instruction Series. The purpose of our series is to help you become a better digital photographer and a better subject should you decide to utilize the services of a professional Photographer.   Everyone wants to capture great portraits of their family. Today we are gong to give you a few techniques that should help you capture better Portraits.

 The combination of good technique, technical ability and capturing the moment will produce a great Portrait. Here are some tips:

You do not need to be indoors to capture great looking portraits. Get out into your neighborhood and look around for an awesome quiet location to shoot your subject. Shooting on location is fun and allows you to incorporate different styles and compositions to your photos. Maybe you would like an urban feel, a cityscape for some grit or something earthy and natural suits you better. The choice you make will have a huge impact on you’re the look and feel of your photo.

Just find a place and shoot yourself using the following tips.

Understand Focal Length and Aperture:

A great portrait will be free of background noise and distractions allowing your subject to “jump” out of the picture. The right aperture, focal length and shooting distance will help blur any detail behind your subject. I used my 100-400mm lens set at 400mm f5.6, 1/800sec at approximately 15 yards to capture the picture of this dragon fly with my camera set on aperture priority. Notice how only my subject is in focus, the saw-grass in the background is completely blurred adding an artistic blur to the photo.

 Blur the background to add interest:

 1. Use a longer focal length, 135 or more

 2. Use a shorter distance between you and your subject

 3. Increase the distance between your subject and the background

 4. Use a wide aperture, like f/3 of f/4

Using a combination of all the above will result in portraits that look like a professional took them.

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Portraits


 

Welcome to Photographing your kids, Part of the Shoot Yourself Photographic Instruction Series. The purpose of our series is to help you become a better digital photographer and a better subject should you decide to utilize the services of a professional Photographer.   One of the hardest subjects for a parent to photograph is their children. Today we are gong to give you a few techniques that should help you capture better pictures of the kids.

The combination of good technique, technical ability and capturing the moment will produce a great family picture. Here are some tips:

1) Keep it Natural: Your child may be comfortable indoors, but there can be distractions, poor lighting and busy backgrounds. Get outside. Use your garden, backyard, a favorite park and let the kids be kids. Use the terrain and natural features as props. 

2) Get Down & Dirty:  Get off of your feet and knees especially when you're shooting a young toddler. Yes, I'm saying GET ON YOUR BELLY. It is a trade-off worth taking. Shooting from a high angle does allow you to use the ground as a background. However, it's worthwhile being at a low angle if you want to capture more of the child's face. 

3) Get Back: Use a telephoto lens and give the kids room to play. If you have an SLR camera use a 70-300mm zoom for good versatility. If you use a point and shoot, use your optical zoom range only. In either case, get back far enough to avoid distracting the child. At 70mm you should get far enough back to get full length photos and zoom in for close-ups. 

4) Why Zoom In?: Zooming in will allow you to pick out all those wonderful expressions, but will blur the background enough to help them stand out in the frame. 

5) Camera Settings DSLR: These settings should give you a great chance to catch the best picture. They should allow you to forget about the technical stuff and enjoy your photography.

   * ISO: Keep it high: Around 400 to freeze the movement in the picture.

   *File Format: RAW is best, but you can use your highest quality JPEG. FYI, I only shoot in RAW. It captures the most information per file and allows the highest degree of post production tweaking in Photoshop.

   *Exposure Mode: Shutter priority is my priority when using a telephoto lens.

   *Metering Mode: Use center weighted metering for accurate facial expressions.

   *Focusing Mode: Single AF for static shots and continuous drive to catch the action.

   *Drive Mode: Use continuous drive to capture the best shot. 

   * Flash: If you have it, use it. Set it to TTL (Transistor–Transistor Logic) and let it rip. Do not worry if it does not keep up with your camera. It will give you more options of better pictures later. On the pictures that had the flash fire, you will see some or all of the shadows have been filled.  Shoot with it and be surprised.

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Shoot your Kids!

Shoot your Kids!

Hi, I'm Miami based Fine Art Photographer, John Ermer.  Welcome to Photographic Lighting techniques, Part of the Shoot Yourself Photographic Instruction Series. The purpose of our series is to help you become a better digital photographer and a better subject should you decide to utilize the services of a professional Photographer.   In today's world everyone has access to a digital camera.  Whether you use your cell phone, a point and shoot or an SLR camera, you probably want to take better photos. By paying a little closer attention to your surroundings, and using them to your advantage, you will be able to achieve better results without making a large investment in professional equipment.  On today's show we're going to focus on lighting, for indoor and outdoor shots. 

When taking photos, most of us fail to pay attention to the light that surrounds us.  Before shooting,    you may want to take a moment to assess how the light around you can affect your subject.   When the light is directly behind the subject, will emerge more often than not, as a shadow or silhouetted figure. Too much light directly in front of the subject can result in harsh reflections or squinty and or red eye. Red eye is caused by reflection of the light off of the cornea back to the camera lens. Illustrating why, the worst place for a flash is directly on the camera. Since this is the way most of your cameras are constructed, you may want to avoid the flash as much as possible. Try adjusting the ISO setting on your camera to 400 and see if it does not compensate enough to avoid using the flash. The photo look a little grainy, however that can add a soft and sexy look to the picture. If the light source is directly above your subject it could cast some shadow down the face. A piece of white cardboard quickly remedies this situation. Have your subject hold the cardboard in their lap or below the shot and simply reflect some fill light back up to the face.  Experiment with this technique for yourself, I think you’ll like the results. If you have ever seen a professional shoot you have seen the photographer use various lighting enhancers, multiple light sources, reflectors, etc. You can immolate these same devices at home.

Outdoor shots ensure one thing. You have no control over the lighting situation. However, you can use the same white cardboard and lighting recommendations as above for light directly above your subject casting shadows on the face. You may want to add fill flash to your pictures. Simply put this is the use of your flash to fill in any shadows resulting from outside lighting, or you can use the same white cardboard to reflect light back up to your clients face filling in the shadows.

If you are shooting outdoors, avoid having the sun directly in the face of the subject(s). You should strive to position the subject with the sun at a 45 – 90 degree angle.

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Light up like a pro!

Light up like a pro!