Photography podcast – photography blog – Photography.ca

Focus on the eyes

Today’s small tip to better your photography is a simple yet crucial one and the title of this post really explains it all. Portraits are the most common type of photograph that people take. People contstantly ask me to evaluate their photos that they think are amazing. 50% of the time when there is a person in the photograph their eyes are not sharp. This DESTROYS the shot. When taking a portrait, focus on the eyes. Don’t focus on their nose or their hair, focus on their eyes. If their head is turned toward the camera, focus on the eye that is closest to the camera.

That said, I’m sure to get “but Marko what if I want to try something funky and keep the subject blurry to get an effect”. In that case you can do whatever you want to do, because that is your intention. You gotta know the rules before you can break the rules.

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Depth of field – Photography podcast # 2 – Photography.ca

Our second podcast is dedicated to depth of field. We discuss in pretty good depth how to become more creative with depth of field. These 2 photographs below illustrate the differences between smaller and larger depths of field. Remember: A smaller aperture like F 16 results in both the background and the foreground being pretty sharp. A larger aperture like F 2.0 results in a sharp foreground and unsharp background. If you’d rather read the differences instead of listening to the podcast below, a good depth of field explanation is located here.

If you see the player, use the player below to listen to the podcast – it’s faster. If you don’t see the player click the link below.

You can download our second podcast here. http://www.photography.ca/podcasts/photog_ca_podcast2.mp3

Photography podcast transcript #2

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Tags: depth of field, photography, photography podcast

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Photography podcast transcript 2 – Depth of field – Photography.ca

[Camera clicks]

Please note that this is an audio transcription. Grammer and punctuation will not be perfect.

Hi there everyone and welcome to the Photography.ca podcast #2.  My name is Marko and I am you host.  Today is August 24, 2006, and we are coming to you from Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
First off, thanks so much to those few people that left some comments on our bulletin board about the first podcast that we did.  I would encourage more people to leave comments as that is really the best way to make the show as good as possible.  For those people that may have stumbled upon this podcast by accident, really, there is not that much that you need to know.  You just go to the bulletin board on Photography.ca.  It is completely free to join.  You navigate your way to the podcast forum and you can post some feedback, any suggestions, what would you like to learn, what would you like to know, what would you like me to research for you.  It is absolutely free to join the bulletin board and while you are there, you could post one of your own pictures and get some critiques from me and perhaps from other people as well.  You can always give critiques for those photos that are already there.  The forum could use a little bit more actions so it would be really appreciated if people could leave more comments and post more pictures.  In that way, it will become an even better forum.  The forum as a whole is really dedicated to more alternative techniques in photography, not pictures that are so straight up.  There is a lot of fun we can have posting different pictures.  So, again, please post them.  Please leave comments about the podcast.
Today, I would actually like to talk about depth of field and changing it up when we are shooting in different types of situations.  Because Photography.ca is all about experimenting, well, it is nice to experiment.  In normal situations where you would choose a small depth of field or a large depth of field, well, I encourage you to change it up a bit and see the results that you get.  For those who do not really know that much about depth of field, there is a pretty good basic article on Photography.ca.  Just click the articles link and you can find it, but to recap in a nutshell, depth of field simply refers to the degree of sharpness between the foreground and background of your scene and subsequently your photograph.  You can control depth of field by two main ways by either making the aperture larger or smaller or by choosing different lenses.  If we talk about aperture, well, the smaller numbers on the barrel refers to a larger hole or aperture and the larger hole or aperture makes the foreground subject sharp but the background blurry.  If we choose the larger numbers around the barrel, well, that makes the entire scene from foreground to background fairly sharp.  The numbers in between will give you something in between.  In terms of choosing lenses, well, wide angle lenses tend to give you sharper depth of field than longer lenses.  So, wide angle lenses, 24 mm, etc., 20 mm, even 35 mm, that is going to give you a much sharper image from foreground to background than, let us say, a zoom lens of 200 mm.
Traditionally, when we shoot landscapes, we want to make the foreground to background the sharpest possible, so what people do is they will put it on a really small aperture like f/16, f/22, f/32, or even f/45 depending on what camera they are using.  They will often stick it on a tripod and they will get a sharp, sharp foreground to background shot.  Now, that can be extremely interesting and it is beautiful and it is the classic way to shoot landscapes.  What I would suggest doing is doing the exact opposite.  Choose a really large aperture, something where just the foreground is going to be sharp and the background is going to be blurry and experiment with what you are going to get.  Maybe focus on a rock or a tree or some small element in the scene and focus on that element and let the background go soft or blurry.  Shoot it at f/2.8 or f/4, see what happens.  Take a shot at f/5.6 instead of f/32 and see the difference.
On the other side of the coin, if you are shooting a portrait, let us say, well, a lot of people are going to choose a larger depth of field, which means a smaller number on the barrel and that will isolate the subject from the background.  It gives a really beautiful effect, but why not mix it up a bit?  Stick it on the tripod, try to get your person to stand as still as possible and shoot at f/32 or f/22.  Make sure you get some fast film when you are doing this, but see what happens.  Take a picture of their whole face in perfect sharpness, mix it up, change the angles.  That is really what it is all about.  That is the best way to experiment.
Play with your lens choices as well.  If you have more than one lens, try doing different things.  Use a wide angle lens and try and use the largest aperture possible.  See what happens.  See what you get.  Put a zoom lens on and try and use the smallest aperture possible.  See what you get.  Experiment, try both ends.  Record, record, record.  See the results.  Compare one from the other.  Find your own style.  Depth of field, it is one of the key things about photography.  It is one of the main choices to determine how you want your picture to look.  It is really up to you and experimenting is really the best way to make your photography even more interesting.  Of course, that is what we want.  We want interesting photography.  We do not always want the same old shots, the same old person in the middle of the photo.  We want to change it up.  We want to make it exciting.  Along those same lines, choose different angles, choose different heights.  If you are shooting a person, get on the ground and angle your camera up at that person, make them look large like a tree or get up on a table and shoot down at the person and give them a weird angle on their face.  Experiment and see what you get.  We are all about experimentation around here and we could not encourage it more.  If you want to really change it up, use a combination of the techniques we just talked about.  Shoot a portrait or shoot a landscape better.  Yeah, shoot a landscape with a really wide open aperture and get on a crazy angle.  Take a picture of the tree from the ground using zoom lens instead of a wide angle lens.  Do something unconventional.
On the other side of it, instead of taking a picture of a person with a wider open aperture for a more shallow depth of field, stop down a bit, go to f/8, f/11, use some faster film, stick a flash on there, choose a different angle, mix it up.  Choose a lens that you normally would not use, mix it up.
I guess that is really the theme of today’s show, mixing it up by using different depths of field that you normally would not use, but in order to learn it is really important to record and remember what you did.  Take some notes while you are doing it.  If you are lucky enough to have a digital camera, the notes will be there as well.  They will be on the EXIF data.  Just learn, just record and learn.
That basically covers it.  It is a really short episode today.  Next time, we will make one a little longer.  Again, I encourage everyone to leave some comments about this podcast, what did you like, what did you not like.  Please go to the forum and post your comments.  You can always send me an email at photography.ca@gmail.com and I will be sure to reply just as soon as I can.  I absolutely appreciate emails and I absolutely appreciate feedback.  So, thanks again for listening everyone and we should be back in about two weeks with a brand new tip and a little bit more of advice.  Until then, everyone.  Take care and happy shooting.
[Camera clicks]

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Welcome to the first Photography.ca podcast!

I’m Marko the Admin of Photography.ca and in this our first podcast I’ll tell you a little bit about myself as well as provide a photography tip. This week’s tip is about controlling the background. 

Photography podcast transcript #1

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Tags: backgrounds, distractions in photography, photography

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Photography podcast transcript 1 – Photography.ca

[Camera clicks]
 Please note that this is an audio transcription. Grammer and punctuation will not be perfect.  
 Hi there and welcome to the very first Photography.ca podcast coming to you from Montreal, Quebec, Canada.  My name is Marko and I am the admin and owner of Photography.ca.  For this, our very first podcast, it is going to be a little different than future podcasts.  I am just going to tell you a little bit about my experience and I am also going to shoot a little tip your way in order to hopefully make your photography a bit better.
So, first, a little bit about me.  I have a BA in Psychology as so many people do and many photographers yourselves.  I have also studied photography for two and a half years at the Dawson Institute of Photography here in Montreal.  Once I graduated, I started doing a lot of freelance, so I do have really a fair amount of photography experience.  I have shot many, many different types of photography, but my main love is really portraits.  I love a good portrait and I have shot them in many different ways.  I have shot weddings, I have shot pregnancies, I have shot cats and dogs.  As long as it has a face, I am all over it with my camera, that is.  Aside from that, I also have a pretty good feel for alternative photo techniques especially when it involves portraiture from hand coloring, which is also known as hand painting, to infrared to SX-70 manipulation, though I am not even sure if they are making that film anymore, though you can still do so many of these techniques in a digital way, but even if we are going the digital way, most of us, all the basic photography rules still apply.  So, enough about me and on to something a little more interesting.
Today, I just wanted to talk about the background and by background I do not mean the actual background that a photographer rolls on a stand and places a model behind, although that could apply, but in this case I am really talking about what is going on in the background when you take a picture.  I have actually written an article on Photography.ca about what is going on in the background and trying to be aware of what is going on in the background.  If you go to the site, Photography.ca that is, and you click on the articles, tips and links link, you will find that article there called Backgrounds, but for right now and for those who are not really interested in doing any surfing and they are only interested in listening, you really have to pay attention to what is going on in the background.  Most novices just do not look what is going on in the background and even advanced amateurs and sometimes pros, they spend all their time focusing on what is going on in the foreground without ever really looking what is going on in the background and that is really a huge mistake.  Please excuse the little bit of sniffling as it is allergy that I must suffer, but I will try to do my best to control it.  Okay, back to the backgrounds.  You really have to notice what is going because you could be taking a really beautiful picture, a portrait or a landscape or anything, but if you are not aware of what is going on behind it, you can really wreck the photo.  You really want to make sure that the foreground subject is not being marred by what is going on in the background and the only way to do this is to really pay attention.
So, for instance, if you are taking a portrait of someone and in the background, there is like a light fixture.  They are in the house, you are taking a portrait of them and there is a light fixture right behind their head, well, we see the world in 3D, right, but a photo is actually 2D.  So, what happens when it gets compressed, the 2D, when you get it back from the lab or print yourself is that the fixture is going to look like a hat if it is over his head or her head, that is.  What you want to do is you do not want to put a fixture, a light fixture or something hanging from the wall right behind their head.  You want to move them, so that that element is not distracting.  Likewise outdoors, if you are shooting someone, when you see some trash or telephone wires or telephone poles, you do not want to put those elements right behind them if possible.  Now, some people might say right away, “Oh, but what if that’s part of my image?”  Well, if that is part of your image and you thought about it and it is an environmental portrait and you want to shoot a punk rocker, let us say, in a really messed up or dirty looking or grungy environment, then yes, by all means.  Not that it does not matter, but it matters less what is going on because the background will add to the shot, but if we are doing just a regular shot and we do not want the background to distract from what we are shooting, well then we really have to be aware of that.
A good technique on how to be aware of it is to really look through your viewfinder and picture the whole viewfinder as a clock.  Check what is going on at 12:00, 1:00, 2:00, 3:00, etc.  What is going on there?  What elements do you see that are detracting from the main subject and can you reposition that main subject so that it is less intrusive, less distracting?  Usually, the answer is yes and when you do have that ability, I highly encourage you to do so.  Sometimes just moving the subject or making them move two or three inches to the right or left or you, as the photographer, just changing your angle slightly, sometimes that really makes a huge difference in the impact of the shot and these days since so many of us are shooting digital anyway.  Let us say you do happen to capture something in the background, well then using Photoshop or any other imaging software, it might just be a smart thing to remove that element from the background.  Oh, I could see the purists going bananas now saying, “Oh, but it’s not a real photo,” and you know what, that is a whole other conversation for another time and maybe we will do a podcast on that as well.  For now, I guess I just wanted to put into your mind that you really have to be aware of what is going on in the background and remove distracting element.
Another way to really limit the distracting elements that go on in the background is often through use of depth of field.  I do not want this podcast to be about depth of field and there is quite a bit of info on it already on Photography.ca and many other websites, so if you just want to go to the article section or tips and links section on this site, you could probably read up on depth of field and that will really help you.  It is up to the photographer to choose what depth of field they want to use per shot and very simply, depth of field means or refers to how sharp the foreground is relative to the background.  Large depths of field will make the background more blurry and smaller depths of field will make the background more sharp.  For portraits, I usually choose a larger depth of field because that allows me to isolate my subject, my main subject from the background and by having the background slightly blurred, it becomes less distracting.  This is really a good technique to use, so I highly recommend it.  So, again, I really do not want to get into exactly what depth of field is because we could do just a whole podcast on depth of field easily, but just read up on it a little bit and know that it can be controlled and it can be used to solve a lot of these common problems.
You know what, that about does it for our first podcast.  I thank you so much for coming and listening.  I really hope you do give input.  There is going to be a new section in the bulletin board on Photography.ca and if you are a member, you could just join and give comments, which would be so useful.  I will also post some show notes and things of that nature on the bulletin board on Photography.ca.  So, if you are not already a member, please come and join our bulletin board.  You can post some of your photos for critiques and of course you can give critiques on this podcast as well.  So, thanks again for listening everyone and we will be sure and put up a new podcast shortly.  Bye for now and happy shooting.
[Camera clicks]

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