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FINI@.®Y = Advanced guides for als? Digital Photography Everything you need to take your photographic skille to the next level ie 4 Want to take great photos? Then don't miss our EW Photography magazine on =: Readily now! Vy 7.0) THE ULTIMATE GEAR GUIDE! OA UTCRESSORIS ae Ya hot k | > am Essent protoeany stte PV Issue One Mar! ch 2022/\/100% 4 INDEPENDENT indispensable PRO-LEVEL Tips, & Guides The ‘Secret to Perfect Portraits © Pro-tutorials for shooting better photos right now How to shoot incredible scenes at night Cy Portraits that will Stop Fast Motion in ¥ Shoot Incredible Blow You Away its Tracks: 3 Landscapes Right Now 7 : ae : Fite Create stunning black and Control your camera and Capture amazing tack-sharp white photography freeze the action images with ease TRICKS a & TIPS Advanced guides for Digital Photography Welcome to the next level of understanding and expansion of your user experience! For some it is enough to master the basics of your new device, software or hobby. Yet for many, like you, that’s just the start! Advancing your skill set is the goal of all users of consumer technology and our team of long term industry experts will help you achieve exactly that. Over this extensive series of titles we will be looking in greater depth at how you make the absolute most from the latest consumer electronics, software, hobbies and trends! We will guide you step-by-step through using all the advanced aspects of the technology that you may have been previously apprehensive at attempting. Over the page Let our expert guide help you Our Journey Continue build your understanding and we wif be with i of technology and gain the at every ctage ¢ You skills to take you froma Y 0 advice, (Aform and ultimat ” ly inSp ire you to go ft utther. confident user to an experienced expert. Contents N) Take better photographs 8 Choosetherightcamera 11 Learn from others 8 Choosetherightlens 11 “Further afield 8 Buyatripod 11 Outoftheshadows 8 Earlybird 11 Batteries 9 Visualinterest 12 Asense of perspective 9 Pickaprime 12 Maximum exposure 9 = Theholy trinity 12 ~~ Lockitup 9 Stop the shakes 12 ‘Filtersystems 10 Depthcueing 13.‘ There’s an app for that 10 Enhance your photos 13 Take control 10 Areyoucompensating? 13 Staysharp 10 Don't fear the histogram 13 Persistence pays off We have some great hints and tips that we wantto pass on, so you can evolve as a photographer. 4 www.bdmpublications.com CONTENTS | Creative projects 16 How to photograph women 68 = Thestand-in safari 18 Night photography 74 ~~ Glossary 22 Howtophotographmen 24 = Shallow depth of field portraits “enereare ‘plenty of guides to inspire — nr ee Ss ly and get vee shooting 26 ‘Black and white photography 28 Master metering outdoors 30 = Actionand sports 34 ~~ Natural light portraits 36 = Shallowdepth of field and bokeh 44 Master landscape photography 46 _— Pet photography 50 = Shooting amazing sunsets 52 ~The power of silhouettes 56 ~~ Howtocapture macro images 58 — Highspeed photography 62 Long exposure photography wi confidence and use sit cei www.bdmpublications.com 5 TAKE BETTER PHOTOGRAPHS Ss f ierearea number offfints and tips 6 www.bdmpublications.com TAKE BETTER PHOTOGRAPH Some tips that can help you improve as a photographer your photos look more like simple snaps and not professional level masterpieces? There are a number of hints and tips we can pass on that can help you evolve as a photographer. Many of those tips cover shooting techniques, others may simply be advice about equipment and understanding a little more about your camera. You don’t have to use them all but pick out a few that work for you, develop them and make them a part of your creative photographic process and they will stand you in good stead as you progress your skills. = | ave you arrived at a point where you wonder why www.bdmpublications.com 7 8 Choose the right camera When you're looking to buy anew camera for your photography, make a list of your requirements and set yourself a budget. Don’t forget to allow for accessories such as lenses, a tripod and cleaning kit if you need them. Don't fall in to the trap of thinking that a more expensive camera will make you a better photographer. You're much more likely to improve your technique by overcoming the limitations of cheaper kit than by spending more money than you need to. Choose the right lens If you're buying a compact system camera or DSLR, it will probably come with a standard telephoto lens that is ideal for general photography and snapshots but there is a wide variety of special lenses available for other types of photography. If you like to shoot landscapes, get a good wide-zoom lens but avoid super-wide lenses as these will distort the image. If you want to shoot wildlife, you'll need a high quality fast telephoto but this will be expensive. Buy a tripod Improve your photography by investing in a decent tripod. For the best combination of strength, rigidity and portability, the ideal choice is carbon fibre. They start at around £120 ($175, €165) and can cost ten times more, so if that's too expensive get a good quality aluminium one. Features to look for include a ratcheted centre column, portrait-format tilt and all-metal construction. Avoid ones with plastic heads, as they are seldom rigid enough to prevent camera shake on long exposures. Early bird Shooting a landscape in bright midday sun is fine but if you really want your shots to shine, you'll need to get up early and catch the light available just before the sun rises. The shadows are long, giving definition to objects and the light has that special golden ethereal quality. The same is true at the opposite end of the day, at sunset. The period of time around sunrise and sunset is called the golden hour. Simply switching the time you take photos can have a dramatic improvement on your shots. www.bdmpublications.com CO 728 £4 £/5.6 fe fl M6 Apert: mA f/22 TAKE BETTER PHOTOGRAPHS Visual interest The rule of thirds is a simple guide that can help the composition of your shots and make them much more visually appealing. When framing a shot, you have to imagine that what you can see through the viewfinder of your camera is divided into thirds both vertically and horizontally with lines, just like anoughts and crosses game (or tic-tac-toe if you are in the US). Placing your main subject on an intersection where these lines meet is a simple and quick way to improve composition. Pick a prime Fast glass has very large apertures, letting in more light and offering faster shutter speeds in low-light conditions. A good portrait lens that has a maximum aperture of f/2.8 - f/1.2 is fantastic at creating the background blur so sought after by photographers. The quality of defocused light this blurring produces is referred to as bokeh. The ability to shoot at f/1.2, for instance, means you can shoot more natural light portraits, without the reliance on strobes. ad The holy trinity ISO, aperture and shutter speed are the three pillars of exposure. The main idea is that altering one of these three settings has an impact on exposure and therefore how your image looks. One or both of the other settings will have to be altered to maintain a balanced exposure. As you develop as a photographer, you will realise that once you are in control, you can create images that look more as you want, rather than what the camera thinks is right when in full auto mode. Stop the shakes Camera shake is the unwanted movement of the camera during an exposure. Modern cameras offer image stabilisation and it can work well up to a point but the lower the light, the more the likelihood is that your shots will be blurry as you need longer shutter speeds to gather enough light for a balanced exposure. If you buy one thing to go with your new camera, make it a tripod. Use a robust tripod and your images will be rock steady in all manner of challenging shooting situations. www.bdmpublications.com 9 y A Depth cueing Enhance your photos A photograph only has two dimensions and any indication of depth ina If your camera has the option to let you shoot Raw images, use it. A photograph is purely optical. One of the simplest ways to add depth is Raw image is the key to much greater post-processing possibilities. to use leading lines like the curve of sand on a beach image or railway Raw images, as the name suggests, are just unprocessed raw data lines converging towards the horizon. Another method is atmospheric straight from the camera sensor with all the information you need to perspective where mist and fog shroud distant objects making them bring out a beautiful photograph. The act of cropping the shot into lighter and with less tonal contrast compared to darker foreground amore pleasing aspect ratio can save an image, as can turning it to objects. This creates more depth in the image as darker foreground black and white. The choices are endless, even if it’s just contrast, fades to lighter background. saturation, brightness and sharpness. Are you compensating? As good as cameras are, they will often overexpose 5 and underexpose your photos in challenging lighting Darker Brighter situations. That’s where exposure compensation comes ; : in. It's acommon setting found on digital cameras and “), et hOP ol oe, : RE it lets you override the camera by making the image lighter or darker based on how much positive or negative exposure compensation you dial in. A lot of cameras will let you preview the result on your LCD screen and once you are happy with how it looks, you can take the shot. Don’t fear the histogram Available on many modern cameras, a histogram is a graphic representation of the tonal values in your shot and how they are distributed. If the graph is bunched at the far left, then your shot is very underexposed and you risk the loss of a lot of detail to shadow areas. If it is sliding off the right hand side, then it will be overexposed and detail will be lost in the highlight areas. A good exposure will have all the major tones in the middle of the histogram. 10 www.bdmpublications.com