Tips of the Month
5
Questions To Ask Yourself Before Tripping The Shutter
Based on an
article by the same name posted on Digital Photography
School web page by Jim Goldstein.
The following
are 5 key tips to taking good pictures. If you mentally
go through this list every time before you click you
will be surprised at the difference it can make in your
photography.
1. Is my Shutter Speed
correct to capture my subject properly?
Do
you want to show motion blur (Slow Shutter) or stop
action (Fast Shutter)? If you are shooting handheld you
also need to adjust your shutter for the focal length of
the lens to avoid blurred images from camera shake. When
not using a tripod the shutter speed should be equal to
or more than the focal length you are using. Remember
Exposure is controlled by Shutter, Aperture and ISO.
You can adjust either aperture, ISO or both to change
the shutter speed needed for a proper exposure.
Higher ISO settings allow for faster
shutter speeds. Consequently lower ISO settings will
require longer shutter speeds. The trade of here is the
higher the ISO the more noise. Opening up the aperture
will give you a shorter exposure while smaller apertures
require longer shutter speeds. Remember that the
Aperture also affects Depth of Field (DOF).
2.
Is
my selected Focal Length or my Positioning
optimal to capture my subject?
How
much of your subject do you want to fill the frame? A
wider focal length will magnify the subject less while
longer focal lengths will magnify it greatly. Changing
your position by stepping closer or father away from the
subject will also change the perspective. Don’t be
afraid to use your feet as well as the zoom on your lens
when setting up the shot. You will be surprised at what
a difference this will make. I did not use a zoom lens
for this picture of a skee-ball arcade game. I actually
crawled right up the ramp to get the shot / perspective
that I wanted. Note: this is an old arcade game that is
no longer in public use that I had access to.
3. Have I chosen the proper
Depth of Field to best highlight my subject?
Deciding
what will be in focus and what will not depends on your
subject and how you want to capture it. Remember
aperture and distance to subject control the Depth of
Field (DOF). The larger the aperture and the closer you
are to the subject the less DOF you have. By
controlling your DOF to blur the background, keeps the
viewers attention on the subject. Consequently by using
a small aperture and increasing distance provides a
larger DOF typically used for landscape.
4.
Is
my subject in Focus?
While
this may seem obvious, it really isn’t. Most cameras
have multiple focusing points. Make sure that the key
elements of your subject are in focus. For portraits it
is usually the eyes that are the most important. For
landscape, photographers use what is called the
hyperfocal distance to get the most DOF possible. The
exact distance is dependent on the lens you are using
but you can usually get close by focusing a third of way
into the scene. In macro photography the DOF is so
small that focus is very critical. DOF can be less than
an eighth of an inch.
5.
5.
Have I checked the Edges of
my frame to minimize distracting elements?
It is amazing how the brain filters out what we are not
interested in. When looking through the view finder
it’s hard to see past what we are focusing on. How many
of us have taken what we thought was the perfect picture
only to find it ruined by a major distraction later.
After focusing on your subject, check the background and
edges of the frame for distracting or unflattering
elements. If necessary see if you can eliminate or
minimize these by changing your angle of view.
