Set up before you set off

The one thing I hate about the way I handle my camera is I turn it off when I’m done taking a photo. A few minutes later, something springs up on me and I want to take a photo quickly. Alas, my reaction time is delayed, the chance is swept away and I am left kicking myself. Why do I turn it off? Mainly to protect my lens and preserve battery life. Does it ever happen to you? These days though  I tend to leave it on, continuously evaluating my surroundings till I think everything is set for me to turn it off and then I do. Invariably though, I still end up with a few missed shots but… win some, win some is my motto.

Battery power and enough space on my memory card are 2 things I check before I leave home. The memory card one is fairly easy but it’s the battery that does my head in. It is an anti-climax most times to lose the ability to take photos mid-way through an outing. Especially if your battery is not of the regular ilk and therefore will not be found in a corner shop. Then you have to wait to get home and that wasn’t entirely the plan now was it?. So I ensure I have charge in the camera before I head out.

Then I set up my camera before I go out. So if I know I’m going to the market on a bright and sunny day, I’ll put the settings to ‘daylight’ before I actually get out there. If my planned photo-taking spree is indoors, I’ll set it to one or the other ‘Indoor’ settings. All this so I don’t have to fiddle when I get out as I find that some photos have to be taken quickly and often you don’t have a chance to do many repeats (either no opportunity or the grumpy group you’re with!)

If possible, set picture size
Storage space – on your memory card and computer hard drive begins to gain importance the more photos you take. One way I try to forestall this is my setting the picture size before I start shooting. My camera has various picture sizes from small to raw. I hadn’t considered the effects still my hard drive started giving me warning errors of overload et al. Then it came to the fore. Sometimes I can control the image size and other times I can’t. For instance, when my camera is in Wide-angle mode, I can’t dictate the size of the image. If its in the regular shooting mode then I have options of sizes from small (640X480 px, 300kb) through to three medium settings (ranging in size from 2 – 9 MB) and a large (@15MB and 4416 X 3312px).  Most times I have no plans to make posters of my photos. I tend to blog them, frame them or blurb them, for which a small or medium format is adequate. Yet I have taken more photos in large format than not, and ended up with little space on my hard drive and many warnings. So if you can, adjust the size of your photos accordingly.

Decide picture format
I have to make a conscious decision these days to shoot in portrait or landscape when taking photos. I try to think of how I want to share the images. Will they stand alone or will they be combined into sets? Would a wide-angle view capture more? Sometimes, I duplicate the scene in both landscape and portrait. Each one has its benefits. For me, the Portrait mode focuses on a object- immediately drawing your eye to the centre of attraction as the width of the scene is limited whereas in Landscape there is a large breadth of space/scene that is captured, that may combine various elements to tell a story. Look at the ‘colour accented’ photos below and make your call on which you prefer.

Out and about: Compose the scene

What is it that has captured my eye? Sometimes it is the pattern of bubbles when washing a bottle, Other times its an ugly bull or a pretty flower. It could be anything, but what intrigues you most about that scene is what should determine how you capture it. One scene may call for Macro; another is best displayed by accenting one colour or may be stunning in wide-angle. Generally when something strikes me, I make a quick mental calculation, turn the dials, shoot and then look at the result. This then steers me in the right direction. A lot of times it is trial and error. And many times I end up with bad photos, which I desperately wanted to be good and other times, I end up with spur-of the moment photos that end up fabulous. That’s the life. Though in all honesty, I can now reduce the incidence of bad photos, not to the bare minimum but to an acceptable level.

Sometimes, I’ll compose a scene and decide to highlight an element to create a different focus.

At other times, I’ll take two photos of the same scene, swapping the focus so that what i blur in one, I focus on in the other. Makes me happy to see the twist.

 

Shoot, but in which mode?

You have many options when it comes to being a creative photo maker. Some require getting down on your knees and others, keeping a safe distance. These are my tips for putting a twist on your capturing skills.

Macro: Up close and Personal
I couldn’t live without ‘Macro’. It just helps tell a story. For a while when I wanted to take close-up photos, I zoomed in because I didn’t know about the Macro setting. My life has changed since then. Forever and for the better.

Most cameras have some Macro mode or the other. You can enable it by looking for and pressing the little ‘flower’. Like I said, Macro lets you do close-ups. In many cases you can get as close as 1cm away from the object in q.

It is the setting you want to use when you want to capture the details of an object/scene. When you have it set, you do not need to zoom in. If you zoom in, you end up with a blurred image.

What you do is put the camera in Macro mode and then get as close as you can to the object. When you’re set, hold down the shutter to get the image sharp and ‘snap’.   Macro works well in well-lit situations. I tend to open up my aperture as far as it will go to let in as much light as possible. If that’s too bright, I start closing it a bit till I get the best results. Try it for yourself and see what works.

With Macro, I don’t use my flash; I don’t need it in this case. I also tend to take photos from a few more angles (if time permits) – up, down and from the sides, checking each one after a snap’s been made. Just to be sure I don’t take crap photos home (if I’m out, especially if I’m far away from home). When I get home and to the computer, I can worry about which one will stay and which ones to trash – but then I’ll have a few options from which to make that choice.

Down on bended knee: because I want to
A lot of times, I go down on my knees. I’ve also been know to lie down. It helps sometimes. Keeping eye level with my daughter is not the same as staring a toadstool in the face. Of course, the camera is in Macro mode too!

The height of the object determines how low or high I go. Staying down and looking up gives great perspectives. I find it particularly interesting when I want to capture a scene against the skies

So I try to think a little of what I want to see when I’m down… on bended knee, especially since I won’t be there forever.  

Perspective: Take a sideways glance
Often times, I’ll try to take a photo from the side. Profiles of faces, of people of objects can be great. Sometimes they only hint at, and other times they ‘focus’. When I first started taking photos, I used to be obsessed about capturing the whole object or including ‘complete objects’ in the frame. Now I think that cropping a side, or a base or even a head is not an issue – it all depends on what I want.

I don’t think too much of taking a photo of half a bottle or just the top of a tomato. The story is the key thing here. Simple as that. For me sideways could be from the front, back or left or right.

Create your own wide angle: Stand up tall & proud!
Looking down on things in this case is arguably a positive thing. Not with nose up turned but a chance of another photo perspective! Sometimes I see ‘seas’ of things – a pack of sweets, rows of fruit and vegetables, sand on the beach, crawling ants, Bloemen and many more to say the least. One way I capture these is to hold my lens up and above/over the ‘sea’  – not facing it.  You end up with literally a sea. If there are boards or other large images with cut through the sea, they end up having a different perspective too!

Post: At home, by the computer

And last but not the least is seeing all the beautiful piccies on the big screen. Then you can really get excited about the ones that look good and chuck out the ones you don’t like.

So when I get back with my camera, I’ll download them, rotate those that need rotating and then start screening – with emphasis on what I’m going to do with them. I typically do it by ‘scene. Most times, I have multiple images of one scène. I scroll through those – have a look at all of them and then delete what I don’t want to keep.

I do my best to group my photos logically and if possible by date. I’ll be the first to admit that I haven’t always done this but its something I’m working on now. Being far more organized pays off, especially further down the line – say when you want to keep your photos online to some photo store like Flickr or Picasa. All you have to do then is basically create sets or categories, tag them and voila, you’re done.

Uploading them online is where the photo sizes coming in handy – the smaller the file sizes are, the quicker you can upload them.  These days, I don’t keep multiple copies – on Flickr and on my computer. Once I have them online, I delete the copies on my computer. I’ve even started loading the photos direct from my camera memory card direct on to Flickr. Then in Flickr, I name and tag them.

If you intend to leave them on your hard drive, or have them with you in case something goes wrong, then make a back-up: it could be onto a CD, on your iPod, on a flashdrive. Just so you have some… back-up.

The rationale for having your photos online is that if you have  blog on one platform and you decide to move to another platform, you don’t have to re-link your photos because they are ‘externally’ located. And I did have that experience when I moved blogs recently. The good thing was I only had a few posts, the bad thing was I had to reload the photos, but hey that was still fine. Imagine if I had hundreds. Thanks PW.

So that’s its.

My tips all done. I hope you find them useful. As soon as I discover something new, I’ll update this article. Thanks.  What do you do to your photos? Please share your thoughts and comments.

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