This one's a quick tip that many of you may know, Still I thought it is worth mentioning for the sake of fun and anyone who does not know it yet.
You know they say that you must have the eyes focused on a portrait shot? You know how they also say all rules were meant to be broken? I'm about to combine the two. Click to continue ›
Caleb Charland is a photographer that captures the everyday physical phenomena which we never think about in a unique and inspiring way.
DIYP was lucky enough to have Caleb for an interview.
DIYP: Can you tell us about yourself and your background?
CC: When I talk about my work I need to share the experiences that made me wonder. Those moments when I began to think about the world, to show from where the pieces fell.
I grew up in a do it yourself household and learned to appreciate the power that tools and materials hold. Click to continue ›
Some time ago we introduced R/C Helicopter Arial Photography, however Helicopters are not the only thing that flies, in fact R/C planes are cheaper to get in the air.
Although they provide less control they are still a good option to get your camera up high and they are lots of fun to take pictures with.
In this tutorial -manuel- will explain how to apply a similar concept for still and RC planes which are much cheaper. Click to continue ›
Not a long while ago the net was exploding with Corrie White's Fun with Water set on Flickr. Her control over those drops, their color and their timing was remarkable indeed.
This is why I am very exited to share Corrie's very extensive guide for water drops photography.
The guide is for all levels going explaining the setup, lights, optional use of a drip mechanism and post. Click to continue ›
I started toying around with insect macro photography about 18 months ago. And to be honest, those first few months produced some amazingly bad photographs. But as scientists say, there is no such thing as a failed experiment - as long as it yields data. Well, I've managed to amass quite a lot of "data". And I am grateful that I am able to share some of that knowledge with the DIY community.
As bad as they were, those first few macro shots opened my eyes to the amazing detail and intricacies that lay just beyond the capabilities of our vision. Watching the insects move through the viewfinder was - and still is - a fascinating experience. So, from my earliest attempts, I decided I was going to only shoot live insects. Click to continue ›
London based photographer Edward Horsford photographs balloons in a very unique way. He freezes them as the leave his hands to explode.
The pictures are taken with a "high tech" DIYed sound trigger, Strobes, and one rusty stick.
The following post which bounces from interview to tech details outlines the way to take such photographs. Click to continue ›
They say that necessity is the mother of all invention. How will you go on lighting a shot when you have no strobes, no lightstands and no modifiers?
With fluorescents of course. waintaminute! Fluorescents? Aren't those the things that make green harsh hideous light? Well depends. Netherlands photographer Ragoem Vakfotografie shows just what can be done with just a couple of those lengthy lights.
First thing first, you need to understand light a bit to work with light sabers like this. Light is harsh when it is far (and looks small) and softer when it is close (and looks big). So fluorescents had t be placed close to the model. Placed? Try hand held. Click to continue ›
I know it sounds like an oxymoron, however, this is one of the best examples of hack'n mod beating the cr*p out of store bought solutions.
Canberra Australia based photographer Jamie Carl, rigged together a great system that will wireless your USB setup (can you use wireless as a verb? not sure). This is so trivial that it just shouts, Why didn't I do this before.
Jamie says this setup helped hum nail a difficult car-rigged setup where he did not know how fast the car will be going, and as a result did not know what shutter speed to use for good motion blur on the road, but no camera blur on the car. Using a wireless USB Carl was able to sit shotgun and adjust the settings on the go. Click to continue ›
A while back I was contracted by Francois Auradon, he asked me if there is a frugal photographers SW list somewhere on the site.
That was a good point as software can sometimes be a big expense. Gladly Francois picked the glove up and started the ball rolling list going. This list is only the beginning, with your help it can expand to include more stuff to make photographers lives easier. if you know iof a good piece of photography software, hit us in the comments.
So here goes 32 pieces of software for the frugal photographer:
So we had a Portrait Lighting Cheat Sheet that was designed to help placing the light in space around the model. While I called it portrait lighting cheat sheet card, I was only telling half of the truth.
The half that I did not include in that card was how different modifiers will change the light falling on your subject.
It is time to correct this wrong, so this lighting modifiers cheat sheet completes this gap.
There are some new things on this sheet, like a perfectly still model, dark walls to control reflections and a few beers that you can not spot in the actual card. But they were there. Trust me.
You can download a "super size" here.
Again, we tried to keep it simple. We usually ask a wife or a boss to model for those kinda things, but since the differences between the modifiers can be subtle we wanted to keep everything constant but the light. So... We asked Lady Plastic to come to our aid on this one. She kindly agreed or at least did not mind. Click to continue ›
