Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time
Histograms are handy things. They either confirm that you’ve nailed your exposure or let you instantly see if you need to adjust. But, they can be difficult for newer photographers to understand.
In this Two Minute Tips video, photographer David Bergman shows you everything you need to know about reading your histogram.
Do people who take photos today still use the Sunny 16 Rule? Do they even know about the Sunny 16 Rule? I think it might be regarded as a little old-fashioned now. After all, it is firmly rooted in the days of film. If it isn’t being taught (and I’ve taken a quick flick through a selection of recently published photography basics books and can’t find a reference to it) that’s a shame, because I think it’s rather useful.
It’s that word again. Exposure. It doesn’t keep a roof over your head, it doesn’t pay the bills or put food on your table. But can you capitalise on it and turn exposure into income or provide any other real benefit?
New York based fashion and portrait photographer Jeff Rojas believes so, and in this video, he’s going to offer some insight and advice on his thought process when he’s asked to work for free “exposure” – which he says happens weekly.
Yup, you heard right, true TTL on a (1959) Canon P Rangefinder. TTL stands for Through The Lens, which would be kinda impossible for that manual-focus, manual-exposure camera. Yet, Kevin Kadooka (who also made the beautiful LUX TLR) managed to build one using some 3D printed parts and a Trinket Pro 3V microcontroller.
Are you just starting out with photography? Have you ever wondered why that expensive, brand new, professional grade DSLR in your hands is betraying you and not giving you perfectly exposed photos – every time?
Read this article and you can learn the secret to correct exposure with any DSLR camera – revealed for the very first time – right here on the internet.
(Warning – the truth about getting correct exposures from your DSLR camera may shock some readers – discretion is advised.)
One of the first things we learn as photographers are F stops and how we can use them to properly expose a photograph, but there is also such a thing as T stops and we don’t always give them the attention they deserve. Of course, a T-stop may not be essential knowledge on every photo you take, but understanding what a T stop is will give you a better understanding of light, which is never a bad thing for a photographer to have. (It’s also helpful information to have in your bag if you’re going to be lens shopping soon!). And Matt Granger does an amazing job of explaining the difference.
One of the most commonly asked questions by new photographers is what exposure settings they should be using to get correct exposures. Unfortunately, this is also one of the most difficult questions to answer because of the seemingly endless amount of variables involved in calculating such settings. There are always situational elements such as available light, motion, and other things that we can use to help us determine correct camera settings, but outside of those tangible variables, a photographer must also take creativity into consideration. How do you want the photo look?
In this quick primer on exposure settings, Bryan Peterson discusses the notion that just because a photograph is exposed correctly on a technical level doesn’t necessarily mean the exposure settings were the right ones.[Read More…]
Looking on the back of the camera to see if you got a shot properly exposed can be misleading. The LCD may not be calibrated showing a too dark or a too light image. Or the sun hitting the LCD can be laying tricks on you.
Yet there is a tool, that is often ignored that can give you a very quick and good indication if you exposed correctly – The Histogram.
In a nut shell, the histogram is a graph that show how many pixels of each brightness level are present in a frame. John Greengo of CreativeLive give a full back to basics course on photography, in this installation he discusses the Histogram in very easy to understand manner.
Generally, John mentions that you would want a histogram that looks like a mountain with a strong peak in the middle and a slope that goes out to either end. While specific captures may be unique, (such a capturing snow, or night shots), a strong peak on the right may indicate an over exposed image, while a strong peak on the left may indicate an under exposed image.
With the sensitivity of the Sony a7S reaching up to an ISO of 409600, the camera itself has had some pretty high expectations to live up to. Just recently, Photographer Yosh Enatsu took the a7S out for a test run and uploaded some results showing what the camera truly can be capable of. Considering the a7S doesn’t have its own internal 4K codec, the shots were done through a setup utilizing an external Blackmagic converter. Filmed in the middle of the night, the final two videos we see paint an impressive image of what the a7S can do.
A participant in one of my workshops asked me about taking a photo of their iPhone while using an off-camera flash. The main problem he had was that he couldn’t see the iPhone’s screen when using a flash.
So for this week’s article I am going to talk about dragging the shutter – or in layman’s term – how-to or why-to lower your shutter speed while using a flash. I will show different scenarios so you can better understand much how (and why/when) to do this.[Read More…]
You can find out more about John on his website and follow his adventures on YouTube and Facebook.
can change a lens mid-rappel, swap a memory card while treading water, or use a camel as a light stand.
To see more of his work please visit his studio website blurMEDIAphotography, or follow him on Twitter, 500px, Google Plus or YouTube.
JP’s photography is available for licensing at Stocksy United.
Find my work on My website or follow me on Facebook or My page
