Photography for dummies - a (crash)course

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   So, it happened eventually - I visited London (a short business trip - more travelling than working ). But at the same time it was a great opportunity to meet Bob J and take a walk around the city with our cameras. Later on, at the hotel I hit the usual problem of the "time lag" - at home I usually wake up at 6 in the morning, which in the UK turns into a nice 5 o'clock ... Not being able to sleep I had to do something with the spare time and hence the idea of sharing my deep (!), almost professional (yay!), knowledge of photography . This is how this curse course was born. So, let's start ...

Crucial Elements

Yes, to take a good photo you need a subject. A subject can be anything, e.g. a model (c'mon, this is what real photogs are after - show deep emotional aspects of the human soul, etc.; photographing buildings, or bridges, or any other 'scapes is for sissies, phew!).

So, you need a model. THE model, I should have said. 'Cause it should not be just a mere, ordinary person. You need somebody with expressive nature, characteristic face, and rendering around that special (forgive me my poor english) charm.

Once you have the model you need some scenery. Scenery should correspond to the model's nature, character, and general look and feel. You wouldn't put a yuppie in a suit in the middle of the jungle, would you? So keep in mind - the scenery is a crucial as the model is. But we do not want any set up scenery. We want to capture our photos in natural environment - at wild. No cheating, no artificial surroundings.

Other important elements

When shooting "at wild" the first thing you have to do is to position your model and give him some time to get the proper/expected pose. Than look around - there is a high chance that you'll find natuaral composition enhancers, which greatly help creating proper composition by counter-balancing the strong presence of the model. Piece of cake you may think, but wait a minute - the situation is not that simple: there may be some things that work against you. Exposure spoilers, some pieces of equipment laying around and getting into the frame, and last but not least - lack of stabilisation.

Exposure spoilers are the worst enemy: at first you may think that turning them off would help a lot, but unfortunately once you turn them off things get worse than before: mainly the exposition mysteriously gets worse and the rate of blurred photos increases. Besides for some unknown reason turning off exposure spoilers makes all people around very unhappy ... So, you have to live with them ...

Equipment lying around - that's really not a problem. Just take it and put it in your bag ...

Stabilisation - yepp, that's the most important thing if you are shooting "at wild" in a dark and murky surroundings. [IMPORTANT]Long scientific research revealed that it is quite hard to control the stabilizing power (measured in pints) and a lot of practice is needed to use it properly.[/IMPORTANT] So, let's start with a fair dose of stabiliser (there are many manufacturers out there, so use the one you are used to or the one you like the most) and shoot.

To illustrate all elements discussed so far here we have the photo showing them all:

Longer photographic sessions

The longer you shoot in one place the more problems you may have. One of them is that photographing activity attracts composition spoilers (also known as "gremlins"), which try to get into the frame at all costs. It's nearly impossible to avoid their presence at some point so it is advisable to change the location once you notice them in the frame (thanks to digital technology you can detect them as soon as you review the photo on the rear LCD; it was more of the problem when shooting on a film).

It's worth noting that during longer sessions you may run out of stabiliser and you may need to recharge it. Remember: shooting without the stabiliser may have disastrous effect on your photos. For example look how blurred and smeared the following photo is:

Exercise

Now, when you know learned all elements it is hight time to do an exercise: on the following photo find and name all elements discussed so far (show the model, stabiliser, equipment, gremlins, exposure spilers):

Do not worry if you find some unexpected elements on this shot (like e.g. table ghosting) - we will discuss them in the second part of the course ...

LAST MINUTE EDIT:
I've forgotten about very helpful hint:
If you think that there is something wrong with your photos - convert them to B&W 

Edited by MiPr - 03 February 2011 at 14:44