Three Ways to Improve Your Photos
Better communication is not just about language.
Visitors to this website recognize that photographs play an integral part in human communication today.
I got formal training in photography and worked as a photographer for a few years, so I recognize common mistakes that many amateur photographers make.
And this made me wonder: What are three recommendations that I would make to anyone who wants to improve his or her photographic skills?
The answer? 1. Watch your angles! 2. Watch your lighting! 3. Watch your distance!
1. Watch your angles!
Your photographic skills with a digital camera today can improve much faster than they could with film cameras. You get immediate feedback and then re-take the photo in a different way within seconds. And one way in which this helps is with angles. By watching your angles, you can dramatically improve your photos.
My first recommendation about angles is to watch for vertical objects behind the people in your photos. I cannot explain it, but somehow, perhaps unconsciously, we are driven to place people in front of trees, posts, and poles. So avoiding this requires conscious effort. But the result is that your subject will not look as if he or she were on a stick or as if something were sprouting from your subject’s hair or hat.
My second recommendation about angles is to look for the best profiles of the people in your photos. Each of us has his or her “best side”; we are not all attractive from all angles. Ask your subjects what their best sides are, and then photograph them from those angles. They will thank you — or at least not complain to you — later, and you will like those photos more.
My third recommendation about angles is to “mix it up” a bit. Everything shot from a standing position makes for a dull series of photos. Try putting your camera on the ground or floor and shooting upward at the scene. Try holding your camera above your head and shooting downward on a scene. Down-low and up-high photos can be some of the most interesting. Finally, if your photos are destined for viewing on computers or television screens, avoid taking portrait-orientation shots.
2. Watch your lighting!
Photography literally means writing with light, so photography is meaningless without light. And there are some basic tips about lighting that will make a big difference in your photos.
I recommend that you watch out for a mixture of shadows and light on faces. Much of amateur photography comprises taking photos of people, so getting the lighting right on faces is crucial. I recommend that you place people in a scene before you put your camera to your face. This makes it easier to spot the shadows that can streak across a person’s face and make him or her look like the phantom of the opera. And, although many amateur photographers believe that their outdoor subjects should be in full sun, it is actually preferable to have full shade on their faces as long as the background is not sunny. The full shade eliminates harsh lighting and lets people avoid squinting at the camera.
I recommend that you augment lighting where possible. Professional photographers often use three-point lighting, and you can learn about this free at video-clips websites such as YouTube. Just search for “three-point lighting” (without the quotation marks). A simpler technique for outdoor photography is to use the “fill flash” setting on your camera. This lets you put your subjects’ faces in the shade, so that they are not squinting, while having a sunny background. The fill flash can provide just enough light on your subjects’ faces to prevent a “raisins in the sun” look. Speaking of which, be especially mindful about lighting in scenes with people of various complexions.
And I recommend that you be mindful about your shutter speeds. Many amateur photos are ruined by a shutter speed that is too slow for the subject matter. Most digital cameras today will display the expected shutter speed before you snap the photo. Keep an eye on the speed. If it is slower than 1/60 of a second for a typical digital camera, then you probably cannot hold the camera steady enough to get a good shot. The rule of thumb is the slowest hand-holdable shutter speed is 1 over the focal length in millimeters of the lens. Many digital cameras have a focal length no greater than 50 mm, so the slowest shutter speed that you should attempt when holding such a camera is 1/50 of a second. Fancier digital cameras with 200 mm lenses, for example, should not be hand-held at any speed slower than 1/200 of a second. You have a few options to get around this. One is to mount the camera on a tripod. Another is to sacrifice depth of field to get a faster shutter speed. And a third option is to accept more graininess or noise in the photo to get a faster shutter speed.
3. Watch your distance!
Watching your distance requires appreciation that viewing a photograph is not like viewing a scene.
My most important recommendation about watching your distance is to take close-ups whenever possible. When we concentrate on a live scene, our brains filter out the uninteresting parts and let us effectively “zoom in” to what is interesting. In contrast, a photograph presents everything of interest, save for out-of-focus portions, simultaneously to the viewer. This means that it pays to crop the scene in the camera prior to taking the photo so that the person or thing of interest will fill the photo. If you have taken head-to-toe or head-to-waist photos for years, then it will initially feel uncomfortable to take photos only of people’s heads. But try this a few times, and you will see that your favorite photos often will be the ones that you consciously cropped in the camera. And the best way to photograph someone’s head so that it does not look like a pumpkin is to set your camera to its maximum optical zoom (Avoid digital zoom like the plague!) and then adjust your camera’s position relative to the person so that the head fills the photo.
My second recommendation related to watching your distance is to notice the depth of field in each photo that you are about to take, especially when you have near and far subjects that you want in focus simultaneously. I have seen several amateur photos in which all of the subjects are not in focus, even though the photographer wanted everybody to be in focus. Usually this is due to a fast shutter speed leading to a fairly wide aperture leading to a shallow depth of field. If a fast shutter speed is essential, then you must accept more graininess in the photo to get sufficient depth of field to have near and far subjects in focus. The beauty of digital cameras is that you can quickly adjust shutter speed, aperture, and sensitivity and get immediate feedback.
My third recommendation related to watching your distance is to pay attention to focus. Many cameras today have auto-focus systems. While usually these systems are smart enough to focus on what is significant to you, many times these systems “guess wrong”, and you end up with photos that are focused on the wrong people or things. If you have a digital camera and want to be absolutely sure that the subject about which you care is in focus, then I recommend that you put the camera in “playback” mode and zoom into the photo to confirm this.
