Setting Up Your Digital Camera For HDR Shooting. :) Crafty Mama: DIY Lightscoop Tutorial. In a quest to better my photography skills, I came across a knifty little item on Elizabeth Halford's blog.
It’s called a Light Scoop. After reading her posts about it, and seeing the before and after pictures, I knew I had to have one. I experimented with holding something reflective in front of my flash (a piece of cardboard covered in foil) but I couldn’t get it to stay in one spot while focusing on what I was photographing. So I google searched how to make a Light Scoop, and what do ya know, I found a tutorial! This is a great step by step tutorial on how to make a light scoop. In my poorly lit kitchen, ISO jacked way up, no flash. With flash. With the lightscoop. Can you believe the difference? With the little bit that I’ve experimented with photography, my number one problem is lighting.
Here's some more comparison pictures! My crazy messy crafting desk, taken at nighttime in low light. Also taken in low light at nighttime. Mandatory Christmas Tree Bokeh. I think it has become standard to take a Christmas tree bokeh filled photo or two every Christmas...who am I to buck the trend?
You don't know how to make a bokeh filled photo?? Look on your lens...see the M/A and M markings on the left side. It should be on M/A...switch it to M. Now point your camera towards your tree or light source of choice and rotate the lens until it is nice and blurry! ...except maybe don't let the camera shake as much as I did - your circles will turn out a bit more perfectly rounded. I'm pretty proud of our other Christmas activity...we successfully stamped some wrapping paper without permanently damaging anything - YAY! Photo Tips and Techniques for Beginners. I remember the day I got my DSLR camera in the mail-- I had saved up for months to buy my little Nikon D40 and I watched the postal tracking code like my dog waits for her food in the mornings.
(So. Excited.) :) When my brown Amazon box finally came, my heart was beating so fast that I could barely cut open the tape. I took out the Nikon and held it in my hands-- that weight and feel is so familiar to me today. I started taking pictures right away, the same photos that everyone takes with a new camera: everything that is in direct sight. My hands, the countertop, the microwave, my feet, the cat, a pile of newspapers. Back then, I didn't have a clue as to what in the heck I was doing. This photo: ISO: 400, f/2.8, Shutter: 1/30, taken in Wyoming at the Grand Tetons National Park, summer 2011. I think that composition is the first, easiest, most fun, and most important lesson to learn in photography. Square Composition: I am also a huge fan of the square photograph. More square love: