skipping skills

I am not a professional photographer.  This creates quite an obstacle when creating content for our little blog here.  But I have learned to work around all the things I don’t know about photography... which is pretty much everything.  This is what works for me.

Priorities:

1 . Set the stage.  Little Yellow Barn focuses mainly on home improvement and furniture restoration.  A little secret of mine is that my husband, our 3 year old daughter and I live with my parents.  This presents a few road blocks when attempting to offer up design tips to our readers because I lack a canvas (i.e. home of my own) on which to paint and create on or in.  Also a lot of the furniture I restore is not for a specific space.  Therefore capturing an image in which these objects appear to belong is tricky.  SO I SET THE STAGE.  I use a few standard backdrops / panels I picked up at home depot for around $20.  I try and fluff up the piece by adding decor.  I adjust the contrast to transition the photo to seem like it is somewhat in a home and not outside on our patio.  

Set yourself up to take interesting and engaging photos by considering what is in the background and what you are trying to capture.  If the subject lacks worth then the resolution, lighting etc. are moot.  When Ashley and I have a project that we want to share, we try and make the photos interesting as we want to entice our readers to try these projects or at least store the idea for later use.  I think this is the hardest part of photography; figuring out what appeals to the human eye.  Disclaimer... we are working on this priority everyday, hopefully we are getting better.

2. Lighting.  I take 95% of my photos OUTSIDE.  I really do not have the skills nor the expertise to understand indoor lighting.  Thus, this problem is easily solved.  I take the object outside onto my patio early in the morning when there is a soft light.  I never take photos mid day and seldom take them at dusk, unless I am able to avoid any shadows that might be cast.

3. Cropping.  I have found that my photographs are more successful the more simple they are.  I think food is one of the easiest things to capture. I think this is because the eye understands the photo.  A cookie or a slice of cake is simple, one object without distractions, quickly catches the eye.  As the saying goes... less is more. 

4. Working indoors. If I have to take photos inside, I cheat.  I use a set of studio lights that mimic outdoor lighting.  But this option has challenges of it’s own.  I try to angle the lights away from the object as much as possible.  Sometimes if the lights are directed straight at the object, the photo can have uneven exposure, or a glare can appear. 

5. Editing.   Sadly I have to edit 90% of my photos.  I use iPhoto for a quick fix and when I am really wanting a photo to sparkle I use Photoshop.  This tutorial by Brown Paper Packages is one of my favorites for brightening images.  Absolutely wonderful and very well explained resolution for brightening and sharpening images without losing depth.

Like I said I am not a professional photographer.  I work with what I’ve got and right now it’s not a whole lot.  The best advise I can give to anyone wanting to improve their photography skills, is SIMPLIFY.  A lot of photographers create beautiful images by focusing on one object and allowing the background to fade out of focus.  The way I know how to do this is by:

1. Decreasing the depth of field.  The photo below is unedited.  I stood pretty far away from the focus point (i.e cupcake) and then zoomed in.  The green background is actually my lawn. But the depth of field is so small, the cupcake is the only thing in focus.  I use a Tameron AF 18-270mm which provides an extraordinary zoom range.  This lens is the ultimate middle man "covering everything from a 28mm equivalent wideangle to a 270mm equivalent telephoto".  I am able to capture versatile photos without changing lenses.  It's a great well balanced  and convenient option.

   

2. Use photoshop to edit the photo.  I use filters like "guassian blur" and then sharpen the areas I want in focus.  Click here for a YouTube video on this.  

3. Lastly, if you are really wanting to get serious, purchase a decent lens and learn how to shoot in manual mode or shoot pictures in RAW format.  I understand that the exposure of a photo is determined by the ISO, aperture and the shutter speed.  I even know how to switch the dial on my camera to manual mode.  But I always seem to struggle with underexposed photos.  Learning how to manipulate the variables that define effective photography is a goal of mine I have yet to fulfill.  But I am getting there. In the mean time, I choose to skip a few skills.  My method is totally backwards.  It would be nice to shoot a decent image to begin with and then improve on it with Photoshop.  Instead, I shoot bad images and think, "oh I can fix that with Photoshop".  Ironic since I'm all about priorities today.  Maybe I should set better priorities.

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