Critical focus - tips for good photography

On a DSLR when you look through the viewfinder you are actually looking through the main lens. This means you can focus using the resolution of the human eye. I always use the viewfinder and almost never the live view on the LCD screen. In a point and shoot camera you only have the live view on the LCD screen and this is not totally reliable if you are manually focusing. This is partly because the resolution of the LCD screen is not really good enough to ensure sharp focus and getting that focus quickly. Of course, most of the time point and shoot cameras are focusing automatically so even if the screen does not seem sharp the picture probably is.

I also use my DSLR camera in auto-focus mode because, especially when photographing a wedding, it is easier to trust the camera as there is often quite a bit of people movement and I am more interested in controlling the depth of field and the background blur, isolating the main subject. When doing portraits I sometimes use manual focus because it is critical to get those eyes sharp, particularly difficult in low light conditions when auto-focus can struggle to lock on.

So give me a real optical view finder over an LCD screen to ensure critical focus especially when you are in manual focus.

New 24-70mm zoom lens arrived yesterday! - tips for great photography

The glass at the front of your camera is such an important part of taking a high quality picture. It is not of course as important as the lens in your own eye and your ability to 'see the picture' even before you raise the camera to capture the moment.

There are however reasons for all that heavy large glass in front of a professional photographers camera. First a big lens captures more light so is useful when there is not much light around and the need to turn on the flash is reduced. Secondly this lens allows me to have a big aperture, the transparent hole down the centre of the lens that actually lets the light in, which means I can control the depth of field, that part of the picture in sharp focus, useful if you want to isolate the subject from the background as you may do in portraits and wedding photography. This lens does this at wide focal lengths but also when I zoom in. Usually the diameter of the aperture increase and less light gets through so limiting your focus control.

This latest lens is also made to a very high specification including a fantastic build quality and weather proofing, I can now take pictures of weddings in the rain! The lens glass also have a number of special coatings to reduce flare, lines of bright circles created when light sources get into the composition.

Hopefully today I will get to play with this lens and then I can use it at a wedding I am photographing on Friday in Liverpool.

My camera is a DSLR so I can change lenses to meet whatever creative need I have for angle of view and depth of field. Point and shoot cameras usually have one fixed lens with sometimes, a limited amount of zoom.

If you can get a camera with interchangeable lenses I would advise it, but please remember the most important lens is the one in your eye and your creativity, a good photographer can get amazing pictures from even a pin-hole camera, and that has no lens!

Get to know the people you photograph - tips for great photography

Off to photograph a wedding here in Chester. Have really enjoyed the engagement portrait sessions I have done recently. It is a very good opportunity to get to know the couple, they then relax more, at least with me as their photographer, on the wedding day and pictures are always better!

Weather is a little blowy and cool here in Chester, but we should be able to get outside for some shots in the grounds.

Have  a good week!

Do I buy a D800? - tips for great photography

A digital SLR has become for most professional photographers the standard format. Based on the old 35mm cameras they have the advantage that what you see through the viewfinder is what you get in the image. Many compact cameras do not offer a viewfinder anymore, relying on the LCD screen to show you what the sensore will record. I still prefer to look through the viewfinder because it eliminates distraction and makes me focus on composition. Holding the camera closer to the body also reduces camera shake.

My most 'frequently looked at' flickr picture

By the way the letters SLR stand for Single Lens Reflex. That is to say you are looking through the lens which is taking the picture and a mirror that sends the image to the viewfinder lifts up when the shutter is pressed exposing the film or rather, the sensor. Extremely clever, but the amount of glass needed and the mirror makes these cameras heavy and expensive, so generally only professinal used them in the past. The Digital SLR, or DSLR has made the format much more accessible to the enthusiast who can now buy entry level cameras for a few hundred pounds, euros or dollars.

My most 'interesting' flickr picture

Another advantage of the SLR is that the pressing of the shutter means the image is instantly recorded when you want it to be, at that precise moment. On many small compact cameras there is still an annoying timelag, although it is improving all the time, it depends on how much money you are spending.

My most 'favourited' flickr picture

SLR cameras also come with detachable lenses with wonderful optical qualities. Add to this that a camera like the D800 has over 36 million pixels and the amount of detail is expected to be breathtaking. Cameras like the D800 also offer amazing high definition video and online examples of films made show that with this camera a 'professional' image quality is available to the very keen enthusiast prepared to learn how to use such a powerful, if more expensive, camera.

So is the D800 my next upgrade along with a Nikkor 24-70mm lens? Any views?

Examples of portrait work

I thought people might like to see some examples of my recent studio work using studio flash equipment.

Please follow this link to My Facebook page to see more images.

Red eye! - tips for good photographs

Red eye is the reflection of light directly from the blood rich retina (the normally black back of the eye with the light sensitive cells) from the flash being so bright and too close to the lens.

There are a number of ways this can be dealt with.

The most useful advice for the compact camera use is to check the camera manual to see if it sends out a bright 'pre-flash' to cause the pupils of the eyes to close in reflex. This reduces the amount of retina exposed to the 'real flash', but the small pupil size may not look natural.

Another alternative, but does require you to know how to set your camera up, is to increase the sensitivity of the cameras sensor, what is called the ISO. With an increased sensitivity you may not need to use the flash. If you can also increase the amount of natural light by opening curtains, or increase the amount of artificial light, this will all help the camera. Normally cameras are set up for an ISO of 200, but increasing this to 400, or 800, or greater may mean you don't use the flash. It is of course now a trade off between no red eye and what is called 'noise' in the image - bright pixels, and a kind haziness, which begins to affect the very dark and light areas of the image when the sensitivity is too high. The quality of the image will depend on the quality of the sensor.

If possible move the flash away from the axis of the lens. Impossible of course on a compact camera with a fixed flash and that is why camera companies have spent a lot of research and development money and time in reducing the effect in other ways. Worth pointing out that professionals rarely use the built in flashes and enjoy the power of a larger 'off camera' flashgun. Mind you, they do not come cheap, there is always a cost benefit trade-off when we are budgeting for a camera. I also almost always angle the head of my flashgun or 'bounce' the light of the ceiling or walls, again this requires a powerful flash as a lot of the light is lost with the extra distance it has to travel. It also helps to reduce the sharp flash shadow around the people in the picture.

If you have images with red eye all is not lost. Most software, including that which is free on the web, will have a facility to de-saturate the red in the eyes. Before I used Photoshop I used a program called 'GIMP' which my son put me onto. It is a free and very powerful downloadable photo editing program worth looking at if you are serious about making your images 'pop' from the screen at no extra cost except for time.