PHOTOGRAPHY FOR BLOGGERS ROUNDUP
I keep getting questions regarding photography for bloggers so I thought I’d put my entire series in one place. Hopefully it’s able to answer most of your questions.
HOW TO TAKE GREAT PHOTOGRAPHS FOR BLOGGERS
There seems to be this myth going around that you need a DSLR or a pro camera to take a good picture. Sure they might help, but there are some basics that you should be aware of first, otherwise no amount of photography equipment will save your shot. Tools can enhance, but don’t replace skill. In this post you’ll find:
- Get up close
- Rule of thirds and perspective
- Choose your light
- Golden hour
- Pay attention to the details
- Photoshop
As bloggers, we have to be sensitive to what our readers are looking for and bombarding them with too many photos isn’t going to keep anyone interested. I can’t tell you how often I close a blog without leaving a comment because I realize that I’m wasting too much of my time waiting for all the images to load. So you know the saying, “a picture is worth a thousand words”? Well, let’s make sure that it’s true. So what you want to do is plan out each of your shots to maximize your subject, whether it be an outfit or a product. In this post you’ll find:
- Keep it simple
- Watch the negative space
- Keep the flow
- Make it unexpected
- Follow the movement
- Change your perspective
- Background
- Break the rules
Not everyone has a fancy camera and lots of expensive lenses but we can all play with lighting. There seems to be a misconception that just going outside means you’ll have fantastic images and unfortunately that’s not quite true, so let’s take a moment to look at how to get great outdoor shots. In this post you’ll find:
- Get out of the sun
- Filters and diffusers
- Optimize reflection
- Magic hour
- Backlighting
Taking really great outfit shots is hard, know that it takes time especially if you don’t do them very often. Photography is an art form, as is modelling, but they are both pursuits you can learn and perfect. The key is to take lots and lots and lots (and maybe a few more) photographs and over time, you’ll see your style and personality starting to shine through! In this post you’ll find:
- Consider your pose
- Don’t just stand there
- Smile
- Show your personality
- Find your angle
- Love the details
- Consider the location
- Get to know your camera
- Use a tripod
Let’s get one thing straight, I love, love, love my DSLR, but it’s not always handy and I don’t always feel like taking it with me when I go places. Fortunately, that’s usually okay because I’ve discovered just how amazing my phone really is for taking photographs. In fact, I don’t even want to really admit just how many photos on this blog are taken with my phone. For the record, every single photo in this post was taken with my phone and with minimal alterations. Most of them have been cropped and all of them have been lightened with a heightened contrast. In this post you’ll find:
- Get close
- Ignore the zoom
- Use a photo editor
- Clean the lens
- Play with light
As you start gaining ground and becoming more experienced, you’ll want to start using the more technical elements that your camera offers, so I thought I’d put together a guide to some of the terms you should become familiar with. Just an aside, I had the privilege of working with the Canadian Film Center years and years ago and I remember how cool I felt when I could start using the technical terms and short forms in regular speech, so that’s kind of the goal here. Get you comfortable enough with the terminology that you can “hang” with the big boys. In this post you’ll find:
- Exposure
- ISO number
- F-stop/Aperture
- Depth of field
- Shutter speed
- White balance
It’s the lens, rather than the camera that can make or break your photos, since the quality of your photographs is very dependent on the type of lens you are using. In fact, the lens determines the type of photograph you can take whether it’s indoors or outdoors or an extreme close up or long shot. In this post you’ll find:
- Prime lenses
- My primary lens
- 50mm
- Macro lens 60mm 1:2.8
- Lens kit lens
As bloggers, we should be practicing photography all the time. Take pictures whenever you can, with your phone or a camera. Don’t stress if they are “bad” as you can always delete them and no one will know. One thing that has always helped me is to think about a shot before taking it. What am I trying to feature? How do I want to frame it? What feelings/emotions do I want to come across? These thoughts apply to every subject, human or otherwise.
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