Street photography often means somewhat different things to different photographers, but in essence street photography involves wandering the streets and making photographs of daily life as it unfolds before your eyes and camera. 

Street photographers typically react to situations and usually have no specific subject matter in mind as they set out to make photographs. Street photography is very much about life in general and usually don’t involve the concept of visualising photographs in advance of taking them. I use words like ‘typically’ and ‘usually’ as some street photographers may happen upon a scene with a certain play of light and shadow for example, and then stake out that scene until something happens. That something is often some sort of human element in the scene. In fact some people will argue that human presence is a prerequisite in street photography.

What is Street Photography?

Street photography uses the techniques of straight photography in that it shows a pure vision of a scene. It’s therefore up to the photographer to place emphasis on the selection of what elements to include and exclude from the composition – and of course this has to happen in a split second. It is not generally accepted to edit the contents of a street photograph – such as editing out a discarded coke can in Photoshop in post-processing.

What is Street Photography?

Most people will agree that for a street photograph to be successful the scene has to move the photographer in some way. If it moves the photographer – and if the photographer is skilled at capturing the decisive moment – there is a good chance it will also move the viewer.

Effective street photography is about telling a story in a single frame, not simply recording what was there at a particular time and in a specific place.

Photo by Chris JL

The term “the decisive moment” was of course coined by French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson who helped develop street photography as a style or genre.

Cartier-Bresson was an early adopter of the 35mm format and a master of candid photography. You can learn more about Cartier-Bresson in the excellent documentary The Impassioned Eye which is available on DVD. I personally own the DVD and enjoy watching it as a source of inspiration and as a wonderful biography on one of the most influential photographers of the last century.

Street photography generally involves getting close to people – and often within their comfort zones. This means the photographer often becomes part of the scene rather than a distant observer. It also means shooting with wide lenses; usually nothing longer than 50mm. Consequently some street photographers prefer shooting in places like crowded streets in big cities, fairs, carnivals, parades or even on a busy ferry or bus.

Photo by sketchy record

Street Photography Shooting Techniques

How you shoot on the street is of course a matter of personal choice, but some shooting techniques might work better than others.

Here are some tips and tricks on how to shoot successful street photographs:

• Don’t be sneaky and don’t try to hide your cameras.
• If someone objects to having their picture taken, don’t take it.
• If someone turns away as you’re about to photograph, respect their privacy and refrain from shooting.
• Don’t lurk around in the background with a long lens as this will often be interpreted with scepticism and suspicion.
• Participate in the scene rather than be a voyeur.
• For more candid pictures try to blend in with the crowds and be subtle in your camera movements. Don’t constantly put your camera to your eye. Instead relax and put your camera down and just be one of the many people on the street. Then raise your camera when you are one or two seconds away from the shot you want. Click the shutter a couple of times, and then put your camera down again. If you get noticed, smile.
• Embrace the fear and shoot through it. Even more experienced street photographers have fears about being yelled at, chased down the street or worse. While this fear may subside over the years, it will probably never disappear completely. Acknowledge it and make a conscious decision to embrace the fear and shoot through it.
• Travel light. All you need is a camera body and a few lenses and film or memory cards.
• Don’t carry your shiny new high-tech camera bag out on the street. Instead carry your gear in a more casual shoulder bag or messenger-style bag.
• Leave the khaki-50-pockets-photographers-vest at home and wear simple and relaxed clothing. Dress like the people you’re photographing.
• Switch to manual focus, estimate the distance to your subject and pre-set your focus. This way you’re ready to shoot and frame when an interesting moment happens.
• Pre-set your focus and ‘shoot from the hip’. You don’t necessarily have to bring your camera to your eyes to capture a moment.
• Keep shooting ‘through the moment’. You want to capture that decisive split second of a moment, so keep shooting as events unfold.
• Smile, smile, and smile some more. A smile can defuse most negative situations you might find yourself in.

Photo by Joe Holmes

Street photography might not be for everyone, but it is a style of photography that can teach you a lot about composition in photography along with the significance of freezing a moment in time.

For more resources on street photography you can also check out books like Street Photography Now and Street Photography: From Atget to Cartier-Bresson or you could simply immerse yourself and study the photographs in Henri Cartier-Bresson: Photographer.

Next Step?

Head out on the street and start taking pictures!

If you liked this article, you may also like these:

• Shooting Landscapes – Guest Post by Carolyn Fox
• Chasing Reflections by Eli Reinholdtsen
• How to Photograph Water in Motion

This is a guest post by Carolyn Fox. Carolyn left the corporate world a few years ago and is now pursuing her passion for photography. Carolyn specializes in fine art, event and stock photography as well as event photography. You can see Carolyn’s work here: http://www.foxdenimages.com.

The best time to shoot a landscape is 15-30 minutes before sunrise to 30-60 minutes after and the same time frame at sunset. It’s called the “magic hour”, because that’s when you get the soft, warm light that makes great pictures. Yes, you can take landscape pictures at other times, but it will be more difficult to get the kind of shot you want.

So, now you know that you’ll be getting up before dawn & will always be late for dinner. That’s the life of a landscape shooter, so you’d better get used to it. 

Another rule is to always use a tripod. You’ll see shooters out early in the morning hand-holding their cameras. What they don’t know, however, is that when they look at their photos at 100%, they’ll probably be blurry. 

I know that because I used to think I could hand-hold my camera better than I really can. Once I started looking at my photos at 100%, I realized I was wrong. 

When shooting landscapes, you should always shoot in either manual or aperture priority, so you can control the depth of field. In most cases, you’ll want everything in focus from the foreground to infinity. 

Using f/8 or f/11 will usually accomplish this, depending on where you focus in the scene and on your lens. Each lens has a sweet spot for focus. If you use your lens often enough you’ll discover what this is. Once you do, you’ll start getting better pictures. Normally, the best way to ensure focus of the foreground mid-ground and background is by focusing 1/3 of the way into the scene. If you’re using a good lens and a good tripod the entire scene should be in focus. 

A wide angle lens, such as a 12-24mm is great for shooting landscapes. I personally use a 16-35, which is wide enough for my purposes. Just remember, though, that a 16-35 lens, with a 1.6 factor on a Canon camera becomes a 26-56mm lens. Be sure to keep that in mind when you’re shopping for lenses. If you shoot Nikon the factor is 1.5.

When you’re shooting landscapes, include something interesting  in the foreground to show perspective. A wide angle lens is great for this because you can get close to the subject in the foreground & still have the entire scene in focus. Here is an example:

Yellowstone Landscape by Carolyn Fox

I added the rock to the foreground to show the viewer the expanse of the Yellowstone landscape.

No matter what you’re shooting, remember that a good picture always tells a story.

Carolyn has a Blurb book out titled “Killer Tips for Better Pics” which you can purchase by going to her website which is: http://www.foxdenimages.com

If you liked this article, you may also like these:

• What is Street Photography?
• Chasing Reflections by Eli Reinholdtsen
• How to Photograph Water in Motion

The team at Craft & Vision has released a new eBook and this one I’ve really been looking forward to with great anticipation!

I have reviewed some of the previous releases from Craft & Vision over the past couple of months in these posts:

• Ten Ways to Improve Your Craft. None of Them Involve Buying Gear
• Vision Is Better. Free the Mind, Free the Camera.
• The Magic of Black and White
• VENICE

The Craft & Vision eBooks are fantastic because they represent such awesome value at just $5 each for beautifully designed eBooks. And if you buy around the release dates of new books you can usually pick up a 20% discount making them just $4 each (you can hardly buy a large latte for that kind of money!)

The new photography eBook released today is the third in the series ‘The Print & The Process’ and is titled Chasing Reflections by Eli Reinholdtsen.

Eli Reinholdtsen is a creative photographer who, through her unique and skillful approach to reflections, captures moments and juxtapositions that are truly an art form at its finest.

Reinholdtsen digs deep and shares tangible ways to scout, setup, and shoot complex and magical photographs that push the envelope of visual poetry. Her playful descriptions aren’t shy of digging deep into the techniques required to capture movement, timing and contrast.

Quiet frankly this book is almost worth its price just for the cover shot!

It’s an amazing photograph. It’s the type of image you can come back to again and again and it sets the tone for the rest of the book.

As the title indicates this book is all about reflections. I must admit I personally have a soft spot for reflection images. Therefore I’ve also looked forward to this release and I wasn’t disappointed.

The book is divided into the following sections:

• Introduction (The Premise)
• Photographs – 37 pages with one reflection image per page (The Print)
• Subjects, technique and tips (The Process)
• Thumbnails of each of image including technical settings and a brief of discussion of how each image was created.

Overall the 37 reflection photographs included in this book are dazzling and above all very inspiring. As with any large body of work though, you’re likely to like some of the images better than others, particularly because Reinholdtsen spoils us with such a varied selection of images.

Personally I think the selection of images could have been edited just a tiny bit tighter with two or three images letting the rest of the group down a little bit. When that’s said though I still find the overwhelming majority of the images incredibly inspiring and very well executed. As you’ll learn if you buy the book, some of these images have taken hours if not days to plan requiring a good amount of patience.

“I can walk around town for days on end with my camera. If I find a good backdrop with great light I can easily wait for an hour or so for the ‘right’ person to pass by and complete the image” Reinholdtsen writes.

In ‘The Process’ section of the book Reinholdtsen discusses her creative process and generously shares tips and techniques on how you can create powerful reflection images including topics like:

• Combining images
• Good light for reflection images (this one might surprise you)
• Mannequins and posters
• Layering technique
• Depth of field
• Angle of shooting
• Focus issues

You’ll also learn how the human form is a very powerful element in reflection images. For someone who tends to often leave the human form out of my images, this was an important lesson in itself. I find myself drawn to many of the images in this book where there is a strong presence of the human form.

I find this book to be an excellent – and very inspiring – resource on reflection images specifically. It’s a book I know I’ll return to again and again for inspiration.

You’ll notice that many of the images in Chasing Reflections are images where Reinholdtsen takes you on a small visual journey. The layered information contained in many of the images means that you can spend quite a bit of time with each image and discover new details or connections each time you return to an image. This is what is particularly wonderful about so many of Reinholdtsen’s images in this eBook.

At just $5 there really isn’t too much else to say than buy it. You won’t be disappointed!

If you liked this article, you may also like these:

• Ten Ways to Improve Your Craft. None of Them Involve Buying Gear
• The Magic of Black and White
• What is Street Photography?

It’s been a little while since we have focused on a specific technique, so today I thought I would post this beginner’s guide on how to shoot water in motion.

Water in motion is a very popular subject and one that is constantly changing which makes it fun to photograph. Some might consider soft, silky water effects a bit of a cliché, but call it a cliché or not, it’s still a beautiful visual effect that often creates a certain mood in your photographs.

That’s especially true when it comes to slowing down the shutter speed enough to capture the soft movement you see in many flowing water mages.

But how slow is slow enough? To blur flowing or falling water, it’s a good starting point to set your shutter speed around 1/8th of a second and then work your way down to around half a second, and even all the way down to one full second or two. Longer exposure times increase the slow-motion effect.

Photographing water, however, is not really an exact science so it always a good idea to experiment and see which effect you like best.

Image by Thomas Folke Andersen

So how can you slow down your shutter speed?

Use Low Light

This means shooting in overcast light, deep shade, at sunrise, sunset or twilight or perhaps even indoors creating your own flowing water.

Image by Thomas Folke Andersen

Set a Low ISO

When it comes to slow exposures the lower your ISO setting the better. Most of the time you’ll want to set your ISO to 100 or lower if your camera features lower ISO settings.

Image by Thomas Folke Andersen

Small Aperture

Your lens’ smallest opening (the highest f/stop number) will automatically result in the slowest possible shutter speed for the given ISO setting and lighting conditions. In Aperture Priority mode simply choose a high f/stop number. The camera’s auto-metering system will then compensate for the small aperture by lengthening the exposure time.

Image by Thomas Folke Andersen

Neutral Density (ND) Filters

A neutral density (ND) filter cuts down the amount of light entering your lens and therefore allowing for longer exposures. But a polarizing filter also blocks some of the light entering the lens, typically with 1-1/2 to 2 stops. Used in combination these two filters can achieve quite slow shutter speeds in low light situations.

Image by Thomas Folke Andersen

You’ll Need Your Tripod

Long exposures require a steady camera. So you’ll need to bring your tripod when you set out to photograph water in motion. It’s also a good idea to use a cable release or the self-timer function in combination with the mirror-lock mode if you have it (not all SLRs have this latter feature).

For more details refer also to How to Prevent Camera Shake When on a Tripod.

Consider the Speed of the Water

Slower-flowing water requires longer exposures to obtain the silky smooth look while fast or cascading water can be blurred with relatively ‘fast’ shutter speeds.

Image by Thomas Folke Andersen

Distance to the Water

The more you magnify your subject in motion (i.e. either by physically moving in closer or by zooming in tighter with a zoom lens) the easier it is to blur it. More distant scenes require much slower speeds to convey that soft-movement look. So if you’re photographing with a wide angle lens from a cliff top (like I was in the image below) and want to blur the ocean you’ll need some really slow shutter speeds to achieve a soft, smooth effect in the water.

Image by Thomas Folke Andersen

Play

Make sure to “play” with your camera settings since the constantly changing water makes it difficult to tell exactly what you’ll get. Experimenting is key to successful water in motion images.

In other words shoot the same scene at a few different speeds and then compare the results on your monitor when you’re back home with a cup of warm coffee behind the screen.

Have fun photographing water in motion!

If you liked this article, you may also like these:

• What is Street Photography?
• Shooting Landscapes – Guest Post by Carolyn Fox
• Chasing Reflections by Eli Reinholdtsen

Today Andrew S. Gibson publishes part two of his ‘The Magic of Black and White’ two-part eBook series which is available through Craft & Vision.

The Magic of Black & White

Part one of Andew S. Gibson’s ‘The Magic of Black and White’ series is about ‘the vision’ and looks at the process of seeing and capturing in monochrome. It includes subjects like ‘The Art of Black & White’ and ‘Learning To See In Monochrome’ and focuses on the many compositional elements relating to black and white photography.

The Magic of Black and White (Vision) is an excellent introduction to black and white photography, covering a wide range of subjects and is illustrated with many of Andrew’s beautiful black and white photographs over a total of 60 pages.

It’s a great eBook which, I think, can serve as a good source of inspiration for photographers of any skill level.

The Magic of Black and White – Part Two – Craft

Part two of ‘The Magic of Black and White’ series is about ‘the craft’. This second book focuses on the craft of converting your captured image into black and white in the digital darkroom. It looks at the tools needed to turn a colour digital negative into a spectacular-looking black and white image using the software of the digital darkroom, specifically Adobe Photoshop.

‘The Magic of Black and White’ part two is a 51 page downloadable PDF.

The layout has been forced into a landscape format to make viewing on the iPad even better. Using a good PDF reader like GoodReader, this eBook retains the rich layouts found in all of the other eBooks created by Craft & Vision as well as allowing non-iPad users the same great experience they’ve always had.

The Magic of Black and White (Craft) sells for the usual and ridiculously low price of USD$5.00.

Special offer for the early bird:

For the first few days only, if you use the promotional code MAGIC4 when you checkout, you can have the latest eBook for only USD$4.00 OR you can use the code MAGIC20 to get 20% off when you buy 5 or more books from the Craft & Vision collection.

These codes expire at 11:59pm PST June 1, 2010 – so don’t delay!

If you liked this article, you may also like these:

• Chasing Reflections by Eli Reinholdtsen
• Ten Ways to Improve Your Craft. None of Them Involve Buying Gear
• August Snaps 25 August

The zoo is a fantastic place to spend a day with a camera and practice your wildlife photography skills.

The zoo is also a great place to practice before a photo safari if you’re not used to shooting wildlife (or haven’t done it for a long time) and you’re planning a photo safari.
This way you can get into the habit of shooting wildlife and be prepared from day one of your photo safari trip rather than wasting the first few days brushing up on your wildlife photography skills.

You may also be able to study some of the behaviourial pattrerns of the animals you’re likely to encounter on your trip which will help your prepations even more.

Zoo Photography Gear

What camera gear will you need to get good photos at a zoo?

It really depends on the type of images you are after and how much you want to carry.

My advice is to pack light, so you’re mobile and don’t tire so easily. Less gear also tends to also shift the focus more to the animals rather than having to switch lenses all the time and the inner voice asking ‘should I use this lens or that lens’ every time you stop to photograph.

How you pack your bag will also depend on whether you are going to photograph larger animals such as the chimpanzees, lions or elephants or smaller animals such as snakes, lizards or frogs. I will usually concentrate on or the other and then pack accordingly.

However if I’m going for full day’s shoot I will typically bring lenses to cover both.

Here is what I will typically bring to the zoo:

Body:

Canon EOS 5DMKII (sometimes I might bring my 20D body which gives my lenses extra reach due to the 1.6 crop factor of the smaller sensor)

Lenses:

Canon EF 100-400mm f 4.5-5.6 L USM IS, or
Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8 L USM IS, and/or
Canon EF 100mm Macro f/2.8 USM (note Canon now also has a Canon EF 100mm Macro f/2.8 L USM IS version of this lens)

Rubber Lens Hoods:

I bring along rubber lens hoods (instead of the standard plastic lens hoods) for all of the above lenses which allows me shooting right up against glass and completely avoid any reflections and without scratching the glass.

Bean Bag:

Leave the tripod at home for zoo photography!

If you must take a ‘pod’ bring a monopod, but my suggestion is to bring a bean bag or just shoot handheld.

If you’re shooting animals consider that these are moving subjects and more often than not you will probably want to be at relatively fast shutter speeds anyway so you can shoot fast from the hip and stop motion.

Lenses with IS (image stabilization), VR (vibration reduction) or AS (anti shake) will of course also be beneficial for zoo photography and usually allows you to shoot one to two stop slower than with a lens with this feature.

The improvement of image quality in modern day DSLRs will usually also allow you to increase your ISO to 400, 640 or 800 if you need the extra speed.

Those times where I have not wanted to compromise on the ISO, or I have wanted significant depth of field or the light levels have simply been very low, I have usually always been able to use my bean bag to my advantage and get the shot.

Accessories:

Bring an extra memory card or two, so you can shoot freely and in bursts if you need to. This way you don’t have to worry about the amount of shots you take.

Bring a dust blower, some lint-free lens tissue paper and a note book if you want note down species names and other information about the animals you photograph.

Lens extenders and extention tubes may also be items you want to consider for your zoo photography arsenal.

Zoo Photography Tips

I have been photographing in zoos on and off for several years now and here are some of the tips which I have found helpful to get best results with my zoo photography.

1. Watch the background

This tip is relevant to all kinds of photography, but for zoo photography in particular.

Usually, though not necessarily always, you will want to photograph your animal against a nice, clean, soft and out-of-focus background.

If you want to show your subject in a specific setting or perhaps even emphasize on the captive environment of the the animal, you may want a more defined background.
In either case, though, you will want to watch the background carefully.

2. Get close

My goal is often to create what is essentially an animal portrait when I photograph at the zoo and to achieve this you have to get in close. This often means finding animals that are within relatively close distance to where you’re standing and/or taking advantage of your longest focal length.

Zooming in tightly on an animal’s face or body helps you to isolate it against a smaller area of background and achieve the soft background referred to in the first tip.

3. Focus on the eyes

The eyes are the ‘window to the soul’ the saying goes and this is true with wildlife photography as well. Frans Lanting’s excellent book Eye to Eye is a good example of this.

Put your focus point on the eyes of your subject, lock-in the focus and then re-compose if necessary.

4. Get down low (and dirty if you need to)

Photographing an animal at their eye level is a great way to create a sense of intimacy with your subject. This might mean you need to get down on your knees (or worse on your stomach) but it will give your shots impact.

5. Get up high

Just to contradict tip number four, you may consider shooting your subject from up high if possible. This will of course depend on your local zoo’s layout, but finding new and alternative angles can help give your zoo photography a different egde.

6. Watch out for reflections

Often you may be shooting through glass and this can sometimes be a challenge. If possible give the glass a quick wipe with a cloth (or your sleeve) to get rid of finger prints and find an areas of glass that is not too scratched

As mentioned in the Zoo Photography Gear paragraph I recommend that you invest in rubber lens hoods (instead of the standard plastic lens hoods) to fit the lenses that you plan to use for zoo photography.

Rubber lens hoods will allow you to shoot right up against glass and completely avoid reflections with the added benefit that you don’t scratch the glass either.
Contrary to tradition plastic lens hoods you can put a rubber lens hood against a glass plate and then still have the flexibility to move your lens left or right, up or down without letting any stray light in.

7. Shooting through mesh or cages

You can often make mesh or cages literally disappear by pressing your lens right up against the mesh or cage (once again rubber lens hoods come in handy although plastic lens hoods are usually fine for this too) and then mak sure your lens is positioned so the wire of the cage is not in the centre of the frame.

Set your aperture to wide open and focus on your subject – past the mesh or cage – and voila! You have eliminated the mesh or cage altogether.

8. Visit in the morning or late afternoon

Not only is the light often more flatter at these times of the day, but most animals are usually up and active in the mornings which increases your chances to get more interesting shots.

Often the animals rest in the middle part of the day i.e. around noon time and into the afternoon where they will then awake become more active again.

9. Visit on a cloudy day

Personally I prefer to visit zoos on cloudy days where the sky acts as a big, giant softbox providing a nice, soft and even light which suits the type of zoo photography I like to do which is to create what is essentially an animal portrait.

10. Be patient

Rarely will you find animals (except perhaps the Meerkats) which are lined up in the perfect pose when you happen to come by with your camera.

In most cases you’ll need to be patient and wait for something to happen, or for the animal to move into the right position for your shot.

Don’t just fire off a few shots and then move on to the next enclosure. This will rarely lead to exciting and compelling results.

Allow yourself enough time to study the animal for a little while. Spending just a couple of minutes, often you will find that an animal might be moving in a certain pattern or repeat a certain ritual and this will allow you to plan your shot and capture the image just at the right moment.

11. Consider overall context

The challenge with zoo photography is that you’re shooting animals in captivity, yet often the goal for many photographers is to show the animals as natural as possible.

So in addition to considering the background (as per the very first tip) you should also be weary of the foreground and any other unnatural and distracting elements which might creep into your frame.

Before pressing down the shutter button all the way down, quickly let your eyes scan the frame of your of viewfinder to check for distractions.

On the other hand, if your intention is to show the animals in captivity, then use subjects like mesh or cages, man-made structures witin an enclosure, props, toys or even zoo keepers to your advantage for a more environmental shot.

Likewise, if you plan to sell your zoo photography images through stock agencies then consider incorporating space for copy in your composition.
In other words think about how you want to show the animal before you press the shutter button.

Have fun with your zoo photography.

If you liked this article, you may also like these:

• Photo Critique No. 5 – “Flamingos’ Human Thoughts”
• What is Street Photography?
• Shooting Landscapes – Guest Post by Carolyn Fox

Digital toning has become increasingly popular in recent years, but the tecnique is of course more than 120 years old.

Some of the classic darkroom toning techniques include processes like sepia, selenium, gold, copper and iron-blue toning and are achieved with the use of chemicals.

There is no denying that digital toning has made the process of toning your images very easy.

Original black and white image

The concept of split toning involves tinting the highlights in a black and white image with one color and the shadows with another color. Some people might argue that the best results are achieved using opposite colours such as yellow and blue. In my view you can also achieve some really interesting results using two colours that are relatively close to each other such as red and yellow (see this variation at the bottom of this post).

Split toned image (blue and yellow)

If you are using Lightroom then chances are that you’ve experimented with the very cool Split Toning Panel found in the Develop module. Personally I use Adobe Lightroom quite a lot and find that it is probably the quickest and easiest way to apply split toning.

However, you can actually apply split toning to your images (including JPEG and TIFF files) just as easily using Adobe Photoshop CS4.

Here is how to do it in three simple steps.

1. Open Your File in ACR (Adobe Camera Raw)

To process JPEG or TIFF images in Camera Raw, select your JPEG or TIFF files in Adobe Bridge, and then choose File > Open In Camera Raw or press Ctrl+R (Windows) or Command+R (Mac OS).

2. Select the Split Toning Panel

Select the Split Toning Panel which is the little icon with two rectangular bars on top of each other (the 5th icon from the left underneath the Histogram and RGB values). Make your adjustments by experimenting with moving the Hue and Saturation sliders for the Highlights and the Shadows. 

You can then use the Balance slider to fine tune your adjustment and skew it towards the Highlights or Shadows as desired.

3. Open Your Image in Photoshop

Now simply click the Open Image button and your image will open in Photoshop with the split toning effect applied. In Photoshop you can then make any further adjustments if required.

Split tone variation (red and yellow)

As you can see above the first split toned image uses opposite colours (blue and yellow) whereas the second image immediately above makes use of two colours relatively close to each other (red and yellow).

It’s only your imagination and personal aesthetics that sets the limits here. While toning of images is steeped in tradition, there really is no right or wrong answers.

If you’re looking for a great ressource on learning more about digital photography and Adobe Photoshop in general, then check out Vincent Bockaert’s The 123 of Digital Imaging which has impressed even Adobe Evangelist Julieanne Kost.

You can also check out the great Adobe Photoshop tutorials available at Lynda.com for more ressources.

I hope you enjoyed this quick little tutorial on how to split tone your images – including JPEG and TIFF files – in Photoshop CS4 in three easy steps.

Don’t forget to Live, Learn and Enjoy Photography.

If you liked this article, you may also like these:

• How to do Advanced Toning in Photoshop CS4 – Part Four
• How to do Advanced Toning in Photoshop CS4 – Part Three
• How to do Advanced Toning in Photoshop CS4 – Part Two

Tony Sweet is one of my all time personal favourite photographers and he has been a huge inspiration for me when it comes to image design. When you view his images you will notice that each one of them are meticulously composed with careful attention to detail.

I have been fortunate enough to be able attend two of Tony’s online photography classes a couple of years ago: Image Design: Revealing Your Personal Vision and Fine Art Flower Photography which he still teaches over at BetterPhoto.com and I can highly recommend both of these two courses. Tony’s teaching style is straight to the point, yet very caring and encouraging all while he shares a wealth of knowledge with his students.

I’m very grateful that Tony was kind enough to take the time for this interview in between conducting on location workshops, teaching online photography classes, writing magazine articles and running his general nature photography business!

So, get yourself a good cup of coffee, sit back and enjoy this in depth interview with Master Photographer Tony Sweet.

After 20 years as a professional jazz artist, Tony Sweet changed careers and directed his creative juices towards nature photography. Tony is a ‘Nikon Legend Behind the Lens’, a member of ‘Team Nik’ (NikSoftware) and a ‘Lensbaby Guru’. His fine art prints are exhibited in private and corporate collections throughout the United States, and he is represented by The Getty Picture Agency. Today, Tony’s work is published on greeting cards, calendars, post cards, posters, annual reports, catalogs and various electronic mediums.

1. Tony, first of all thank you very much for taking the time for this interview! For those who might not know you, could you describe your style of photography and perhaps also briefly touch on the moment when you first realised you would make photography a career path?

It’s very difficult for one to describe ones own style of photography. In general, I look for color and graphic interest in most cases, however I’ve recently began looking for more sparse subjects for black and white renderings. We are all in a constant state of flux in any creative endeavor. Despite how people love to pigeon hole photographers styles, there really is only two kinds of photography: good and bad. Initially, I began photographing musicians in night clubs and portraits in my house in Cincinnati. When my first mentor, Tony Gayhart, showed me a nature slide, I decided immediately to pursue this as a career path. I also immediately swapped all of my fast, low light glass for lenses better suited for nature photography (20mm, 35-70mm, 80-200mm, and 105mm macro).

2. You have referred to Pat O’Hara and Tony Gayhart as your mentors and influence, but if you look back in the history of photography what other photographer’s work do you admire and why?

When getting started, I read all the books by John Shaw, Galen Rowell, Rod Planck, Larry West, John Netherton, Jim Zuckerman, Freeman Patterson, and Pat O’hara. I just read everything that I could get my hands on. The styles that appealed to my innate sense of design and photographic viscera were Freeman’s and Pat’s. After years of learning from reading the aforementioned authors to get a firm foundation, I began gravitating to the more impressionist, non representational photography, exemplified by Freeman, Pat and others.

3. A photographer’s day and week can be long! I know that you are often up extremely early, work through the day and often also shoot again around sunset. How do you manage your shooting time, admin work and personal life and get some rest at the same time?

Fortunately, I love every aspect of this business now. Interestingly, digital photography and software expertise has grown together and have inextricably merged to where some software expertise is essential in modern photography. Time management is more a function of how facile one is on the computer and in various software. The faster one can get through image editing and optimization, the better. I know what and where I like to photograph, so I’m not guessing as much and, therefore more effectively managing my shooting time, especially before and after workshops. I also can get by with little sleep, which has it’s drawbacks, but does enable me to get a lot done. Personal life?? Sure, I try to play music once a week with friends when home. I also try to get in a few poker games a year with old friends. Sue and I work and travel together. [Note: Tony's better half Sue aka Susan Milestone is an equally amazing nature photographer with some incredible work as well].

4. As a teacher and instructor you are known to be ‘positive, enthusiastic, generous, encouraging, approachable and energetic’. What motivates you to teach photography as passionately as you do?

Quite simply, I love sharing information and like working with people. As I think back on my life, I’ve always been a teacher, regardless of profession (musician, magician, photographer).

5. Can you talk a little bit about how you challenge yourself creatively and how you choose your subjects (or do they choose you)?

Without getting too abstract, I don’t really challenge myself, per se, but function in the moment, not unlike playing jazz music. I rely on my subconscious to perceive a subject area. Once that happens, I look a bit closer for specific subjects. My challenge is keeping up on creative software use by practicing as often as I can.

6. A great deal of your work is made on the East Coast of the US and is often somewhat more intimate nature and landscape images. However you have recently also been shooting more grand landscapes in areas like the Badlands and I know you have also recently completed another long road trip. How do you feel about photographing in new locations versus much more familiar locations to you like the Smokies for example? And do you approach the grand landscapes differently than the more intimate landscapes?

It takes a while to get past the snap shot stage at new locations and to be able to move to the more personal and more abstract stage. This is why I love revisiting the same locations year after year, not to get the same shots, but to shoot deeper and deeper, getting images that were unattainable on initial visits. When first visiting a new site, I go to the visitor’s center to look at books and post cards to see what’s there and get to locations at pre dawn and/or late afternoon for the after glow, like everyone else. The more we return to an area, the more and deeper we “see.”

7. You have embraced HDR photography and even produced an instructional DVD on the subject. You tend to lean up against the more ‘super real’ images. What captivates you about HDR and do you see a commercial market for it?

HDR is not new, being around since about 1937, but it’s new to the general photographic world. And the world has been flooded with a lot of HDR images, good and bad. I find that HDR is essential to get some scenes to work and can be another way to interpret a scene in a new, fresh way. Commercial market? Many video games have HDR style backdrops, architectural photographers use HDR (paying careful attention to processing the scene to record it as it is), stock photography (although the super real look is not a favorite, yet), and of course for book and article illustrations.

8. We all get stuck in a creative rut sometimes. What advice can you give to someone who is lacking inspiration and needs to get their creative juices flowing again?

• Go to a new place
• Use a Lensbaby
• Try HDR, even on a single image!
• Try camera movement / multiple exposures
• Use a fisheye lens

9. I think it’s fair to say you have been successful in the stock photography market. How important is stock photography to your business today and what’s your thoughts on the emerging microstock photography market?

For snap shot life style photography, stock will remain viable for a time, but it’s on the way to a whole new paradigm. The younger generation are populating the stock agencies and with that comes the younger approach. The Getty stock agency is trolling for images and may have purchased at least a part of Flickr! So, anyone who adequately key words their images on Flickr has a chance of being approached for an image sale by Getty. However, I wouldn’t get my hopes up as stock prices have plummeted in recent years to the point of no longer being a substantial part of our income, dwindling more each year.

10. How about fine art prints? I know you have recently purchased an Epson 7900 printer, do you produce a lot of fine art prints? Are fine art prints an important part of your business? Are you represented by any art galleries? Do you work with interior designers?

Our business plan is to enter the print market in the coming year. We have a couple of print agents and interior designers we have worked with and will be taking portfolios around to galleries looking for representation during our winter break, in addition to limited web sales.

11. To me some of your stock photography images could as well be fine art prints. How do you make the distinction between a stock image and a fine art image, or do you also offer fine art prints of your stock images? Is any of your fine art prints offered in limited editions?

I’m not sure what fine art is, but I do a little research for stock and noticed the more abstract, movement / blur images and extreme macros / conceptual images are viable. These types of images can be seen as being “fine art.” In general, I just send in what I like and let the agency pick what they like. But, please remember that for a great many photographers, stock is no longer a viable source of income.

12. Finally, what was the most recent photography book you bought for yourself?

I buy photography books all the time, the most recent being, “Badlands of the High Plains” by Chuck Haney.

—————————————————————————————————————————————

Tony Sweet teaches several online classes at BetterPhoto.com and conducts his “Visual Artistry” photography and digital printing workshops from March through October throughout the continental United States and Canada.

Tony has also produced several really excellent books and DVDs which can be purchased from the store on his website or at Amazon.com.

I’m also very excited to announce here on Photography 24/7 that Tony Sweet has just released a new DVD titled “Visual Artistry: The Art of Pre-Visualizing in Modern Digital Photography” (it’s literally being pressed as this interview goes live).

Shot in the springtime, Tony works in a variety of locations from historic downtown Charleston and Drayton Hall, to the magical landscapes of Magnolia Plantation and Gardens. Visual Artistry is filled with compositional techniques, tips and tricks from Tony s many years as a professional photographer and workshop leader.

You can purchase the new DVD directly from Tony Sweet’s website or at Amazon.com.

I own all of Tony’s DVDs and have watched them several times and find them a good source of photographic inspiration each time, so check them out if they are not already in your DVD library.

You can watch a small video in clip from Tony’s Visual Literacy DVD in this previous post: Tony Sweet Nature Portfolio.

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In recent years it’s as if Mother Nature has put the weather in charge of protesting against us humans polluting ways. Tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes, typhoons, tornadoes and out-of-control raging forest fires seem to make news on a much too regular basis, and often with tragic and devastating results.

However, when I say extreme weather conditions it doesn’t have to be that extreme. And it’s not that I want to put a dark and gloomy spin on this article, but I just thought I would open up with the above observation. We can all help treating Mother Nature better. You could start by hosting your blog or website with Super Green Hosting.

Ok, ok, let’s get on with the actual article.

Shooting in extreme weather conditions can be a lot of fun and it can yield dramatic photographs, but when the weather turns ‘bad’ most of us tend to stay indoors. But, hey, there is no such thing as bad weather, is there?

“Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, snow is exhilarating; there is really no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather.”
- John Ruskin

If you’re into nature and landscape photography this is the mentality you have to adapt, because braving the elements increases your chances of capturing spectacular images that not many other people will capture.

But whatever you do, just always remember this rule of thumb:

Photographing in extreme conditions means taking extreme precautions!

Not only can you put yourself in danger (priority #01), but your expensive equipment can also be destroyed in one quick moment (priority #02), so you need to protect yourself and your camera.

Famous war photographer Robert Capa once said “if your pictures aren’t good enough, you aren’t close enough.” Sure, this can often be the case, but in extreme weather please use your common sense before you get too close! 

Please be careful.

There are generally four elements that you can face when it comes to extreme weather conditions; Cold, Heat, Water and Wind.

Here are 17 tips on how to prepare and deal with each of these four weather conditions.

TIP #01: ALL CONDITIONS – Always carry a camera

It doesn’t matter if it’s a SLR, a little compact camera or even a decent mobile phone camera. What’s important is that you have a camera with you so you can capture the moment as it happens. No capture device, no images. Simple!

But also don’t forget to have your camera ready to shoot. If there is only 10% battery life left, it will run out just as the moment climaxes. Check that your memory card is in the camera, and make sure it has room for at least 30-40 images or you will run out of space just as the moment happens. As photographers we are all too familiar with Murphy’s Law, so be prepared.

Being ready to shoot also means having your ready to shoot on your most common settings as soon as you turn it on — this means turning the flash off, setting the optimum ISO and, if possible, choosing your exposure accordingly. If you change your settings for a specific image, change them back to your most used settings when you’re done.

TIP #02: ALL CONDITIONS – Research the weather

If you plan to shoot in extreme weather, you can learn a lot about different weather conditions by researching different weather phenomena on the internet.

Obviously the weather forecast is essential for you to be in the right place, at the right time. There are a lot of different services available online and you may already have your own favourite, but www.wunderground.com is one site that offers global weather forecasts in great detail.

TIP #03: ALL CONDITIONS – Shoot fast

While it might not always be the case, you’ll often have to react really fast when ti comes to photographing in extreme weather.

Additionally, you will probably not want to expose yourself and your equipment to the conditions for too long at a time.

So you often need to work fast which means you might want to set your camera to aperture priority or shutter priority and let the camera do the math. There is rarely time to mess around in manual mode in extreme weather. This is especially true if you’re likely to point your camera in different directions where the light may vary.

You will probably also want to set your camera to continuous shooting mode, allowing you to shoot a burst of several images in just one second. If you plan to do a lot of extreme weather photography, it’s worth checking out the burst rate on your camera, so you what you can get.

 TIP #04: COLD – Keep it warm

Yeah, yeah, I know, it sounds pretty obvious, but so much of the time we underestimate the temperature, so make sure first and foremost to keep yourself warm, but also your equipment. Keep an extra thermal top in your backpack and find a set of warm gloves that still lets you handle your camera controls with ease.

While most of today’s digital SLR cameras perform pretty well in the cold, you may some cameras playing up in sub-zero temperatures. Shutters can lock up and diaphragms can become inoperative. So when you’re not working with your camera, put it close to your body or wrap it up in that spare thermal top you put in your bag after reading the first paragraph!

TIP #05: COLD – Keep batteries and media cards warm

If you’re shooting with a digital camera cold conditions sap batteries of their power. Keep your spare batteries in an inside pocket of your jacket as close to your body as possible.

If you’re shooting digitally in the cold, spare batteries are not something you should think twice about, they are a necessity!

For the best care it’s also a good idea to keep your media cards close to your body in cold conditions.

TIP #06: COLD – Wrap your tripod legs

If you’re carrying a tripod for lengthy periods in the extreme cold it’s a very good idea to wrap your tripod legs with foam pipe insulation material which you can get from most good hardware stores along with some duct or gaffer’s tape.

If you’re not a DIY person you can splash out on some professional tripod leg protectors.

TIP #07: HEAT – Bring enough water

Yeah, yeah, I know, another obvious one, but I have suffered dehydration here in Australia once after being out in the midday summer sun for just a couple of hours, simply because I hadn’t had much to eat or drink before I went out. It took me several hours to recover from the headache and nausea that ensued. So don’t take this one lightly. Water is a life saver!

It is very easy to get distracted by what you are shooting and get dehydrated or even worse suffer a heat stroke, so bring enough water with you when set out to photograph in high temperatures.

TIP #08: HEAT – Wear loose fitting clothing

Wear light-coloured, loose fitting clothing. It will keep you cooler by reflecting the sunlight.

Allright folks, this is a long article, it’s time for an ad break, I’m sorry. Don’t go anywhere, we’ll be right back!

TIP #09: HEAT – Wear a hat, the right hat.

A hat will also help to keep you cool. Choose a hat with at decent sized brim – say a least a 3-inch (8cm) – all around. Baseball caps leave the ears and neck exposed to potential sunburns. Also make sure the hat is vented, so that the heat from your head can escape and your head can ‘breathe’. This will also help minimize the perspiration that runs off your face and drips off your chin onto your LCD screen!  
 

TIP #10: HEAT – Consider a small lunch cooler as your camera bag

Sometimes the heat can also lead to battery problems, although it is more likely to have an effect on film or media cards. Consider an alternative to a traditional camera bag in extreme heat considers. A small lunch cooler (or an ‘esky’ as we call them here in Australia) , lightweight and insulated could be a sensible choice. If you choose to use a cold pack, go ahead and put it in its own tightly sealed plastic bag just be extra safe that no moisture leaks out where you don’t want it.  

TIP #11: WATER – Cover up your camera

Moisture (snow as well as rain) is the biggest enemy of your equipment. If you go out to shoot in wet conditions bring a large zip lock bag with you. You can use it to place over your camera and cut a hole where the lens is, and then simply use a rubber band to secure the bag to the barrel of the lens.

If you have a separate lens hood, screw it into the front of the lens. If not, even a skylight filter will offer some protection. If you have both, use them! Personally, I keep a Hoya Ultraviolet Pro 1 Digital Multi-Coated Glass Filter on each of my lenses to protect the front of the lens. These are fairly expensive filters, but there is just no sense in spending thousands of dollars on a high quality lens only to put a cheap, poor quality filter on it. Don’t save on your filters!

TIP# 12: WATER – Wear a Shutter Hat

If you want a slightly more sophisticated version of the zip lock bag suggested in Tip #11 then the Shutter Hat is what you should be wearing, or rather what your camera should be wearing. The Shutter Hat is claimed to be the most stable, no fuss, light weight, compact camera cover on the market today. Check it out.

TIP #13: WIND – Protect your lenses with filters

Just as with water you will want to protect your lenses if you are out shooting in strong wind, although I would really recommend to protect your lenses regardless of weather conditions, but strong winds can carry all sorts of small debris which can easily cause small scratches to the front of your lens if you don’t protect it. So cover you lens with a skylight filter or the Hoya Ultraviolet Pro 1 Digital Multi-Coated Glass Filter which I use on each of my lenses to protect the front element of the lens.

TIP #14 WIND – Seal your camera

If you’re out shooting in very windy conditions on or near the beach or in any other sandy or dusty areas, you may want to consider taping up all seals on your camera to avoid sand or dust finding its way inside your camera which can spell potential disaster. However if you’re shooting with one of the high-end prosumer cameras or perhaps even one of the pro DSLR cameras, well then these models are most likely already sufficiently weather sealed by the manufacturer for you not to worry about this point.  

TIP #15 WIND – Weigh down your tripod

If you’re landscape photographer shooting in the wind, you’re highly exposed to camera shake in your exposures. If depth of field is critical and your shutter speed is too low to hand hold the camera, then weigh down your tripod with bean bags, your camera bag or – if you want to be really sophisticated – bring a piece of string with you and tie a heavy stone onto it to weigh down your tripod with it.        

TIP #16 WIND – Shoot hand held

Drop the tripod and go with the flow and simply shoot hand held when you’re out in windy conditions. Adjust your ISO setting to a higher speed and shoot hand held at a shutter speed you’re comfortable with when you don’t have your three legs with you. In my experience this will often work out a lot better than trying your luck with a tripod in extreme winds. And keep in mind that many of the recent DSLR camera models (2009 and newer) display very little noise problems even at high ISO settings like 400 or 800.

TIP #17 OTHER CONDITIONS – Lightning

Photographing lightning strikes is not without risk. In fact you’re at considerable more risk than the average person when you’re standing next to a metal tripod, cable release in hand, trying to get that magnificent lightning bolt that sets the entire sky on fire. I read somewhere that storm chaser Jim Reed is experimenting with a wooden tripod for his lightning photography! Hmm, he is also very extreme.

Anyway, the bottom line here is that you need to inform yourself about the safety precautions when photographing lightning strikes. Here are a few safety tips:

• Avoid water.
• Avoid the high ground.
• Avoid open spaces.
• Avoid all metal objects including electric wires, fences, machinery, motors, power tools, etc. (and be aware of the risk using a tripod!)
• Unsafe places include underneath canopies, small picnic or rain shelters, or near trees. If you get completely caught out and lightning is striking really nearby when you are outside, you should crouch down, put your feet together and place your hands over ears to minimize hearing damage from thunder and avoid proximity (minimum of 15 ft.) to other people.

Getting caught out in the middle of a lightning strike has happened to me once in the Blue Mountains near the Three Sisters a few years ago. A group of people further down the walking track we were on got swept right off their feet while standing on a metal viewing platform. They came walking back up in a complete daze. When you’re this close, it’s pretty scary stuff and you realize you’re in Mother Nature’s hands.

If you have your car nearby get in your car (most of these things have rubber tires) and shoot the lightning storm from inside the comfort of your vehicle while you enjoy a cuppa from the thermos.

It’s not really within the scope of this article to provide you with tips on how to shoot lightning (it’s a pretty fine art in itself and there are plenty of good articles on the subject out there), but here are a few quick tips:

• Use a long shutter speed, say 30 seconds or even the bulb (B) setting if you have a way of keeping your shutter open (most modern cable releases can do this).
• Point your camera towards the sky where the action is and include only just a sliver of ground as the ground is likely to go completely black (unless you have a nice skyline in front of you).
• While lightning strikes are, well striking (sorry, couldn’t help myself there), you will often still need some sort of foreground interest to balance your composition in order to create a good photograph. An image of lightning bolts isolated against a sky with no foreground interest rarely holds the viewers attention for long. Find one and look at it. They get boring really quickly.
• Switch to manual focus. Since you are shooting in relative darkness your camera is likely to ‘hunt’ around for something to focus on if you’re on auto focus.
• Patience is your best friend you when it comes to lightning strikes, so make (or bring) yourself a nice cup of coffee, wait, shoot and enjoy the show.

And that concludes the 17 Tips When Photographing in Extreme Weather Conditions!

If you made it this far I sincerely thank you for hanging in there with me. I hope you enjoyed the information as much as I enjoyed researching and writing it.

Now, it’s time go out there and get some shots.

P.S. I wasn’t kidding, go and check out that Shutter Hat

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The other day I was browsing the internet for photography resources and as always you get thrown in all kinds of different directions, one page leads to the next and so on and so on. So I don’t remember quite how, but I ended up on Simon Plant’s ProPhotoInsights website which I thought was a really good resource for photographers, particularly for serious hobbyist photographers.

The website is interesting because Simon’s tutorial videos take the viewer out on location where he shares comments about the location, camera set-up, techniques etc. and then behind the scenes where Simon walks the viewer through his post-processing work step by step using screen shots from the actual image editing process.

It is free to register at ProPhotoInsights which gives you access to selected features at the site. You can purchase the download video tutorials at nominal prices around the USD 10-15 mark per download.

Here is a little sampler:

For more details visit: www.prophotoinsights.net.

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Yesterday I announced onOne Software as a new major sponsor of Photography 24/7. Their PhotoFrame and PhotoTools plugins are probably my two favourite creative plugins, so I thought I would just share a couple of quick examples of the effects you can achieve. I have used my own daughter, Laura, as the model of choice here.

onOne Software generously offers all visitors and readers of Photography 24/7 a 20% discount on any of their products. You can buy their plugins directly from their website and you simply use the discount code 24SEVEN when you checkout to receive your 20% discount. Simple and easy!

I find the plugins useful for any type of photograpy, but I often find myself using the plugins for portraits where I want to achieve a quick result that looks great.

Here are two before and after examples where I have used both of the above mentioned plugins to achieve a certain creative effect. I would estimate that it took me less than two minutes to achieve these results, and most of that time is spent browsing through the many effects available with each plugin.

As you can see I have created a slightly toned version of the original colour image (using PhotoTools) and then stacked it with a photographic frame (using PhotoFrame). As I created these images a while ago I cannot remember the specific choices here as there are a wealth of options with these plugins.

In this example I have created an old photo look (using PhotoTools) and then applied a old looking paper as the frame/background (using PhotoFrame).

Notice that both images were shot at ISO 800 with my Canon G9 – now replaced by the Canon G10 and you might notice a reasonably high amount of noise in the images. However I wasn’t too worried about this as in black and white or ‘old style’ conversions this noise only adds a bit of ‘grain’ and mood to the images.

If you liked this article, you may also like these:

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If you’re shooting RAW you will already know that RAW images need some post-processing to come to life and not look like flat, lifeless pictures. If you’re new to shooting RAW please understand that it is not a sin – more like a ‘must’ – to do some post-processing work to make your images look more like the colourful JPG files that your camera will typically produce when you’re shooting JPGs.

I usually use Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 to develop my RAW files but the same work can be done in the latest version of Camera Raw right inside Adobe Photoshop CS4.

The processing of this image is an example of the RAW power of Lightroom 2. All processing has been done right inside Lightroom 2 (but as mentioned these steps can also be made in Camera Raw). In fact as you will see I have only used the Basic Panel and the tools just above the Basic Panel (Spot Removal, Graduated Filter and Adjustment Brush). As you can see these simple changes make quite a difference to the image and the good news about processing RAW files is that YOU are completely in control of the changes and how far (or not so far) you want to take them.

The only changes made in the Basic Panel are minor changes to Exposure, Blacks, Clarity and Vibrance.

I used the Graduated Filter to saturate and darken down the water a bit. Notice I have also made a yellowish colour change by using the Color setting within the Graduated Filter.

This shows the changes applied in a second Graduated Filter I used to darken the sky and again I used the Colour setting to put a little bit of blue into the sky. Notice how much I have been able to crank up the Saturation without the sky looking ridiculously blue.

The Adjustment Brush is a new powerful – and memory hungry – tool in Lightroom 2 which allows the user to make local non-destructive adjustments to their image which is very cool functionality. In this example I simply used the Adjustment Brush to make a local contrast increase to the sky.

You can click on the little square thumbnail at the top of the post to view the finish image in large view. By the way the image above is from the grand basin at Castelnaudery on Canal du Midi in France from where you can go on the most beautiful river cruise you can ever imagine.

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If you’re anything like me you have spent a great deal of time learning about various aspects of photography, you have spent a great deal of time making photographs and you have spent a great deal of money buying photography equipment, books, magazines and imaging software for your computer such as Photoshop and Lightroom . At some point the quality of the images you are producing has reached a certain standard and you slowly start thinking to yourself something along the lines:

“Hmmm…it would be nice to do something with all these images, perhaps make some money from them, I wonder how I could do this?”

There are many ways of making money from your photos, but probably the single most popular way to make money from your images is called microstock.

This market has expanded rapidly in recent years with the advent of digital photography and in particular with the advent of affordable prosumer level DLSR camera models. However even entry level DLSRs like the Canon EOS Rebel T1i or the Nikon D90 are easily capable of producing image files perfectly suitable for stock submissions.

So what is microstock?

In brief microstock is based on the concept of selling stock photos for a low price (usually just a few dollars) with the expectation that if the images are cheaper then more people will also buy them. This is in contrast to the more traditional stock photography market where images are typically licensed at much higher prices. What is particularly interesting about the microstock market is that it has opened up some interesting opportunities for serious amateur photographers to make money from their images by uploading their work and sell it to a large audience of buyers. Some will even say the microstock market allows the amateur photographer to compete directly against the professional photographer.

So can you really make money from microstock?

Well, first of all I must be absolutely clear and state that I’m not currently participating in the microstock market myself, so I have no personal experience with microstock, but I do follow the developments within the microstock market and I think it’s fair to say that there are definitely a lot of photographers making money in microstock. Of course the amount of money you can make will depend on your input. As with almost anything what you get out of microstock will depend on what you put in.

Take my fellow Dane Yuri Arcurs as an example - he is widely reported on the internet as one of the world’s top selling microstock photographers with sales of more than one million individual licenses per year which is impressive to say the least! Clearly this would earn him a decent annual income. To reach that level of success you will obviously have to be both very effecient and very dedicated with regards to your input, but it proves that it’s possible to make good money in the microstock market. 

Of course the average amateur photographer will not make as much money in the microstock market as Yuri Arcurs, but if you’re consistent with your input you will also get some output and you can earn some money which can help cover some of the cost of your photography equipment etc.

Here are five quick tips that might help you succeed in the microstock market:

1. Shoot Lots of Pictures

The more you shoot the better you will get at creating your images and the more ‘keepers’ you will ultimately have.

2. Be Ruthless When You Edit Your Own Images

Just because the images are being sold at lower prices doesn’t mean you can compromise on quality. If you take a look at some of the work on the microstock sites mentioned below you will notice that the images on these sites are all of high quality.

3. You Don’t Need the Latest and Greatest Camera

As mentioned above entry level DSLRs like the Canon EOS Rebel T1i or the Nikon D90 are just fine for microstock photos. You don’t have to have the latest and greatest camera or lens. Instead focus on being creative with your ideas and concepts and execute these to a high standard with the gear that you have.

4. Stock Photography is Different

Stock photography is different than shooting fine art or just personal work. You have to think commercially and in concepts. How will your photograph be used? In a web page, a magazine spread, or an advertisement etc? Will negative space be required for text? Your image should convey a clear message.

5. Know Your Competition

Know your competition (other photographers) and look at what type of images are already on the microstock site you sign up with. Are there concepts you can illustrate better or differently? Are there concepts you have in mind but cannot see being represented very well or at all?I’m not really for or against microstock (and this can be a really heated debate). As mentioned I’m not currently uploading my work to any microstock websites although I’m considering it. One thing seems certain though, microstock is here to stay. The market for selling and buying images has changed dramatically in recent years and the price for stock photos has been driven down as a result of this significant market shift. My prediction is that this trend will continue in the years ahead.

So if you want to make some money from your images why not consider getting involved with the microstock market now and see where it takes you? If you’re really good you could end up selling over one million licenses per year! Give it a go…

Here are some microstock websites you might consider joining as a contributor:

Shutterstock

Dreamstime

Pixmac

BigStockPhoto

and if you join multiple microstock agencies you might also want to take a look at ProStockMaster which allows you to post stock images and entire folders to multiple agencies, in one click!

Good luck sellling your images!

If you liked this article, you may also like these:

• What is Street Photography?
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Unless you’re going for a creative effect, you should always strive for sharpness in your pictures. If a picture is worth taking, it’s also worth ensuring sharpness, even if it means introducing a little bit of noise. Here are a few thoughts on ensuring that your photos are just as sharp as you want them to be when you are working in low light situations.

Hold Your Breath

When you are forced to shoot in a low-light situation without a tripod, hold your breath and push the shutter button down very gently. Do not get so excited that you push down the shutter button too ‘roughly’ or too ’quickly’ as you might end up with a little bit of camera shake and thus a blurred image.

Find Something To Lean Against

Lean against a wall, tree or fence or brace yourself against a rock – anything you can find for added stability. This will definitely help you get sharper images in low light.

Set Your ISO To Get a Fast Enough Shutter Speed

Avoid using an ISO settting that is too low for low light situations. It is true that ISO 100 or 200 helps to minimize digital noise but there is no point in going this low if your pictures will not be sharp. If you are not using a tripod and you are in low light, you have to adjust your ISO until your shutter speed is fast enough to hand hold the camera. The rule of thumb is that if you use a XX mm lens, then your shutter speed should be no less than 1/XX second – in other words if you are shooting at 200mm, then your shutter speed should be 1/200 second or faster if you are shooting hand held. Making noise-free pictures is irrelevant if they end up blurred anyway. Many of the new DSLR cameras on the market today produce pictures that are virtually noise-free even at high ISOs like 400 or 800.

The above image of the Kookaburra was shot at ISO 1600 with a Canon 20D and a 300mm lens at 1/80 second while leaning against a tree. The image does display a little bit of digital noise, but with newer cameras like the Canon 5D MKII your images will look even better with even less noise.

Have a look at some of the latest DSLR models from Canon or Nikon at B&H Photo if you are considering getting a new DSLR which produces virtually noise-free images at high ISO settings.

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Camera shake is the enemy of sharp pictures! Even when you are on a tripod camera shake can occur relatively easily and especially if you are using a long telephoto lens, slow shutter speeds or if you are not using a remote cable release.

So how can you prevent camera shake when on a tripod? There are a few simple precautions you can take. Here are a few ideas:

1. Don’t Use the Center Column

Do not use the center column on your tripod unless circumstances really require it. When the center column is extended it causes instability – quite the opposite from what you would expect from using a tripod.

2. Use a Remote Cable Release

Always use a remote cable release (also known as a cable release, remote trigger, remote cable shutter release). There is little point in using a tripod if you are pressing down on the camera body itself to make the picture.

3. Use Your Camera’s Self-Timer

If you do not have a remote cable release (or you forgot it at home) then use your camera’s self-timer as this is a more gentle method of triggering the shutter.

4. Mirror Lock-Up

Use your camera’s mirror lock up function if it has one, and then trigger the shutter with a remote cable release.

5. Mount Your Telephoto Lens Directly On Tripod

If you’re shooting with a telephoto lens always be sure to mount your lens directly to the tripod, not the camera. This creates a better balance of the weight across the tripod (use a remote cable release when possible).

If you own a SLR camera (film or digital) and do not already own a remote cable release I would highly recommend that you consider buying one.

Usually you can find the details of the remote cable release that fits your camera in your camera’s instruction manual. Places like Amazon.com usually provide a good selection of remote cable releases in different brands and types (wired and wireless) or you can visit your local camera store and inquire with them.

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• What to Look For When Choosing a Tripod
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