Photography Class

So, I have been going to a photography class lately and it's been really fun. Here are a few tips that I really liked:

1. Fall pictures - this is a little late but hopefully you can still find some fall leaves. If you get a Polarized lens cover, it dims the brighter areas leaving you with more saturation. You will get the most out of the beautiful colors. However, since you are toning down the lighter areas, you'll want to take this lens off when you are taking pictures in dimmer light. Otherwise, you would have to bump up your ISO's and risk creating more noise in your picture.

2. Reflecting light - I'm sure you have all figured out the trick to taking pictures inside with your "Direct On Camera Flash" (aka the flash that you have to physically attatch to your camera). In case you haven't, to get the most out of your in door pictures, point your flash towards the ceiling above you (hopefully it is white or some kind of tone around that) and bounce it off towards your subject. I've been doing this for a while now, thanks to my fabulous teachers Jen and Becky but I learned last night that you can tape or attatch some other way, a white card to the back of your flash so that it sticks up a couple of inches from the flash. What happens is when you take the picture and the flash goes off, the light not only bounces off the ceiling but also off the white card, creating light that hits your subject from the top and the front. This will smooth hard lines and edges. Let me know if I need to post a picture of what I'm talking about.

3. Also, along the lines of lighting, you can take a white sheet and hold it up in fron of a lamp to create soft lighting for portraits and etc. You really can create your own photo studio with objects like these, it's all about diffusing your light and spreading it out.

4. www.strobist.com - my professor told us of this website where they take cool pictures using regular camera flashes. Just something fun to look at.