Queens Head, Yehliou, Taiwan

I’ve spent the past few days fighting off a cold which has meant the cameras haven’t really been out for awhile. So I’ve spent a bit of time playing around with a few textures. I’d originally had the intention of putting together a more detailed tutorial about the use of textures but ultimately decided against it. Why? Simply because Trey Ratcliff has already created the ultimate texture tutorial and so rather than try to reinvent the wheel, I’ll just send you over to his site where there’s a choice of three different texture tutorials. Click here to go to his tutorials.

Like any other photographic technique, textures are ripe for abuse. You can easily go too far and produce work that is quite ridiculous. In general, I prefer to use texture in a subtle way that doesn’t overpower the image. The Queen’s Head photograph above is an extreme example for me. More to my taste is the portrait below. There’s a hint of texture in it but it isn’t the main focus of the photograph.

Newari Man

One thing that texture should not be used for is to rescue an otherwise poor photograph. A lot of people tend to resort to some kind of tricks or special techniques to try to squeeze life out of photographs that simply don’t work. HDR is a prime example of this but there’s also black and white conversions, oversaturation, fake tilt-shift and so on. Not a day goes by where I don’t see a photo enthusiast post something online that uses these techniques that should never have seen the light of day. Texture should be used in order to enhance a photograph that is already strong rather than to salvage one that’s weak.

The image below was shot with the intention of using a texture in the processing. The location ultimately didn’t quite match what was in my mind so it’s sat unpublished until now. I want to share it now to highlight the point that it’s often better to have a plan before you shoot rather than simply winging it and relying on Photoshop techniques to save you.

China Girl

Textures do have their place in photography but like any other technique, they should be used as part of your overall vision not merely a crutch to lean on when things don’t work. Check out the tutorials and share your results with me. I’d love to see them.

One of the most useful skills a photographer can have is the ability to convey a sense of place to the viewer. This is particularly true for the travel photographer. For the professional, the photos are often required to sell a destination or illustrate a story. For the amateur, it might be to wow family and friends back home. What both have in common is the need to engage the viewer.

Tibetan cooks stand around a large vat of Tibetan butter tea, Bodhgaya, India. 2002

Like a story, a photograph can be considered successful if the viewer finds affinity with the subject matter. Conversely, apathy suggests that there’s nothing to draw the viewer in and engage their attention. As such, a photo which leaves the viewer feeling a sense of aloofness may be considered unsuccessful. One key way to draw the viewer’s attention is through travel portraiture, particularly the environmental portrait.

It’s often said that it’s the people you meet that make travel so special, and this is especially true in travel photography. For all the wonder that a beautiful sunrise, ancient ruin or stunning natural vista might evoke, nothing engages the viewer like a well executed portrait. Images of people can cut across the boundaries, bridge the differences and give us an insight into the lives of others, in ways that serve to remind us that people everywhere are essentially the same. Capturing a person in such a way is not always an easy task. Unlike candid photography, portrait photography implies a relationship of some kind between the photographer and the subject. This need not be a posed photograph (and many would argue it should not be, particularly a stiffly posed, expressionless subject), but instead the subject may at least be aware of the photographers presence. In this regard, the image becomes more of a collaborative effort where the subject seems less like a random stranger and more like a companion.

When we think of people photography, what often comes to mind are things like facial features, dress, makeup and posture. To the travel photographer in particular, the surroundings are just as vital in revealing the identity of the subject and establishing the sense of place. Items such as works of art, tools, religious artifacts, food and the wider location all assist in creating the essence of being there that we should be aiming to achieve in the viewer. So the question becomes, how does one achieve this?

Fruit vendor at work. Hanoi, Vietnam. 2003

For many, people photography is hard. For many travelers, people photography is the most difficult part of the journey. Having to deal with issues of language, customs, faux-pas and shyness just adds to the difficulty. In an ideal world, spending time in an area, getting to know people and creating a sense of comfort will be all it takes to be able to create images that convey the experience. In reality however, this is often not possible. When traveling we often find ourselves having to move quickly, thinking on our feet as we rush, or are rushed, from place to place.

Perhaps the most obvious point, but one which is often overlooked, is to know your camera. While you may not be able to do anything about the language barrier, or the crowds, or the weather, your camera is something you can and should take the time to master (or at least be familiar with) before you get anywhere near your destination or location. Knowing which settings to use, whether to make it a vertical or horizontal orientation, where to stand and so forth are all important steps you can take before approaching the subject. Nothing spells disaster more than fiddling with camera settings while you have a ready and willing subject.

Crucial to the successful environmental portrait is a connection. Connection between the photographer and subject, as well as the viewer. Sneaking around and trying to furtively take the photo kills any chance of a connection. Instead, a friendly, open manner on the part of the photographer will go a long way to establishing the all important initial connection with the subject.

Once we have established this initial connection, we have a lot more freedom to work. Unlike frame-filling portraiture where a medium telephoto lens is often used, environmental portraiture usually sees the photographer employ a wide angle lens. This allows us to move in very close and shoot both the person and their surroundings. Additionally, the shorter focal length allows us to handhold the camera at longer exposure times meaning we can use greater depth of field. This is often important because the surroundings are integral to the image and we may want everything to be in sharp focus.

The relationship between the person and the surroundings is all important. Objects that are close to the person and sharply focused often gives a sense of connectedness. There’s an intimacy within the photograph, a suggestion that the particular objects and the person are closely bound. The reverse is also true. Distance and/or shallow depth of field may convey a feeling of separation, or even alienation. As a photographer, how you position yourself in relation to the elements in the frame as well as the way you arrange them and the settings you choose to shoot with, is important in getting your vision across to the viewer. Your goal is to get the sense of connectedness between you and the subject across to the viewer and make them feel equally connected.

A slightly bored Indian banana-wallah. To me, this is an example of an image that lacks connectedness. Varanasi, India. 1997

Next time you’re out with your camera, or away on some travels, keep these ideas in mind and you’ll find that you come back with much stronger photographs as a result. Let me know any thoughts, ideas and successes you may have on the subject.

I recently received a request from a reader asking about some tips for taking photos in situations of low light, particularly when flash or tripods are not able to be used. Standards tips for this type of photography would be to use a fast lens. With lenses such as the 50mm f1.8 being so cheap, this is an easy solution. Other options usually include using an image stabilized lens, which, although more expensive, can give an extra 3-4 stops. Modern DSLRs boast excellent high ISO abilities with low noise – shooting in RAW at ISO1600-6400 can produce images that are easily acceptable for most peoples needs.  A further option is to rest the camera on some kind of support, be it a wall, box, chair or whatever. Not as good as a tripod but often a viable option. These tips are all commonly given and work well.

Oftentimes however, there’s another easy option, especially when there’s a willing subject, that can help improve the light of a photograph. Consider the photo below of Selina. Before you scroll past it to continue reading, spend a few moments trying to work out how it was lit. It did have a high ISO, in this case 3200, but I used a 70-200mm lens at f4 with a shutter speed of 1/125.  This is a straight RAW conversion without any Photoshop editing.

Selina shot at f4 1/200 ISO3200

So how is it lit? I didn’t use a flash, but the observant amongst you will notice that there is a catchlight in her eyes, so the light must be coming from somewhere. I did give the ambient lighting a little bit of help. Here’s another version but without the help I gave it.

Selina in the dark

We can see that it was very dark in this room. This used the same settings as the first image, that is ISO3200 f4 and a 1/125 shutter speed. The trick in this case was sitting on the table in front a me. Take a look.

Selina holding a napkin as an improvised reflector. ISO3200 f4 1/125

This was taken between sets at the BoPoMoFo gig last weekend. A paper napkin/serviette that was on the table made for a quick and easy DIY reflector which bounced enough light back into Selina’s face to make the shot work. The light is just the regular ceiling lights over the table.

So there you have it. Take a look around you next time you’re shooting photos in a dark environment. You never know what a difference it could make.

I hope this little tip is useful to some of you. If it is, drop a note in the comments and share it with your friends. I’d especially like to hear from anyone who guessed what was used before they saw the answer.

As a reminder to anyone interested, I’m still taking bookings for Light Your World lighting workshop. It’s only NT$2000 if you book and pay before the end of the month. There aren’t many places left, so get in quick. Thank you.

Introduction

As a photographer, what do you do after the sun has set? For some, that might be time to pack up, head to a bar and have a couple of drinks. Others may prefer to head home and upload their days photographs to a photo sharing website or blog. However, the setting sun doesn’t mean the end of the photography day. With a couple of simple preparations you can continue shooting into the night. Right through the night if you’re keen. So let’s take a look at night photography and see what’s what.

Equipment

In terms of photo gear needed, as long as you have a suitable camera and tripod you’re good to go. What do I mean by suitable camera? Well, you’re going to have longer exposure times at night than you would in the daylight, so you need a camera that can cope with this. As long as your camera a range of slow shutter speeds (1 second to 30 seconds) you’ll be fine. If the camera as a “B” or bulb setting, even better, as this will allow you to shoot exposures of longer than 30 seconds if need be. Most older manual exposure cameras and modern DSLR’s will be perfectly equipped for night photography, as will many modern digicams. If you’re unsure whether your camera can do it, check the manual.

Longer exposure times means you require some way to get the camera stable. Handholding is not possible as you will get noticeable camera shake in your pictures. So you’re going to need a tripod.

10 second exposure – this wouldn’t be possible without a good tripod.

If you take some care in your initial tripod purchase, it can be the only tripod you’ll ever need to buy. One of the biggest mistakes people make is buying a cheap tripod that isn’t sturdy enough. And they often don’t find out that it isn’t sturdy enough until after the pictures have been taken, by which time it may be too late to re-take them. Avoid buying plastic tripods, instead aim for aluminum (cheaper and heavier), titanium, magnesium alloy or carbon fiber (more expensive but lighter). Spending a little extra money upfront can save you in the long run. Manufacturers such as Manfrotto/Bogen, Gitzo, Slik and Giottos all make great tripods but they are by no means the only ones. The tripod will have a head to hold the camera secure. Typically you have a choice of either pan/tilt or ball heads. Pan and tilt heads move left/right and up/down whereas ball heads have fluid movement in any direction. Both have advantages and disadvantages – I personally prefer to use a ball head but try both out before you make your purchase.

One further piece of equipment that is handy to have is some kind of remote release. Once you have the camera mounted on your sturdy tripod, the last thing you want to do is introduce shake by pressing down on the shutter release. There are a number of ways to trip the shutter remotely. The simplest method is the cameras own self-timer, although this won’t work on bulb setting. Setting the timer to 10 seconds (usually the default) will allow any small vibrations caused by your touch to settle down before the picture is taken. A better option is to use a wired (cheaper) or wireless (more expensive) release. There are proprietary releases made by the camera manufacturers, cheap third party releases and professional solutions available here. Choose whichever best fits your budget and needs.

Technique

So there you are. Standing outside somewhere at night, camera on tripod, remote release in hand and wondering what to do. Set your camera to its lowest ISO, usually ISO100 or 200. Pick an aperture that will give you some depth of field but won’t make for dramatically long exposure times. F5.6 is probably a good starting point, although you could open up to f4 or stop down to f8 depending on the scene. With the camera is Av mode, take a shot and see what it looks like. Viewing the resulting image on the LCD screen will give you an idea as to how accurate the exposure is. In-camera meters can sometimes get fooled or become inaccurate at night, so don’t worry if your photo is overly bright or dark. If your exposure time falls within the range of roughly 1/30 to 2 seconds, you make experience some slight shake from the mirror-slap. If your camera has a mirror lock-up (MLU) feature, enable it. For exposures longer than 2 secs, mirror shake is negligable, so MLU is not critical as many night shots are going to be longer than 2 seconds.

With your first test image as your guide, make adjustments accordingly. If you got close on the test shot, you could try adjusting the exposure compensation dial on your camera. Dialing in +/- 1EV may be all you need. Otherwise, change the exposure mode from Av to M, set your aperture as desired and take a range of different exposures, adjusting the shutter speed as need be. Don’t worry too much about what the camera’s meter says – at this point you’re just experimenting to get an optimum exposure for your vision. Camera meters are great, but they can’t read your mind. The look you’re going for may well be different than a “normal” exposure. And remember the warning above about nighttime inaccuracies.

A critical, and often overlooked factor in night photography is focusing. Simply put, the darker it is, the harder it is for the camera’s autofocus to properly lock onto the subject. Being dark, it’s also difficult to see well enough through the viewfinder for accurate manual focusing, especially if the lens is stopped down for greater DOF. Fortunately, there are a couple of methods available to make things easier.

If there are point light sources at a similar distance as the subject you’re shooting, you can try focusing on one of these brighter spots, lock the focus and recompose as necessary. As I’ve mentioned in other tutorials, the center focus point is often the most sensitive, so make sure you’re using it. On nights when there’s a moon, you can aim your camera and autofocus on it, then recompose your shot with the focus locked. This will establish your focus at infinity. The most recent crop of DSLRs offer live view modes that allow accurate manual focusing using the rear LCD rather than the viewfinder. If you have one of these cameras give that a go.

Flash

I can hear you wondering, “It’s dark. Why can’t I just use a flash?” Well you can. And you can’t. Indoors, with walls and ceilings, the light from the flash has plenty to bounce off and reflect back into the scene. No problem. Outdoors however, and it’s a different story. With only the sky above we have no ceiling to bounce the light from. The most powerful hotshoe flash will only light a small area at close distances so anything more than a few meters away will remain dark. So in most instances, a flash is not going to do us any good.

Most instances is not all instances and there are times when we can make use of a flash outdoors at night. Earlier we talked about long exposures of multiple seconds. Great for buildings that tend to remain still but not so useful for people. It’s close to impossible for the average person to remain perfectly still for 1 second, so if we need a 30 second exposure to get enough light, our person is going to be a blur. Without getting into a long discussion on flash photography, the ambient light is governed by our shutter speed (hence the need for long exposures) but flash is controlled by the aperture. So we can make a multi-second exposure of the background and pop off a small burst of flash to freeze the person we are taking a picture. The 1/1000 or so of a second the flash fires for is enough to light the foreground subject but doesn’t alter the background. (This 1/1000 is roughly the duration of the flash firing, it’s nothing you need to set.) You may need to make sure you’re in M mode for this, as some cameras won’t allow long exposure times in Av when there’s a flash connected. Done properly, we get a nice, sharp well-lit portrait with our night scene in the background. Like so.

By following the steps above, you can make great night photos. In a future post, I’ll be giving some specific examples of different images and how they were made, so stay tuned. In the meantime get out there and give it a try. Email your best shots to the submissions desk and I’ll feature them here in a future post.

How many times have you returned from a vacation, looked at your photos and been underwhelmed? Have you ever wondered how to make great travel photos? Well read on after the jump because I’m about to give you a few tips that will take your travel photography from good to great.

1. Before You Leave.

Great travel photography starts at home. Before you head off on vacation there are a few things you can do to ensure your photographs are the envy of your friends. Firstly, make sure you are familiar with your camera. It’s not uncommon for someone to buy a new camera right before leaving on a trip. If you plan to do this, try and give yourself a few days to get comfortable using it and learn what all the controls are for. At the very least, spend an hour or two around your house or in a local park taking a few shots with different settings.

Some pre-travel research is also recommended. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a family vacation or a highly paid photo assignment – the more you know about a place, the better your pictures will be. Spend some time on the net looking at pictures from your destination. This will give you an idea of the type of things you can expect to see. Take note of the direction features are facing. Is that cool looking building on the beach facing east or west? Look up the sunrise and sunset times – prime times for photography, known as “Golden Hour”, when the light is soft and warm. Find out if there’s a tourist office in the area and write down its address. Tourist offices are handy for maps and other local knowledge.

There are countless other small details that could be an article in themselves. Make sure you have freshly charged batteries and plenty of memory cards or film. Check that the various plugs for your battery charger and so forth are compatible with the power source at your destination – you may need to buy adaptors if you travel to a different country. Find out whether permits are required for any locations, or whether photography is banned in certain places such as museums. Plan a backup strategy – do you have a second camera, even if it’s just a cell phone? Things can go wrong, and if you drop your camera into the ocean on the first day of your holiday you won’t be taking many pictures if you don’t have a backup. The more you travel, the better you will be able to anticipate these things and they’ll become second nature.

2. On Location.

So now you’ve done all the pre-departure planning and preparation and are at your destination. How do you go about making great photos? As mentioned above, the time around sunrise and sunset is ideal for photography, particularly landscapes, scenics and wildlife. The light is soft and golden, the animals are active and, at sunrise at least, there aren’t too many people getting in the way. Try and plan to get out at these times if possible – you’ll be glad you did when you see the results. Also remember that for 30 minutes or so after the sun goes down there is often an “afterglow”, where there is still color in the sky. Many people pack up and head to the bar as soon as the sun sets. Give yourself an extra half hour and you’ll get some of the best light of the day – ideal for skylines, lighted monuments and cityscapes. If you’re near a body of water, the reflections will last as long as the light in the sky.

3. Rule Of Thirds.

Following a couple of simple rules can take your photography to a higher level. The most basic rule of thumb is the “rule of thirds”. It states that an image should be imagined as being nine equal parts, formed by two equally spaced vertical lines and two equally spaced horizontal lines. This forms a grid three parts wide and three parts high. If you can place the main subject of your photo on the intersection of these lines, it’ll naturally create a more interesting composition than merely placing the subject dead center. It’s important to remember that it doesn’t have to be exact – near enough is good enough.

4. Shooting People.

One of the most common shortcomings in travel photography is a lack of people pictures. Landscapes and monuments are fine but can become a little boring to friends and family back home, whereas photos are people are a lot more engaging and interesting when viewed at a later date. The biggest obstacle to photographing people is shyness – we often don’t want to approach someone to take their photo. A good place to start is with pictures of the people you interact with – waiters, taxi drivers, vendors and so forth. If there’s a local festival taking place, you’ll find that people are relaxed and happy which makes it much easier to get some good photos of people.

There are two main ways to photograph people and end up with strong photos. One is the environmental portrait, which includes the person and the immediate surroundings in the frame. If you take a photo of a waiter for example, an environmental portrait might show him serving plates of food or drinks to a table; a taxi driver may include all or part of the taxi.

The other method is to “fill the frame”. Here, you make the subject the only thing in the photo, completely filling the frame which means that all of the viewers attention is one the person in the photo. The most important thing to remember here is that the eyes need to be in sharp focus – if the eyes are sharp, everything else can be soft and it’ll still look good. For more tips on people photography, take a look at my earlier tutorial post Ten Tips For People Photography.

5. Final Thoughts.

Travel photography doesn’t need to be difficult. By following the above tips, you can transform the photos from your next vacation into something your friends and family will want to look at time and time again.

More often than not, it’s the people you meet that make travel truly memorable. It’s also the photographs of people that usually get the best reaction from family and friends when you return home. So without further ado – 10 tips for better people photography.

Bonus Intro Tip – Common to all genres of photography are three things. Correct exposure, correct white balance and sharp focus. Getting these right is essential. No amount of Photoshop trickery can replace these three basic points. Ensure you’re competent in these before you learn anything else.

1.Focus Points – One is better than many.

Modern digital cameras have a number of focus points that helps the autofocus lock on to the subject. For portrait photography, having a large number of points can be more a hindrance than a help. When using all the points, the camera will make a guesstimate based on the average of all the points. Sometimes this will work well, sometimes it won’t and you’ll be left with your subject out of focus and something in the background/foreground in focus. Not what you want. Instead, select one focus point only – usually done with a dial on the camera, check your manual for how to set it. The center point is the strongest, so use that one to lock your focus on what you want, not what the camera thinks you want.

2.Focus On The Eyes

I’ve mentioned this  before – the eyes are the most important part of a portrait. If they are sharp and in focus, the rest of the picture can be out of focus and it’ll still look good. Point the center focus point from 1. at the eyes, lock the focus and then recompose as necessary.

3. Shoot At Large Apertures

The aperture or f-stop is what controls the amount of light reaching the sensor. A large aperture is, sometimes confusingly, the smallest f-number. F2.8 is a larger f-stop than f16. It lets more light in, and has a shallower depth-of-field. When we set the aperture to its widest (eg f2.8), it’s known as shooting wide open. It gives a pleasing out-of-focus effect (bokeh) in the background away from the critical point, which results in pleasing portraits. The viewers’ eye is directed to the subject not the background.

4. Shoot At 70mm or Longer

At shorter focal lengths than 70mm, distortion starts to occur. It’s not really noticeable until you are below 50mm so you have a bit of leeway. If you shoot a frame-filling portrait with a wide-angle lens, your subject’s head is going to look strangely large due to the distortion. The classic portrait lengths are between 80mm and 135mm but anything from 70mm to 200mm will look good.

5. Shoot RAW

There’s really no point buying a DSLR or high-end digicam if you then go and do all your shooting in JPG. Shooting in RAW captures all the image data. Shooting in JPG means you are throwing away all but the basic data. If you make any kind of error while shooting, you can often still get usable images out of a RAW file. If you try and edit a JPG, you’ll just make things worse. If your white balance is off (or you want to creatively change it), you can with RAW. You can’t with JPG. A RAW file will be 12 or 14 bit. JPG is 8 bit. And so on.

6. Shoot In The Shade

The last place you want to be shooting is in direct sunlight. It’s harsh, it creates hard, directional shadows and it’s not at all flattering to your subject. Move into the shade and you’ll get smooth, even shadows and softer light.

7. Cloudy Days Are Your Best Friend

Professional studio photography spend hundreds and thousands of dollars on softboxes, umbrellas and other light modifiers in an effort to create soft, even light. Nature also provides soft light and best of all, it’s free. Cloudy, overcast days are the people photographers best friend. Cloud cover can help enrich the colors and create smooth, flattering shadows.

8. Learn Sunny 16

Sunny 16 is a rule of thumb for determining exposure. It’ll give you a baseline to work with. Sunny 16 simply says that on a sunny day, with your aperture value set to ƒ16, your shutter speed will be the inverse of the current ISO speed. For example, if your camera is set to ISO 100, and your aperture value is ƒ16, your shutter speed will be 1/100th of a second. On a cloudy day (or when in the shade) you simply use ƒ8 instead.

9. Watch Your Background

Pay attention to what’s going on around the edges of the frame. The last thing you want is trees or power poles appearing to grow out of your subjects head, or power lines coming from their ears. The internet is full of funny picture websites that show people in the background making funny faces, mooning or giving the finger behind the subject. Don’t let your photo turn into something like that.

10. Never, Ever Use On-Camera Flash

Probably the worst possible thing you can do when taking a photo of a person (or anything for that matter) is to use on-camera flash. This can not be repeated enough. National Geographic photographer Joe McNally says it best, “Straight flash is disaster light. Use it at 3:00am, with bodies on the highway and nothing to bounce off”. It is the most unflattering light – you are literally throwing light at the subject and instead of making a photograph, you’re making a copy. Doing something as simple as holding the flash at arms length in your left hand while holding the camera in your right hand can make all the difference.

So there we have it. Ten simple tips for improving your people shots while you are traveling. Get out there and give these tips a go and you’ll see a marked improvement in your pictures in no time at all. Happy shooting.

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A couple of weeks ago, Mark Forman posted a new photoessay at his site that feature gritty, urban type post processing. Quite a few people are interested in this type of look, so I decided to create a tutorial that outlines the steps you can take to achieve a similar result.

Starting with our RAW file, we import it into Lightroom or Photoshop. Both use the same RAW processing engine and have the same controls. My screenshot below is from Lightroom, but you can use the same settings in Adobe Camera RAW in Photoshop. I always recommend shooting RAW but for those who insist on throwing away image data and shooting JPG, you can apply the same settings on your files.

The first step is to adjust the Recovery, Fill Light, Contrast, Clarity and Vibrance to +100.

Then, drag the Saturation slider all the way to the left (-100) and slowly ease it back until the color starts to appear. In this case, that was -76. Next, adjust the Blacks to balance the photo – setting the Fill Light to +100 will make it look washed out. Finally, adjust the Exposure slider if necessary and add a vignette in the vignette panel to darken the edges.

You may find that it makes peoples skin appear overly sharp – if that’s the case, you may want to soften the skin. Open the image in Photoshop, hit CTRL/CMD – J to duplicate the layer, apply a Gaussian blur of 20 (Filter>Blur>Gaussian) and lower the opacity to around 50%.  Click the Layer Mask icon at the bottom of the Layers palette, get the Brush tool, choose a soft-edged brush, and then paint over the skin, while avoiding the eyes, eyebrows, lips, teeth, nostrils, hair—-these are details areas you want to keep sharp.

Here are a couple more examples. At the end of the post, there’s a Lightroom Develop preset that’ll apply the basic settings with a single click. Feel free to download it and use it if you are a Lightroom user. To install, simply open Lightroom and go to the Develop module. In the Presets panel, right click and choose Import to import the preset.

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This week on 5 we’re going to look at a few tips for creating photo essays. Humans are naturally drawn to stories and with a little planning, you can create your own photo essay that will wow family, friends and strangers. A photoessay is simply a series of photographs put together that tell a story. So let’s look at creating one.

1. Choose A Topic

The first step is to decide what it is you want to present to the world. A photoessay doesn’t need to be hard-hitting news stories, or documentary photos of the rich and famous. It can be anything, from some local history, to a travel feature, to a relatives birthday, to a trip to a new restaurant. The key is that is has to be interesting to you.

Photoessays will typically fall within one of two categories – narrative or thematic. Narrative photoessays present a series of images in chronological order showcasing a person or activity over time, whereas thematic essays focus on a theme and show photographs relative to that theme. The following image is from a thematic type photo essay “Cambodia’s Forgotten Kingdom“.

2. Research

Once you’ve decided on your topic and its style, it’s time to do some research. Talk to some local historians if you’re focusing on local history, interview family members if the story is about them, read articles and guidebooks if you are doing a travel essay, talk to the chef and waiters if you’re looking at restaurants. Anything that’s related to your topic can be used as a point of research. In my look at Cosplay, I took a single cosplay event and looked into the history of the subculture to give me some extra ideas.

3. The Real Story

After you’ve done some research, you’re now ready to start planning out your photoessay. Go beyond the basics and look for an angle to draw the viewer in. Is there some connection between your hometown and the exotic travel destination you’ve decided to shoot? Does the new restaurant use locally produced produce? Is your family member celebrating a successful achievement or battling a disease? Looking further into the story can help broaden its appeal and make it speak on a deeper level.

4. Find The Emotion

Successful photo essays have one thing in common – emotion. They provoke an emotional response in the viewer. Fear. Joy. Anger. Sorrow. Conveying the emotion in the first images is essential in order to hook the viewer and make them want to keep looking. This is often the most difficult part of the essay, as everyone will react differently. In the photo below, KMT supporters celebrate as their candidate Ma Ying-jeou is declared winner of the 2008 presidential elections in Taiwan.

5. Plan Your Shots And Presentation.

The final point relates to both the shots you take and the way you lay the essay out. Before shooting, walk around the area, pre-visualize any shots you might want to include and look around for both small details and large, mood-setting type images. When laying out the essay, aim to start with a powerful lead photo that draws the viewer in, a second photo that describes the general scene or theme, portrait and action shots if people are present should come next, followed by finer details, closeups and the like. Finally, use a summing up type photo as the penultimate image to wrap the story up, and finish with a clincher photo, designed to leave your viewer with the emotion you want them to walk away with such as the following one from the pod village at San-zhr.

My friend Kenneth of Investor Blogger and Obblogatory recently requested some basic Photoshop tutorials. Perhaps the best place to start is with a tutorial on Levels. Make sure you click on the images for a larger version – the small ones don’t fully show the details and color.

For most people, the main objective after the picture has been taken is to either have it look good for posting on Flickr or sending as email, or to make an inkjet print at home, or a print at a photolab. The first thing you need to do is to adjust the tonal range so that the photo has a good, full contrast. In general, the biggest concern will be how light or dark the photo is – are the blacks black and the whites white? And for that, we can look at Levels in Photoshop. So lets start with an image that needs some adjustment.

[singlepic id=153 w=500]

We can see that this shot is a little underexposed and lacks contrast. If we look at the histogram display, we see that all the values are over towards the left. The histogram is a graph that displays the tonal levels from dark (black) on the left to light (white) on the right. The graph will look different for every different photo – there’s no such thing as an ideal, one-size-fits-all histogram. In general though, we want to see our graph spaced over the entire histogram, not bunched to the left like the following screenshot.

[singlepic id=154 w=500]

To fix things, we want to go to our Layers palette (F7) and create a Levels adjustment layer, as shown below. We can make the same adjustments directly onto the image without using Layers, but this is destructive – we permanently change the pixels. Using Layers means that we can non-destructively adjust the image without permanently changing pixels. This allows us to revisit the image in the future and make further adjustments as we desire without degrading the image. Non-destructive editing is always a better choice than destructive editing – it’s one of the reasons why we shoot RAW instead of jpg, assuming our camera is capable of it.

[singlepic id=156 w=500]

This will bring up the Levels dialog. To improve the tonal range, we want to use the highlight slider (shown below) and drag it to the left. For finer control, hold down the option/alt (Mac/PC) key while you click on the slider to see exactly where the highlights pop out.

[singlepic id=158 w=500]

You want to drag it closer to where the tonal values are on the histogram.

[singlepic id=159 w=500]

And now do the same with the shadow slider, located on the left. Again, you can hold down Option/Alt for finer control.

[singlepic id=160 w=500]

Once things look good, click ok in the Levels dialog. Notice the difference in both the image and the resulting histogram.

[singlepic id=155 w=500]

You can now save the file as a TIFF or PSD which allows you to preserve the layer structure. As mentioned above, this lets us revisit the file in the future. To make changes it’s simply a matter of double-clicking the adjustment layer icon in the Levels layer.

[singlepic id=157 w=500]

To save it as a jpg for print or the web, simply flatten or merge the layers (Cmd/Ctrl-Shift-E) or choose the option from the Layer menu at the top of the screen.

And there we have it – our finished image. Or, our image that’s ready for any further editing we wish to do.

[singlepic id=152 w=500]

With the lunar new year fast approaching, one thing you can count on seeing over the next couple of weeks is fireworks. Also, for those of you who live in Chinese cultures, the lantern festival takes place two weeks later. So how do you go about photographing fireworks?

Well, the good news is that it’s quite easy but there are a few things you’ll need. First, make sure that you have a camera that can be operated manually. Look for a “B” or bulb setting. You’ll also want to be able to focus manually. If you leave autofocus on and try to take photos like that, it’ll just hunt for something to lock onto in the black sky and you won’t get anything. Once you have the camera, you’ll need a sturdy tripod. This is a must as we are going to have exposure times of a few seconds and any camera shake will ruin the picture. Some kind of remote release is required as well. It doesn’t matter if it’s wired or wireless, as long as it’ll let you trip the shutter without needing to touch the camera.

1 second @ f11. ISO 100

It doesn’t matter how many auto modes your camera has. All those little icons of flowers and mountains are useless for fireworks. With your lens set to MF, focus on something in the distance. Once you are happy, recompose so that the camera is pointing to the area of sky where the fireworks will be but make sure you don’t change the focus. You may not need to do this if you are in an area with buildings, bridges etc. For the above photo, I focused on the red bridge.

With your ISO set to 100, shutter set to B, aperture between f8 and f16 and remote release in hand you are ready. Selecting an aperture between f8 and f16 gives you plenty of depth-of-field, and the shutter at B allows you to leave the shutter open for as long as you like. Press and hold the release button once to start the exposure and let go to stop it. A little trial and error may be required, so take as many shots as you can, with differing shutter times. If you can see the place where the fireworks are being launched from, you could try opening the shutter when you see the launch and closing it when the firework goes out. Or, you could leave it open and catch a few bursts of fireworks on the same exposure – hold a black card in front of the lens between bursts to cut down on any stray light.

7 seconds @ f11 ISO 100

Good luck and remember to stay safe and warm when you’re out photographing fireworks on these cold winter nights.