Photography Tips
Think about potential uses for your photographs before you take them. Many website uses now require horizontal images. Social media sites can require horizontal or square. Try to take a variety of photographs, if you plan to use them in a variety of ways.
Top 3 Tips:
- Take a lot of photos.
- Get close.
- Pay attention to the lighting.
Detailed Tips:
- The subject is the starting point for a photograph.
- As you think about your story, consider images that could help communicate your message, including photos of people involved. You may have access to a high-resolution image of the subject, but you may not. If you have access to a camera, you can take one using these tips.
- People sometimes are uncomfortable having their picture taken. You can have them hold something that is related, such as a book or other object, or you can have them rest their hand on a stair railing or fence.
- Another option is to think about a situation or item that communicates the concept or subject of the story.
- Take a minute to look at your subjects as you have put them into a setting. Is the person holding things that do not belong in the photo, such as a phone? Is the subject’s hair neat and shirt collar straight? Is the sun causing shadows from the subject’s nose, or making the subject squint?
- If the subject talks as you take photos, the face may be distorted. However, It can be good to get the person to laugh, and then take a photograph just as the laugh relaxes into a natural smile.
- As you think about your story, consider images that could help communicate your message, including photos of people involved. You may have access to a high-resolution image of the subject, but you may not. If you have access to a camera, you can take one using these tips.
- Lighting is a critical aspect to obtaining a good image. Often, we think of the setting first, but bad lighting can ruin a good setting, while good lighting can help a bad setting succeed.
- Dim lighting, bright overhead sunlight, office lighting (which can cast a blue, green or yellow tint) and a harsh direct flash used on a subject who is close to a white wall all can cause issues.
- To deal with this issue, you can try to take your photograph in diffused natural light. Shade under a tree can work, but sometimes the leaves let sun peek through, and one part of a person’s face is bright and another part dark — which causes issues. You want the lighting to be consistent on the subject.
- Stand back and look at how the light is falling on the face of your subject. If the strongest light is behind the subject, the person may become a silhouette and their features may be indistinct.
- Smart phones, particularly outdoors with natural light, can take high-resolution photos. However, the lower the lighting, the more your photo will look pixelated, or fuzzy.
- Take a picture. Look at it on your phone or on the camera back, and see if the lighting has caused issues.
- An example would be if the person is standing in front of a window with the bright light coming through the window behind them. The camera reacts to the bright light, and the person is darkened and you cannot distinguish their features. This often is the situation in an office. Counteract this by moving the person to where they are facing the window, and you and your camera or phone have the window behind you. That way, the light through the window puts light on the person’s face.
- Use a flash if you need to, but if you point the flash toward the window, it will bounce/reflect the light back at you.
- An example would be if the person is standing in front of a window with the bright light coming through the window behind them. The camera reacts to the bright light, and the person is darkened and you cannot distinguish their features. This often is the situation in an office. Counteract this by moving the person to where they are facing the window, and you and your camera or phone have the window behind you. That way, the light through the window puts light on the person’s face.
- It is also best not to take a photo in full, overhead sunlight. That leads to harsh shadows, because the longer aspects on a person’s face (nose, brow) cast shadows on the face. People also can end up squinting. If you must take images at that time of day, try to find a space with consistent shade or cover.
- If you use a direct flash (one that points straight at the subject), pull them as far away from light-colored walls as you can. Otherwise, they will have huge black shadows behind them.
- Dim lighting, bright overhead sunlight, office lighting (which can cast a blue, green or yellow tint) and a harsh direct flash used on a subject who is close to a white wall all can cause issues.
- Setting is an important consideration.
- If a particular setting is essential to telling the complete story – a lab, a library, a garden, a community space – then use that space.
- Remove or avoid distracting items – drink cans, power cords, people in the background, clutter on desks that is not part of the story.
- If any setting will do, choose one that gives you good lighting options and that has minimal visual distractions. Remember, the person or people are the reason for the photo, so the focus should be on them.
- If you have time, try several different settings, and use your setting(s) in different ways. A person leaning against the back of a couch or chair might be more comfortable and look better than the person sitting on the couch.
- Take A LOT of photographs to obtain a few good ones.
- Professional photographers often take hundreds or thousands of images to obtain a few of the very best. You do not have to take that many, but certainly you should take several.
- With a group, take even more than you do with one subject. Inevitably, someone is blinking, frowning, looking away, yawning, talking, laughing or moving. While you may just need one photo, it likely will take many shots to obtain that one image.
- For a portrait style photograph, tell your subject(s) to keep looking at you, even as things go on around them.
- If you are taking photos of people doing something, ask them to continue doing their task, as you move around them to get photographs.
- While you are taking the photos, think about a wide view, a medium view and even closeups of the objects involved in the work, if you think that can help tell the story. Take images from all these distances. If your camera equipment is unable to zoom, then you can do the zooming — simply by moving closer to the subject.
