Self Por trait in Ottawa
A lot of you have been ask ing me ques tions about pho tog ra phy and how to achieve cer tain effects. While I’m by no means an expert, I’m an avid photog ra pher and I had to chance to exper i ment a lot. I’m also always a teacher at heart and yes, I like talk ing about pho tog ra phy, because I’m sure I can give you some tips and learn from you as well.
So I decided to start the Sat ur day Series again, this time with a focus on pho tog ra phy. A new “les son” will be pub lished every Sat ur day, for a total or ten posts. Enjoy the “Ten Pho tog ra phy Tips”!
Alright, let’s be hon est: yes, I edit all my pic tures. Doesn’t mean I do much though. First, my editing skills aren’t that devel oped, sec ond, I like my pic tures to look nat ural. Indeed, photo edit ing is an art in itself and plenty of pho tog ra phers spent hours devel op ing new tech niques or fol low ing pro cess ing fads.
While exces sive edit ing can not suc cess fully mask improper tech niques and poor pho tog ra phy, a lit tle edit ing can dra mat i cally improve your pictures.
Crop ping — Some thing, all you need a lit tle bit of crop ping to reveal a great pic ture. Trim off the excess, remove the dis trac tions in the back ground and cut down to your main point of focus. You can either keep set dimen sions or get a bit cre ative, it’s up to you. Vir tu ally all main edit ing software have a crop ping func tion, includ ing Flickr (where you can edit with pic tures with Piknik) andPicasa (which is free).
 The orig i nal pic |  Tada! Cropped… looks better |
Color Bal ance —Color bal ance is the global adjust ment of the inten si ties of the col ors. Basi cally, some times the cam era doesn’t ren der the col ors the way they are because of the color of the light sources: some light bulbs add a yel low color, bright sun makes every thing looks warm, shade turns thing blue-ish etc. The camera’s auto white-balance sys tem is eas ily mis taken. For tu nately, on most cam eras, you can chose a white bal ance man u ally with set tings such as “cloudy’, “sunny”, “flu o res cent” etc. and the cam era will com pen sate accord ingly. You can also cor rect the color bal ance when edit ing your pic tures and even play with it.
 The orig i nal pic ture looks reddish |  After bal anc ing col ors, lost the red hue |
Straight en ing — Like I explain last week, crooked shots are one of my pet peeve. It’s very easy to set the hori zon set in pic tures if you for got to do it while shoot ing. Sim ply align and rotate the pic ture, and crop a bit if needed. Once again, this is easy to do with the main edit ing soft wares, such as Pho to shop, Light room, Picasa etc.
 Mmm… Bit crooked! |  Straighter! |
Adjust the Expo sure — When the expo sure is too short, pic tures look dark. If the expo sure is too long, the pic ture looks too bright. You can adjust the expo sure man u ally on most cam eras (look for the “+” or “-“ but tons). You can also cor rect it at the edit ing stage. Warn ing: this can get tricky, so bet ter get this expo sure right when tak ing pictures!
 This sun set is overexposed |  A more dra matic sun set after adjustments |
Cor rect Red Eyes — Ah, the evil red eye… while it cer tainly add some Hal loween flavour to your por traits, your sub jects may not like it (eh, not every body wants to be an evil vam pire!). The red eye effect occurs when you use the flash: the bright light passes into the eyes of your sub ject through the pupil and reflects. It looks red because of the blood in your eyes. The best way to avoid this effect is to either use ambi ent light or to have the sub ject look away. When edit ing, you will notice numer ous soft ware allow you to remove the red eye effect and make your sub ject look human again. They will thank you, for sure.
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