If you want to a really good photographer, buying better cameras and photography gear isn’t enough. You need to improve your photography skills too! Firstly, you need to practice and take a lot pictures. The most effective way is to use little tricks and tips that are real game changers. Here are 20 easy photography tricks.
1. Hold up.
Hold the part where the shutter button is with your right hand. Place the left hand under the lens and keep your elbows close together to reduce camera shake. Make your that you stand with your legs open to keep the balance. Moreover, you should hold the camera as close to you as possible.
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2. Raw is better.
Use the RAW format in your camera. This is the least processed form of the pictures. I know it sounds like a bad thing but it isn’t; this format allows much more freedom in editing compared to the JPEG formats. A picture has four times more pixels when you shoot it in the RAW format!
3. Mix it up.
Try different modes, especially aperture priority and manual mode. They give you more control over your pictures as you can play with the shutter speed, aperture and exposure. If you just use the automatic mode for photography, it will get boring and you will never learn to control the settings according to the situation
4. Beautiful blur.
Take a black paper, cut a random shape in the middle. It can be a star, heart or even a square, just be creative. Now tape the black paper on the lens and take pictures of a bunch of lights or bulbs. Voila! You have created a bokeh of your desired shape.
5. All shadows are not spooky.
You can use a tea or vegetable strainer for this. Hold it up in front of a light source and take a picture of yourself in front of that light. This way you can great beautiful shadow patterns on your face in a very cheap, even free technique!
6. Technology in disguise.
Open up a picture of your desired background and place your mini subject in front of your laptop screen. Now, put something black on the keyboard that can act like a smooth base. Finally, take a picture of your object with a fancy background
7. Light box.
You can make your own light room effect by pasting white paper on a glass window. Use this during the day so that the paper is backlit because of the sun. This is a fun and cheap way to make your pictures look professional.
8. CD lens flare.
If you tilt a CD around your camera lens, in some angles it produces very pretty glares. These glares give the images a more aesthetic vibe and it does not even require a lot of time and effort. By using the CD, I mean the back holographic side, not the printed one of course.
9. Heavy Metal.
Scrunch up some pieces of aluminum foil and paste them on a wall. Take pictures of the subject in front of this background for a very cool silver and bokeh-ed photo effect. Especially when the aperture is high and the background is blur.
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10. Find the golden hour.
Golden hour is the time right after sunrise and right before the sunset. Portraits in this light are beautiful. So, try to take pictures at those times of the day so that the skin of the subject looks like it’s glowing.
11. Capture flowing water.
Increase the shutter speed in your camera when taking pictures of water bodies, especially streams. You need a tripod for these pictures. Since, you can’t hold the camera still for that long and don’t want blurry pictures. Using a longer shutter speed will capture the movement of water and capture soft dreamy water streaks.
12. For old times sake.
Not all pictures pull of the black and white effect. Usually softer pictures with very few harsh edges look better in black and white. It gives them a mysterious and intense look. It is very important to balance between the blacks, whites and greys properly.
13. Get a tripod.
For a lot of cool pictures, especially those which need to capture movement and night life, the camera needs to be very still. This is why you need tripod because in longer shutter speeds, slight movements are much exaggerated and can ruin a picture.
14. Make one instead.
If it is not possible for you to buy a tripod, you can make a do-it-yourself tripod. It is cost effective and quick. There are many different ways to make your own tripod so just try the one which is convenient for you. If you do the right kind of advertising, you can even make and sell
15. Light trails.
You can make patterns, shapes and words by using a light, which can be a flash light or sparklers. All you have to do is set your camera on a tripod, increase the shutter speed to maximum and tell someone to repeatedly make the same shape with their light source till the shutter clicks. It captures the object motion and you can see the light trails. on the screen.
16. Too flashy.
Although, it is absolutely necessary to use flash, it is better to avoid it. Mainly when taking portraits. It usually over exposes the subject. There are still ways to make the flash less harsh, for example by holding a white plastic bag in front of it or attaching a black foam paper to its bottom.
17. Repeatin’
Look for repetitive patterns and photograph them. The outcomes are usually very satisfying and attractive to look at. These pictures can be very vibrant, like a photo of umbrellas or dull like a photo of an old building with many small windows. Nevertheless, pictures with repetitive patterns are high appreciated on social media. There are many other ways to create desirable images for social media.
18. High angle shots.
A picture of your food can look very appealing using a high-shot angle. This means that the picture is from an overhead angle so that it creates more impact. This way you can see all the items that are there in the frame and nothing gets blurred out. This type of photography is usually done in food blogs making the content more attractive.
19. The 1/3 rule.
You know that grid on your camera’s live view? Yeah, it’s not useless. The one-third rule suggest that if you place your subject at the point where the two lines intersect, it brings more attention to the subject. It is a common misunderstanding that you should place your subject in the middle box of the grid.
20. My name is blurry face.
A picture looks more appealing when the background has less or no noise so that the focus in on the subject. This can be done by setting a big aperture, which is a lower f value. In a 18-55 mm lens, the lowest f value is still not low enough to create good background blur. A great lens for this is the 55 mm portrait lens.
Every photographer and blogger should know these easy and small camera tricks which sometimes give astounding results. The best part is, you can use a lot of these hacks using your phone camera too.
