When Beginners Snap Digital Photographs

So, You Want To Take Digital Photo's?

You find yourself attracted to the possibilities available with digital photography, but are just not certain how to begin. Allow me to reassure you that you have come to right place: This guide is intended to be an introduction for beginners like you to the ever changing world of digital photography.

A Quick Look at a little Photography history:

The world of photography has been continually evolving over the past 170 years or so. For the first 160 of those years every camera pretty much required the use of "wet" film. You would load a light-tight canister of film into your camera body, closing this canister behind another light-tight door. You would shoot according to the film type and light requirements and hope and pray you managed to get the right exposures, timing, and focus set. Then you would take the used (shot) film to a processing lab where they magically turn your canister of 24 frames into pictures by running the film strip through a "wet" chemical process of developer, bleach, and stabilizer. Nervous anticipation of the outcome was usually warranted; as light, film, and equipment can be a tricky coupling.

Today this wet process is virtually a thing of the past, with only the most traditional of photographers continuing to demand it. With the creation of the charged coupled device—(CCD) that which converts light waves into digital signals that can be stored in image form — the need for wet film and traditional photography is left far behind. Today we simply pop in a flash card or memry device and start shooting—well, you should take a peek at the viewing screen to make sure you get the shot you want. Even still, some have asked why has the change to digital photography been met with such high praise? The best answer I can offer you is this:

With the development of digital photography the world of art, design, technology, and photography itself, can now easily collide to make a spectacle of brilliant advancements toward a more comprehensive and richly conceived visual world.

Pictured at right, you find the original image taken of heavy shadows which fell across a piece of terracotta pottery conspicuously leaned on an old pile of junk. Struck by the contrast and character of the original shot, I saw more within the photo than just old pottery. I was able to create a pretty unique image by using a few easy techniques and image editing software. By multiplying the image, desaturating certain colors, and developing several layers, I was able to created the piece "SHADOWS" that you see here. This level of work can be completed after some time and after familiarizing yourself with your choice of image editing software. On occasion, you might be able to create something so special that it is worthy of being viewed and sold in a Gallery; and that is an awesome experience!

One of the highly regarded features of digital photography camera's is the fact that after taking a picture you can decide on the spot, whether you want to keep it, or delete it and try shooting the photo again. But, the top and most sought after advantage of digital photography has to be the fact that you can load your photos (images) onto your personal computer for storage, reporting, sharing, or for the real devoted photog's, enhancing the images however you wish. By utilizing image-editing software (like PhotoShop, illustrator, or for even Paint Shop Pro) you gain the advantage of controlling the fine details of your final image.

Some of the techniques that give you creative license are known as:

The technique of cropping involves selecting a smaller section of the entire image so you can remove (crop out) any of the background you don't want. All that remains in the finished image is the important main subject of the photo. Cropping can also help to better configure an image. By cropping close to the mushroom in the sample at above, the image takes on a greater degree of intensity, and is placed in dynamic configuration rather than directly at center. The mushroom is not located at center because this makes the image far more pleasing to an artistic eye. When configuring your crop, locating your subject in the top left center quadrant of the picture brings added movement and character that otherwise would not appear. More on photographic configurations in a later and separate article.

Taking a picture in different kinds of light can produce unusual colors in your pictures. For instance, fluorescent lights add a greenish tint, while indoor lights can make your pictures look orange. Also, some CCDs are able to reproduce certain color's more easily than others, making consistency between CCDs an issue to keep in mind when using your new found digital photography knowledge. I have found that the Fuji CCDs tend to offer a cooler or slightly greenish/yellow tone, while Nikon has a beautiful warm magenta tone feeling more natural in print. Which ever digital camera you use, the CCD will have its own trend in color tonality as well as general appearance. I am here to ease your mind though, by simply adjusting the levels of red, green, blue (RGB) -or- cyan, magenta, yellow, key (CMYK), you can dial in the color for a more naturally lit image using digital editing software.

When talking about the color palette of CMYK - the "k" refers to "key" or the color black.

When we talk about Photography, the "photo" portion of the word refers to light. If we shoot a picture with too little light we create images that are under exposed, and too much light becomes over exposed. This holds true in wet photography as well as digital photography. Where the difference arrives is in what we are able to do with the exposure after it has already been shot. In the wet film world, you're pretty much at the mercy of a long and ambitious process of burning and dodging your photo (burning and dodging is a difficult chemical and light exposure process used to activate in different degrees, and in separate positions, the light and reactive silver of the wet print process) which often leaves you with flat or inconsistent contrast resulting in "unnatural" looking finished prints. Ansel Adams was a master at burning and dodging, but not many traditional photographers are, and is why he became such an highly revered artist in the photography world. He may not have been the highest quality picture taker, but he absolutely understood the chemical process like no other. With an under or over exposed digital image you have options and outstanding image editing software to aid your process, and within far less time! By adjusting the brightness and increasing or reducing the contrast we can again create a finished picture that is more correctly representative of the actual lighting of the shot taken.

Built into image editing software are several types of special effects. You can add text in many font styles to any image, you can revise the tint of a picture making it sepia (like old fashion photos), add vignettes, create new backgrounds, add frames, combine many different pictures to make one, and even create your own cards for holidays.

The image at right has been completed using a single digital image of a leopard roaring behind a cyclone fence. By multiplying the background and fence texture, and then building layer after layer of information from the original leopard picture, a very interesting digital picture has been transformed into an expensive work of art costing over $4,000 when printed on canvas using pigmented high-art quality inks and nicely framed. It would seem that digital photography can offer more than holiday greetings when approached with talent, skill and experience. No matter how good the editing software, there is no doubt a great picture is always a great place to start.

As you can see with the visual instructional aides presented above, image editing software has many uses other than high-art and holiday greetings. It would be pretty easy to alter any of the pictures here for any number of articles on a broad range of topics. By simply revising the text and picture selections you create never ending possibilities. School projects, reports, business ads, letterhead, and billboards all are at your fingertips with a little practice. You are only limited by the manufacturers ability to produce and upgrade new image editing software and your personal willingness to learn and practice the digital photography craft from beginning to end.

STOP WAITING AROUND AND GET STARTED TAKING YOUR OWN DIGITAL IMAGES!