Capturing Wedding Memories With Wedding Photography

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When planning out the details of a wedding, securing the services of a good wedding photographer is something that should not be overlooked. Years from the wedding date, the photos will allow you to vividly look back on the day and relive some of those happy emotions. Wedding photography helps to capture what might be one of the most important events in a couple’s life. The photographer does more than just take standard shots of the wedding party, including shots of just the bride and groom as well as group shots. In fact, wedding photographers capture candid moments and feelings of romance during the wedding and reception. Since the wedding day usually involves a ceremony and a reception, the wedding photographer should be booked for both of the day’s events. This enables the bride and groom to have photos of the ceremony as well as photos with friends and family after the ceremony and throughout the reception.

At some weddings, the photographers even bring the wedding guests into the fun and let them be the photographers. This is done by placing disposable cameras on each table for the reception. This gives the bride and groom some really unique wedding photos because they are shot from the perspective of the guests. It can really give the bride and groom an idea of how everyone else was celebrating their union since they can’t be everywhere at once during the reception.  Of course, the professionals continue to take wedding photos as well, which gives the bride and groom a nice mix of professional and amateur wedding photos.

Regardless of whether all the wedding photos are by the pros, or if your guests help out during the reception, you are certain to have plenty of photos to look back on. You can even enlist a family member or friend as a backup photographer to get twice as many memories captured.

Brandis Alves is a Minneapolis Wedding Photographer.

The Image That Promotes The Brand

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If somebody would ask me to name three things off the top of my head when I hear the term “Tory Burch”, I would probably say ‘shoes’, the ‘golden emblem’ and ‘good looking woman’. That’s actually interesting and another good example of how the human brain associates certain images with certain terms. When I hear somebody mentioning the name, I can’t help but thinking of the “Tory Burch Reva”, a picture of the designer smiling to the camera and the emblem that probably 50% of my female colleagues here at work proudly display on their handbags or shoes.  

Tory Burch RevaNow all of that would not be worthwhile talking about, but the truth of the matter is that I’m a 40 year old male who has as much interested in fashion as Keith Richard has in a glass of warm milk. But the bottom line is because my daughters are both into fashion and clothing it impossible for me not to know about Tory Burch and her merchandise. And the three images I just mentioned trigger very specific other images in my mind, specifically “Cozy but Chic” and “Casual Attire”. When you think about it, it’s exactly what Burch’s products are known for. So there’s the proof – successful image branding works, even on people who would normally have absolutely no interest in the subject matter.

The L55 Digital Camera Might Be Your Camera Choice

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Choosing a camera can be quite a personal thing, after all it is only you who knows exactly what you are going to be doing with it. So only you know what you really need in terms of specifications, so this is something to consider if your are asking for one on your top Christmas Gifts 2012 list.

A good idea if you are going to ask for one for a present is to give a list of those you would like. By this I mean actually go through and choose one yourself, or give a list of those you might like, give a variety of price options too.

So what would you consider getting? The Fujifilm FinePix L55 camera is a good digital camera to start with. It has a lot of features that would suit you if you are an entry level photographer, but it is not so simple that you would not enjoy it’s features, and be able to take really good photographs with it.

 Fujifilm Finepix L55With it’s six great colours there is sure to be one that you like. It has a 12 mega pixel sensor and comes with Fuji-non 3x optical zoom, it has the ability to shoot in panoramic mode too, so you can get those pictures of wonderful vistas without too much trouble.

One of my favourite functions is the blink detection ability it has, I always blink when some one takes my picture. It is also easy to use to upload all your pictures to YouTube and Facebook too, really useful in today’s social sharing world.

 

Does Technology Make Us Worse Photographers?

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Today’s portrait photography is not the same as it was 20 or even 10 years ago. Magazine covers are plastered with pictures of women who look only slightly like they would in real life, and photoshop is capable of removing wrinkles and lines, enhancing bust and reducing dress size.

What would take 8 weeks to accomplish with a wrinkle cream can all be erased in a few moments with the burn or smudge tool inside a photo post production suite.

The questions that arises is, are we better off? Has all this new technology made us better photographers? Or are we now more software users with cameras?

My wife who is a professional photographer believes that all of this post production software has allowed photographers to get lazy. They no longer have to know exactly how to expose a photo properly, since they can adjust the exposure afterwards. They don’t need to be able to perfectly frame the image since they can quickly crop that image into perfect thirds.

I feel that this is only going to become even more of a debate as technology progresses and we move further and further away from film photography and photographers having to think about the images they’re shooting to ensure that what they capture is what they see.

 

Convert All Your Film Into Digital

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In this day and age I’m not sure why anybody still has not digitized their film collection.  In the past, this would have been an expensive and time consuming process that could only be done by a professional.  With new film digitizers like this Plustek Opticfilm 7200 film scanner even amateurs can digitize their slides and film at home.

The type of slide scanner that you get will depend on how many slides or films you need to convert.  A regular slide digitizer can process a couple hundred to a thousand slides in several days.  This is the most economical type of slide converter but you will need to manually load each slide. 

If you have boxes and boxes of slides to scan though you will want to get a more advanced model.  The more expensive slide scanners have auto loading trays that can process large batches of film.  However these machines can cost upwards of $1000.  The best solution in this case is to rent a slide scanner or sell your scanner after you are done using it.  The good thing about slide scanners is that they retain a high resell value for many years.

No matter what type of slide scanner you plan to buy, make sure it has digital ICE technology to clean up scratches and dust.  Otherwise you will have to clean up each digital photo in Photoshop which is a big headache especially if you have more than a few photos.

 

Making Passive Income with Your Pictures

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With more and more people going online to start a business or to create videos or to work on website related projects each day, there is a demand for good pictures. If you like taking pictures or even making them using programs like Photoshop, then you could probably make some money with this. Of course, creating a picture or letting someone use your pictures you take on a one time fee basis is okay but what you really want is passive income. There are tons of passive income ideas out there and using your pictures is one of them.

The basic concept involves having your pictures receive royalties when people decide to use them for various things. In order to get your work seen to a vast audience, you can sign up as artists at sites like IStock and so on. Whether you make a lot of money will really depend on your skills, whether or not people like your work, and luck. Let’s face it, sometimes you just need to be in the right place at the right time. If all else fails, you can always create a site that teaches people to take better pictures. You could create tutorials and so on and maybe sell your work in book form.

Photographying Cats

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Cats are so varied in their expressions and habits that there is no need to be satisfied with stereotyped studies. After the cat has had a saucer of milk, there is generally an interval for licking and cleaning. This is a good time for photographing a cat. There are pictures to be made from a yawn or meow, sharpening claws or stretching. In every case the secret of getting an interesting shot lies in foreseeing the picture in time to photograph it.

These and similar pictures call for a shutter speed of 1/100 second or faster.

The color of the animal will have to be taken into consideration when determining the exposure. It is easy to see that a white cat needs less exposure than a dark one, if the picture is to show detail and texture in the animal’s coat. Panchromatic film will be advisable for most cats.

White cats are every bit as difficult to photograph as black ones. Often a white cat will make a better picture in the shade. Siamese cats are also tricky; not only are they temperamental but their dark faces and light bodies present an exposure problem.

The most important features of a cat are its eyes and its whiskers. Both should be rendered perfectly sharp; the general rule is to focus on the eyes of the animal. Strong sidelight can sometimes throw shadows on part of the eyes or make one eye appear much darker than the other.

In extreme close-ups the cat may squint as it watches the camera. A most natural thing to dp, but it will spoil the picture for most cat fanciers.

It is never difficult to attract the attention of the subject. Cats are keenly interested in all strange movements and noises. Flapping of a handkerchief, hissing, or calling the cat by name is enough to get it to look in the desired direction.

Food and drink are useful bait, and even when they have been disposed of, a full and contented cat is less likely to be temperamental than a hungry one.