How to make a great photo shoot. How to take a good photo: choice of location, pose, background, device quality, photo processing programs and tips from photographers

Almost every modern person has a smartphone that has a camera. And certainly every owner of it takes pictures on it. But you must admit that they do not always turn out the way we see them in our minds. Either there is not enough light, or it turns out blurry, or the colors are distorted. Today RosKase will tell you about a few secrets that will allow you to take nice pictures with your phone.

The first secret is cleanliness

Check the smartphone lens - it needs careful care. If there are fingerprints or dust on it, the picture quality will deteriorate. Wipe it regularly with a special cloth (microfiber is great) so as not to scratch the vulnerable surface. If suddenly sand gets on the camera, do not rub the lens, but try to blow off the grains of sand so that they do not damage the integrity of the optics.

The second secret is light

We believe that you have already checked more than once that the best pictures are taken in daylight. Try to position the subject so that the light source is behind you and the subject being photographed is adequately illuminated. If the object is immovable (for example, a house), and you need a certain angle, then try experimenting with the camera settings and take several different photos until you achieve the desired result. For portraits, for example, you can also use special reflectors to help achieve the right light.

Secret three - settings

Check your device's camera settings. Most users shoot in auto mode. But it is not always suitable for a particular moment. Conduct an experiment - try changing the white balance, exposure. See what happens. This will help you adjust the camera for certain conditions next time. If manual settings are not for you, see which mode is best for shooting on a phone camera in a given situation. There are different modes - portrait, panorama, sports, macro, night, etc. Selecting one of them by default causes the phone to set the settings according to the situation.

Secret Four - Avoid Zoom

Digital zoom ruins photos. If you need to shoot an object closer - just go to it. In the event that this is not possible, take a photo in maximum resolution, and then crop the picture in a special program. So the quality will be better than when using digital zoom.

Secret five - a few shots

Take multiple pictures. In the end, it is more convenient to choose the best of those made than to regret that the one and only did not work out. After all, this is not a 36-frame film - you can take as many pictures as you like with a digital camera - everything is limited only by the device's memory (and this is definitely many times more than 36 pictures). You can also use continuous shooting, which, with a single press of the button, will independently take several frames in a row.

Secret six - flash

Of course, the flash must be used wisely. But when there is not enough light, and you want to take a photo, using it is the first thing that comes to mind. In any case, the photo will turn out better with it than without it. And you can always take pictures.

The most obvious advice on how to take good pictures with your phone is to set the image quality to maximum. Go to the settings of your smartphone and check if your device is using the maximum of its capabilities. If there is not enough memory on your phone for many high-resolution pictures, you can always find a way out - for example, purchase a memory card or send a photo to the cloud storage.

Any breath or movement while shooting can cause the image to become blurred. To solve this problem, the photo stabilization function was invented. It allows you to smooth movements and take clear pictures. Turn this feature on and forget about blurry pictures.

There are many photo editing software available today. In them, you can crop pictures, overlay captions, make frames, apply filters and do many other things. Try to edit your photo. And you will be surprised how it can change. At the same time, filters can give it mystery and eccentricity. Experiment - and don't be afraid to mess up the photo - you can always go back to the original version.

It is impossible to pick up a device right away - and immediately start taking professional photos on a smartphone. This takes practice. And the more it is, the better. Read the relevant literature, but first of all, read the manual of your smartphone, paying special attention to the section that describes the camera functions. It is possible that you will discover many new things for yourself.

How to take professional photos with your phone

If you want to take high-quality pictures on your device, then you should choose a device based on its camera. The Nokia Lumia 1020 is currently the best smartphone for photography. This is the only smartphone that takes pictures in 41 MP! Of course, there are a number of other gadgets that have good cameras - and here you have to study numerous parameters in order to choose the phone model that suits you.

And we wish you good luck in improving your photographic skills and clear high-quality images!

Steps

Composition

Find the shaded side of the face. Take a look in the mirror or take a test photo and see which side of the face is further away from the light source and therefore looks darker. Take a photo from this side to achieve an artistic effect and appear slimmer. In bright sunlight, this technique may not work.

Take pictures creatively. Instead of the traditional front-facing self-portrait, try taking an artistic photo with a completely different composition. Here are some ideas:

• take a profile picture, that is, from the side;
• take a picture of only half of the face - left or right;
• take a close-up photo of the eyes, lips, or cheek.

1. Do not place your face strictly in the center of the frame. The best photos are usually built according to the rule of thirds. This means that the eyes (the compositional center of the portrait) should be at a distance of one third vertically from the top of the image and to the right or left of its middle. The photo will turn out more interesting, and the angle will probably be better.

   Keep the camera away from your face. The lens distorts objects that are too close. Selfies are usually taken with the camera or phone at arm's length, which is a very small distance, and because of this, the nose often looks larger than it actually is - definitely not the effect you want to achieve.

   • If you want to take a close-up photo, it is better to use the optical zoom and shoot from a greater distance. You can also take a waist-length or full-length photo, and then crop it.
   • If your camera has a timer, lean it against a stable support, turn on the timer, and step back. Such a photo is likely to be more successful than a hand-held selfie.

2. Use your phone's main camera. It is more convenient to take pictures of yourself on the front camera of a smartphone, but the main one allows you to take much better pictures.

   Place a mirror behind the camera. Taking pictures is easier when you can see yourself, so having a mirror behind your camera or smartphone can help you achieve a better pose or facial expression. Keep your smile natural!

   Ask someone to take your photo. This is not always possible, but it is preferable to have someone else photograph you. You can focus on posing without having to think about holding the camera and pressing the button at the same time.

   • Ask a friend to take a photo of you. He may tease you a little, or he may ask you to take a picture of him too.
   • If it's at a party or other event, ask someone to take a picture of you (and your friends if you're in a group). It's best to have someone you know, or at least look trustworthy so your phone or camera doesn't get stolen.

Poses

1. Avoid double chin. One of the ugliest traits that a bad shot can reward you with is a double chin. This can usually be avoided by stretching the neck and slightly pushing the chin forward, away from the body. It will seem to you that it is strange and inconvenient, but in the photo it will look just as it should.

   Straighten your shoulders. Stooped shoulders and bad posture don't adorn anyone, so take your shoulders down and back. This will give you a more cheerful look, visually lengthen your neck and thereby improve your photo. You can slightly lift one shoulder or turn it towards the lens, rather than stand in an even, static pose.

   Change your attitude. If you shoot and post a lot of self-portraits and look serious without exception, you may seem overly serious and even boring. Try to fool around and take a funny photo. When you allow yourself to relax and have fun, you can suddenly get a surprisingly successful shot.

   Turn to the camera at an angle. Instead of standing straight in front of the photo, try turning your face or your whole body slightly. Experiment to find your more winning side. Standing sideways in a full-length photo will make you look slimmer and accentuate your curves.

   Do not look directly into the lens. Even if your eyes are your most beautiful feature, try to look away from the camera to make the photo more interesting.

   • You can still focus on your eyes by opening them wide and looking over or away from the camera.
   • Try not to look away too obviously. If you look slightly away from the lens, you will get the impression that you do not know that you are being filmed. If you look away at least thirty centimeters from the camera, it will already look like a conscious pose.

2. Show emotions. Sincere emotions are usually immediately visible on the face. A forced smile usually does not make you more attractive. So if you're posing for a photo smiling, think of something really nice or funny.

   Dress appropriately. If you're shooting a self-portrait for a specific purpose, consider how you should dress.

   • If you need a photo for work or for a professional web page, opt for understated, business-like clothing and a simple, neat hairdo.
   • If you're photographing for a dating site, you can wear something bright or fun, but don't dress too sexy (such a photo will immediately give away your efforts to appear sexier!). Hair doesn't have to be perfect; let it be casual, but show that you pay attention to your appearance.
   • If the photo is for your social media page, think about how people will perceive you. The choice of clothes is very wide, but a dirty T-shirt is still not the best choice for a selfie (unless, however, you demonstrate that you have just returned from a twenty-kilometer hike).

3. Don't play duckface! The so-called duckface (a face with “duck” lips) - lips folded in a bow and stretched out like for a kiss - everyone got tired and became a model of bad taste when taking a selfie. There are many other, prettier facial expressions.

Situation

Shoot in natural light. Natural light is always preferred for photography. However, direct sunlight, especially at noon when the sun is directly overhead, is not good for portrait photography: you don't want harsh shadows on your face!

• If you have a choice, it is better to take pictures on a cloudy day.
• Indoors, try to take pictures by a window, in natural light (but not in direct sunlight).
• If you are forced to use artificial light indoors, avoid fluorescents and overhead lighting. You may be able to achieve more favorable lighting if you turn off the ceiling lights and turn on the table lamps and sconces.
• If you have to shoot in direct light from above (whether natural or artificial), use the flash to fill in the shadowy areas - then your photo will not have shadows under the nose or eyes.

1. Check out the background. By posting a photo on the Internet, you are unlikely to dream of the glory of a person who captured himself against an absurd or indecent background.

   Think about visual frames. A photo can be more interesting if the composition forms a kind of frame. Here are some ideas for such visual frames:

   • pose in the doorway;
   • hold the camera in two outstretched hands, and not in one;
   • stand between two objects - for example, trees or bushes;
   • grab your chin or prop it up with your hand to create a visual frame from below.

Editing

1. Zoom in on the desired area. If you want to highlight a particular part of the face or body, use a photo editing app to zoom in and save the edited version. On most smartphones and computers, you can install photo editing software, many of which are very easy to use.

   Crop the frame to remove all unnecessary. Any unnecessary or ugly parts of the picture should be removed by cropping. If you took the photo with one hand, it is better to remove it from the frame, as it will look large and not very attractive. If the hair is standing on end, remove it at least partially. You are not obliged to show the photos to anyone as you took them: first edit, then post or send.

   Use a filter. Most photo-sharing sites have the option of built-in filters. With their help, you can change the hue, contrast and brightness of your photo. Try different filters until you find the one that works best for your shot.

   Retouch the photo. In addition to programs and applications designed for photo editing in general, there are applications specifically designed for retouching portraits. With the help of such programs, you can get rid of red-eye, remove pimples and blemishes, even out skin tone, and perform other actions to bring your photo to perfection.

Cole Rise is a popular photographer, traveler, and creator of the Rise preset for Instagram. His photographs are distinguished by the fact that even after processing they look natural. Cole shared his secrets on how to shoot with a mobile phone and edit photos so that they are close in quality to pictures from SLR cameras.

1. Add light to the shadows and darken the highlights

Most photo editing tools have options for adjusting highlights and shadows. And this should be used.

To improve the nature photograph, Cole balanced the exposure by adding light to the shadows and slightly darkening the highlights. He also applied the Winsy filter from the Litely application collection to the photo to bring warm tones to the image.

2. Add a vignette effect and drop shadow to make your photo brighter

The vignetting effect adds a dark border around the perimeter of the photo and lightens the middle of the photo. This is one of Cole's favorite tricks. The original photo would have been too dark, so Cole increased the saturation and added some sharpening to separate the balloon from the landscape. This made it possible to keep the photo natural.

3. Edit the image and then reset all settings back to 50%

It is very important.

The trick is to make your photo look natural. Edit the image as you normally would and then reset all settings back to 50%.

Last year, Instagram users finally got the ability to control the power of filters. To use these settings, simply select a filter and then click on it again.

And one more tip: don't use the LUX tool on Instagram. Its job is to correct the lack of contrast that makes a photo look unnatural.

4. Photograph people wherever possible

Landscapes look best when there are people in them. The person in the photo is able to convey feelings. The best example of how people add personality to a picture is the work of Murad Osmann, who photographs himself holding his girlfriend's hand in different parts of the world (Follow me photo series).

These are the ruins of the ancient city of Jerash. If we remove a person from this photo, then we will not feel the scale and grandeur of this structure.

6. Try taking pictures while leaning out of a car window

You will never know in advance what you will succeed. In the case of the iPhone, simply hold the shutter button and hold to take photos in burst mode. On a smartphone running Android, you can enable burst shooting by selecting the appropriate mode (Burst Mode) in the camera settings. On Samsung smartphones, it may be called Burst Shot. For this photo, Cole used a Slow Shutter Cam to add a blur effect.

7. To get an interesting shot, place your smartphone on the roof of the car

If there are clouds in the sky, then their reflection on the roof of the car will add some zest to the photo.

8. Lower your gadget to the surface of the water for a cool reflective effect

9. Hold your smartphone upright when shooting for Instagram

To make it easier for yourself, hold the camera vertically: it's easier to fit everything you need for the frame into a square area. Better yet, set your camera to shoot only square images right away.

10. When shooting landscapes, press the volume button to release the shutter

Did you know that you can simply open your iPhone's camera and press the volume button to take a photo? The same is true for Android phones. On Samsung Galaxy S4, assign the shutter function to the volume button in settings instead of the default zoom function. This reshuffle of the buttons will make it easier to take the phone to avoid the effect of "shaking hands" that can ruin the photo.

11. Get closer to the ground if you want to bring your subject to the fore.

Smartphone cameras have poor depth of field, so you can resort to tricks. For example, lower the camera closer to the ground.

12. Do not attract attention and do not carry a backpack with you.

A tourist, hung with gadgets, is a great bait for thieves. When traveling, Cole never wears flashy clothes, keeps his camera and phone close to him, and always leaves his backpack at home. Before filming a merchant or just a person on the street, be sure to ask his permission. You will be surprised how responsive people are.

13. Bad weather = great photo

Don't run away when it starts to rain or hail. These are excellent conditions for taking a good picture. Overcast and cloudy days are an opportunity to capture interesting patterns in the sky. Do not sit at home even when the weather seems non-flying.

14. Be ready to shoot even in the most unexpected moments.

It is not always possible to thoroughly prepare for shooting, and unexpected moments happen. Like, for example, this shot with a low-flying plane. Therefore, if you do not want to miss great shots, learn the hot keys of your phone. For example, Samsung smartphones have a Camera Quick Access option in the settings. And the new Galaxy S6 has built-in hotkeys, you just need to double-tap the Home button.

15. To get the best shots, go further than others.

The only way to discover beautiful places is to force yourself to explore. Do you want to get non-standard shots? Move away from crowded tourist areas.

In general, as Cole says, live a bright life, then great photos will appear themselves.

Artem Kashkanov, 2019

The article you are reading has been in existence since 2008 and every couple of years it is thoroughly edited in accordance with current trends and trends in the field of photography - amateur and professional. This is due to the fact that we now live in a critical era, when photography has turned from the lot of professionals and enthusiasts into a general hobby. And not even a hobby, but an integral part of everyday life.

On the one hand, this is very cool, but on the other hand... Photography ceases to be an art because of its mass nature. Every day, millions (or even billions) of the same type of photos with flowers, cats, plates of food, selfies are uploaded to the Internet, and oddly enough, all this finds its audience - “Instagram stars” gain thousands of likes for unsharp photos like “me and my cat". Just because their pictures are understandable and close to the majority. Photos of recognized masters have a much lower rating among the general public - they do not understand them. Their creations will be appreciated by true connoisseurs of art. This is about the same as comparing two areas of music - pop and, say, jazz.

Let's get back to the question - why do you want to learn photography? If you are doing this only because it is “fashionable”, “prestigious” or “friends advised” - do not bother. This "fashion to be a photographer" will pass sooner or later. If you really want to "rise above the hustle and bustle", this article is for you!

What is the best camera to buy for learning photography?

There is a choice of camera on the site, so here I will list only brief theses.

1. If you really want to learn how to take pictures, you need a camera, not a smartphone. It is highly desirable that this camera be with interchangeable lenses. Smartphones are conceptually sharpened for shooting on the machine. Creativity requires manual mode.
2. To learn photography, it is not necessary to purchase the most modern and expensive equipment. Now amateur technology has developed so much that it satisfies the requirements of not only amateurs, but also advanced photographers with a large margin.
3. The main element in a modern camera is the lens. Buying a simpler carcass, but with a cool lens is a perfectly reasonable idea.
4. The regular ("whale") lens is not as bad as they write and say about it. He gets to the camera almost for free and you should not refuse him. Read more about optics in.
5. There is no point in chasing the most modern models. They are expensive and usually do not offer any significant advantages over the previous model cameras. Prices for new items are unreasonably high.
6. Frank "junk" is also not worth buying, well, maybe used for a symbolic price.

Introduction to basic camera features

So, the camera is bought, now we need to get acquainted with its capabilities. To do this, it is advisable to be patient and study the instructions for the camera. Unfortunately, it is far from always written simply and clearly, however, this does not eliminate the need to study the location and purpose of the main controls.

As a rule, there are not too many controls - a mode dial, one or two dials for setting parameters, several function buttons, a zoom control, an autofocus and shutter button. It is also worth learning the main menu items in order to be able to configure things like . image style. All this comes with experience, but over time, you should not have a single incomprehensible item in the camera menu.

It's time to take the camera in hand and try to portray something with it. First, turn on the auto mode and try to take pictures in it. In most cases, the result will be quite normal, but sometimes photos turn out too light or, conversely, too dark for some reason. The time has come get to know such a thing as exposure.

Exposure is the total light flux that the matrix caught during the shutter release. The higher the exposure level, the brighter the photo. Photos that are too bright are called overexposed, and photos that are too dark are called underexposed. It's very short. If you want more details, read on. If you know all this - click on the "skip the boring theory" link.

A bit of boring theory - shutter speed, aperture, ISO sensitivity, depth of field.

The picture is exposed when the shutter opens. If fast moving objects enter the frame, then during the time the shutter is opened, they have time to move and the photos turn out to be slightly blurry. The time for which the shutter opens is called endurance.

Shutter speed allows you to get the effect of "frozen motion" (example below), or, conversely, blur moving objects.

Short exposure photo

The shutter speed is displayed as a unit divided by some number, for example, 1/500 - this means that the shutter will open for 1/500 of a second. This is a fast enough shutter speed at which driving cars and walking pedestrians will be clear in the photo. The faster the shutter speed, the faster the movement can be "frozen".

If you increase the shutter speed to, say, 1/125 second, the pedestrians will still be clear, but the cars will already be noticeably smeared. If the shutter speed is 1/50 or longer, the risk of getting blurry photos due to the shaking of the hands of the photographer increases and it is recommended to install the camera on a tripod , or use an image stabilizer (if available).

Night photos are taken with very slow shutter speeds of several seconds and even minutes. Here it is already impossible to do without a tripod.

To be able to fix the shutter speed, the camera has a shutter priority mode. It is designated TV or S. In addition to a fixed shutter speed, it allows you to use exposure compensation. Shutter speed has a direct effect on the exposure level - the longer the shutter speed, the brighter the photo.

What is a diaphragm?

Another mode that can be useful is aperture priority mode.

Diaphragm- this is the "pupil" of the lens, a hole of variable diameter. The narrower this aperture, the more IPIG- the depth of the sharply depicted space. Aperture is indicated by a dimensionless number from the series 1.4, 2, 2.8, 4, 5.6, 8, 11, 16, 22, etc. In modern cameras, you can choose intermediate values, for example, 3.5, 7.1, 13, etc.

The larger the f-number, the greater the depth of field. Large depth of field is relevant for when you need everything to be sharp - both foreground and background. Landscapes are usually shot at apertures of 8 or more.

A typical example of a photograph with a large depth of field is the zone of sharpness from the grass under your feet to infinity.

The meaning of a small depth of field is to focus the viewer's attention on the subject, and blur all the background objects. This technique is commonly used in . To blur the background in a portrait, open the aperture to 2.8, 2, sometimes even up to 1.4. At this stage, we come to the understanding that the 18-55 mm whale lens limits our creative possibilities, since at a "portrait" focal length of 55 mm, the aperture cannot be opened wider than 5.6 - we begin to think about a fast aperture (for example, 50mm 1.4) in order to get a similar result:

Small depth of field is a great way to switch the viewer's attention from the colorful background to the main subject.

To control aperture, you need to switch the control dial to aperture priority mode (AV or A). At the same time, you tell the device what aperture you want to take pictures with, and it selects all the other parameters itself. Exposure compensation is also available in aperture priority mode.

Aperture has the opposite effect on the exposure level - the larger the f-number, the darker the picture is obtained (a pinched pupil lets in less light than an open one).

What is ISO sensitivity?

You have probably noticed that photos sometimes have ripples, grain, or, as it is also called, digital noise. Noise is especially pronounced in photographs taken in low light. For the presence / absence of ripples in the photographs, such a parameter is responsible as ISO sensitivity. This is the degree of susceptibility of the matrix to light. It is denoted by dimensionless units - 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200, etc.

When shooting at the lowest sensitivity (for example, ISO 100), the picture quality is the best, but you have to shoot with a slower shutter speed. With good lighting, for example, during the day on the street, this is not a problem. But if we go into a room where there is much less light, then it will no longer be possible to shoot at the minimum sensitivity - the shutter speed will be, for example, 1/5 second and at the same time the risk is very high. shakers”, so called because of the trembling of the hands.

Here is an example of a photo taken at low ISO with a long exposure on a tripod:

Note that the swell on the river washed out in motion and gave the impression that the river was not ice. But there is almost no noise in the photo.

To avoid "shake" in low light, you need to either increase the ISO sensitivity in order to reduce the shutter speed to at least 1/50 second, or continue shooting at the minimum ISO and use. When shooting with a tripod at slow shutter speeds, moving objects are very blurred. This is especially noticeable when shooting at night. ISO sensitivity has a direct effect on the exposure level. The higher the ISO number, the brighter the picture will be at a fixed shutter speed and aperture.

Below is an example of a shot taken outdoors at ISO6400 late in the evening without a tripod:

Even in web size, it is noticeable that the photo turned out to be quite noisy. On the other hand, the grain effect is often used as an artistic technique, giving the photograph a "film" look.

Relationship between shutter speed, aperture and ISO

So, as you may have guessed, there are three parameters that affect the level of exposure - shutter speed, aperture and ISO sensitivity. There is such a thing as “exposure step” or EV (Exposure Value). Each next step corresponds to an exposure 2 times greater than the previous one. These three parameters are interrelated.

• if we open the aperture by 1 stop, the shutter speed is reduced by 1 stop
• if we open the aperture by 1 stop, the sensitivity decreases by one stop
• if we reduce the shutter speed by 1 step, the ISO sensitivity increases by one step

Programmed exposure mode

Programmed exposure mode or “P mode” is the easiest creative mode. It combines the simplicity of auto mode and at the same time allows you to correct the operation of the machine - to make photos lighter and darker (exposure compensation), warmer or colder (white balance).

Exposure compensation is usually applied when either light or dark objects dominate the frame. Automation works in such a way that it tries to bring the average exposure level of the image to 18% gray tone (the so-called "gray card"). Please note that when we take more of the bright sky into the frame, the ground turns out to be darker in the photo. And vice versa, we take more land into the frame - the sky brightens, sometimes even whitens. The exposure compensation function helps to compensate for shadows and highlights that go beyond the boundaries of absolute black and absolute white.

Even in the program exposure mode, you can adjust the white balance, control the flash. This mode is convenient in that it requires a minimum of technical knowledge, but at the same time it is able to provide a much better result than full automatic.

Also in program exposure mode, you should be familiar with such a thing as bar graph. This is nothing more than a graph of the distribution of the brightness of the pixels in the picture.

The left side of the histogram corresponds to the shadows, the right side - to the highlights. If the histogram looks "cropped" on the left, then the image contains black areas with lost color. Accordingly, the "cropped" histogram on the right indicates the presence of light areas "knocked out" into whiteness.

Most modern cameras have a "live histogram" function - displaying a histogram over the image in the viewfinder in real time. When adjusting the exposure, the histogram will shift to the right or left, while the picture, respectively, brightens or darkens. Your task is to learn how to control the histogram and not let it crawl beyond its limits. In this case, the exposure of the picture will be correct.

Manual mode

In manual mode, the photographer has the ability to control everything. This is necessary when we need to rigidly fix the exposure level and prevent the camera from being "amateur". For example, darken or lighten the foreground when more or less sky enters the frame, respectively.

Manual mode is useful when shooting in the same conditions, such as when walking around the city on a sunny day. Once adjusted and in all the photos the same exposure level. The inconvenience in manual mode begins when you have to move between light and dark locations. If we go from the street, for example, to a cafe and shoot there at “street” settings, the photos will turn out to be too dark, since there is less light in the cafe.

Manual mode is indispensable when shooting panoramas and all thanks to the same property - maintain a constant exposure level. When using auto exposure, the exposure level will depend heavily on the amount of light and dark objects. We caught a large dark object in the frame - we got sky flare. And vice versa, if light objects predominate in the frame, the shadows have gone into blackness. To glue such a panorama then one torment! So, to avoid this mistake, shoot panoramas in M ​​mode, setting the exposure in advance so that all fragments are correctly exposed.

The result - when merging, there will be no "steps" of brightness between frames, which are likely to appear when shooting in any other mode.

In general, many experienced photographers and photography educators recommend using manual mode as the main one. They are somewhat right - when shooting in manual mode, you completely control the shooting process. You can choose the most correct combination of settings for a given from hundreds of options. The main thing is to know what you are doing and why. If there is no clear understanding of the principles of work in manual mode, you can limit yourself to semi-automatic ones - 99.9% of viewers will not notice the difference :)

In reporting conditions, the manual mode is also not very convenient, since you need to constantly adapt to changing shooting conditions. Many do it tricky - in M ​​mode, they fix the shutter speed and aperture, while "releasing" the ISO. Although M is on the mode selector, shooting is far from being in manual mode - the camera itself selects the ISO sensitivity and flash power, and can change these parameters over a wide range.

Today, only the lazy do not take pictures. And of course, everyone dreams of taking beautiful photos that everyone would like. At the same time, for really good photos it is not at all necessary to have an expensive camera. Knowing simple secrets will allow you to take professional pictures.

1. Bokeh effect

Attach a piece of foil to any vertical surface, place your subject, put a mirror opposite and shoot. This trick will allow you to create amazing pictures with the bokeh effect.

2. Underwater shooting

Do not despair if you do not have special equipment for the popular underwater shooting. A transparent plastic container will help you take amazing pictures of the underwater world. Make sure it doesn't leak, place your camera set to shoot in it, and gently lower it into the water.

Very interesting photos from the top angle can be taken without outside help. To do this, you need to make a special stand for your smartphone out of cardboard, fix it on the wall above your head with adhesive tape and turn on the automatic shooting mode.

4. Color highlights

Use the CD to get the original color highlight effect. Just attach it to the bottom of the lens and press the shutter button - beautiful photos are guaranteed.

5. Through rose-colored glasses

Another interesting effect can be obtained by photographing through the glass of sunglasses.

6. Softening

Wrap the camera lens with a film, grease the lens contour under the film with a small amount of vaseline or cream. This technique will allow you to take amazing pictures with the effect of blurred exposure without the use of additional equipment and filters.

7. Clarity

If you want sharper and sharper shots, use a clean coffee filter or a thick coffee cup wrapper. This trick will prevent the appearance of unwanted glare in the photo and improve the quality of the images.

8. Lace

Using lace fabric will allow you to get really beautiful and unusual pictures. Lace fabric can be thrown over yourself, on a camera lens or on a light source, while getting completely different results.

9. Color filter

A couple of strips of adhesive tape, colored with colored markers and glued to the lens of a SLR camera, will help you get fantastic shots with an unusual effect.

10. Marshmallow effect

A wooden circle and colored wool can be used to make creative shooting accessories that will help you create creative photos with charming color effects.

11. Flash

While shooting, shine a small flashlight on the lens. This will allow you to get the effect of a soft haze, which will make the pictures mysterious and unusual.

Video bonus:

12. Shadows

In the art of photography, shadows are as important as light. The absence of shadows will make the photos flat, and the presence of some unusual shadow, on the contrary, will fill the picture with meaning. Therefore, novice photographers or amateurs should not be afraid to experiment by playing with shadows using a colander, fabrics or paper stencils.

13. Soft flash

Flash photos often come out too harsh and unnatural. Most often this happens due to inappropriate lighting and incorrect camera settings. Be that as it may, you can soften the effect of the flash by placing it in a white plastic bag.

14. Color transition

Two-tone film with a hole in the center, put on the camera lens, will help you get fascinating photos with an unusual color effect without the use of special equipment.

15. Weather protection

Rain and snow can not only disrupt the work of the photographer, but also harm the camera. You can protect your work tool from the rain with a plastic CD case and thick cellophane.

16. Reflector

Use a white sheet of paper instead of a reflector to make your portraits look lighter and more natural.

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17. Through the glass

If you want to replenish your collection with photos with unusual effects, take pictures through glass. Light haze effect, unusual highlights and soft colors are guaranteed.

18. Reflector for flash

A small piece of white plastic or a regular business card can make a great flash reflector.

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However, cool photos can be taken with a smartphone.
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