Sunday, November 23, 2008

Dump the date

I'll bet you've seen a wonderful photo ruined by a date and time stamp. There may be some professionals in different fields who need time and date embedded in a picture, but not a photojournalist striving for the very best shot.

Here's an under-appreciated fact: there's no need to mar your photo because the digital image file contains metadata with the date and time of the shot, along with a wealth of other information such as exposure data, the lens you used, and more. You can read the metadata on your computer.

So, turn off the date-time stamp.

However, what if later you discover you've created a photo with the camera's date stamp feature turned on? Here are some ways to get rid of it from a photo.

Crop the photo

The easiest way to eliminate the date stamp is to use your photo editor's crop tool. The date stamp is almost always positioned in the lower right corner of the image, where a little surgery with Adobe Photoshop Elements or any other photo editing software might not affect the rest of the photo very much.

Click the Crop tool and make sure the Aspect Ratio is set to No Restriction in the Options palette. Next, click and drag a crop box in the photo until the date stamp is gone.

Keep track of the date and time data. You can add the date the photo was taken to your image file's metadata. Windows Live Photo Gallery is one of a number of programs that can do that for you.

Find your newly cropped photo in Photo Gallery. Right-click the file and choose Change Time Taken. Now adjust the date to match the original date stamp, and click OK.

Rubber stamp over it

You might not always want to crop your photo to eliminate the date stamp. Instead, you could use your photo editor's Rubber Stamp or Clone tool to paint it out.

If there is a regular, non-patterned background behind the date this kind of surgery will be easy. If the background has a pattern, you will have to be very careful.

Open the image file in a photo editor, such as Photoshop Elements. Choose the Rubber Stamp or Clone tool. Set the size of the clone brush to about 30 pixels, or increase the brush size for larger photos. Alt-Click an area very close to the date stamp. Then just paint the date away until all you can see is the background.

Freeze the action

No matter how cute the baby, furry animal or wind-blown scene is you're photographing, be sure to freeze the action, or the only thing people will notice is that it's blurry.

Practice techniques for taking steady photos, such as using a tripod or stable support as often as you can.

It even will help to earn how to use the aperture priority or shutter priority control on your camera to freeze the action with a fast shutter speed.

In low light conditions, you can increase the ISO setting of the camera to force faster shutter speeds.

Also see these posts below:
Sharp night shots without a tripod
Panning for that speedy look

Keep it level

Sometimes we're so busy framing and exposing the perfect image, we forget to hold the camera straight.

Our brains filter and correct the data our eyes see and may not warn us that a scene in the viewfinder isn't level.

What to do? Pay attention to keeping a photo level.

However, if you do take a crooked photo, don't fret. You can straighten it easily with a leveling tool found in almost any photo editing program, such as Photoshop Elements.

Watch the light

The beauty of the automatic digital camera is you don't have to think about exposure settings -- the quantity and quality of light around your subject. The camera does that for you.

Getting the proper exposure is important, of course, so keep in mind that sometimes you can't rely entirely on your camera to get it right.

Here's a trick to avoid shooting in very contrasty lighting.

If you can see both direct sunlight and shadow in your viewfinder, you'll are likely to obtain a lower-quality exposure. The way around the problem is to try reframing the shot to get more-even lighting in the scene. Not necessarily more light, but more-even lighting.

The hours in the middle of the day are not as good for outdoor photography because of the overhead light is strong and harsh. Try to shoot earlier or later.

If there's strong sunlight in the background of your image, the camera will probably overcompensate and underexpose the subject.

Also see the post below:
Love those overcast days

Focus on your subject

Consider your subject. There should be some specific element in a photo that you want to emphasize to show off, to call attention to. For instance, a person, an animal, a flower, a building.

Rule of Thirds
Imagine dividing your photo into a grid, like a tic-tac-toe board, with two vertical and two horizontal lines.

Position your subject in the camera's viewfinder frame where two of those lines intersect.

Arrange the scene you see in the camera's viewfinder so that your subject is at the intersection of two of those "third lines" in your photo. That means not dead center or at an edge of the frame.

Using this Rule of Thirds, you will get the most visual impact.

Of course, you'll also want the subject in sharp focus. If the subject is sharply defined, it would be okay -- and sometimes even a good idea -- for the rest of the photo to be out of focus so the eyes of people who see your photo will be drawn to the subject.