Improve Photography

Over the last year and a half, hundreds of students have taken my online beginning photography class.  By FAR, the most common problem that Dustin and I have seen as we review photos from our students is poor sharpness. Sometimes, the photos are clearly blurry to the point that anyone would notice the problem.  But [...]

So you have an artistic eye.  You see the world in ways that are unique, interesting, and different.  You want to share this world view through your photography… but one of the greatest frustrations new photographers encounter is that when they get back to their computer and pull images off the camera, the results are [...]

Exposure is the most basic element of photography If you want to be a photographer, you absolutely must learn how to control the exposure of a picture.  It will take a minute, but this page has everything you need to know.  Click on the different camera settings on the interactive exposure tool above to practice [...]

What is the process a photographer should go through to get photos from the camera to the customer? Is there a “best” way to do this? Workflow is different for everyone. Landscape photographers will post-process very differently from sports or portrait photographers. For example, if you’re shooting a wedding, you can’t throw away 80% of [...]

Two weeks ago (I know, I’m slow…) on the Improve Photography Facebook fan page, I asked our community what photography tips they wish they would have learned sooner.  I was looking for lessons that many photographers procrastinate learning and it ends up keeping them back from progressing as photographers. Over 96 photographers commented on that [...]

Two weeks ago, I found myself grabbing my DSLR, putting on a lens with no filter since that destroys image quality, putting it on a tripod and using a cable release to take the landscape photo, putting the camera in mirror lock-up mode for a night photo, turning on long-exposure noise reduction, and covering the [...]

Every time I go to my nephews’ soccer games and see all the parents with their cameras on “green mode”, or attend a sporting event and see spectators using their flash from a quarter mile away, it makes me grit my teeth.  It’s all I can do to stop from walking up to them and [...]

Photographers these days spend so much time on the Internet learning good things about photography that they never make the time to do the things that would be really great for their photography.  I’ve compiled a list of 21 things in this article that you can do today that would completely change your photography forever. If you [...]

Introduction My inbox is filled each morning with questions from students in my online photography classes asking various photography questions.  I’m glad to get the questions because it helps me to think of what I should write about here on Improve Photography.  You would be shocked to see how many of the questions are about [...]

One of the most significant benefits to digital cameras is the LCD screen, which shows you your picture immediately after it was taken.  Unfortunately, the LCD also causes severe problems for photographers.  In this post, I’ll explain a few methods for determining if your exposure is correct by looking at the LCD of the camera. [...]