Photography for the Average

Do you max out your credit cards during the Christmas holidays and spend the new year paying them off? Here’s a better idea: raise extra cash for the holidays and actually have the money to celebrate and enjoy the season.

I’ve got a solution that’s easy, fast and – don’t worry – it’s perfectly legal and legitimate. The sooner you get started, the sooner you’ll be raising your holiday funds. What’s more, this method will keep the extra cash coming in for months, even years to come.

http://www.turnyourphotosintocash.com

I’m talking about turning your digital photos into cash. That is, sell your digital photos online through stock photo sites. It takes a minimal amount of time to get set up, and then it’s a matter of adding pictures to your collections and tweaking them to sell more photos.

Here’s how you can turn your photos into Christmas cash:

1. Sign up for free accounts in stock photo sites, if you haven’t done so yet.

Make a Google search for stock photo sites, and sign up for those that allow photographers to sell their photos online. Make sure you can register for free, and read and re-read the terms of use to make sure everything’s acceptable to you. You’ll want to steer clear of sites that require you to pay for registration, or to give the copyright of your photos to them.

2. Look for sell able photos in your hard drive.

You probably already have sell able photos sitting in your hard drive right now. Organize your photos a folder. To find out which photos sell fast online, check out this free report called  Make Money with Digital Photography.

Read the rest of this entry

Technorati Tags: amature photography, Extra Christmas money, money with digital photography

I always have been a fan of art in different forms; Photography being one of my favorites. Although I have not really stretched my own efforts into taking very imaginative art photos, I do appreciate great work. I did stumble across a website recently that I really must comment on; Tom Shea Art is a art and music blog that I really enjoy reading on a regular basis. He scours the web to bring very frequent and interesting posts showcasing new undiscovered artists and obscure musicians from across the web.

One artist I, Jaime Martinez, really blurs the line between still photography and computer animations. The movement in the photographs seem to pull the subjects off the page; almost giving them a 3D quality.  The pictures themselves are truly outstanding. The way color is used, seems to me to divert attention from the human subject to the object that is in sharp contrast in color. Read the rest of this entry

When we put the view finder up to our eye what are we thinking of; what do we want to tell the person viewing the photo in the future. Will that story stand the test of time or is it a story only to be understood by our current generation.  These are all questions we have to ask ourselves when taking a photograph. Now I am not trying to get deeply spiritual here, but in all the photographs we take as armature photographers or even more so as professional photographers. The subject is the story.  The background or framing or any other aspects add to the story; they are the adjectives in the picture. It really doesn’t matter what type of photography you’re into, this holds true for family pictures as well as for wedding pictures. Let me show you what I mean. Read the rest of this entry

Technorati Tags: amature photography, Family photography, picture composition, Wedding photography

I took a trip to the zoo about a month ago, and, of course, I took my camera along to take some snap shots. I have been really concentrating lately on zooming in on the subject that I want to shoot.

It seems that I go in phases on how I see my subjects. Sometimes I like to pan out if the subject is active, so I can sort of capture the event taking place. Other times I will pan out if the background landscape will add to the picture with either content or with color. A sharp contrasting background to the subject may be more than enough to pull the subject out without having to zoom all the way in tight. If the subject is compelling enough and defined well enough it should be seemingly be pulled away from the background.This is especially true with wildlife photography. There is so much color to use to your advantage when framing your shots.

Lighting can also effect the concentration of the subject in the photograph. The effective use of direct lighting on a subject to cause shadows in the background can be a very effective way of highlighting your subject without having to zoom all the way in on the face of the subject. I do though like to see a little bit of the background in this case. I have seen photographs where the entire background has been blacked out by shadow, but in my opinion it is tough to get it to work. This I believe is getting more into the realm of studio photography where all the lighting is more easily controlled. Remember I am just an amateur photographer out to have fun; maybe some day I will dive into the realm of studio photography, but not yet.

Wildlife photography can be some of the most fun. Animals can be unpredictable which can either lead to some really great shots or many that just get deleted off the hard drive. I love the power of digital photography. Till next time, have fun shooting.

Technorati Tags: amature photography, photography lighting, Wildlife photography

Photography can be fun for anyone. It doesn’t have to be complicated and you don’t need to have a whole bunch of technical knowledge to take great looking photos. You don’t even need a bunch of expensive photography equipment to take great looking pictures. Taking great looking photos is more about how the subject matter is positioned in the picture rather than the expensive equipment that take the pictures. Below is a picture I shot with a video camera I purchased online. I am not a professional photographer, and I’ve never had any formal training about photography. But, I do love great looking pictures and study the pictures I do look at to try and understand what makes a great picture great and average pictures, well, just average.

I have received many compliments about this photo, I think what draws me into it is the small piercing eye of the Flamingo nested in the soft sea of pink. It may be the accenting of the different shades of pink defining each individual feather. This digital camera was set on standard mode with the auto focus feature turned on. The fun in this picture lies in the subject and how it is framed. Another beautiful part of digital photography is that the pictures that don’t turn out can just be deleted, no more paying for processing on pictures that you don’t like.

Wedding photography, family photography, and art photography are probably the most popular areas for the amateur photographer. There are sometimes small technique differences between the three, but the same basic principle applies to all three. I have included separate categories for all three of these in the blog along with a section for equipment reviews. My intention for the reviews is to find the best quality for the smallest price. Making photography fun is not about the money spent, but the pride that comes from producing great looking pictures. Thank you for dropping by, and I hope I can shine a light of hope to amateur photographers struggling to have fun taking pictures.

Technorati Tags: Making photography fun