How to take good photos

This is a post that I have been meaning to write for a long time but I've never got around to doing it, but alas after joining in the bbloggers chat on twitter the other night about photography, a few people asked me how I edit my photos so I thought the time has come that I get my butt in gear and write this!

The Camera - I know that nearly everybody says you don't need a good quality camera to take good photos, but with having a dad who is a professional photographer I'm going to say that you do. To have a photo that can be blown up very large and still not be pixelated you are going to need a good quality camera. This doesn't mean that you have to spend a fortune on a DSLR, they're are plenty of compact cameras that can still take equally as good photos. An example is The Canon S95, my Mum uses this camera, and I have used it for some of the photos in my old blog posts. It's really good and I would definitely recommend it!

Camera Settings - To take a good photo you need to know your camera settings such as Aperture, shutter speed, Macro and depth of field. Aperture refers to the set of small thin interlocking metal blades called the 'iris'.  You can adjust the size of this let  more or less light into the camera sensor. Aperture sizes tend to vary from 2.8 to 22. An easy way to remember it is 'the smaller the aperture number the bigger the hole' and vice-versa. Here is a diagram to help:

The bigger the iris is the more light will be let into the camera sensor, this will make your photos brighter. So if you are in a room with poor daylight you want to open the aperture up as much as possible to allow as much daylight to reach the sensor as you can, therefor it is best to set your camera to an F number between, 2.8 and 4. (I hope this isn't all too confusing, I've tried to explain it simply) Where-as if you are in a well lit room o outdoors it is best to have a higher F number such ad 11, 16, or 22, this will let less light reach the lens and won't make your photos over exposed (that happens when too much light reaches the sensor and the lightest parts of the photo come out white)

Depth of field - In basic terms depth of field is how you take a photo that has focused on a certain point and the rest in blurry. If you want your photo to only have a small amount in focus then you need to use a larger aperture (F stop) such as 4.5, whereas if you want all of the photo is focus use a smaller aperture like 22. Here is an example, notice in the photo on the left only the perfume is in focus but on the photo on the right the perfume and the background are in focus.

Shutter Speed - For your photo to be in focus (unless you are using a tripod) you need to use a high shutter speed such as 1/2000. If your shutter speed is too slow your photo will be blurry. The shutter speed can also affect the brightness of a photo, the longer the shutter speed the brighter the photo because again, more light has reached the sensor.If you are using a tripod then you can use a slower shutter speed because the camera won't move at all during the duration of the shutter.

Focus - It is important to make sure that the important part of the photo is in focus. If you are taking a photo of a product, like a lipstick it is important for it to be in focus. Before taking the photo point the camera at where you want it to be in focus and lightly press on the shutter button, it should make a little beeping noise and this means that is has focused there, then take the photograph! If you are taking a close up photograph make sure your camera setting is on macro, this means it will focus a lot closer up and the photos will be sharper too, it really does make a lot of difference.

Lighting - Most photos look best with natural daylight as the light source. If you are photographing indoors find a well lit room and photograph near the window where the light is best, make sure not too use the flash as this can make things look a different colour and create a harsh light.

Background - If you want a certain thing to stand out in the photo it is best to use a neutral background, such as a white duvet cover or against floorboards. That way it isn't distractiong, but if you want to use something a bit brighter, I oftne use a floral bed cover, make sure you focus on the product and use an F number of about 4.5.

I hope these tips were helpful, next time I'm going to do a post on how to edit your photos! So let me know if there is anything you want to know or if you have any questions, I will make sure to answer them all :) 

From brown to blonde

 

This is my hair before (it's an old piccy, but my hair colour was exactly the same)

 I have finally got round to dying (well bleaching) my hair. This post is long overdue as I said I would do it ages ago, but then they didn't have the dye I wanted and I just didn't get round to it. But alas... here it is! The set of pictures above is after I used 'schwarzkopf live xxl max blonde 00B' what a mouthful! I left the dye on for the allocated time and put a shower cap on (probably not the best idea) I thought that this dye would just lighten my hair a shade lighter so I thought wearing the shower cap would increase it's lightening power from the heat on my head. However when taking a look under the shower cap shortly before washing it off, I was a bit shocked to see my roots were bright yellow/ ice blonde and the rest of my hair was a gingery blonde, and despite using 2 bottles of the product because I have longish hair, it was still slightly patchy, but this is probably due to me not applying it very well. 

After drying my hair I was a bit shocked to see how bright it was, and very yellow and dry too! I could have cried, but my Mum said she would buy me some new hair dye in the morning.

(Excuse my frizzy hair but I left it to dry naturally, and don't want to use any heat on it for a while so YAH KNOW!)

Before putting this new Nice n easy dye on my hair I was really considering putting a deep brown dye on my hair to cover the mess I had made! But I had researched about brassy blonde hair, and found out that I needed to put an 'ash' shade dye on my hair to counteract the brassiness. So this time my Mum applyed the dye for me (after seeing my attempt it was for the best)! When it was on my hair I was really worrying because it looked very ginger, but lets be honest... It couldn't have looked any worse than before. So I left it on again for the allocated time, then washed it off and left my hair to air dry (no more heat on my hair until it has recovered a bit) I quite like the results, it's still a bit of a funny colour but I am hoping it will look more natural once I have washed it a few times, and I am going to use my John Frieda shampoo that reduces brassiness. So here is my new hair, a bit damaged from the bleaching but alas... it is blonde!