Tips for Taking Good Photos

[Hornpipe2]

I love love love seeing pictures of people's game rooms on here, but as many of you know, the pictures often don't do justice to the room itself. We've spent so long putting everything in its place and building up a nice collection, so it would be great to let your pics show the detail you've invested.

 

The good and bad news is, it's not your camera - it's you! At the little 640x480 shots of a still-life in a room we post here, your camera is fine. Bad news because you can't just buy a new camera and get better shots... and I know how much we all love new toys. You'll just take the exact same shots with a newer piece of gear. Good news because you can fix some of those problems right now!

 

So here are three simple tips anyone can apply to get better looking photos now. I'm a hobby photographer and I've found that with just a slight change in methodology, the quality of your photos will improve drastically. Try it next time and just see what you think. In fact, these are widely applicable to any photos you shoot, but it's especially helpful for when you have a lot of time to set things up - like, say, pictures of a gameroom!

 

1. Ditch the flash. Find out how to disable the flash on your camera NOW. For all we care you may as well stick a piece of black tape over the darn thing. On-camera flash (not the external kind you stick in the hotshoe on top) suffers from two big problems - #1 it's very weak, failing to illuminate anything more than about 4 feet in front of your camera, and #2 it shoots in the same line as your lens looks, which means all your objects look super flat (with those garish "dark wall shadows" behind everything). We don't walk around with head lamps on all day, so we're not used to seeing things being lit from that angle. The end result is that stuff close to the lens gets full-blown white shininess, while things further away end up not being lit at all, and turn out dark dark black when the camera attempts to compensate for your poor setup choices.

 

One great way to illustrate people's obsession with the dinky flash attached to their camera is to go to a concert and watch the crowd. People who are hundreds of feet away from the stage still fire away with the flash perhaps hoping the light will reach the band. Not a chance. Enjoy your brightly-lit images of the backs of people's heads : )

 

"But it's too dark to take pictures without flash!" Then put some more lights in! Open window shades, and turn on overhead lights and lamps. Seriously, why use that little 1 inch square strobe to light your whole room? (If things are still too dark, you will want to take your camera out of Full Auto Mode and get the shutter to stay open longer, letting more light in. This is a slightly more advanced topic and could take some experimentation, but I'll elaborate if you want.)

 

2. Put the camera on a tripod. "My photo is blurry" is 99% of the time NOT a focusing problem, it's a problem of "camera shake"! Even if you think your hands are rock solid, you'd be amazed at how much they move in the time it takes to snap a photo - especially indoors, where the shutter must stay open much longer to compensate for the reduced light. If you don't have a tripod, bum one off a friend - or just set the camera on a solid surface. Then turn on the self-timer, press button, and wait. That way the act of pressing the button doesn't disturb the camera. Bingo, instantly sharp photos. Here's an area where a cell phone camera might let you down, as many don't offer self-timers or tripod mounts. I'm sure you could rig something with rubber bands or whatever if that is all you have to work with.

 

3. Fill the frame. Your subject is the SNES and games on the shelf, right? Then why are you standing 10 feet away from it? Get close. Put your camera into "macro mode" and get closer. Zoom (but never digital zoom). Check the viewfinder not just for your subject but also what's around it, and make sure you're not accidentally getting your dirty socks in the corner of the frame.

 

Hope that helps. I'd be glad to contribute more later, but this should help people correct the initial problems with their photos.

 

ETA: This was fun to write up. I may try making a short video later just for fun (same info). Then someone can come tell me how to make better videos!

Edited October 15, 2009 by Hornpipe2

[iwan-iwanowitsch-goratschin]

[cvga]

Good tips. I discovered through trial and error that turning off the flash and turning on the lights gives me much better pictures.

[keilbaca]

Wow, I didn't even think about using the 2 second self timer when on a tripod, so even pushing the button won't disturb the picture.

 

Thanks for the tip!

[GOTHCLAWZ]

Cool, is it possible to take a picture at all 360 angles so the image loops & shows your whole room? Like Google Earth on street view. That would be kinda cool.

[the.golden.ax]

Next post should be: Taking good photos of tips.

 

AX

[Hornpipe2]

Cool, is it possible to take a picture at all 360 angles so the image loops & shows your whole room? Like Google Earth on street view. That would be kinda cool.

 

Yes! The term for what you're trying to do is "image stitching" (or "panorama stitching" or something similar). Basically, you put the camera on a tripod, then rotate it around and take a picture every 60-90 degrees or so, and then use a software app to blend them into one long image. Then you'd need some kind of 360 degree viewer that you could load the photo into.

 

I've never tried it before but I know the tools are out there. Hopefully, at least some are free : )

[Tursi]

Yes! The term for what you're trying to do is "image stitching" (or "panorama stitching" or something similar). Basically, you put the camera on a tripod, then rotate it around and take a picture every 60-90 degrees or so, and then use a software app to blend them into one long image. Then you'd need some kind of 360 degree viewer that you could load the photo into.

I've never tried it before but I know the tools are out there. Hopefully, at least some are free : )

 

I use Panorama Factory - it's not free, unfortunately, but it works well. http://www.panoramafactory.com/

[Hornpipe2]

I've done a little more research into taking panorama shots, and even tried one of my own over the Christmas break. A couple of free programs to try:

 

* hugin (Linux) is nice and automated, and can pick out control points for you automatically.

* Windows Live Photo Gallery (Win XP and higher, free from http://download.live.com/photogallery ) also does a good job of image stitching.

 

The key to good results is to use a (level) tripod, and take shots with a good amount of overlap between images. Otherwise, you end up with weird breaks or distortions, or the images are not in a straight line and you have to crop out a bunch.

Edited January 7, 2010 by Hornpipe2

[GOTHCLAWZ]

Yes! The term for what you're trying to do is "image stitching" (or "panorama stitching" or something similar). Basically, you put the camera on a tripod, then rotate it around and take a picture every 60-90 degrees or so, and then use a software app to blend them into one long image. Then you'd need some kind of 360 degree viewer that you could load the photo into.

 

I've never tried it before but I know the tools are out there. Hopefully, at least some are free : )

Oh, thanks! I'll get right on that...

[Hornpipe2]

Let's suppose you want a high quality digitized version of an instruction manual or box, but you don't have a scanner handy. No problem: with a tripod, your camera, and way to set up the document you can get the image easily.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3aXW5ZKa9w

 

This is a reasonable setup for one-time shots. Dedicated users needing multiple documents over and over should either

* get a scanner for maximum quality

* rig a setup like one of these: http://www.subchaser.org/photographing-documents

[ZZTOP SOFT]

^{If you doesn't have a tripod.... always can take a broom and use the self timer. Works fine for me.}

Edited May 11, 2012 by ZZTOP SOFT

[RedRaider]

Very good tips for the P&S crowd.

 

A homebrew light box, lit with flood lamps from the hardware store, would do wonders for individual product shots as well.

[Omega-TI]

I use a simple and inexpensive hand-held multi-LED flashlight for highlighting or fill. If gives a more diffused light, unlike the focus type flashlight I used to highlight the name on the photo below. Since the area in question gets more lighting, you can have a reduced shutter time which results in a clearer photo.

 

 

 

Below are a few examples of closeup shots using the above flashlight.

Use light to put emphasis on a specific portion or the subject of the image.

 

 

 

Sometimes if you angle the light in a specific direction you can still highlight the whole image, but put the brightest light on the "shiny bits" to make the image "pop".

 

 

 

If you back off a little on the light a little, you'll still get a decent image, but with the more subdued effect you can use to bring other lights. In this image I wanted the glow of the LED's, but you can see the lighting was angled in from the right-hand side. It helps frame the image, but does not over power the subject of the photo.

 

 

 

Whatever you do, take LOTS of pictures, with a digital camera it does not cost anything, so take a dozen at least from different angles, then pick the one you want later.

 

 

(ALL THE PHOTOS CAN BE ENLARGED BY CLICKING ON THEM)

[Games Retrospect]

Thanks for these tips. Most of what I know about taking pictures is based on trial and error (like most of the things I've learned on my own,) but it's nice to know how other people do it.