10 Common Mistakes Made by New Photographers
Whenever I teach, I get a lot of requests to review images. Over time, I’ve started to notice that a majority of the mistakes I see come from the same small group of errors that are repeated constantly, particularly by less experienced photographers.
Please keep in mind that all of these common mistakes can also be advantages when done well and with purpose. This article is not about those times, but is an observation about how often I see them done the wrong way. As a photographer, you need to build the right foundation of skills before you can successfully veer away from them.
The Most Common Technical Mistakes
1. Colors are too strong or unrealistic
Unrealistic and strong colors are often a fantastic creative choice. However there is a noticeable difference between when it is done purposely due to experience, and when it is done through lack of knowing any better or poor color management.
The first thing you need is a good monitor that is color calibrated. Without this, you are working on your images blind. I see photographers share images that look good to them on their screen, but they look off to everyone else. This is because their screen is the problem. How can you retouch an image if you can’t see the true colors or tones?
There is also a common tendency of newer photographers to try to make their photographs look like paintings. Once again, this can be done well, but the way I usually see it done is where people raise the saturation slider way too far. It may make the colors stand out more on a monitor and be more noticeable as a thumbnail in Facebook, but it just makes the image look fake. In a print, the colors will end up even more extreme than they do on a monitor. When you print images with natural and subtle colors those colors will look incredible and much stronger than you think. This look can sometimes be hard to notice on the monitor.
Instead of raising the saturation slider, find images where the natural colors in the scene are already strong. Find a subject that is a bright color surrounded by muted tones. Shoot at the golden hour to let the colors naturally gain strength. Instead of raising the saturation slider if you want the image to feel like a painting, overlay a specific color onto the image. Or try creating a moody image with subtle and natural color, print it out, put it on your wall, and shine some light on it and you will see how powerful that subtle color can be. That can feel like a painting too.
Smokestack and Graffiti, NYC.
2. Shots are not sharp enough
Intensional blur can be gorgeous, but to be a good photographer you need to have control of your sharpness. If you are doing a portrait, the focus point should be on the eyes. The eyes need to be the sharpest part of your image, not the nose or the ear. Also, pay attention to back focus in certain situations. This is where the camera’s focus will miss what you are aiming at and instead focus on the background behind it.
To achieve sharpness and reduce handheld camera shake, your shutter speed needs to be at least one over your focal length. So if you are on a full frame camera with a 50mm lens, the shutter speed would need to be at least 1/50th of a second (and probably a little faster to be safe). On an APS-C sensor a 50mm would be the equivalent of around an 80mm lens and on a micro-4/3rds camera it would be the equivalent of a 100mm lens, needing 1/100th of a second shutter speed. If you are freezing motion you need an even faster shutter speed. For people moving at average speeds, I prefer 1/320th of a second.
Think about raising your ISO sometimes to get sharper shots, particularly in darker lighting situations, but also sometimes during the day. A higher ISO will allow you to use a faster shutter speed and a smaller aperture, such as f/16, to ensure that your entire image will be in focus.
3. The composition is off
Shop, Chinatown, NYC. Notice the right edge.
If you are Garry Winogrand then you can skew your images purposely for that energetic effect. However, I notice many photographers struggle to get their images straight. Look through the viewfinder and find a frame of reference to straighten your image. Maybe it’s a lamp post or a sidewalk or a tree. Pay attention to when the camera might be slightly lower on the left or right side. Often it will be the same side consistently for you and it’s just a tendency that has to be unlearned. Some people don’t even notice that their images are very slightly skewed when editing. Noticing and fixing the slight skew (crooked) can make a huge difference.
The other thing I notice is that a lot of photographers don’t pay attention to their edges. Put things in the edges of your frames when possible to keep a viewer’s eyes from moving off the print. This could be a tree branch, a fire escape, a building, anything. Cut off a part of an element and place it in the corner to help keep the eyes in the frame. Look at the right edge of the image above. It makes a big difference.
Sometimes compositions can be too simple. Simple can be good but not always. Take a step back and see if you can include more in the frame. Create more complex composition with more elements. That can make for very fun and engrossing images.
Also, a surprising number of people overly rely on either vertical or horizontal shooting. It’s good to have a preference, but when I see it in beginners it seems more like they are just uncomfortable shooting the opposite way. It’s not like they are shooting two verticals for every one horizontal, some are shooting six or more verticals for every horizontal, or vice versa. It’s not on purpose as they default automatically into that way of shooting no matter the situation.
Most importantly, I find that people will see something interesting, stop immediately when they notice it, click a few shots, and move on. It’s almost like a robotic move. Stop yourself when you see something interesting and take a few seconds to actively think about the best way to capture it. Horizontal or vertical? What is the best focal length and where can I move to get the best viewpoint? Are there other elements that I can include in the frame? How is the lighting?
SoHo, New York, NYC.
4. Not close enough
Robert Capa once said it all, “If your photos aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough.” Don’t hover from far away like a sniper. Get in there close, and get in there with a wider angle lens. This can work for portraits, landscapes, or any type of photography. Sometimes it is best to get closer and capture what is most important, large in the frame.
5. Contrast, exposure, black and white levels are off
The overall tones in your image are vital and you need to get good at working with the contrast, exposure, black levels, and highlights. Always try to get the exposure as close to perfect as you can in the camera. I know you can fix it later and often you can do it well, but it’s just not the same as getting it right in the camera. Also think about whether your images might be too dark or too light.
Getting the contrast correct is tough. Be very careful about overdoing contrast as this is a very common mistake. You also don’t want to add the same amount of contrast to every image because the amount of contrast needed depends on the lighting that was in the scene. I notice both tendencies from photographers who use too little contrast or too much contrast. Sometimes this is the monitor’s fault but other time it is the photographer’s.
Having blacks and whites in your image are good things. Often you want some detail in the shadows or highlights but you want areas of white to draw the eyes in and areas of black to ground the image.
6. Heavy-handed HDR
HDR in black and white, Central Park, NYC.
I’m not against HDR. I swear I’m not. I just see it overdone so much that it makes me want to cry. HDR can be done subtly, and it can look amazing when done right.
However, what I often see is HDR done to such extreme that the colors look far from real. It doesn’t even look fake, it just looks bad. There are absolutely no shadows or blacks, and no highlights or whites. I’ve seen entire images that are all middle tones!
You can take some detail out of the shadows and bring in the whites somewhat to get a better dynamic range. Try to find that fine line between realism and looking as good as possible. Retouching is about finding that fine line where an image works and not going over or under it.
The Most Common Conceptual Mistakes
Shoe Store, SoHo, NYC. Notice the consistency in the next three photographs.
7. No subject
Photographing beauty, light, and color is so important, but sometimes your images need some substance to them as well. Great photography is the merging of both form and content. If you can mix a beautiful image with an interesting subject matter, you have hit photographic gold. Think about subjects, ideas, or emotions that are portrayed within an image. Figure out what that substance is that appeals to you and develop it. Think about what your voice is and develop it.
Prince and Broadway, SoHo, NYC.
8. Photographs are not consistent enough
You can photograph many different subjects and you should try different styles, but organize these subjects and styles into cohesive groups. Try to give these groups a consistent look with an overall feel and related content. Consistency is developed with experience, so the more you photograph, the more you will start to think about it. Pay attention to the flow of one image into the other.
9. Too many travel photos and not enough close to home
Trash, SoHo, NYC.
So many people say to me that they only photograph when they travel. I don’t care where you live, or how busy you are, it’s so important to photograph where you live.
If you don’t want to lug your camera around then use a phone camera. Phone cameras are pretty good. Schedule some time every week, even if it’s only 20 minutes or during a lunch break, to photograph somewhere, anywhere. Photograph in the parking lot, on the corner, at the market. I promise you that there will be interesting subject matter there if you look. But you have to go out and take the time to look.
10. Too many photos
It’s fine to take a lot of photos. It’s fine to show a photograph a day if you shoot a lot, but edit your work down to the best. Nobody has the time to wade through a million photographs to find the gems. They will miss the gems if they have to look through too many mediocre images.
We all take mediocre images but the best photographers do the best job at hiding those images. Do your viewers a favor and pick out the gems for them and only show those. You want people to want more rather than wanting less, because if they want less then they’re probably not coming back.
Do you have any other mistakes you think should be added to this list? What are you guilty of, and willing to admit it?
Dani Jo | Perfect Storm | CD Baby Music Store
"After 2 years my album is finally on iTunes! I'm so excited it's finally released, please check it out!"
Dani Jo's style is a quirky mix of Modern Country with a twist of pop.
Song list includes:
1. Better This Way
2. Can't Go Back
3. Dear Girl With the Broken Heart
4. Happily Ever After
5. I'm Sorry
6. I Just Wanna Find Me
7. My Heart Beats for You
8. My Heart Melts Each Time
9. Perfect Storm
10. She May Be Waiting
You can order a copy of Dani Jo's CD 'Perfect Storm' here:
Marty Stuart's photos help keep country music's memories
by Peter Cooper
Vincent van Gogh and Lester Flatt.
Merle Haggard and Claude Monet.
Makes sense to Marty Stuart. He puts the work of all these men under the category of "museum-quality art." Lately, the museums are in agreement.
"The Frist is part of our spring world," says Stuart, the "Grand Ole Opry" star whose work behind camera lenses is the star of a new exhibit at The Frist Center for the Visual Arts called "American Ballads: The Photographs of Marty Stuart" and of a forthcoming (due for a July 4 release) Vanderbilt University Press book of the same name.
"Later this year, we're at the Smithsonian," Stuart says. "This fall, it's the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I've been working on getting our culture to be weighed in alongside jazz, ballet and theater. Now, these institutions are responding."
It's telling that Stuart's work as a photographer and documentarian and his subjects' work as performers of simple songs are recognized as entities of cultural significance. It's also telling that The Frist Center, which opened in 2001, is recognized as a place of international renown and a major museum worth mentioning in the same breath as the Smithsonian or the Met.
The artist and the museum have attained such status by embarking on similar missions: They each survey their immediate surroundings and the world at large with jewelers' eyes, seeking people and things that are special and then illuminating those people and things so that the rest of us can have a better understanding.
Inspired by his mother, Hilda Stuart, whose photographs are published in a Nautilus Publishing book called "Choctaw Gardens," Stuart began taking photographs when he was 11. His first one was of the headline performer at the Choctaw Indian Fair in Stuart's hometown of Philadelphia, Miss. That performer was Connie Smith. Today, she's a Country Music Hall of Famer, and Stuart is married to her.
Stuart moved to Nashville when he was 13, over Labor Day weekend of 1972, to work as Flatt's mandolin player. Soon, he found himself on tour with Flatt in New York, and he saw the striking, black-and-white photographs that Milt Hinton took of jazz greats Louis Armstrong, Billie Holliday, Miles Davis and others. Stuart soon called his mother and asked her to mail him a camera.
"He knew he could do for country what Hinton had done for jazz, and the timing was perfect," writes Frist Executive Director and CEO Susan H. Edwards in her essay at the outset of the "American Ballads" book. "The arc of Stuart's career placed him no more than two degrees of separation from every legend of country music, living and dead. Moreover, Stuart was keenly aware of how quickly country music was changing, and he wanted to be the memory keeper."
Photos win raves
Stuart's musicality and affable personality afforded him access that a backstage pass never could. His attention and perspective allowed him to turn that access into art.
He took photos of "Father of Bluegrass" Bill Monroe on his Goodlettsville farm, the rare place where free-range chickens and late-model limousines intersected. He captured Jerry Lee Lewis, extending middle fingers over drinks in Paris, and Johnny Cash and Ray Charles howling with laughter at a Nashville recording session produced by Billy Sherrill.
He shot Hank Williams Jr. and his daughter, Katie, at the gravesite of Hank Williams, and he shot "King of Bluegrass" Jimmy Martin at Martin's own grave. (The King took a proactive approach to perpetuity.)
The most striking music portrait may be of Cash, addressing not the camera but his own mortality, on Sept. 8, 2003, four days before his death.
"American Ballads" is not exclusively devoted to country musicians. There's also a section called "Badlands," filled with portraits of the Lakota people of South Dakota, and another called "Blue Line Hotshots," filled with characters Stuart has met on the road.
"All of these are folk heroes to me," he says. "The common denominator between them and the country music masters is the fierce sense of individualism and independence they all share."
Edwards, who worked with Frist curator Kathryn Delmez (who edited the Vanderbilt Press book) on the exhibit, is a photography historian who has come to admire the work of country music-oriented Nashville photographers including Stuart, Les Leverett and Jim McGuire.
Stuart's status as a master musician didn't sway her opinion of his photographs: She was appropriately swayed as soon as Delmez showed her samples of Stuart's work.
"His work holds up, or it wouldn't be in a museum," she says. "Marty Stuart is a serious photographer, and his photographs transcend his renown. He would be considered an outstanding documentarian in any genre. That he happens to live in Middle Tennessee is our good fortune."
Reach Peter Cooper at 615-259-8220 or on Twitter@tnmusicnews.com.
If You Go
What: "American Ballads: The Photographs of Marty Stuart" exhibit
Where: Conte Community Art Gallery, The Frist Center for the Visual Arts, 919 Broadway
When: Today through Nov. 2
Admission: Access to the Conte Community Art Gallery is free and does not require Frist admission.
Country music singer Kevin Sharp dead at 43
PHOTO COURTESY OF SUE VELDKAMP/AP
FAIR OAKS, Calif. - Kevin Sharp, a country music singer who recorded multiple chart-topping songs and survived a well-publicized battle with cancer, has died. He was 43.
The singer, author, and motivational speaker made his big debut in Country music in 1997 with the No. 1 hit, “Nobody Knows,” a cover of a song originally made popular by R&B artist Tony Rich. The single topped the Billboard country charts for four weeks. Sharp’s debut album Measure of a Man was released the same year, producing additional Top 5 singles “If You Love Somebody” and “She’s Sure Taking It Well.”
Being a cancer survivor, he was an active supporter of the Make-A-Wish Foundation. He authored an inspirational book, Tragedy’s Gift, about his experience and toured the U.S. as a motivational speaker.
Born December 10, 1970, Sharp grew up in Weiser, Idaho in a musical family of seven children and many foster children. They moved to Sacramento, California as Sharp was entering his second year of high school. A gifted athlete who excelled in several sports, he began experiencing fatigue and unexplained pain that was later diagnosed as a rare form of bone cancer (Ewings Sarcoma) that had spread to his lungs. During his senior year of high school, Sharp was told that his chance of survival was slim.
Uncertain if he would live six months, he was introduced to the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which grants wishes to children with life-threatening illnesses. They honored his wish of meeting producer/performer David Foster. That friendship sustained Sharp through two grueling years of chemotherapy, experimental drugs, and radiation treatments. It also opened the door for Sharp to pursue his dream of becoming a Country artist, and he eventually landed a deal with Asylum Records in Nashville.
To the surprise of many, he went into remission in 1991 and the disease did not return. However, he experienced lifelong health issues as a result of the aggressive treatment.
Sharp’s musical career garnered many accolades including New Male Vocalist from the Academy of Country Music, New Male Touring Artist of the Year from the Country Music Association/SRO, Favorite New Country Artist from the American Music Awards, Billboard Magazine’s Best New Country Video and TNN/Music City News Male Star of Tomorrow.
His last single was 2011’s “Let Me Rock You To Sleep.”
Donations can be made in his memory to the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Memories of Sharp can be emailed to sharp@kevinsharp.com, and cards for the family can be sent to:
Kevin Sharp
c/o Cupit Music Group
7309 Tidwell Road
Nashville, TN 37209
A memorial service celebrating Sharp’s life is being planned for Nashville. More information will be released in the near future.
He is survived by his mother, and siblings Lisa, Mary, Ron, Gregg, Richard, Larry and Genni.
FAIR OAKS, Calif. - Kevin Sharp, a country music singer who recorded multiple chart-topping songs and survived a well-publicized battle with cancer, has died. He was 43.
His sister Mary Huston said Sharp died at his mother's Fair Oaks home at 10:49 p.m. Saturday of complications from past stomach surgeries and digestive issues.
"He had a strong heart, that's what kept him alive, (but) I'm so happy for him, that there's no more suffering," Huston said through tears and exhaustion. She had cared for her brother since his return home to Northern California last Friday after 10 weeks in the hospital.
The singer, author, and motivational speaker made his big debut in Country music in 1997 with the No. 1 hit, “Nobody Knows,” a cover of a song originally made popular by R&B artist Tony Rich. The single topped the Billboard country charts for four weeks. Sharp’s debut album Measure of a Man was released the same year, producing additional Top 5 singles “If You Love Somebody” and “She’s Sure Taking It Well.”
Being a cancer survivor, he was an active supporter of the Make-A-Wish Foundation. He authored an inspirational book, Tragedy’s Gift, about his experience and toured the U.S. as a motivational speaker.
Born December 10, 1970, Sharp grew up in Weiser, Idaho in a musical family of seven children and many foster children. They moved to Sacramento, California as Sharp was entering his second year of high school. A gifted athlete who excelled in several sports, he began experiencing fatigue and unexplained pain that was later diagnosed as a rare form of bone cancer (Ewings Sarcoma) that had spread to his lungs. During his senior year of high school, Sharp was told that his chance of survival was slim.
Uncertain if he would live six months, he was introduced to the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which grants wishes to children with life-threatening illnesses. They honored his wish of meeting producer/performer David Foster. That friendship sustained Sharp through two grueling years of chemotherapy, experimental drugs, and radiation treatments. It also opened the door for Sharp to pursue his dream of becoming a Country artist, and he eventually landed a deal with Asylum Records in Nashville.
To the surprise of many, he went into remission in 1991 and the disease did not return. However, he experienced lifelong health issues as a result of the aggressive treatment.
Sharp’s musical career garnered many accolades including New Male Vocalist from the Academy of Country Music, New Male Touring Artist of the Year from the Country Music Association/SRO, Favorite New Country Artist from the American Music Awards, Billboard Magazine’s Best New Country Video and TNN/Music City News Male Star of Tomorrow.
His last single was 2011’s “Let Me Rock You To Sleep.”
Donations can be made in his memory to the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Memories of Sharp can be emailed to sharp@kevinsharp.com, and cards for the family can be sent to:
Kevin Sharp
c/o Cupit Music Group
7309 Tidwell Road
Nashville, TN 37209
A memorial service celebrating Sharp’s life is being planned for Nashville. More information will be released in the near future.
He is survived by his mother, and siblings Lisa, Mary, Ron, Gregg, Richard, Larry and Genni.
Glen Campbell Has Been Moved Into a Facility
by 
The "Goodbye Tour" tour was filmed for a documentary called Glen Campbell … I'll Be Me, which will make its debut Friday at the 2014 Nashville Film Festival. The documentary follows Campbell, his wife, and their three adult children – Cal, Shannon, and Ashley – as they deal with the various stages of the disease and perform on the road together.
"I still love making music," Campbell told PEOPLE at the time.
"And I still love performing for my fans. I'd like to thank them for
sticking with me through thick and thin."
photo's by Ray Tharaldson all rights reserved 2014
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)