Wish for do overs

With WebShots still down, I was thinking about a subject brought up by SheyMouse on his blog about wanting to retake some photos given the chance. Going through my portfolio, I have loads of missed opportunities: beautiful locations and subjects, but a badly composed photo or no photo at all as I didn't even see the chance. Composition doesn't come naturally for me and I have read a couple of books about it without grasping the fleeting notions described in them. It is not until I read "Learning to See Creatively: Design, Color & Composition in Photography" by Bryan Peterson that things started to make sense a little more. If you have some money to spare, I would also recommend his excellent "Understanding Exposure", even for the advanced amateur photographer. I have pre-ordered his "Understanding Shutter Speed: Creative Action and Low-Light Photography Beyond 1/125 Second" and I'll let you know if it is of the same quality.

If Bryan Peterson has a Google Alert on the use of his name and comes across this blog, please eave a comment for a devoted fan :-)

Sepia Tone and Motion Photography

Five Hints to Create a Sepia-toned Photograph Filled with Motion I always play with my camera. One of the things I like to do with it is move it in different directions when the shutter is open. Here are some hints to do just that... 1. If an object, such as a horse and carriage are moving at night, set your camera to Tv mode and then set your shutter speed to 1/2 a second, more if you are daring. 2. Follow the object you are photographing as you shoot, kind of like how a seagull follows a boat. Your objective is to get the object clear among a moving background. 3. Take the photo in Raw format if at all possible so that you can get sepia from the Raw workflow in Photoshop CS 2. You can do this with any object from your dog catching a frisbee to your baby crawling on the floor.