My first shots

[Brigitte]

Hi to all!

Here are the first pictures I made with my new Digital-Camera Canon Power Shot A 470.

I´m amateur. Helpful suggestions are very welcome.










regards,
Brigitte

[Tareq Alhemrani]

Hi to all!

Here are the first pictures I made with my new Digital-Camera Canon Power Shot A 470.

I´m amateur. Helpful suggestions are very welcome.


regards,
Brigitte

Hi Brigitte,

nice shot you've taken.

My suggestions will be:

- Try different angles for different compositions

- Can you use Manual in your camera? by this you can take control on your camera as you want, because i can see the exposure is over in your shot, and details almost lost in highlights part.

- Try to use low ISO

- If you play with contrast, saturation, then you will give the shot more punch and popping, as i feel the color is washed out and the contrast is low.

I am not an expert at all, i am an amateur as well, so you are free to take my suggestions or reject/ignore them.

Good luck

[Tareq Alhemrani]

Just curious, why the low quality of the photos? Did you resize them or you compressed them or how did you save them for post?

[Colin Southern]

Well done Brigitte - may they be the first of many more!

Probably my first suggestion would be to get yourself an online gallery so that you're not limited by the relatively small amount of storage space here - there are quite a few out there; all seem to have free trial accounts, but offer more storage for just a few $$$ a year.

Personally, I use pbase.com - no doubt others will chip in with their recommendations as well (hint hint)

[Brigitte]

Dear Tareq and Colin!

Thanks very much for your helpful suggestions.
I use the automatic mode from the camera and choose high ISO.
For now I only try this one angle. It will be better to take shots from different perpectives.
Thx, for the hint.
I resize the photos to a smaller size before I post them, because it takes too much time for loading.
I started reading the manual today, it has about 180 pages. I only manage until now 20 pages. So will know something more after a finish.

Colin, I had an account at Photobucket. It is for free.


Thanks again,

regards,
Brigitte

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Brigitte,

Congrats on getting the camera, good first posts.

You've got those children well posed, do they want to be models I wonder?

I would agree with Colin about getting an online gallery, I looked around and settled on PBase too.
I'm still getting the hang of it, there's a link to mine in my signature, and also my initial Picasa one. The problem with Picasa is they didn't allow the direct linking to the photos, so I couldn't show them here. As Colin says, you have to pay a bit for that feature (but with PBase it's only $23 USD a year).

EDIT Just seen your reply, I think Bob (tsiya) in Florida uses Photobucket, so I guess that must work ok.

Well done on the pics,

[Brigitte]

Okay, here is another photo.

Edited and resized..

regards,
Brigitte



Emily

[Brigitte]

Dear Dave!

Thanks for congratulations and the encouragement.
I´m very happy with my new camera.
I view your and Colins picture galleries at Pbase. It it is very nice and has a fine appearance. I will think about
to invest some money. First I must become a better photgrapher. , then it will be worthwhile.

regards,
Brigitte

Edit: The girls on the photo are children from the neigborhood.

[Dave Humphries]

Hey Brigitte, you got Photobucket working already, there's no stopping you now!

It is quite tight framing, no ear tips or chin. Never the less, for the first day with the camera, you're doing very well, I have seen far worse.

Unfortunately, poor Emily is suffering a classic case of 'pet eye', which is like human 'red eye' you get with flash.

With an on camera flash, there's really no way to avoid it, except taking pet pics (without flash) in daylight.

In this case, the green reflected from her retina is almost the same colour as her eyes, so it looks perhaps even more strange. Probably the only way to give her back her black pupils is to do it manually in PP, as I suspect even the special automatic 'pet eye' correctors would struggle with the colours here.

Well done again,

[Brigitte]

Dear David!

I use mako-modus for the photo. I don´t take much distance to the object (Emily), because of that I cut the ears and the chin.
Yes, I use flash-light for the photo, the cat is sitting in the basement on an old box.
I will make some trys tomorrow without using flashlight, then it will be better.

Thanks for your help.

regards,
Brigitte

[Jim B.]

Hi Brigitte,

Nice first shots.Glad to see you posting images.I use photobucket also.So far,it works fine for me.Looking forward to some more of your work.Have fun!
Regards,
Jim

[Brigitte]

Hi Brigitte,

Nice first shots.Glad to see you posting images.I use photobucket also.So far,it works fine for me.Looking forward to some more of your work.Have fun!
Regards,
Jim

Dear Jim!

Thanks
Yes, Photobucket works fine for me too.

regards,
Brigitte

[Tareq Alhemrani]

I was using Photobucket in the past but then i ignored it about 2 years ago.

i use now only www.imageshack.us to upload my photos.

About gallery, i have profile on flickr and deviantart.

[The Blue Boy]

Firstly Brigitte, let me begin by saying you have the [COLOR="RoyalBlue"]coolest damn avatar on the whole internet! I use flickr as a base and I'm active in twenty different groups. There is only one that comes close, but that's all it does!

Anyway, as for the pictures I think you've made a great start by having the courage to get kids to pose. As for the windmill, next time maybe step back a bit and get more in the frame. Maybe the same for Emily

As for photosites I see you've chosen photobucket. I never heard of that before I chose flickr. The link to my stuff; erm.. see[COLOR="RoyalBlue"] my stuff below

[Geoff F]

Hello Brigitte.

In all honesty, there isn't really a lot wrong with those photos.

Always try to use as low an ISO as possible but never so low that your shutter speed or aperture give problems like camera shake of very shallow depth of field. Try to get away from auto settings and experiment with Tv or Av. I often take the first shot with semi auto, just in case I get everything else wrong, then have a play around with different options.

As well as trying different camera angles always think about the background as well, but too often there isn't much choice.

Black and White Cats are very difficult to photography well. If you expose for the white you can lose detail in the black fur but if you overexpose the white areas get 'blown away'. Generally it is better to just underexpose the whites and try to recover any faulty black areas with suitable software.

After substantial resizing for internet use most images will benefit from a little bit of sharpening, eg Unsharp Mask. But don't overdo it, I usually reckon 50% at 1 pixel maximum.

Geoff.

ps. how do you get the cat to pose for you? Whenever I try some test shots on my old moggie he quickly gets fed up and walks away.

[The Blue Boy]

Agreed.

You need to recolour your cat. I would recommend a nice shade of...erm...blue?

[Tareq Alhemrani]

Agreed.

You need to recolour your cat. I would recommend a nice shade of...erm...blue?

I prefer ........ RED

[ajith.rajeswari]

Hi Brigitte,
Nice set of photos.
My comments :-
the 3rd photo seems to have lot of noise and a bit close to the subject
The cat pic framing seems to be a bit close (I wud prefer full face )
Try shooting in a mode other than AUTO.
Thatz all from me for now!!

~Ajith

[Brigitte]

Firstly Brigitte, let me begin by saying you have the [COLOR="RoyalBlue"]coolest damn avatar on the whole internet! I use flickr as a base and I'm active in twenty different groups. There is only one that comes close, but that's all it does!

Anyway, as for the pictures I think you've made a great start by having the courage to get kids to pose. As for the windmill, next time maybe step back a bit and get more in the frame. Maybe the same for Emily

As for photosites I see you've chosen photobucket. I never heard of that before I chose flickr. The link to my stuff; erm.. see[COLOR="RoyalBlue"] my stuff below

Yeah I like this avatar too. I found some pics in web. If you want I can send them to you by mail. I will check out flickr as well. Thanks for the hint. . I don´t encourage the kids to pose. I guess they like takes a photos.
Next time will step back. I didn´t take much distance to the object and use zoom for the pictures.

Here is another photo from Emily. (from yesterday evening )



regards,
Brigitte

EDIT: View your side at flickr. Terrific stuff. I like the black/ white photos a lot.
EDIT: Check out this: http://www.flickr.com/photos/35999918@N05/

[Brigitte]

Hello Brigitte.

In all honesty, there isn't really a lot wrong with those photos.

Always try to use as low an ISO as possible but never so low that your shutter speed or aperture give problems like camera shake of very shallow depth of field. Try to get away from auto settings and experiment with Tv or Av. I often take the first shot with semi auto, just in case I get everything else wrong, then have a play around with different options.

As well as trying different camera angles always think about the background as well, but too often there isn't much choice.

Black and White Cats are very difficult to photography well. If you expose for the white you can lose detail in the black fur but if you overexpose the white areas get 'blown away'. Generally it is better to just underexpose the whites and try to recover any faulty black areas with suitable software.

After substantial resizing for internet use most images will benefit from a little bit of sharpening, eg Unsharp Mask. But don't overdo it, I usually reckon 50% at 1 pixel maximum.

Geoff.

ps. how do you get the cat to pose for you? Whenever I try some test shots on my old moggie he quickly gets fed up and walks away.

Dear Geoff and Ajith!

It is difficult to take photos from cats. I think they don´t really like it. Emily don´t stop running around
Today I check out the manual mode. I can choose different ISO like Auto, HI and from 80 to 1600. I´m not familiar with it. For which photos are low and high ISO?
Can anyone explain ? .
With the manual mode I can also choose different colour settings, exposure, lights etc.

I will try out how it works.


Thanks for your help.

regards,
Brigitte


EDIT: I will testing to recolour the photo with Gimp.