If you need some tips on selling photography online, you have come to the right place. Stock photography sites like Dreamstime, BigStockPhoto, and Shutterstock can be gold-mines for you if you submit the right photos, but a small fact that my surprise you is that they do not accept every photo submitted! Make sure yours are not rejected by following these basic steps – these tips on selling photography online.

• Focus Is CRUCIAL! Photo stock sites get so many submissions that they can afford to reject anything less than perfect. The “blurred effect” can be a plus, but a good rule of thumb is to limit it’s use to that of emphasizing movement.
• Shoot Intentionally. Think about what will make the photo really stand out AS YOU ARE TAKING IT! Lighting, composition, and other “technical stuff” is important from the moment your finger rests on the shutter button. If you think you can always crop or zoom in to get that sell-able photo, think again!
• Watch your lighting. Don’t take pictures directly into the sunlight, of course, but also be aware that shiny surfaces can reflect light that may lessen the overall attractiveness of your shot.
• Be creative in your niches. The market for photos of flowers and sunsets is rather saturated. Think outside the box and ask yourself WHO might be looking for photos of WHAT. Designers of brochures for outdoors companies may want photos of tents, camping supplies, etc.
• Keep your lens clean! This is one of those simple but often-forgotten tips on selling photography online that is more important than you realize! An eye-glasses wipe cloth works well if you don’t have a camera lens cloth.
• Take lots and lots of photos, but only submit the best! Get camera-happy, be a photo-holic… but limit your submissions to only those that are truly great shots. Build your online portfolio with your top work.
• Don’t forget about model release forms! VERY FEW stock photography sites accept photos of people without their permission. If they are even remotely identifiable, you will need a signed form. This includes random “locals” you shoot while travelling, by the way!

Photography as a hobby is a very rewarding one, as you become an artist and can showcase your talents to the world. Make it a profitable hobby by taking photos that won’t be rejected by stock photography sites, but instead will be accepted and right away get you selling photography online! You will LOVE the extra cash!

The advice above is a small compilation of basic tips on selling photography online that will help you get a good start and be welcomed by stock photography sites. If you follow them and keep learning as you go, you will soon be making some lovely Cash From Photos!

Winter is a wonderful season that conjures up images of snow, Santa and hot chocolate.  Winter photographs often help individuals get into the holiday spirit, even if the photo has nothing to do with Christmas.  People begin to think of family, happy times, and are in generally good spirits during the frosty season.  Whether you desire a professional position as a photographer or just want to capture images for yourself, the following photography tips will help for the chilly season.

Attitude when Taking a Shot:

It doesn’t really matter the season, your attitude has to be right for getting a successful shot.  However, when it is cold outside you may feel the need to rush through your image capture in order to get back to the comfortable indoors.  You should replace thoughts of a fireplace, hot chocolate, and a good book with enthusiasm.  For most of us it just takes looking outside at the snow, trees, and finding a beautiful scene to record.

To have the right attitude you should dress appropriately for the weather.  You want unrestrictive clothing, but clothing which is designed to keep you warm.  Instead of a thick jacket that makes it hard to move consider layers such as thermal underwear, fleece shirt, and a fleece jacket.  Also get your outdoor clothing a couple of sizes too large to help in the movement.

Opportunity:

The wintry season offers a myriad of unique sounds, light, and subjects.  A branch weighed down by snow or frozen water hanging from an eave can all add to the image you capture.  Is the day grey or sunny?  How is the light reflecting on a subject?  You have to learn to recognise an opportunity in winter in order to capture it.  Some of the best subjects are animals out in the snow.  Deer, squirrels, birds, and other animals can make great subjects as long as you are willing to find them.

Camera Protection:

In cold temperatures it is possible for your camera to malfunction.  Before going out you should read the manual to determine if it has sensitivity to extreme temperatures.  Batteries can also have sensitivity issues.  You may want to bring extra batteries in case they freeze up.  The only thing that needs to be exposed on the camera is the lens, view finder, and the buttons.  You may decide in winter photography you want to create a camera cover to help protect it from the elements.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Claire_Jarrett

Long lenses

Telephoto lens settings allow you to fill the frame with distant subjects. But the ideal maximum focal length to take with you will depend on your holiday plans

The main purpose of telephoto lens settings is that they allow you to get ‘closer’ to a subject without having to move your feet, magnifying the image in comparison with shorter lenses. They are essential in situations where it is impossible or unwise to move within a certain distance of the subject. But whilst the use of long telephotos with sport and wildlife subjects is usually essential, most subjects will occasionally benefit from the use of a more extensive zoom.

A short telephoto lens (with a focal length 70mm to 135mm, say) is often the best lens for close-up portraits, as it tends to flatten the features in a flattering way. Longer settings (from 200mm to 300mm) can be useful for candid shots – letting you capture shots of local people, or of family and friends, without their becoming camera conscious.

Even with subjects such as architecture and landscape, where the wide-angle is often the lens of choice, a long telephoto will not only allow the photographer to pick out details and individual elements in the scene, it will allow him or her to tackle these subjects in a refreshing way. The way in which a telephoto lens can seem to compress elements in the composition, or throw backgrounds so convincingly out of focus, can often be more beneficial than its narrow angle of view

The exact length of lens required will depend on the subjects you find at your destination. The further away you are, and the smaller your subject, the longer the lens you will need. On a safari you will benefit from the magnification of a 400mm, whilst shooting surfers from the beach you may need an 800mm. Such extreme focal lengths are not often found on zooms, requiring you to buy a bulky additional lens (or use a teleconverter). Zooms for SLRs, however, are widely available with a maximum focal length of 300mm – capable of dealing with most subjects, including action and nature.

Avoiding undue disturbance

Even if the people you meet on your travels do not object to being photographed, a long telephoto lens will allow you take their picture without invading their personal space. By taking pictures from of locals from afar, you don’t need to ask their permission or disturb their work.

The iPhone is the worlds most popular smart phone and in many ways it has changed the way we live our lifes. The iPhone has brought with it an assortment of apps (applications) which offer all sorts of perks and benefits. In this post, I investigate the role that iPhone apps are now playing in iPhone photography. They say the best camera is the one you have with you. Since iPhone owners tend to never leave home without them, that makes the iPhone win by default. But the iPhone might just be the best camera in another sense: with the near-limitless assortment of apps ready for download, that little camera suddenly got a lot more powerful. Read on to discover a few of the cool things your dedicated digital camera could only dream of doing.

Hipstamatic ($1.99, Synthetic Corp.) Even though the iPhone 4 is capable of taking some really sharp HD pictures, sometimes we miss all the fun flaws of cameras from the past– vignetting, light leaks, distortions, and all. That’s where Hipstamatic comes in. While a real dyed-in-the-wool hipster might scoff at using an app to simulate the toy cameras of yesteryear, Hipstamatic is faster, less expensive, and much less pretentious. Hipstamatic even lets you switch out the lens, flash, and film of your virtual camera, so the possibilities are endless. But be warned: with all the in-app upgrades, Hipstamatic might become an addictive, expensive habit.

TiltShift Generator ($0.99, Art & Mobile) Tilt shift photography has gone from indie-art underground trend to iconic camera mod. It even made its way to a sequence in David Fincher’s The Social Network. To put it simply, tilt-shifting a photograph adds a little blurriness in all the right places, making regular-sized objects like people, cars, and buildings look like miniature toys. TiltShift Generator for iPhone won’t play with your lenses like the real thing, but it will easily let you adjust the blur, tint, saturation, and more. It’s cheap, it’s easy, and, most importantly, it looks awesome.

Color Splash ($0.99, Pocket Pixels Inc.) If the App Store had an All-Star League, Color Spash would definitely be in it. This app has been a bestseller for so long because it does one thing, and does it well. Color Spash will turn any image black and white, and then let you choose which parts of the image to bring back in color, mimicking the dramatic look of movies like Sin City. After that, you can adjust the saturation to make the picture even more striking. If you don’t have the time and patience to become a master of Photoshop, Color Splash is for you.

Darkroom (Free, Stepcase) Great as they are, iPhones have limitations. The 3GS doesn’t have a camera flash, and the flash on the iPhone 4 could drain a car battery. What’s more, sometimes a flash just doesn’t look that nice. It can flatten an otherwise dynamic photo. Darkroom is a camera app that automatically applies a series of filters to brighten and improve any photograph that was taken in low-light conditions. The results are actually pretty impressive: bright, balanced, and a lot sharper than one might expect. Best of all, the basic version of Darkroom is free.

Pano ($2.99, Debacle Software) Pano is an app that must be seen to be believed. Pano will guide the user through the steps to line up and shoot a series of photos that it will then stitch together into one amazing, hi-res panorama. Whether it’s a skyscraper-top cityscape or just a trippy, 360-degree view of your bedroom, Pano will make your jaw drop. These panoramas are perfect for Flickr or your Twitter feed, but be prepared for your friends to ask just how you did that.

Landscape photography is a pastime enjoyed by young and old, all over the world. From fields and ponds, to an unspoiled beach, there is no limit to what you can catch on camera. Some of the most conventional landscape photographers like to take pictures of greenery, empty fields, desolate woods, and so on. In the more modern world, other aspects like wildlife and urban buildings can now be included in what has become quite a broad term. The main theme however is to show as little human activity as possible.

Since the work of Ansel Adams and Edward Weston in the mid 1900′s, landscape photography has more recently grown in popularity attracting novices and experts alike. The most popular scenes tend to be clear, open fields with no man made structures in sight, wildlife may also play a part in these photographs. In more modern times, people travel the world in the hopes of getting the best picture. Wild African Savannahs, lagoons in Thailand, and the highlands of Scotland make some of the most beautiful and sought after photographs that any landscape photographer would be proud of. There are endless scenes that those with years of experience will spend all their time and effort trying to capture.

Millions of houses across the world will own at least one framed photo on their reception room walls, depicting landscapes. From the most popular sandy beach with a lonely palm tree, to a lonely glacier in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, landscape photography is a popular theme in any art lovers home. The photographers themselves may utilize this fact to make money by selling their best pictures, although most do it for fun. Another option is by selling their pictures to many magazines and websites looking for graphical proof of the wonders they tell in their articles.

For any photographer, the joy is in their work. With landscape photography, these people get to travel to wonderful places and do what they love, while sometimes getting paid for an image of what they have seen first hand. The fanatic will rise before sunset to catch those first few rays, and wait through the day to catch that final sunset with its mix of colours and awe. The photographer will never mind carrying heavy equipment to the top of a hill to get the best view of any landscape. No matter how high the hill is, or whether it’s extremely hot or cold or whether its raining or snowing, the landscape photographer will always wait for that perfect shot.

All in all, whether you’re being paid for landscape photography, or whether it’s a hobby that drives your partner mad, you can safely say that any job or activity that can take you round the world, seeing the most delightful sites is one to be respected and admired by their peers. The thought of having your view of a landscape on someone’s wall in their house, or in a gallery is surely assurance enough that what you are doing is full of endless fulfilment.

Landscape photography also makes an amazing personal and corporate gift for anyone.

In this post I am invesigating the role played by the F-stop in photography. This guest article talks you through what the f-stop does and how you can use it to positively influence your photography. F-Stop is a measure of the size of aperture (opening) in a lens. Some photographers refer to F-Stop as the F-Number or simply as the aperture setting on the camera. It all amounts to the same concept. As a professional you should know that the origin of the letter F in the term F-Stop is frequently attributed to Ansel Adams, who dedicated much time, one-third of the way into the 20th century, to developing optimum aperture settings and therefore is widely recognized for his contribution to photography and developing the acknowledged Aperture Zone System.

History aside, you’re possibly wondering what the F-Stop numbers represent. I’ll tell you that they represent a geometric progression starting at 1 where each subsequent F-Stop number greater than 1 is multiplied by a factor of approximately 1.414, (which is the power of the square root of two). Grab a calculator, enter 1, multiply it by 1.414 and you’ll obviously get 1.414 as an answer. Now multiply your answer by 1.414 again and you’ll get 2 as your answer. Do it one more time and your answer will be approximately 2.8. If you continued to do the math, you would swiftly determine the entire F-Stop range of values, I.E. 1, 2, 2.8, 4, 5.6, 8, 11, 16, 22, 32 and so on until F-Stop 45 or even F-Stop 64.

Great, now that you know what the word F-Stop means and what the numbers associated with it are, you’re probably still asking yourself what these numbers actually mean! To explain I will use an analogy of a cat’s eyes. (If you have a cat, you’ve probably noticed this several times). When your cat is outside and it’s a bright and sunny day, you’ll observe its pupils are long and thin and resemble tight vertical slits, but as your kitty walks into a darker indoors, its pupils widen up to become large round discs very quickly. Now this happens so that your cat can see equally well in the different environments where the intensities of light may vary.

If we relate the above analogy to the school of photography, please imagine that the cat’s pupils are akin to that of the shutter in your camera — being able to open each time you take a photo to a lesser or to a greater extent. Hence to allow plenty light to reach the image sensor in your camera you would select a set an F-Stop setting (pupil size) which would not restrict the amount of light entering your camera. On the other hand if you wanted to limit the quantity of light entering your camera, a high F-Stop setting would be the setting to choose.

Each time you move between F-Stops, you either halve or double the light intensity. To give an example, if you selected an F-Stop of 4.0, and then adjusted it to 5.6, you would then have halved the amount of light entering your camera. Should you have set your F-Stop to 2.8, you would’ve doubled the light intensity. It’s important to remember that a higher F-Stop number means a smaller aperture or opening allowing light into your camera. Conversely a lower F-Stop number means more light entering your camera. To compensate for a one stop lower F-Stop number you would have to double your shutter speed to attain the same exposure. Should you increase your F-Stop by one stop, you would need to halve your shutter speed to keep the playing fields equal.

Like any profession, being a good photographer requires a routine to complete his job effectively. Having a proper routine enables a photographer to take stunning pictures in different conditions. It is completely impossible to accomplish great tasks if you don’t have an effective routine – regardless you’re a professional or an amateur photographer. Apart from that, by having a productive routine, you’ll be able to improve the accuracy of your photo-taking skill and your preparedness in photography.

Here’s the effective routine of a photographer who uses a compact digital camera:

1. Bring along your bag in every photo-taking session

Being a photographer, you must a set of tools to help you take spectacular pictures. You must bring along some spare memory cards - compact flash cards, SD cards or memory sticks, spare batteries – most compact cameras have self-installed batteries, hence you’ve to bring along the camera’s battery charger, tripod - since you cannot rely much your camera’s Image Stabilizer feature to avoid taking blurry pictures, some snacks – just in case there are no food available during your long photo-shoot session; and artificial lighting (if you’re carrying along large-size bag) – i.e. spot lights that are meant for indoor photo shoot.

2. Always shoot in automatic mode

Since the photo-taking process can be so unforgiving, sometimes you’ve to act fast to capture those unforgettable moments or any dazzling images by using the automatic mode. If you have ample of time to take a certain picture, you can manually adjust the camera settings – i.e. colors, contrast, brightness, white balance and many more; so that you can produce good quality image.

3. Always have a habit of re-check your work

In every shot you take, the snapshot is viewable in the LCD mini-screen as soon as you’ve pressed the shutter. If it’s still possible to take another shot, you can capture the image once again and re-check it via the LCD mini-screen. Eliminate those pictures which the subjects are completely overshadowed by any distracting elements of the pictures.

4. Using the right ISO setting

You can manually adjust the ISO settings when you’re taking pictures under different conditions. For instance, if you want to take pictures under dim conditions – you have to use a lower ISO setting (in this case, it’s ISO 400). Same thing for capturing images of fast moving subjects – using the same ISO setting can increase the noise level of the image. If you’re capturing images outdoors – suggested ISO setting is between 800-1600.

Black and white photographs have remained popular since their inception roughly 150 years ago. The ability of black and white images to fit many decorating styles has contributed to their increased popularity. As such, people have become more open to alternative, more sophisticated framing designs for these items.

How to best frame a black and white photograph is a subject for much conjecture. Plain and simple to take nothing from the art, or more ornate to complement the subject matter? Add colour in the frame design to help draw the eye to the picture, or stick with a rigid two-tone approach to ensure dramatic elegance?

So where does that leave us? Well to be honest somewhere in the middle. The fact is that there is as much variety in black and white photography as in any other art form. Think of it this way, if we asked everyone to dress in the same way the look would suit a few but be terrible for most. However, there are some simple rules and techniques you should keep in mind when framing black and white photographs.

- Some framers believe a pristine white mount is best for all black and white images, on the basis that it does not detract from the picture itself. However, for pictures with a white focal point, a pristine white mount can be too bright and will compete with the image for attention.

- Another common mistake is to try to ‘lighten’ dark art by surrounding it with a light mount. In reality, a light mount border causes the dark colours in the photo to look even darker.

- Mounts should be black, white or grey. Any other colour adds an element that isn’t present in the picture. If you have a customer who insists on a colourful mount, a common suggestion is to go for a white mat with a small accent of colour as a second mount. However, this accent actually pulls the eye away from the photo. A better solution is to use the colour as the predominant top mount and place the accent of black or grey below it to work as a transition into the photo. With all that colour surrounding the photo it isolates the image, in affect, drawing attention to it.

- When it comes to the moulding, consider the era, style and location of the photograph. As in framing any art piece, each frame must enhance the style and mood of the photograph itself. Many framers believe you should stick to a narrow, basic frame for black and white photographs, but this may not co-ordinate with the subject of the photo. For example, a picture of an ornate piece of architecture may look better with a more classical moulding design.

- Elongation is often a good treatment for portrait photographs, images with vertical subjects or strong vertical lines. By making the top and bottom borders wider, it dramatises all those vertical elements.

- A mountslip which matches the moulding can create a strong, classic outline around the photograph. This helps pull the viewer’s attention in from the frame to focus on the picture. Mountslips can also help enhance the customised appearance of the design, adding character and perceived value.

When any item is framed properly the frame design should add a sense of value to the finished product. So a good frame design will help a mediocre shot look good and an unimaginative framing job will bring even the best picture to the level of a cheap poster.

Remember, just because the subject lacks colour doesn’t mean the framing should lack imagination.

For more help or to discuss any of the points raised above please do not hesitate to contact us or visit us in person.

Mark Johnson
http://www.wall-space.co.uk – UK’s leading manufacturer of quality wooden photo frame

There are so many Canon cameras to choose from. But how do you find the best Canon digital cameras for you? It can be difficult to get a clear sense of what’s on offer from a big company like Canon when you’re not familiar with all the jargon.

It’s important to be able to separate the sales lingo from the facts, and make a choice that’s right for you, not someone else’s bank balance! So I want to give you a quick starting guide to who Canon actually are, what they offer and what some of their best cameras are.

So, what sort of company is Canon?

Basically, they’re an enormous Japanese corporation who make lots of imaging and optical products. They are the market leaders in producing digital cameras, along with Nikon (each having about 40% of the market).

You can buy compact cameras or DSLR‘s from Canon. The best Canon digital cameras should last you for many years and provide a fantastic tool that will not become obsolete any time soon.

Canon DSLR’s are named with the suffix ‘EOS’, for example the Canon EOS 550D. This abbreviation simply refers to a technology that makes it possible to have no mechanical links between a camera’s body and the lens.

The first EOS digital camera that Canon turned out was the D30 back in 2000. Quite a few more have followed! There are also lots of great compact cameras made by Canon.

Find the best Canon digital cameras by choosing which category to look in.

So, to keep things simple, there are essentially 4 main categories of Canon camera to choose from.

1. Compact cameras
2. Beginner DSLR cameras
3. Prosumer DSLR cameras
4. Professional DSLR cameras

Your choice depends on the type of photography you’d like to do. Work out how the requirements you have translate into specifications.

For example, do you want to make large poster prints? You’ll need a large sensor with plenty of MP’s. Perhaps you find yourself taking lots of shots when the light is failing but get annoyed when pictures come out blurry. Look for a good ISO range and good performance at the higher settings. Do you enjoy wildlife photography? Look for a fast shutter speeds. Perhaps you like taking little movies? More and more cameras enable this.

1. Compacts. If you want everything to be as simple as possible and are not interested in stretching the creative potential of photography, a compact camera is perhaps the best option. The best Canon digital cameras in this category are increasingly excellent quality. I personally really like the Canon Powershot SD 4000 IS. It has a 10MP sensor, large range of focal length and strong build quality.

2. Beginner DSLR. Perhaps you would like something a step up from a basic compact. Maybe you need to produce images with better detail for larger prints. Perhaps it’s important that you can alter the lenses for greater variety in focal length. Or perhaps you’re just starting to really like this whole photography thing! A beginner DSLR would be perfect. Canon offer several excellent models.

Personally I think the Canon EOS 550D is a great all-rounder. It has a very large 18.7 MP sensor which can turn out highly detailed prints suitable for large format printing. The light metering is accurate making it easy to take good pics and the large ISO range opens up low light photography for you very nicely.

3. Prosumer DSLR. Getting a bit more serious? Started to notice one or two details on your existing DSLR that could serve you a bit better? The best Canon Digital s for you to look at might be those in their prosumer range. A good example would be the Canon 40D. It’s very popular and offers photography enthusiasts an excellent quality camera. For me, its best asset is probably the extremely good performance it delivers at higher ISO settings, sacrificing very little in image quality at these faster speeds.

4. Professional DSLR. Are you prepared to splash out a healthy sum of money on a really top-notch professional piece of equipment? The very best Canon digital cameras belong in the professional category and provide amazing quality and specifications.

The Canon EOS 1D Mark IV is widely praised, though I can’t say I’ve had the pleasure of trying it myself yet! It has a superb full frame sensor, can shoot 10 frames/second (!), has amazing autofocus and an unbelievable ISO range. Only purchase a camera like this if you will definitely use and enjoy it. If you can afford to get one, go for it, but I’m jealous.

To help your search further, a thorough guide to the best Canon digital cameras and Canon camera reviews can be found here: http://www.photography-art-cafe.com/canon-camera-reviews.html

Taking photography as a hobby is as easy as picking up a camera and starts shooting but getting the right camera before one can actually start can be  a tough task. It will boil down to your aims as a photographer, how seriously you take your hobby and where you would like to go with your photography.  These are some things which should be clear before one can start thinking about a camera. One easy way can be borrowing a camera from a friend or relative and playing with it for some days, going out and just taking pictures, to get a feel for it and try figure out what he or she wants to do. But still, this might not come easy.

A digital camera is just like an analog camera but with a electronic photo-sensitive sensor instead of a film. It has a lens in the front with a sensor behind it, some mechanism (mechanical or electronic) to show a live picture to the user(so he/she can she where is the camera pointed at), some electronics for controlling the exposures and shutter speeds and settings and some buttons and controls to set these available settings.

There are literally thousands of digital cameras on the market nowadays. Tens of brands produce hundred of models. Cameras can be generally divided into two classes,which are:

1. Compact digital cameras
2. SLR cameras (Single Lens Reflex)

A compact is any small, usually pocket size digital camera. It might be fixed focal length or might have a zoom, have an eye piece or may not and so on. They are small in size and can easily fit in a pocket. They have an advantage of size over the SLRs but they are generally very incapable. To a normal person their pictures might seem of very high quality but a trained eye will really tell how good the pictures really are. These camera, depending on the make and model are very limited with functions and options, e.g. an external flash cannot be normally added to a compact flash. Later on we’ll learn that an external flash is a necessity for low light photography and the on-board or built-in flash in not enough.

As its names suggests, everything on the compact camera is also compact, even the lens and the sensor behind it. The sensor is an analog component and as its size becomes smaller, the noise level it gives out on its signal becomes higher, they are inversely proportional. And this is one of the reasons, pictures from a compact will seem of low quality, they seem to have higher noise levels. If the camera is used in darkness, the camera will try to amplify the signal, as it does that it also amplifies the inherent noise in the signal which results in usually worse quality pictures in the dark. The lens on a compact suffers from the same size problem i.e. it has to be small to fit in the smaller camera body and it becomes harder to produce high quality optics in that size also. Plus when the lens is smaller, lesser amount of light will fall on the sensor, which then requires slower shutter speeds or signal amplification by the sensor.

SLR cameras on the other hand are bigger in size mainly because they house a prism to redirect the light through the lens to the optical eye piece. There is a mechanism inside it, which allows the light to fall on the image sensor when a picture is being taken. SLR are bigger in size and they house bigger, higher quality image sensors. As the sensors are bigger in size they produce lesser noise even when the light is low. SLR cameras provide much more manual settings and options for photography. External flash units can be used, a variety of lenses can be uses for different purposes which in case of the compact would not be possible. But this all comes with a price tag and some weight on ones shoulder.

In general, compacts vs. SLRs is a give and take situation. One would have to think about what he or she wants to do actually. Photography with a compact is fun but with an SLR its on completely different level.

Muhammad Sohail Khan