Step Three: Learning to See as the Camera Sees

I'm often disappointed by the pictures I take. I see in front of me a glorious mountain range, but in the picture I take, the mountains look faraway and unspectacular. I see the beautiful smile of the person I love but the picture I take has elements that distract from what I envisioned when I snapped the camera. Photography is always reminding me how wonderfully made we are. No matter what kind of camera you have, the lens doesn't compare to the eyes and the mind that God gave us.

First of all, we see in 3D and the pictures we take comes out in 2D so you lose depth in the shot. If you're not careful you'll end up with optical illusions making it appear that things are growing out of peoples heads or bars are running through peoples ears. 

For example, in the photo below because the tree is directly behind Brie and she's blocking the trunk going into the ground, it looks like the tree is literally growing out of her head. 

Dissecting objects are much like decapitations and cutting off limbs. Some are more glaring than others, but now that I told you about the dissecting tree, you're wondering how Brie was able to walk around balancing that tree in her head. I should have moved her a few feet to my left or I should have taken a few steps to the right and I would have had a picture worth editing. Pay attention to what's in the background and remember the camera will flatten the distance between the objects. 

Our minds also allow us to focus in only on the subject of our photograph, especially when we're photographing loved ones, so much so that we lose sight of everything else around. The camera doesn't do that which means if you don't pay attention to everything in the frame you end up with elements in the picture that detract from the final product. 

The four of us look nice enough in this shot, but there are objects in the peripheral vision that distract from the photo, ruining an otherwise good picture. Plus we're not properly centered. Luckily, I took a look at the camera display before my son left the room and promptly made him take another, resulting in the shot below.

Better, but still not good enough. You can still see the pillow and part of the picture in the background. Unfortunately, this time, I didn't notice the distractions, but thankfully I was ultimately able to crop away the clutter.

Yes, it's true that there are times you can't do anything about the distractions, but in most cases, changing the point of view from which you're taking the picture or asking your subjects to move can transform an average photo to a stellar shot. In the case of the two photos above, since we were obviously posing for the camera, with a few simple changes, the photos would have been much better. Take the time to look at everything within the frame to determine if there are objects you need to somehow exclude. If you can't move the objects or the subjects, move in close to eliminate as much as possible the distractions. This simple step will vastly improve the quality of the pictures you take.

Take out your camera and look through the viewfinder or LCD and start training yourself to see everything that the viewfinder sees. See the clutter in the background, move closer, change the angle of the camera or move the things out of the way so that the only thing you and others can see in the picture will be the one thing you want them to see.

Step four will be learning about cameras and how to get the most out of yours.

Step Two: Why Composition is so Important

Most of us aren't looking to make a living off of our photography. We just want pictures of our family and friends and in the digital age it's easy to make that wish come true. Sometimes it's a bit too easy and we get photo vomit. I'll be the first to admit I'm guilty of it myself which is why my boss is hell bent on getting me in a 12-step program.

A benefit of digital photography is that it's easier to learn how to take better pictures than it used to be because there is instantaneous feedback. That is, it's easy if you're willing to take off your rose-colored glasses and look at your pictures with a truly constructive eye. I know, I need to practice what I preach.

It's surprisingly harder than it sounds. We all have a natural bias towards the pictures we take, not because we're vain, but because we have an emotional connection to the person(s) or moment(s) we're capturing. If you don't want others running in the opposite direction when you come at them with your cellphone or camera full of photos or if you want to wow others with your photographic prowess, then it's worth it to admit that you're biased and learn a little (or a lot) about composition. Say it with me, my name is Debra (or insert your name here) and I'm biased about the pictures I take.

In most cases we either put too much or too little into the frame when we're composing the shot. I have a "when in doubt, leave it out" mentality which is my way of saying I have a tendency to err on the side of filling  the frame with my subject a little too often. It's something that I'm working to change. When taking a picture, ask yourself, what is it that you're trying to convey, or why is it you're compelled to take the shot. The answer will tell you what needs to be within the frame for you in order to convey that message.

If you're trying to convey that your baby love is the cutest thing in town, I suggest going in for the kill. In the photo below, I pulled in nice and tight so I can kiss those little chubby cheeks on my computer screen anytime I want. True, I lost a bit of Max's fingers and little bit of his head in the composition, but that's okay because I didn't cut him at his limbs and I didn't decapitate him.

I was accused by brother of cutting Matt and Ashley out of the picture below because it's all about Maximus now. While that may be true, I purposefully did it in this shot because I wanted to convey the message that Maximus is in good, loving hands. So I pulled in close enough to show him enveloped in the strong arms of his daddy while his mommy looks lovingly upon him. I probably should have composed it a little lower so I'm not quite decapitating Matthew, but I wanted to frame up a bit of Ashley's face because I loved how she was smiling at her baby boy.

In this shot, I show the entire family, but because it's framed differently, the message I trying to convey above is lost. It's just a lovely family enjoying a Saturday afternoon.

In the photo below, I pulled the camera back enough so that you can see that Maximus is lifting up his body and head to look at something of interest to him. If I had pulled in too close, I would have lost the curiosity he's showing and if I pulled too far back, the people in the background would have been a distracting part of the picture. Note how he's close to the edge of the frame, but I still captured his chubby little fingers death gripping his pretzels.

There's not always a right answer in what should or shouldn't be included in your composition, but there is sometimes a better answer. Case in point in the three pictures below. Last week I talked Brie into going to the park with me to take some pictures. I asked if she was willing to climb a large tree with a giant trunk and much to my delight, she agreed. I started off with my normal close and tight shot. I thought I was doing good because I wasn't as close and tight as I normally was.

As I looked at the camera display, I realized that by being so close, I was missing the grandeur of the tree (not to mention I had cut off a bit more of her feet than I wanted to) so I stepped back at bit and was rewarded with what I think is a far more compelling shot.

I like the next shot even better because it gives the illusion that she's higher off the ground that the shot above, but there is no doubt that both shots are better than the first one.

Below is another example of how being aware of what's in the frame can make a difference in the message you are trying to convey. As I was out this evening, the colors of the sun bouncing off a building caught my eye. In the first shot, you can see the brilliance of the sunset, but the cars in front of the building distract from the beauty and unless I told you what you were looking at you're probably not sure why I stopped to take this picture.

I drew closer to the building eliminating the cars from the frame, but honestly, it's still a yawner of a shot.

I stepped in a little bit more and took this shot which I like better because now I've got silhouettes of the trees and flags in the reflection of the building, but I've lost the golden fire color and I have those blasted cars in the background again bringing me to my next point...not everything makes a good picture no matter what you do. Sometimes it's best just to hit the delete button.

Tomorrow, I'll cover seeing the shot with camera eyes instead of human eyes and then on Thursday, I'll cover what you need to know about your camera. For now, look at some of your photos with that critical eye and consider what you might do differently if you had the chance to do it over again. If there is too much distraction in the frame, try cropping elements out to see how that would change the composition and if that would better convey your message.

My 12-Step Program to Better Pictures

Anyone who knows me knows that I am passionate (passionate!) about photography. I've spent a lot of time in the past two years learning how to take better pictures. I hope I don't sound vain here, but I feel  like the studying has finally been paying off and things are now clicking.

After sharing some photography stuff with my boss at work, he jokingly told me that he was going to put me on a 12-step program. That got me thinking that I should put together a 12-step program of my own. I'll share what I learned and hopefully in two-weeks, just in time for Easter break, at least one person who reads this blog will be taking better photos.

And so I begin...

Step One: It's NOT about the Camera
Yes, a good camera helps, but if you're waiting for a bigger, better camera to take better pictures, I'll guarantee you two things:

1. You're missing opportunities to take better pictures NOW; and
2. You'll be really disappointed if/when you finally get a big girl/boy camera 

The key ingredient to a good photo is good composition. The good thing is this means you don't need a DSLR (expensive) camera to take good pictures. That's right, you DON'T. Even if you're saving up for a DSLR (and, yes, if you are really serious about good pictures, a DSLR is ultimately what you want) as long as you have access to any kind of camera at all, then pick it up and dust it off and get ready to start snapping pictures. I mean it, even if all you have is your cellphone camera, that'll work, too. I love, love, love taking pictures with my cellphone camera all the time. (Yes, I'm sick, but at least I know it).

One of the hardest things for me when I first starting taking pictures was to really look at what was within the frame of the viewfinder or LCD. 

It takes a lot of practice to look at the world as the camera sees it instead of as we see it. If you are deliberate about what you exclude/include in the frame and the angle in which you take the shoot, you can take an awesome photo with any kind of camera at all. And if you still not convince, many professional photographers love the challenge of doing a complete photo shoot with a compact camera or cellphone.

Here's a few visuals of what I'm talking about. Yesterday while we were at the beach, my friend Liz took my camera and asked if she could take some pictures of me (I think she wanted to show me how annoying it can be to be with me for any length of time). Forget the issues with the light because that'll be a topic in a later step. We're just focusing on composition for now.

At first glance this picture may look okay, but look at my legs and you'll see that she cut me off at the ankles. There's something about cutting off limbs at the joints that is unconsciously disturbing to the human mind. You may not have noticed it, but now that I told you about it, you know what I'm talking about. It would have been better for her to come in a bit with the camera and capture me at mid-thigh or pull back the camera and capture my feet, too so I had her try again.

In this shot above, Liz pulled the camera back a bit so now I'm not cut off at the joints, but in doing so, she centered me. When taking a picture of a single subject you don't want them in the center of frame. This should only be done with groups of people. Ideally a single subject should to the right or left of the frame, depending on the direction in which the subject is facing and the background involved. Notice, too, that my foot is a little cut off, but because it's not at the joint it's not a bad thing. I had Liz try again, this time positioning the camera so I'm 1/3 off to the side.

And there you have it, a much better composite. My limbs aren't chopped off and I'm framed a bit off to the side. True, you may not have realized there was an issue at first with the other shots, but when you are looking at the pictures that other people take, subconsciously your brain sees these and knows something isn't quite right.

Lesson Two will be building on composite by focusing on the elements within the frame.

Listography|Places I've Lived (Part II)

After our short stint in Brazil, we moved back our cozy little house in Pico Rivera. The time in Brazil proved to be good for my dad's career. In preparation for the Greg's birth, we moved to what I would assume was a bigger house in a newer community of La Puente. 581 Peckam Drive will be forever ingrained in my head.

For the next few years this house became our home and, often times, the gathering place for our extended family. The three bedroom, two bathroom house fit our needs. It came complete with neighborhood children that we would traipse around the street with, riding bicycles, roller skates and toy cars up and down the block till dark.

It was here that I truly remember my first Christmas's and Easter's. It was here that I lost my first tooth and lay in bed at night, if not fighting with Eliz about whether the door should be fully or half closed, then talking silliness until our dad ordered us to sleep.

It was during the start of my 2nd grade when I realized that a change was about to happen. One of the first clues where a series of appointments to the doctors for vaccinations. On December 1 (Greg's 3rd birthday), we moved to Ponce, Puerto Rico. This was back in the day before 9/11, terrorist threats and underwear or shoe bombers so the whole family came with us to the airport to say goodbye.

I was both sad and terribly excited. Plane travel at that time was glamorous and not many people could say they had been on a plane. I had no idea what or where Puerto Rico was. I just knew there was plane travel and hotel stays. We flew from LAX to New Orleans to Miami where we stopped for the night. The next morning we took a little peddle jumper to San Juan, Puerto Rico where we stayed at the InterContinental Hotel for a few nights while dad did some work in the city. It was luxuriousness like we have never seen before.

For the first year, we lived in a little house near a co-worker of my dad's and thus began our long friendship with the Keeney's. Genevieve in third grade at the time so right in the middle of me and Elizabeth. Her brother, Richard, was a year younger than Vic which worked out perfectly, too.

It was in many ways paradise for us. Mom and dad joined a country club that many other Fluor employees belonged to and there we would spend weekends and some weeknights swimming like little fishes. On the weekends that we didn't go to the club, we frequented the beach which had clear blue water, nothing like you see in California or we would go sight-seeing.

Dad didn't get along too well with the woman who owned or managed the house we lived in and it had leaky ceilings and other issues so we moved to a house on Constancia Gardens. It was here that I met my other best friend Jill. She was in my class and it was so exciting to live on the same street as her.

Because there was still no such think as email, texting and telephone calls were too expensive, it was so exciting to have dad come home to find out if there was mail. Christmas would bring a flurry of packages in brown paper. While I missed our family, they were never far from our memory or conversations.

Because everyone that we knew was in the same boat (away from home) our friends became our extended family.

Listography| Places I've Lived (Part I)

I take great pride in the fact that I'm true Californian, 2nd generation at that. Both my parents were born in this state, all my brothers and sisters, my children and now my grandchildren. I've also been blessed to have lived in other states and other countries and I can emphatically say that there is no place like the United States of America and no place like California.

My first memory of home was a little house on Red Bird Lane in a working class community called Pico Rivera. I don't remember much about the interior of the house.

I have vague memories of the kitchen with a high chair, a bedroom and looking at my brother in his crib. I remember most vividly the spacious backyard with the brick wall that kept us safe. 

I have vague memories of the kitchen with a high chair, a bedroom and looking at my brother in his crib. I remember most vividly the spacious backyard with the brick wall that kept us safe.

Within the confines of that yard was a swing set and a kiddie pool. Those were happy times.  And looking back, I realize that there is not a memory that I have of those times in which my sister, Elizabeth is not a part of.

Sometime in 1964, our little family did something daring at the time. We moved to Brazil. I'm sure my mom and dad must have been pinching themselves as they readied for the trip. By that time, my dad had worked his way into a solid job with an engineering company called Fluor and he had an opportunity to take a short time assignment in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

I was not even 3-years old at the time and my brother, Victor was merely an infant, but I remember little tiny snippets of the trip there. The walk down the hallway in the hotel we had to stay at in Mexico City. The silver creamer that held the milk for my cereal. Even at my age, I knew there was something exciting about that. The smell of the hotel.

I also remember little snippets of our time in Sao Paulo. Waiting for my mom to come home from the store while we stayed at our apartment with the housekeeper/babysitter. The Yoder's, another American family who was there, too, coming over to visit. The kitchen table.

I'm sure it was hard for my mom, being in a foreign land with three children under 5-years, away from family and friends in a time where there wasn't instant communication. And generally when we've lived overseas, the work hours are longer than state side so I'm sure she held the house down more than usual, but someone she persevered.

Photo Heart Connection|February

I've been looking forward to the end of February, not because I want time to fly because really I want to savor every minute, every moment of 2012, but because I've been looking forward to selecting my Photo Heart Connection for February.

It's been a lot of fun participating in Kat Sloma's challenge so far. The photo connections that I've seen have been most excellent and her blog has been an inspiration as I go out and shoot.

February was a good month for photos. I was able to go out with Matthew, Ashley and Maximus and take some good family pictures and my business trip to Austin was ended each evening with a photo exploration that was invigorating and exciting. I really expected to choose a picture from that trip.

Once again, I find myself surprised by the photo I ended up selecting. It's one I didn't even look at until tonight as I downloaded some pictures from last weekend. The day began with cool, cloudy weather. I was venturing out to a little town in our area called Claremont when I received a text message from my mom telling me to stop by the car show that our church was hosting. I had been on fence about whether to attend so her text was the sign I needed. I, in turn, texted Brie telling her to let me know when she awoke so I could come back home and we would go to the car show.

To say that she was less than thrilled is an understatement. Any other day I would have let her off the hook, but this time I was insistent. We would stay less than an hour, I promised her. It was after 1pm by the time we headed to the church. The weather had warmed up, the sun doing its duty. The church parking lot was packed with classic cars shinier than most kitchen appliances and happy people meandering about. I basked in the sun, as Brie and I walked together, enjoying this gift of time with my daughter.

When I saw this picture tonight, I was transported to that day. I remember the blue skies, the puffy clouds, the cool, but not cold air, the laughter of my daughter, our lighthearted banter, how alive I feel. I remember how I stopped to take this picture and seeing that reflection of myself, snapped the camera. I have a photo heart connection.

Listography: The Pets I've Had

The first pet we've ever had was a Cocker Spaniel, we named Paul. Or should I say my sister named Paul, after Paul McCartney. We called him Paulie Baby. We loved him even though he was a high strung, biting loving, non-obeying trouble-maker. He didn't listen to anyone and bit as many of us as he could. I was one of the lucky ones who never had his teeth sunken into.

One morning we woke up and much to our delight, there he was. He was the offspring of a dog named Spanky that my uncle and aunt owned who was a biter, too. Luckily for my parents, after we had him for a year or so we moved to Puerto Rico and they didn't want to take him with us so they gave him away to a friend of my grandfather's. The truth is, I don't know how much longer we would have kept him had we not moved away. Having small children with a high strung dog doesn't really work too well. But we still loved him.

Our next pet was a duck that meandered it's way into our backyard one day. The boys named him Twaddle. He was more Greg's duck than anyone else's but having a duck was pretty darn cool. Except for the yucky mucky pool that he would float in from time to time. 

He was a good little duck and unlike Paul, didn't relish biting us and never ran like a wild child through the neighborhood. That still didn't save him from being given away when we moved from Puerto Rico back to the states. I think we all knew that he wasn't going to make the trip home with us and he was given to the neighbor children before we left. I often wondered how long he lived before they served him up for dinner. 

Our next pet was a rabbit, we named Rabbit (yes, we are very good at names in our family). Like, Twaddle, he just came into our lives via the backyard. He lived with us for almost two years, feeding off the grass, roaming freely in the confines of the yard. It was a sad day when he died because he was a good little rabbit.

We went for a long period without anymore pets, until dad got us another dog when we lived in Iran. It was a Lhasa Apso that Greg named Pepper. Like most of our other pets, he was mainly Greg's dog, but mom took Pepper under her wing, treating him like her 5th child. Like, Paul, he was high strung and while he didn't bite us, he was a growler and a grumbler. I liked him well enough, until it was apparent that mom liked him better than the rest of us, after which I became a little (or a lot) jealous of him.

He lived a long and privileged life in our house until he passed away when Matt was a toddler. Matthew's arrival took some of the glow off Pepper and he never really liked Matthew for that. As mom once told Matthew when he commented that Pepper didn't really like people..."He doesn't like YOU".

After much prayer, Belle entered our lives almost exactly two years ago. We brought her home from the Pasadena animal shelter. Matthew says that she often has a sad look about her and I always reply that we don't know what her life was life before we brought her home. Yes, she might look a little scruffy and a little sad at times, but the truth is, she's a little lovey dovey. 

She's a licker (lover) and loves to greet people with licks galore but that's because she is friendly and sweet. And sometimes, no denying, annoying. When Maximus was a baby, she could  barely contain herself because she wanted to lick him like a lollipop, but really she's so sweet natured that he can take his food and treats and bowl and she doesn't do anything about it. 

We have been so blessed to have her.