Taking Great Photos

Out of the box, your DSLR will take beautiful photos in Auto mode. But to produce images with impact, you should take a moment to think about the composition of the photo, and the same rules apply here whether you’re shooting with a mobile phone or a professional DSLR.

Before you rush in and take the shot, think about the options that are available. Will moving in closer or further away make the photo more pleasing to the eye? Is the background going to accentuate the subject, or is it too distracting? Will shooting at eye level be suitable, or will the photo look more dramatic if you squat down or tilt the camera on an angle? Walk around the object and look through the viewfinder at the different angles that are possible. A little bit of prep time up front will go a long way towards making your photos look different from everyone else’s.

Rules of thirds

The rule of thirds is one of the oldest compositional tricks on the book. It involves dividing a scene into a noughts and crosses-style grid of nine equal rectangles, and placing the subject at (or as close as possible to) one of the four points that make up the centre rectangle. Any horizontal or vertical lines (such as a landscape horizon or a tall building) should also line up as close as possible with the corresponding lines on the grid.

What this means in practice is that if you have a DLNA certified television and a DLNA supporting PC, you can just access your media collection straight from the TV. In the past this would have involved connecting a PC directly to the television and manually playing files. With DLNA certified products your TV will look on your home network, automatically recognise the PC as a media server and allow you to access the media from your remote control.

Composing your photos in this way adds more interest and makes them look stronger than the standard shot of simply aligning the subject in the middle (a style that’s cliché and boring). It also prevents the horizon in landscapes and city scenes from cutting the picture in half (another over-used composition).

Foreground interest

When you’re taking a photo of anything that’s in the background (such as a landscape, beach or garden), try to incorporate some foreground interest using an object that’s closer, such as a rock, a bale of hay or a flower. This adds depth to the shot and makes it feel less like a flat two-dimensional image. Since the closer object appears larger in the image – and your brain is able to deduce that the foreground flower isn’t actually larger than the rolling hills in the distance – the depth of the scene depicted is implied.

Better people shots

For photos of people, switch to your camera’s ‘Portrait’ picture style, which you can access either from your camera’s Menu system or from the mode dial (usually depicted by an icon of a person’s head). This setting will accentuate skin tones and makes faces look a little softer (and hence more attractive).

Some of the newer DSLRs come with a face detection feature for automatically focusing and exposing for any people in the shot. If your camera doesn’t have this feature, you can do it the old-fashioned way by moving the auto-focus square (which you see in the camera viewfinder when you half-press the shutter button) over one of the person’s eyes. If a person’s eyes are sharp, then the whole photo will look sharp as a result.

Power of the PVR

Another option is to have your PVR act not only as a recording device, but as a media server as well. Some models of PVR are quite flexible in how they treat the recordings they make. This can turn your PVR into a media powerhouse. The latest version of the Topfield 2400 PVR for example combines the ability to watch one channel while recording three others with DLNA certification. It even allows you to add an external hard drive directly to the PVR via a standard ESATA connection to increase the amount of storage.

One thing to keep in mind with PVRs, though, is that a lot of models on the market will restrict what you can do with recorded content. Generally speaking those that support the Freeview episodic program guide will be more restricted than those that don't support it. Topfield's offering for example comes with a 3 month Ice TV subscription instead of Freeview support.

Source: TechLiving Issue 4 – Winter 2010