Whether you’re photographing wildflowers and plants in the forest, or shooting these colorful subjects in your backyard, we have some simple tips and techniques for getting the job done. With this straightforward advice you can also capture beautiful photos at a nearby park or nursery.
Instructor Toma Bonciu is a Romanian pro specializing in travel, landscape, and adventure photography. Today he steps out of his comfort zone with seven easy-to-follow suggestions, including camera settings, for depicting flowers and plants as they appear in nature.
Tip #1 is shooting from a low camera position, like experienced photographers do when making images of young children and pets. If you think of blossoms as having and eye, and shooting from that level, the concept immediately makes sense. As Bonciu explains, by taking this approach you’ll create separation between your subject and the background that really grabs attention.
Bonciu also recommends shooting with a wide aperture that will further make a flower stand out by giving a soft, pleasing blur to everything else in the scene by limiting depth of field. Here, a fast prime lens really helps to exaggerate the effect.
Another way to minimize depth of field is to move back a bit from your subject and shoot with a telephoto lens, taking care that your shutter speed is fast enough avoid subject movement especially on windy days. By doing this you’ll also achieve a compressed perspective depending upon the focal length you use.
Tips #4 is to follow the old maxim that if your photographs aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough. In other words, fill the frame with the plant or flower that’s the subject of your shot. Bonciu says to think of the photograph as a tight portrait and take care to compose the shot so there’s limited empty space above the flower. This is easy to do if you position the flower in the upper portion of the shot.
Bonciu also suggests using a diffusor to soften harsh light. He says that if you don’t own a purpose-built diffusor a simple household umbrella will work fine. Slightly overcast days can be perfect in this regard if you think of the sky as a huge diffusor that softens light falling on your subject.
Another simple accessory that you likely have at home is a small spray bottle filled with water. If you’re photographing when there’s no dew on the plants, a quick spray from the bottle to create small droplets on a flower will add interest and impact to a photo.
Bonciu’s final tip is to experiment with breaking tip number #1. In other words, try shooting from a high perspective while pointing your lens downward on the top of a bloom. This technique works particularly well with relatively flat and symmetrical flowers like daisies. After watching the tutorial head over to Bonciu’s instructional YouTube channel where you’ll find many more tips and tricks.
And on a related note, be sure to watch the tutorial we posted from another accomplished pro, explaining how to use contrast and color to add depth and impact to nature photos.
In case you’re unfamiliar with Photoshop’s Smart Filters, here’s the deal: These are simply normal Photoshop filters that have been applied to a Smart Object. They provide additional versatility during post processing, and you’ll learn everything necessary to put these tools to work in the quick tutorial below.
Instructor Julieanne Kost is a photographer, author, expert at all things Adobe, and a self-proclaimed “digital imaging evangelist.” In less than six minutes she demonstrates five reasons to use Smart filters to significantly improve your Photoshop workflow and achieve more effective edits.
Kost covers everything from revealing how these tools work, to facilitate masking, stacking, opacity, blend modes, and more. She does so in rapid fashion, so we recommend jotting down a few notes. She explains that to apply a Filter as a Smart Filter you must first change the background of the image. Or if you’re working with a layer or layers it’s necessary to turn them into Smart Objects.
This simple procedure involves selecting the Filter tab atop the screen and choosing the Convert for Smart Filters option from the dropdown menu. One you’ve done that the Layers panel confirms that the background has been converted to a Smart Object, with the corresponding icon on the thumbnail.
Kost then selects a neural filter from the Filters dropdown menu and enables the Colorize option. Photoshop then uses artificial intelligence to create a hand-colored effect and apply it to the image. One of the benefits of this technique is that it’s non-destructive, meaning a do-over is always possible if you don’t like what you see.
Kost demonstrates how to refine Smart Filter settings, and easily modify or refine the look you achieve. Along the way she provides helpful keyboard shorts for speeding up the already quick process. Another benefit of this straightforward method is that you can use the Smart Filter’s mask to selectively hide or show the filter in the image.
As the lesson continues Kost provides more easy tips and techniques and demonstrates three more reasons you should start using Photoshop’s Smart Filters today. It doesn’t take long to get the hang of it, at which point we’re sure you’ll add this technique to your Photoshop bag of tricks.
There are numerous editing lessons on Kost’s popular YouTube channel, so be sure to take a look after watching this video.
We also suggest checking out an earlier tutorial we posted from another expert photographer, explaining what to do if you’re tired of photos with blown highlights and crushed shadows.
ISO is a basic camera setting with a big impact on the photos you shoot when it comes to exposure, image quality, and other important variables. Unfortunately the simple concept is misunderstood and often results in images that don’t meet expections.
The worse-case scenario is when photographers bump up ISO to the limit when shooting in low-light situations and drop it all the way down in bright light. There still plenty to know between these crazy extremes if you want to achieve optimum results.
Professional wedding photographer Vanessa Joy clears up all the misconceptions and provides valuable advice when choosing the proper setting for the task at hand in the quick tutorial below. In less than five minutes she explains how ISO works, the synergy between ISO and other exposure settings, and the way this important choice affects the look of your photos.
As Joy explains, “ISO refers to the sensitivity of a camera’s sensor.” It’s one of three parameters in the familiar Exposure triangle, the others two being aperture and shutter speed, that work in tandem to arrive at a correct exposure. It’s important to know the proper order in which you configure these settings, and that depends upon the specific photo you are capturing at the time.
Joy discusses the concept of ISO from the perspective of a portrait photographer, But the knowledge she imparts is equally valuable for whatever genre rings your bell, be it travel, landscape, sports, or wildlife photography. And her tips apply to whatever camera you use.
Joy explains it like this: The higher the ISO the brighter your photo will be, while the lower the ISO the less sensitive the camera’s sensor is with darker photos being the result. Of course that’s with all other settings unchanged, which shouldn’t be the case. That’s because as you alter one parameter of the Exposure Triangle the other two are modified as well.
There’s much more to understand, especially when it comes to image quality. For example, as you ramp up ISO there are several important consequences, including the fact that noise becomes a bigger and bigger problem at higher settings. Color saturation will also suffer as you bump up ISO beyond certain limits depending upon the sophistication of your camera.
Joy provides examples shot with her premium full-frame Canon EOS R5, and the difference in image quality at higher ISO is readily apparent. You can expect more exaggerated problems when shooting with a less-capable camera.
As we mentioned above, if you keep ISO levels at manageable levels, the aperture and shutter speed for properly exposed photos change as well—sometimes with image quality concerns in other areas that you need to be aware of. These include sharpness, depth of field, and other key characteristics.
We suggest paying a visit to Joy’s popular YouTube channel where there’s much more to learn. And be sure to check out the tutorial we posted recently from another accomplished shooter, explaining how pros use color to shoot outdoor photographs with perfect tones.
