How To Easily Start A Nature Photography Business From Home
Nature photography is the photography of animals, birds, fish
and other wildlife. We will be discussing marine photography in
a future article, because it involves specialist, expensive
equipment and assorted diving skills. Here are some important
things that you’ll need to know..
Nature photography offers special challenges to the
photographer. Not least of which is the developing process of
film itself. When single reflex print film is developed it goes
through two processes, development and printing. The development
produces a true color; however automatic printers do printing
processes these days. In most cases these are set automatically
to reproduce flesh tones, the color of skin. As a tonal color
this is not very much represented in nature so that when your
film is printed, the colours shown, are not necessarily the
colors that were shot. This can be frustrating when you are
trying to improve your technique. One way to see an instant
improvement is to use slide film, this only goes through the
first process of development, and the distortions that occur in
printing are eliminated.
The medium to top of the range, digital cameras also improves
tonal quality as well as having improved highlight and shadow
features. The disadvantage to the use of SLR digital in nature
photography is that the consumption of battery power is higher,
and you may not be in a position to re charge them in remote
places. Also the delicate sensors in digital cameras can be
damaged when dust gets in the mirror chambers.
Another challenge for the nature photographer is to understand
how a light meter works. Light meters reflect light off a
surface, but they cannot measure tone, which is a shade of
color. As it cannot register a shade of color. It makes a basic
assumption that the surface measured will reflect 18% of the
incident light, that means the amount of light falling on a
subject. In practise that means that regardless of the color of
the object it will provide a reading that assumes you want to
produce a shade at 18% mid gray. If you then set your aperture
opening at the suggested setting it will produce 18% of grey in
the finished image. Unfortunately there is not that much grey in
nature, but there is plenty of pure white, for example snow, and
clouds.
Once you have obtained your light reading you have to manually
adjust the aperture setting so that the final tonal colour will
be white and not gray. To reproduce a pure white image you may
have to open your f/stop settings by 2 full points. Conversely
if you want to reproduce pure black then you have to close down
the aperture, by 2 ½ to 3 f/stops. An f/stop is only a numerical
number that represents how far the aperture is open.
In changing light conditions for both sand and snow, bracketing
is a useful technique. It means that you take or three extra
exposures at different settings, so that you can almost
guarantee the “perfect” exposure. If you have determined the
best exposure is to be taken at 1second at f/16, then to bracket
using slide film, you would also shoot additional exposures at
1/2 f-stop settings above and below the “best” exposure setting.
This means 1 second at an f-stop between f/16 and f/22; and 1
second at an f-stop between f/11 and f/16. This is 1/2 stop
above and 1/2 stop below your meter reading.
For the beginner it is useful to record your exposure
information in a notebook. It will help to better your
techniques when the film is developed. Record the f/stop, the
shutter speed and whether the exposure was as a result of the
light meter reading or whether it was adjusted for some other
reason. You can also write this information directly on to your
slide mounts, because you may think you will remember, but
chances are you won’t! Whilst on the surface bracketing seems
expensive, it does not have to done all the time, after a while
you will have a feel for a how your own camera reacts, but it is
a good technique to use when a shot is really important.
If you would like to explore exposure in an interactive way,
this is a simcam simulator and you change your exposure and
shoot and see instantly the effects.
All nature photography is improved by the use of slow film;
never use more than ISO100, and ISO50 is better still. When you
use slower film it increases the danger of camera shake. To
minimise this a solid tripod is a good investment. Virtually
everyone buys one that is too light at first. It may have to
support the weight of your camera over rough terrain. Nature
photographs are amongst the most saleable of pictures and the
sharper they are the more saleable they become. A tripod helps
here because it stabilizes the camera. Make sure that your
tripod legs are independently adjustable to take full advantage
of low shots. These low shots are used often in natural
photography for instance in shooting flowers. A tripod is
usually in two parts the head and legs, the head needs to be
able to moved up and down as well as to tilt.
Every nature photographer initially balks at the tripod because
it is heavy and unwieldy, but it is an essential piece of
equipment that makes sure your images are razor sharp. The start
up costs of being a nature photographer are high, you need good
optical equipment and excellent tripod. Can you take good
photographs without a tripod? O course you can, but are they
marketable in a highly competitive field, can you make more
money by investing in the best equipment money can buy.
The quality of the light is also crucial in nature
photographyand it is always better early in the morning or late
afternoon, or when the sky is slightly overcast. Harsh midday
glare does no favors to the nature photographer as the resultant
images lack depth.
There is also a specialist magazine available online for the
nature photographer . Their resource links are excellent and
they have free issues available for you to read.
About the author:
Publisher & photography solutions for budding and keen photographers. A
whole world awaits keen eyes, imagination and some get up and
go. Find out you can easily expand your passion and skills in
photography into a profitable career at
http://www.profitable-photography-resources.com