‘Sharpening’ is a part of the digital workflow that is often least understood or mis-understood. Most beginners (and some advanced workers too) tend to over-sharpen their images. But first, let us understand why we need to sharpen our images; after all, when we were using films, we did no such thing as ‘sharpening’. The Reasons for Sharpening 1) If you remember the basics … [Read more...]

Depth of Field (DoF) refers to the zone of acceptable sharpness in our picture. Let’s take that a bit further. When you focus your lens (any lens) at any given distance, technically speaking, only that point (and all points along that same plane – plane of focus) should be sharp. However, in reality, some distance in front of and some distance beyond the focussed plane is … [Read more...]

Rohinton Mehta Most cameras allow us to shoot using different exposure modes – Aperture priority (A), Shutter priority (S), Program (P) and Manual (M). On Canon cameras, Aperture priority is known as Aperture value (Av) and Shutter priority is known as Time value (Tv). Some cameras also offer Scene modes but in this write-up, we shall not be discussing them. Let’s see how … [Read more...]

Last month we saw how we could select the sky that is often seen through the trees and darken it. This month we will see how to replace a dull, boring sky. Rohinton Mehta We often come across scenes that we love except for boring dull skies. Sometimes the sky is just plain bald (like in the rainy season) and sometimes cloudless blue. Though a cloudless blue sky is better … [Read more...]

Photography was commercially introduced to the world somewhere around the year 1839 – about 178 years ago. In those days there was only black & white photography. Colour photography came about 96 years later, somewhere in 1935. Back then, during the B&W era, photographers made amazingly beautiful photos in spite of the fact that camera lenses and films were of very poor … [Read more...]