'How to take good photos for under $1000'

john m flores said:
Thoughtful editing is a great way to learn though. I've improved over the years simply by taking lots of images, editing carefully, and then thinking about what made the chosen images better. Next time out, I had that knowledge with me.



Agreed. The fundamental premise appears to be Shallow DOF=Good and that's a gross oversimplification.

I did a motorcycle photo workshop last summer, riding around Western NC with a bunch of folks, stopping at scenic places and helping them take better photos with their cameras. Most had point-and-shoots, but simple tips on composition, framing, and using zoom creatively helped them tremendously, and for much less than $1000
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John, reading this "how to" made me think, "I'd like to see New Camera News respond to this advice point by point!" then I went over to NCN on my cellphone (which won't let me make comments) and laughed myself to sleep.
 
First of all, James, thanks for posting this. It was fun to read, even while it gored many of my oxen, and it's stirred up a lively discussion.

I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to a bright young parent wanting to get portraits of their children, with the proviso to get to a good camera store and consider mirrorless and so on. Get a decent camera in their hands, tell them how to get good photos of the kids without busy, distracting backgrounds, and let them go from there. Those who just want good snapshots will be happy forever. Those who get the photo bug, will be positioned to feed it. Just call the article, "How to take good candids of your kids for less than $1000.

As it stands, I feel marginalized. 2 cases in point "Only post pictures of people on Facebook?" Maybe the author has no friends who garden, feed the birds, enjoy their home landscaping, like architecture, appreciate engineering, are train enthusiasts, hike, enjoy views of each other's home towns, or love history or nature.

"Carry your DSLR IN A SLING BAG." Not in the bag that works for you. In the bag that works for me. I happen to be a woman who carries a large purse, because when I'm out with my husband he shoves thing at me and says "here, put that in your purse." I know mothers with large purses whose children do the same thing. I carry my D40 in a Lowepro Dayrunner fannypack turned to the front, so it doesn't get tangled with the purse. I hope to God no one ever takes my picture showing it, because I must look deformed, but hey, it works for me.
 
TraamisVOS said:
I'm afraid you have missed his tongue in cheek sense of humour.

*edited - which is in fact subtle a poke at facebook culture.
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1) We really need that suggested punctuation mark, the "snark," - irony and scarcasm don't always come across in print.

2) He can poke all he wants at HIS Facebook culture, but when he pokes at my active friends, I get my back up. Of course, I have been known to take things too personally. I'm going to be a bad girl and tell a sexist joke at the end of the post, but I know it's my own fault!

3. He's trying to be clever and engaging, and he does write well. But for those outside the circle of "people who share Stu's experience," he's being clever and annoying. The thing is, I'm always reading in news articles about how going on Facebook makes people depressed, or how vapid and vain the posts are. But my newsfeed isn't like that, and the feeds of my active friends aren't like that, so I resent him tarring me with that brush. We are actually managing to connect on FB in a meaningful manner. I do get new baby pictures - I can understand that. I would say I get maybe 10 times the pet photos as I get selfies, and that's just the way I like it. I get a blessedly small number of photos of food. But if one of my friends was at the Eifel tower, I would want to see it! I "inherited" some of my FB friends when my best friend died about this time last year. Two of them haven't changed their profile picture to a selfie in that time. I don't know what these people look like! But we talk about books and movies and our pets and gardens.

4) It's true, if I post a photo of me and my husband, Facebook friends "come out of the woodwork" to "like" it. Mostly my relatives and his relatives who don't share many of our leisure interests but like to see us once in a while. But I don't post on FB to get "likes", I post on FB to connect, so I don't care if the "people pictures" are the most popular.

Ok, the sexist joke. A man is sitting at a dinner table and says to another man sitting on his right, "Women take things too personally." The woman on his left leans over and exclaims, "I do not!"

But as I said, if I knew a new parent starting out, I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it. And I may go back and take a look at those presets! As a new Lightroom user, I'm forbidding myself impulse buys. But after 24 hours, it isn't an impulse buy, is it?
 
I realized my long post is a lot about me wearing my heart on my sleeve and very little about the article under discussion. I apologize and if anyone feels I should remove it I'll be happy to. I would like to say this in general . A year ago this month I lost my best friend, someone I'd been through thick and thin with for some 40 years. But it's good to be reminded that we can move on from loss and find new places where we can feel safe and among friends. Even if now and then we feel safe enough to post ill-considered revelations of how easily our buttons can get pushed!
 
TheRubySusan said:
1) We really need that suggested punctuation mark, the "snark," - irony and scarcasm don't always come across in print.

He's trying to be clever and engaging, and he does write well. But for those outside the circle of "people who share Stu's experience," he's being clever and annoying.
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Ruby,

I'm in full agreement with your comments quoted above. I am happy to read advice by people given in a neutral sense, but once they seem to say that this is the way I do it, this is the only way to do it then I too object, and this is how I interprete the gentlemans article.

I can't offer any thoughts with regard to facebook, not having any family it's something I have felt no need to use.

Like you I'd like to think that this site puts me amongst friends and there are times when we might reveal things because of that feeling. I don't see any need for a deletion of what you have said. As a rather private person of few words I might keep such thoughts to myself, but experience has taught me that that is not always the wisest course of action.

Barrie
 
TheRubySusan said:
It was fun to read, even while it gored many of my oxen, and it's stirred up a lively discussion.
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I've never heard that phrase before. I will try to use it as much as possible during the next week.

I appreciate what he's trying to do, but he has so many of his prejudices confused with facts that I have to laugh. There was a much better article written by a writer from the Washington Post. Not an enthusiast, he went out and bought a Nikon 1 V1 to get better shots of his daughter. His experience said a lot about the needs and interest of those who want images and not cameras.
 
drd1135 said:
I've never heard that phrase before. I will try to use it as much as possible during the next week.

I appreciate what he's trying to do, but he has so many of his prejudices confused with facts that I have to laugh. There was a much better article written by a writer from the Washington Post. Not an enthusiast, he went out and bought a Nikon 1 V1 to get better shots of his daughter. His experience said a lot about the needs and interest of those who want images and not cameras.
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The adage is, "It all depends on whose ox is getting gored." That should give you a little more leeway, Steve!
 
I started exactly the way Stu recommends. Bought a Canon Digital Rebel (300D) and the 50/1.8. Actually, for me Step 1 was "Have a baby". There's three great things about starting with a fast short tele: 1) Composition is easy. Basically portraits, flowers, close ups, etc. Not hard to make a pleasing composition. 2) You learn right away, effortlessly, how aperture affects DOF and exposure. 3) You immediately get to play with DOF in a way that wasn't possible with your small sensor compact or phone camera.

A lot of people who only use the kit zoom probably never learn about controlling aperture. I do think that if you take such a person and gift them a fast short tele or normal prime, the chance they will fall in love with taking pictures increases greatly.
 
Thanks for posting, very curious and disturbing. I'm not concerned so much about the oxen gored here but that this looks and smells like, so I suspect is, a 'smart' advertorial. The author knows his audience, the masses with their camera phones and Facebook accounts, and with a subtle dose of derision whispers a little something in their ear.."psst, you yeah you, you can be a little better than them, yeah them the ones like you. All you need do is part with a little money, buy a dSLR kit and an extra lens, oh and then my presets…." (only hint, hint, $20, hint, hint). Conveniently there are links abounding on the margins to help the 'herd nudgers' to find the right store on-line to act on this received wisdom as the impulse resides. Put a starter kit and fast fifty in their cart (I assume there is a similar referral commission structure attached to these links) and maybe buy the presets in advance of its arrival…I wonder if they know they need a $99 (minimum) piece of software to plug the presets into. I mean mum and dad iPhoneographers don't already have Lightroom resident on their Macs….do they?
Edit: just re-read and noticed that all product placements have convenient Amazon hyperlinks. Oh jeez….

Once he has them on that treadmill, there aint no looking back. Hooked! Wonder if there's talk later of fast f2.8 zooms (14-24, 24-70, 70-200 likes) in whatever was your first ordained brand. What's the old adage - "a fool and his money are soon parted" (or the suchlike)

Although he cloaks his words in sarcasm (its a part of his exclusivity ploy) his approach is brash. The whole thing is very sad indeed. Then again maybe I'm just being overly cynical…tis the season.
 
Amin Sabet said:
I started exactly the way Stu recommends. Bought a Canon Digital Rebel (300D) and the 50/1.8. Actually, for me Step 1 was "Have a baby". There's three great things about starting with a fast short tele: 1) Composition is easy. Basically portraits, flowers, close ups, etc. Not hard to make a pleasing composition. 2) You learn right away, effortlessly, how aperture affects DOF and exposure. 3) You immediately get to play with DOF in a way that wasn't possible with your small sensor compact or phone camera.

A lot of people who only use the kit zoom probably never learn about controlling aperture. I do think that if you take such a person and gift them a fast short tele or normal prime, the chance they will fall in love with taking pictures increases greatly.
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"A lot of people who only use the kit zoom probably never learn about controlling aperture. I do think that if you take such a person and gift them a fast short tele or normal prime, the chance they will fall in love with taking pictures increases greatly. "
I agree with you there, and that's the most important thing to take away from the article. Ironically, Nikon makes an inexpensive 50mm for its DSLR's, but the one that will autofocus with my D40 is over $200! So I'll probably wait to get what I think of as a "standard" lens (from the days of film) until I upgrade the body. But as I'm finally getting off auto and learning to navigate the menus, I'm finding myself reaching for the 18mm - 55mm instead of the 55-200, because the shorter zoom has a wider aperture. So it's coming back to me!
 
TheRubySusan said:
I realized my long post is a lot about me wearing my heart on my sleeve and very little about the article under discussion. I apologize and if anyone feels I should remove it I'll be happy to. I would like to say this in general . A year ago this month I lost my best friend, someone I'd been through thick and thin with for some 40 years. But it's good to be reminded that we can move on from loss and find new places where we can feel safe and among friends. Even if now and then we feel safe enough to post ill-considered revelations of how easily our buttons can get pushed!
Click to expand...

That would definitely leave a lasting effect on me if I lost my best friend.

It's up to you if you want to remove any comments you've made but I don't have a problem with anything. We're all ok here on Serious Compacts.
 
Amin Sabet said:
I started exactly the way Stu recommends. Bought a Canon Digital Rebel (300D) and the 50/1.8. Actually, for me Step 1 was "Have a baby". There's three great things about starting with a fast short tele: 1) Composition is easy. Basically portraits, flowers, close ups, etc. Not hard to make a pleasing composition. 2) You learn right away, effortlessly, how aperture affects DOF and exposure. 3) You immediately get to play with DOF in a way that wasn't possible with your small sensor compact or phone camera.

A lot of people who only use the kit zoom probably never learn about controlling aperture. I do think that if you take such a person and gift them a fast short tele or normal prime, the chance they will fall in love with taking pictures increases greatly.
Click to expand...
kyteflyer said:
Thats what my Minolta SRT303b came with in 1973, and I loved it: well it wasnt what you'd call a nifty 50, it was a darned good 50... Learned a lot, too, about depth of field and other groovy things.
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I think you have been the only two who have truly understood what Stu is getting at. Including me. I started with the cheap fast 50 too. And a not-so-cheap DSLR.
 
James,

For me it's not so much about the message he's giving, but the manner in which he's giving it. His manner is doing him no favours and leaves me with an unflatering opinion about the gentleman, that maybe undeserved, but it is how he comes across to me.

To somewhat broaden the discussion I do think it's more difficult for newcomers to photography to understand the basics because the modern camera is able to do so much of the "thinking" if you let it. I started photography in the 1970's with an all singing, all dancing manual camera and you had to learn how to control aperture, depth of field and the like. I was introduced to digital in 2001 by being invited to attend a course being run at the field centre where I volunteered in those days. I got on very well with the visiting lecturer and so sat in on the course to a greater or lesser extent in subsequent years.

One year we had a 15 year lad on the course, well educated and already a competent naturalist. He was obviously struggling to understand the concepts until I took in one of my medium format manual lenses with an inbuilt leaf shutter and was able to demonstrate what happened when you altered the aperture and how the DoF scale on the lens showed you how that was affected by aperture setting.

I find the "modern" lenses less tactile and therefore less involving to use and I to would struggle to understand what is going on, however I wouldn't want to be lectured to in the manner that that gentleman seems to adopt, so for me his message is lost because of his manner.

Barrie
 

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