sharpshooterProven Techniques for Sharper Photographs

Martin bailey

sharp shooter : 2

IntroductIon ....................................................... 3

What Makes It sharp? ......................................... 4

Where to Focus ................................................... 6

Focus In the Macro range ...............................11

advanced Focus technIques ........................... 14

the great un-sharp .......................................... 19

checkIng crItIcal sharpness .......................... 23

analyzIng BlurrIness ....................................... 24

sharpenIng In post ........................................... 28

conclusIon ........................................................ 35

appendIx .............................................................. 35

table of contents

sharp shooter : 3

Tthere’s nothing worse than getting home thinking you’ve bagged a

world-beater, only to look at your new prize on the computer and find that

it isn’t sharp. this eBook isn’t going to transform every image you shoot into

a razor-sharp wonder, but it will give you some tools to nail that world-beater

more often than you lament it.

We’ll look at depth of field and why things are sharp in the first place, and

I’ll cover various focusing techniques and settings. But it’s important to

remember that there’s no single right way to set up your camera and shoot

the various scenes you’ll come across. Being a sharp shooter is about

arming yourself with an understanding of why focus is what it is, learning the

techniques required for each situation, and selecting the best method when

the time comes.

When I turned and saw these penguins coming towards me, I was shooting

with the wrong settings for this scene. I didn’t want to miss the shot, but they

were going to be too close in a second or two. there was no time to change

my settings, so the fastest and easiest way for me to focus without changing

anything was to pre-focus on the ground in front of the penguins, and then

release the shutter as the first penguin reached that point. It was a split-

second decision based on practice and experience. the more you understand

the techniques available to you, the more likely you are to reach for the right

tool at the right time, even under pressure.

I’ll show you ways to figure out why a shot didn’t work out and provide some

tips on how to fix it. We’ll also experiment with using out-of-focus areas and

intentional blur to great effect. In addition, if despite your best efforts you don’t

quite nail the focus on that dream shot, we’ll look at what can be done on the

computer so that you don’t have to throw it out.

have fun, sharp shooter!

introduction

sharp shooter : 4

BDepth of fielD

Before we talk about techniques to get

sharper images, let’s work through some

theory, to make sure we all understand

why images are sharp—or not—in the first

place. I’m sure you already know that the

aperture you set on your camera when

shooting affects how much of the image

will be in focus, and how much is not

sharp, or “soft.” the depth of the sharp

area is called the depth of field (commonly

referred to as “doF”).

a wide aperture gives a shallow doF with

just a small part of the subject in focus,

and a small aperture gives a deeper doF,

with much more of the scene in focus.

to confuse matters, wide apertures are

represented by small numbers such as

1.4, 2.8 and 4, and small apertures are

represented by bigger numbers such as

16 and 22. this is because the pioneers

of photography needed a numerical

system to represent the size of the

aperture in relation to any given focal

length, such as 24mm, 50mm or 100mm,

etc. the resulting apertures are written as

f-numbers, like f/2.8, f/5.6 and f/11, etc.

aperture numbers are calculated by

dividing the focal length of the lens by

the width of the aperture, or the hole

through which light travels through the

lens. this means that the aperture of a

50mm lens at f/2.8 will be 17.86mm in

diameter. likewise, an aperture of f/4 on

a 200mm lens will be 50mm in diameter.

the range of aperture numbers in full

stops is 1, 1.4, 2, 2.8, 4, 5.6, 8, 11, 16, 22,

32. these numbers are actually the square

route of 2 to the power of 0, 1, 2 and

so on, which is why they’re such weird

numbers to remember.

what makes it sharp?

focus Distance anD

focal length’s affect

on Depth of fielD

let’s look at some examples of how

distance to subject and the focal length

of your lens affect the doF in your image.

these calculations are commonly based

on how sharp an image would look when

printed at 8x10 inches and viewed from a

distance of two to three feet. perceived

sharpness will vary depending on how

you eventually use an image, but these

examples should help you to understand

the theory.

If you photograph a subject three

feet (91.4cm) away with a 50mm lens

and the aperture set to f/5.6, the doF

is approximately 4.24in (10.8cm). If you

photograph the same subject from the

same distance with the same aperture

using a 100mm lens, the doF decreases

to a shade under an inch (2.53cm),

just a quarter of the depth. see how

doubling the focal length greatly

decreases the doF?

to maintain the same doF with the

100mm lens at f/5.6, you’d have to double

the distance to the subject by moving

back to six feet (183cm). on the next page

I’ve provided a couple of examples of this

(see Figure 1), with full-sized photos from

both the 50mm and 100mm lenses on

the left, and a 100 percent crop from each

photo on the right. see how similar the

bokeh is in both photos?

If you were to go back to the 50mm lens

while still shooting from six feet away,

at the same aperture you’d just over

quadruple the doF to 1.47ft (44.8cm).

and for good measure, here’s one last

example: if you want to shoot at three

feet with a 100mm lens and still get

a four-inch (10cm) doF, you need an

aperture four times smaller, taking you

from f/5.6 through f/8, f/11 and f/16 to

f/22. remember how changing from

100mm to 50mm at six feet quadrupled

the doF? It’s the same thing; it’s an

inverse square, and this is why doF is so

shallow in macro photography (discussed

later in this eBook).

If you aren’t famIlIar wIth how dIstance to subject, focal length and aperture affect depthof fIeld, a dof calculator can be a very useful learnIng tool. (see appendIx)

sharp shooter : 5

fig

ure

1

50mm @ f/5.6 from 3’ (91.4cm)DoF = 4.24” (10.8cm)

100mm @ f/5.6 from 6’ (183cm)DoF = 4.23” (10.7cm)

sharp shooter : 6

Ook, so we’ve looked at how to control our

depth of field, but where should we focus

when composing an image?

eyes (usually) DeManD

focus

generally, if there are people or animals in

your shot, you will want to focus on your

subject’s eyes. Without the eyes in focus,

the subject can look lifeless. In this shot of

a clothes merchant in a market in India, I

used an 85mm lens with the aperture set to

f/1.6 for razor thin doF on the gentleman’s

face only, particularly his wonderfully

distinguished eyes. his nose and eyebrows

are out of focus, but we don’t care, or even

notice, because his eyes are sharp.

soft eyes

as usual, guidelines are just that. there are

always opportunities to break the rules, and

having eyes not in focus is not always a total

no-no. tell a different story by not having

focus on the eyes. For example, in this

photograph I focused on the snow Monkey’s

ear instead of the eye, resulting in the image

being more about the texture of the fur, and

to also give a distant, somewhat thoughtful

where to focus

look to the little monkey. I stopped the

aperture down to f/6.3 so that there was

enough detail in the eye and face to make

it still work.

finD the lines

autofocus systems work by detecting lines

and texture. If ever you are trying to focus

on something and the lens starts to search,

it’s often because you placed your selected

focus point over an area that has no texture

or lines. For example, focusing on a cheek

is much more likely to give you trouble than

the eye would.

sharp shooter : 7

foregrounD bokeh

(Maebokeh)

the Japanese word “bokeh” has been

assimilated into the english language,

much like sushi, tsunami and origami.

Bokeh is the out-of-focus part of an image

and can be used for effect in front of the

main subject, as well as behind. a not-so-

commonly used Japanese word for this is

“maebokeh,” which literally means “front”

or “foreground” bokeh.

occasionally, finding something and

purposefully composing your shot with it in

the foreground—but out of focus—can give

a beautifully ethereal feel to your images,

like this photograph (Figure 2) of crowds

on a bridge enjoying the cherry blossoms

in tokyo. I had the aperture of my lens

wide open to make the foreground cherry

blossom as out of focus as possible.

I got the inspiration for this photo from an

image shot by a good friend of mine, david

lee, but david shot his image more like

this, (Figure 3) with the focus on the cherry

blossom, rather than the people. I love

both compositions, and which you choose

is totally up to you. as photographers,

considering which focus option to use for

a particular scene broadens our creative

horizons; there is usually more than one way

to portray a scene or subject and still make

a successful image.

figure 2

figure 3

sharp shooter : 8

hyperfocal Distance

Whereas shallow doF is a great creative tool for the

photographer, sometimes we want to see everything in focus.

rather than just stopping your aperture down as far as you

dare and hoping for the best, you can use a calculated distance

known as the hyperfocal distance to help you get most—if

not all—of the scene, from the foreground to infinity, in sharp

focus. this is especially useful when shooting landscapes,

for example, when we might want sharp focus throughout

the image. let’s look at some examples of focal length and

aperture combinations, and the resulting hyper-focal distances.

If shooting with a 50mm lens at f/16, the hyperfocal distance

is just over 17 feet (5 metres). the area of acceptable focus

doesn’t start from the point at which we focus; rather, that’s

the sharpest point. the focus extends about one-third in front

of that point, and two-thirds back from it. When focused

at the hyperfocal distance, the area in focus starts halfway

between the camera and the point at which we’ve focused

and continues to infinity. this means if we focus on a point 17

feet from the camera, everything from 8.6 feet (2.6 metres)

to infinity will be in focus. some lenses have a distance scale

on them in a small window, which you can reference to set an

approximate focus distance.

We noted earlier that wide-angle lenses have deeper doF, and

this means our hyperfocal distance is also closer. so if using a

24mm lens at f/16, the hyperfocal distance is just four feet (1.2

metres). If we focus on this point, everything from two feet

(0.6 metres) to infinity will be in focus. this is literally right in

front of the lens, so you can appreciate how much doF you

can get with wide-angle lenses.

sharp shooter : 9

figure 4

conversely, of course, this means that long telephoto lenses are not really

suited for shooting using the hyperfocal distance. as shown here (Figure

4), at 200mm with an aperture of f/16, the hyperfocal distance is 274 feet

(83 metres) with acceptable focus starting at 137 feet (42 metres), which

is obviously not going to cut it if we want the foreground in focus. We can

also see here that from around 50mm, getting mid-foreground in focus is

pretty easy, and wide-angle lenses are great for getting everything in focus

using the hyperfocal distance.

sharp shooter : 10

hyperfocal guIdelInes

there are links to some hyperfocal

distance calculators in the appendix.

they are great tools for learning

about hyperfocal distance. although I

occasionally use mine in the field, once

you have an idea of how your lenses

and various focal lengths perform, you

won’t have to get out a calculator every

time you want to shoot at the hyperfocal

distance. I often just stop the lens down

to between f/11 and f/14 and focus about

one-third of the way into the scene. For

very wide-angle lenses, I focus on the

foreground and this is usually enough to

give me good doF in my images.

Diffraction

In practice, I try to avoid stopping my

lenses down past f/16. It varies from lens

to lens, but most lenses start to suffer

from diffraction with apertures around f/16

and smaller. diffraction is what happens

when light rays start to spread out as

they pass through a small hole, which

prevents the light from being focused to a

small enough dot to create a sharp image.

this means that even the areas that are

within the depth of field—and therefore

supposed to be sharp—actually become

softer. Because of this, I like to give

myself a soft limit of f/14, and try to avoid

using f/16 or smaller when possible.

there are tools such as canon’s digital

lens optimizer—which is built into digital

photo professional (dpp), the software

distributed with canon digital slr

cameras—that actually do a very good job

of removing diffraction caused by using

small apertures. however, I have to have

a serious problem to deal with before I’ll

use dpp, so generally I accept the slight

softness if I absolutely have to go smaller

than f/16.

sharp shooter : 11

focus in the macro range

shallow Depth of fielD in Macro

as we learned earlier, the closer we get to our subject, the shallower the depth of field gets, so let’s look at some

techniques for focusing in the macro range. For example, if you are going to shoot something at life-size* or

closer, f/11 will only give you 4mm of doF.

of course, shallow doF is not necessarily something to avoid. this photo of a dandelion

seed was shot at f/3.2 to ensure that only a part of the seed ball was in

focus and that the background was totally blurred. as the subject

gets closer, though, it’s usually best to stop down to around

f/8 or f/11 to get a reasonable amount of focus.

focus stacking

sometimes we want to see everything

totally in focus, but cannot accomplish

this by stopping down the aperture.

In this case, I sometimes use a

technique called focus stacking.

this can be used for normal

photographs such as

landscapes, if you are using

a long focal length, or for

macro shots, both of

which usually result in a

shallow depth of field,

even when stopped

down some. let’s look

at how to focus stack in

the macro range.

* Life-size or 1:1 is the closest most macro lenses will enable you to photograph, and this basically

means that an object 20mm wide would measure 20mm on your sensor. Perhaps easier to

envision is a 35mm slide frame or negative. Imagine using a ruler to measure the subject on the

piece of film. It would be 20mm across, which would be life-size or 1:1 in macro terms.

A

sharp shooter : 12

shooting for a focus stack

Focus stacking is the process of shooting multiple images, focusing on

different points across the subject and stacking them together for a single

image with deeper doF.

For macro stacking, I like to shoot at around f/11, as I did for this shot.

although we’ll auto-align the images, if you handhold, you will likely move

slightly as you shoot (especially in the macro range) so using a tripod is

highly recommended. also, if you are shooting outside, try to pick a

calm day, so your subject isn’t blowing around in the breeze.

set up your tripod and frame your subject for how you

want your final image to look. note that when you focus

a macro lens you are actually going to zoom a little,

even with a fixed focal length like a 100mm macro

lens. Because of this, focus on the nearest part of

your subject to begin with, and don’t frame your

subject too tightly. you’ll need a little space as

some of the edges will need to be trimmed away

after aligning and stacking your images.

lock your exposure down, preferably shooting

in manual exposure mode to avoid any shift in

exposure, which will cause problems and need

correcting before you proceed. If you have live

view on your camera it can help to use it,

especially if you also have a live histogram. If

you don’t see your histogram in live view,

try hitting the Info button on the back of the

camera until it’s displayed. not all cameras

have a live histogram and the button to turn

it on can vary, so if it doesn’t appear, check your

manual. If necessary, take some test shots and adjust

exposure using the histogram from these shots.

sharp shooter : 13

once you have your exposure where you

want it, turn off the histogram (if shooting

in live view) and turn off auto-focus as you

don’t want the focus to jump around as you

press the shutter button. Manually focus on

the furthest part of your subject that you

want to be in focus and expose your first

frame. then, trying not to move the camera,

manually shift the focus a little closer and

shoot another image. continue this until

you have moved the focus gradually across

your subject, shooting a series of images

for the entire subject or all of the parts that

you want to be in sharp focus. you’ll need

to experiment a little to see how many

frames you need for each subject, but you

can usually see quite clearly as the focus

advances. to get this image of a flower, I

shot six frames.

processing a focus stack

to process a focus stack, import the photos

into your computer and open them in

photoshop as layers in a single image. If you

are working in lightroom, select all images

for your stack, right click on one, select

Edit In, and then select Open as Layers in

Photoshop. If you want to open the images

as layers from within photoshop, select

Edit > Automate > Photomerge, and then

select your images from your hard drive.

I find it better to turn off Blend Images

Together in this dialog as it produces some

strange results. select Auto under the

Layout menu, and then click OK.

If you’ve opened your images from

lightroom, ensure that all layers are

selected, and then from the Edit menu

select Auto-Align Layers and make sure Auto

is selected under Projection. Whether you

started from lightroom or opened your files

from within photoshop, by the time you’ve

reached this point, you’ll have something

like the example image we see in Figure 5.

your layers will be open and selected in

photoshop, and probably have a little bit of

transparent space around them from the

alignment process. this will happen even

if you used a tripod because of the slight

change in perspective due to the zooming

effect as you shifted focus.

next, select Auto-Blend Layers from the Edit

menu. once auto-blending has run, check to

make sure photoshop has done a good job.

you may need to jump in and change some

of the masking that photoshop did or you

may need to reshoot your images with a

smaller aperture or more incremental focus

steps. In this sample image (Figure 6), I

masked out the sharp stem of the flower,

opting to leave it soft and out of focus. once

the masking looks good, the last step is

to trim away any transparency or artefacts

around the edge of the image to clean it up,

and you’re done!

figure 5 figure 6

sharp shooter : 14

WWe’ve looked at what makes our images

sharp, how to control both depth of field and

bokeh for creative effect. there are times,

however, when you need to apply slightly

more advanced techniques to get a sharp

shot, so let’s take a look at these.

back button focus

Many sports and wildlife photographers

disable focusing with the shutter button in

the custom settings and use the aF button

(see Figure 7) on the back of the camera to

focus. this can sound like a pretty wacky

thing to do at first, and although it takes

some getting used to, there are some major

benefits to using the back aF button.

For example, if the shutter button activates

the autofocus, this means that you have to

keep a focus point over your subject the

entire time you are pressing the shutter

button. If you’re using one shot (canon)

or single servo (nikon), half-pressing the

shutter button will lock the focus, and then

as you recompose, you have to keep the

button half-pressed the entire time. using

the back aF button allows you to focus, then

release your thumb from the button to stop

focusing, and that means you no longer

have to worry about where the focus points

fall in the frame as you recompose. It’s like

being able to toggle manual focus on and off

in an instant.

there are also times when the main subject

that you want in focus is near to the edge

of the frame and not covered by any of

your focus points, like the leaves at the

advanced focus techniques

figure 7

very bottom of Figure 8. at times like that,

if every time you half-press your shutter

release button the focus snaps to something

that you didn’t intend to focus on, your only

alternative is to switch your lens to manual

focus mode.

possibly the biggest benefit of back button

focus is that you can leave your camera in aI

servo (canon) or continuous Focus (nikon)

mode, to get the best of all three modes.

For example, if you suddenly needed to

focus on a fast-moving subject and you’d

switched to one shot/single servo, you’d

need to locate the button and switch it over

to aI servo/continuous-servo really quickly,

and by the time you were using continuous

focus again the opportunity could be gone.

sure, there are ways to set buttons to

toggle between aI servo and one shot, or

continuous and single servo aF, but even

that isn’t as fast as simply not pressing a

button to go to manual aF, pressing and

then releasing that button for the equivalent

of one shot/single servo, or pressing and

holding that same button for continuous

focus. you basically have access to all three

aF modes without changing a thing.

figure 8

sharp shooter : 15

center, Manually selecteD,

or all focus points

Whether your camera has 9 or 61 focus points,

you choose which to focus with. Many people

favour the center focus point, because it’s often

the most accurate and simply because it’s in

the middle. also, using all of your focus points

with automatic selection can lead to the camera

focusing on the wrong part of the scene. another

option is to either use just one or a small group

of focus points, but select something other than

the central group. let’s explore when and why

you might use these various methods.

center focus poInt

When shooting with a reasonably deep depth of

field, or when your subject is far away, using the

center focus point is good for quick and accurate

focusing. It’s also much easier to focus using the

center focus or a selected focus point—rather

than the entire range of focus points—when

there is a lot of texture in the background or

objects in the foreground. autofocus systems

generally look for contrasting lines and textures,

and will often jump to these things more readily

than your intended subject. selecting your focus

point enables you to tell the camera exactly

where you want it to focus.

note that if you are shooting with a long

telephoto lens—especially if you are using the

back aF button to focus—half-pressing your

shutter button will activate the image stabilization

on your lens and make it easier to keep your

focus point over your subject.

manually selected focus poInt

the problem with focusing with the center focus

point and then recomposing your shot is that the

plane of focus shifts as you recompose. looking

at this example image, imagine that you were

photographing a person from the waist up with

a 50mm f/1.4 lens, which has just one centimeter

of depth of field when used wide open. you can

see here that you might initially move the

camera upwards and focus on the eye (signified

by the green line), but as you move the camera

down and reduce the space above your subject’s

head, the focus that should have been over the

left eye is now closer to the right, as shown by

the blue line.

that may not seem like a big shift, but in Figure

9 I rotated the camera on its sensor plane,

which is close to the back of the camera. In

reality, you are more likely to move the camera

forward and perhaps down a little on an arc,

creating a difference more like Figure 10, where

the shift is the difference between having the

face sharp or not. this second example was

photographed by moving the camera on the

ball head without moving the tripod. this is the

actual amount of shift.

figure 9

figure 10

sharp shooter : 16

When shooting at a relatively close

distance with a very wide aperture, it’s

better to select a focus point closest to

the eye, or a specific part of the scene on

which you want to focus to avoid this kind

of focusing error.

Moving Subjects – Automatic Focus

Point Selection

although automatic selection using all

of your focus points is available in one

shot (canon) or single servo (nikon)

focusing modes, I rarely use it in these

modes because it’s too prone to error,

often jumping to higher contrast objects

in the frame. however, I do make good

use of automatic selection from all focus

points when using aI servo (canon) or

continuous servo (nikon) focusing

mode. When using continuous focus,

most cameras use a single focus

point—often selectable—to gain initial

focus, and then automatically switch to

using all focus points to track the subject

around the frame. this allows you to

recompose your photo or track a fast-

moving subject more easily once you have

locked your initial focus on your subject.

It’s great for tracking birds in flight or

focusing on a subject like a soccer player

darting around the pitch.

continuous focus works best when the

subject is over a plain background. When

there is a lot of texture or contrast in the

background, the camera can lose focus on

your subject, often at a critical moment.

that being said, cameras are getting

better, and we can tweak the settings to

make focusing more accurate.

you will need different settings for

different subjects and scenes, but as an

example, for fast-paced bird photography

over high contrast backgrounds, I set

my camera’s tracking sensitivity to -1,

acceleration/deceleration tracking to +1

and aF point auto switching to +1 (see

Figure 12). I add these three options to

My Menu so that I can access and tweak

them quickly in the field; I rarely go back

to the preset scenes.

continuous focus works better if you have

time to stay locked on your subject, to

allow the camera time to refine the focus.

In the photo on the next page (Figure 13),

I stayed with a steller’s sea eagle from

way up in the sky, staying locked on as

it darted downwards and then I fired off

figure 12

figure 11

sharp shooter : 17

nine frames as the eagle levelled out just

above the water and swooped across the

surface, catching a fish in his talons.

the first and last frames of the series

were slightly soft, as the camera learned

the direction and speed of the subject,

but the seven frames in the middle of the

series were all tack sharp. the sea ice in

the background is good at stealing focus,

but with my selected settings—based on a

lot of bird photography over high contrast

backgrounds—I’m pretty happy with how the

focus system stayed locked on the subject.

steaDying super telephoto

lenses

If you shoot with super telephoto lenses,

like a 400mm f/2.8 or a 500 or 600mm f/4,

these beasts are so big that you can often

get vibration in the lens caused simply by the

action of the mirror jumping up and down as

you release the shutter, and even sometimes

caused by the shutter itself opening and

closing. the best way to get sharp images

with these long lenses is to shoot with a fast

enough shutter speed to beat the shuddering

of the lens (approximately 1/320 of a second

and higher).

figure 13

If you are shooting when there isn’t much

light (such as dawn or dusk), and your Iso

is cranked up as high as you dare, you’ll

need to start taking extra precautions as

your shutter speeds drop to 1/250 of a

second or lower.

all super telephoto lenses have tripod

feet on them, and you can reduce lens

shudder by wrapping your left hand around

the tripod foot, with your small finger, ring

finger and middle finger around the foot,

then push up against the barrel of the lens

with your thumb and index finger (see

Figure 14). this usually puts your fingers

against the focus ring of the lens as well,

so you can manually tweak focus in this

position if needed.

another way to apply pressure to reduce

lens shudder is to lay your left arm over

the top of the lens (see Figure 15). this

also puts your hand over the focus ring

for manual tweaking, and is easier to do

for long periods of time than the previous

method. Whether you are applying pressure

from below or above the lens, you can

also push your face against the back of the

camera as you look through the viewfinder.

this helps to remove any play between the

camera and the lens.

sharp shooter : 18

a third way I apply pressure to stop lens

shudder is a method that bird photography

legend arthur Morris taught me in an

email exchange (and an eBook sale) a

number of years ago. When using a long

lens and going really slow (under 1/100

of a second), using a gimbal setup such

as the Wimberley head, push up at the

elbow, applying pressure to the swing

arm knob while pushing down on the lens

with your hand (see Figure 16). pulling

the camera down with your right hand

and pushing your face against the back

can really help to steady a long lens with

slower shutter speeds.

another option to support the lens and

reduce shudder is the really right stuff

long lens support package (see Figure

17). I sometimes combine the third

technique above with this setup when

shooting in very low light. Which side

you place the arm of a gimbal head

depends on the method you use to

reduce shudder. If you don’t use the

third method with the elbow under the

knob, you might find it easier to have the

gimbal arm to the right of the camera, so

that you can get your left arm up and over

the lens unencumbered.

figure 14

figure 15

figure 16

figure 17

sharp shooter : 19

Ggood photographs aren’t always about having everything perfectly sharp. In fact,

images with only a small part of them sharp are often more aesthetically pleasing,

as they lead the eye directly to the intended subject, and the dreamy bokeh or

intentionally blurred areas become supporting actors. here are some ways to create

intentionally blurred areas in your images.

wiDe apertures

as shown previously, wide apertures provide a shallow depth of field, which can give

a beautiful ethereal feel to our images. I love looking for patches of flowers with a

pleasing background and shooting them with a long lens and a wide-open aperture, like

this “Flowerscape” of equinox flowers shot at 150mm with the aperture set to f/2.8.

Just because the background and foreground are out of focus, it doesn’t mean that you

just accept where the elements fall; I take great care to find the right camera angle and

height so that the background elements enhance the image.

the great un-sharp

sharp shooter : 20

panning

panning to make your main subject

sharp with a blurry background is a very

effective technique, but the faster and

more erratic your subject’s movement, the

more difficult it can be to get them sharp.

If you can accept that you’re going to have

a low success rate—even when you get

good at it—this technique is a lot of fun.

With longer focal lengths and a fast-

moving subject, you need a faster

shutter speed; however, the goal is to

move the camera fast enough to blur the

background, and the more you can blur it,

the better the results will be.

For example, when photographing birds,

you will most likely want to capture a bit

of wing movement while getting the head

as sharp as possible.

When shooting a subject like this steller’s

sea eagle, you’ll need a shutter speed of

around 1/100 to 1/125 of a second. For

slower moving objects or things further

away, you’ll be able to go slower, down to

around 1/50, or even 1/25 of a second. to

get a slow shutter speed in full sunlight,

you might need to use a small aperture

such as f/11 or f/16. there’s no need to

worry about your depth of field being too

deep because everything that isn’t moving

with your pan will be blurred anyway.

sharp shooter : 21

trees in the snow, which was used as the

cover of issue two of the craft & vision

digital magazine, PHOTOGRAPH.

to get an image like this (Figure 18), you’ll

need a shutter speed between 1/10 and

1/30 of a second and use as small an

aperture as necessary to stop the image

from over-exposing. you may even need

to use a neutral density filter in bright

conditions. then move the camera down

and release the shutter as the bottom

of the trees comes into frame. you don’t

necessarily have to include the bottom of

the trees, but I find it more pleasing to do

so, especially with a snow scene like this.

note that you need to ensure that you pan

perfectly with the vertical lines. If you start

to move diagonally, the blur will be less

pleasing, even messy. I usually hand hold

for this sort of shot, but if you have a tilt-pan

style tripod head, you can lock down

the horizontal axis and use the vertical

axis for a pan like this, or vice versa for a

horizontal pan.

you can use this technique with fields

of flowers or grasses, for buildings or a

crowded street. you might also try rotating

your camera or zooming while making the

exposure. experiment with these techniques

and see what you come up with.

figure 18the most successful panning shots are

when the subject you are following is

crisply sharp, but if they’re a little soft

don’t worry about it too much. If the

results are pleasing to look at, you’ve

done a good job.

pannIng technIque

the best panning technique I’ve found is

to stand with your feet shoulder width

apart, point your body slightly toward

where you think the pan will end, wind

yourself back like a spring (toward the

start of the panning action) and then

rotate from the waist while unwinding.

this gives you a very smooth panning

action and, although you’ll lose shots,

you’ll have a good chance of getting one

or two that really work. you’ll also need to

have your camera set in aI servo (canon)

or continuous Focus (nikon), so that you

can continue to focus on the subject as

they move towards or away from you.

intentional MoveMent

blur

In contrast to tack-sharp images, some

scenes can actually work very well by

intentionally moving the camera while

photographing a static scene, blurring

everything! I used this technique for this

photograph of a simple copse of birch

sharp shooter : 22

long exposures

long exposures are a great way to allow the moving

elements of a scene, such as water and clouds, to blur

into areas of beautiful smooth softness. For long exposure

shots, you’ll need to invest in a sturdy tripod. Without a

good tripod, even the tiniest bit of wind or vibration will

result in camera shudder. I use a mix of really right stuff

and gitzo tripods, all of which are tall enough to get the

camera’s viewfinder to eye level or higher without having to

stoop. they also have thick leg sections for utmost rigidity.

although I use the Wimberley head gimbal to aid tracking

when using my super telephoto lens, for everything else

I use the really right stuff Bh-55 ball head or the Bh-40

when I’m traveling and weight is an issue. Both are as

rigid as can be and, in my opinion, the best ball heads

on the market.

use mirror lockup to get the mirror mechanism up and out

of the way before the exposure starts, but if you are using

some of the latest live view cameras, live view pretty

much equals mirror lockup. you also need to get your hands

away from the camera well before the exposure starts. a

cable release is a good tool for long exposures, but wrap

it around something to stop it from dangling if possible.

even with a sturdy tripod, a dangling cable release can bang

against a tripod leg and introduce vibration, especially when

windy. If you don’t have a cable release or some kind of

remote release, use your camera’s two-second timer and

trip the shutter with your finger, then move your hand away

from the camera immediately as the timer starts.

sharp shooter : 23

Aafter you’ve shot your images and

transferred them to your computer, you’re

now ready to edit your selection down

to just your best shots. If you are only

shooting for the web, you can simply

browse through your images and, if they

look good on the screen, you’re good to

go. But if you want to do any printing,

submit your images to a stock photo

agency or enter them into competitions,

etc., you really should check for critical

sharpness before you take any photo

through your post-processing workflow.

at what point you do this is up to you,

but I’m a big believer in checking for

critical sharpness early because I like to

weed out flawed images before I invest

much time and emotional energy on

them. generally, my first pass through

my images is to look for images that I

like based on composition and artistic

merit. I use star ratings to mark what I

like, and at this point I also hit the x key

in lightroom to reject technically flawed

images or those that make me wonder

what I was thinking when I shot it.

I usually give my initial selects four

stars to give me leeway to promote or

demote images and filter them out of my

current view in lightroom. you can do

the same in Bridge, aperture and most

other image browsing software. Which

rating system you use is a matter of

personal preference; I’m just explaining a

few elements of my workflow to make it

easier to follow the process.

once I have starred all of my “likes,” I

do a second pass and try to reduce the

number of selects by comparing finer

checking critical sharpness

compositional nuances and checking

the critical sharpness of the images.

I might start to gravitate towards one

image over the others because of a slight

compositional difference, but before I

allow myself to get too attached to that

image, I zoom in to 100 percent to check

that it is sharp where I intended it to

be. some people recommend zooming

to 50 percent and others recommend

200 percent. With the new Mac retina

screens, it can sometimes be necessary

to zoom past 100 percent depending on

your screen settings, but most of the

time, 100 percent is enough for me.

In my opinion, zooming to 50 percent

is not enough to really assess critical

sharpness unless you know that you

never want to produce large prints or sell

your images. they don’t necessarily

have to be totally tack sharp (later we’ll

look at what to do when you don’t quite

nail the focus), but when you have a

choice from multiple images, it’s better

to initially spend time and select the

sharpest of the batch, rather than have to

go back to your original files and search

for an alternative later.

the dilemma begins when you have

one image that is compositionally better

than another, but less sharp. a decision

must be made as to whether or not the

less sharp image is sharp enough and can

be saved—by the techniques covered later

in this eBook—or the sharper image is

compositionally good enough to be

“the one.”

sharp shooter : 24

there are a number of reasons that

images might end up blurred or soft;

to enable you to fix the problem, you

need to investigate the cause. Blur is

typically caused by camera shake, subject

movement, focus error or a combination

of the three. let’s examine a few ways

to tell the difference, and I’ll give you

some tips on how to overcome these

issues in addition to the techniques

we’ve already covered.

caMera shake

If everything in your image is blurred,

including foreground and background

objects, it most likely means that your

camera moved during the exposure. to

reduce the risk of camera shake, ensure

that you are supporting your camera

properly when hand holding. If you are

shooting with an slr camera, hold the

grip with your right hand and your finger

on the shutter button. Most people find

the best way to support the camera is

to cup your left hand under the lens,

palm facing upwards, with your fingers

wrapped around the barrel of the lens.

this also enables you to adjust the zoom

ring or manually tweak the focus when

analyzing blurriness

figure 19

Tnecessary. It also helps to tuck your

elbows into your sides, and if you know

that you are pushing it a bit on the shutter

speed, find something solid to lean

against, like a tree or a wall.

you might also need a faster shutter

speed to eliminate camera shake. to

recap on a well-known guideline, the

golden rule regarding the slowest shutter

speeds for hand-held shooting is to use

the focal length

at which you are

shooting as the

shutter speed.

For example, if

you are shooting

with a 50mm lens, use a shutter speed of

1/50 of a second or faster to avoid camera

shake. If you are shooting at 200mm,

you will want a shutter speed of 1/200 of

a second or higher; the longer the focal

length, the faster your shutter speed

needs to be.

Image stabilization (canon) or vibration

reduction (nikon) can also help

by providing two or more stops of

stabilization. this means that if you have

three stops of stabilization, you could

most likely get away with a shutter

speed as low as 1/25 of a second at

200mm. the problem with going this

slow is that you may start to see

blur because of subject movement,

so I generally try to use the focal-

length-as-shutter-speed rule as a base

measurement, regardless of whether or

not I’m using image stabilization.

of course, an alternative to hand-holding

is to use a tripod, and so long as you buy

something sturdy enough to hold your

gear and withstand a bit of wind, that will

certainly help in most cases. But since

tripods aren’t always available or practical,

it’s still useful to learn good hand-held

shooting techniques.

I only rely on Image stabIlIzatIononce lIght levels drop so low that I can’t push my Iso any hIgher.

sharp shooter : 25

subject MoveMent

upon inspection of a blurry image, if you can see that some

parts of the image are sharp (like the ground around a subject’s

feet) but your main subject is blurry, it may be unwanted subject

movement. to overcome this, increase the shutter speed. how

you achieve a faster shutter speed will depend on your chosen

shooting mode, but you will generally need to select a higher

Iso to make your sensor more sensitive, a wider aperture to

let in more light, or a combination of the two.

how fast you need to take your shutter speed will depend on

the subject, but to freeze the motion of a child running around a

lawn, you’ll probably want 1/500 of a second or faster. the freeze

a large bird in flight, you’ll want between 1/800 to 1/1250, and

for smaller birds or fast paced sports, you may need as high as

1/2000 of a second or faster.

sharp shooter : 26

focus errors

When looking at a blurred subject, if

you can see something in the foreground

or background that is sharp, chances are

you missed the focus. this is a common

problem when shooting with a shallow

depth of field. using a smaller aperture

will help to get more of the subject

sharp, but assuming you want to have

fun with shallow depth of field, let’s

think about what we can do to reduce

our focus errors.

We’ve already looked at the various focus

modes (so I won’t go into detail on this),

but when shooting a relatively stationary

subject with a wide aperture, select one

shot on a canon or single servo mode

on a nikon

camera. this

locks the focus

when focus is

achieved and

keeps it there

as long as you

half-press the

shutter button

or while you

hold the back

aF button if

you use the

back aF button

to focus. as

previously

mentioned, if you are using the back aF

button, you might choose to stay in aI

servo or continuous servo and just take

your finger off the button to stop focusing.

another useful technique for landscape

and still life photography is, when using

a tripod, to use live view and then zoom

in to 5x or 10x on the camera’s lcd and

manually adjust the focus (see Figure

20). zooming in live view is generally

activated using the same buttons that

you use to zoom in on a photo during

playback, but it also works in live view

on most cameras that I’ve come across in

recent years. this is a great way to adjust

focus for static subjects, but doesn’t

make much sense for hand-held shooting

or for moving subjects.

figure 20

sharp shooter : 27

another common focusing problem is accidentally focusing on the

wrong part of your subject, such as the eyelashes of this snow monkey.

to overcome this, I focused manually instead of relying on the camera’s

focusing system. there are times when it’s just easier to take full control.

to successfully use manual focus, you need to be able to clearly see your

subject. I know this sounds silly, but you wouldn’t believe the number

of people I’ve met who aren’t aware of the diopter on their camera. the

diopter is a small adjustment dial next to the viewfinder that allows you to

adjust the viewfinder sharpness to match your eyesight. check where this

is on your camera and ensure it’s set to enable you to see through your

finder as clearly as possible. If the range of the diopter is not great enough

to match your eyesight, you can even buy viewfinder eyepieces with fitted

dioptric lenses from your camera manufacturer.

sharp shooter : 28

sharpening in post

Oonce you’ve done all you can in camera

and selected the best of the bunch, what

can you do with a photograph that’s not

quite critically sharp, but it’s so close you

don’t want to throw it out?

saving the “alMost

there” shots

sometimes, you get so close that not

being quite perfect is not a good enough

reason to throw something out. here are

a few tricks you can use to save the ones

that almost got away.

selectIve sharpenIng

I love this photograph of a Japanese

White eye bird surrounded by the early

flowering kanzakura cherry blossoms, but

truth be told, I didn’t quite nail the focus

on the bird’s eye. to give me that beautiful

dreamy background, I shot this at f/4 at

420mm, so the doF is razor thin. When

viewed at 100 percent, you can see that

the focus is about 5mm behind the eye.

there’s a line of sharpness on the bird’s

body, just in front of its legs.

sharp shooter : 29

fig

ure

22

I could argue that this is the best place to

have the focus at this aperture, otherwise

the shape of the bird would have been

slightly less defined, but excuses aside,

a wildlife shot usually doesn’t work if the

eyes aren’t acceptably sharp. Because I

didn’t want to just throw this out, I used the

adjustment Brush <k> in lightroom to paint

in some sharpness. I didn’t want to sharpen

the entire image as I wanted the soft parts

to remain nice and dreamy. they wouldn’t

sharpen up much, but I wanted it as dreamy

as possible. as shown in Figure 21, I painted

a relatively rough area over the bird and

turned the sharpness up to 100.

the amount of sharpness you need

will depend upon the sharpness of the

original photograph. If you go too crazy

with sharpness, it can look digitized and

pixelated, so adjust to taste. I often take

a slider way up, then pull it back to where

I think it looks good, but for this photo, it

didn’t look over-sharpened even at 100, so I

left it there. By the way, the resulting image

has been licensed a few times by popular

photography Magazine, so I’m pleased I

didn’t throw it out.

localIzed sharpenIng In photoshop

as much as I love lightroom, when I

need very detailed sharpening, I do it in

photoshop. My sharpening filter of choice

is Smart Sharpen, found under the Filter >

Sharpen menu. the amount of sharpening

required depends on the amount of softness

you are dealing with. For my White-eye

shot where I missed focus on the eye, I

needed quite heavy settings to get the eye

sharp.

having set the Remove pull-down menu to

Lens Blur and clicking the More Accurate

checkbox, I selected an Amount of 100

percent and a Radius of 2.3 px. the problem

with going this heavy on the sharpening is

that it can create halos around the edges,

as seen here in the Smart Sharpen Preview

window (Figure 22). Both the edge around

the bird and the pink cherry blossoms look

pretty nasty here. an easy way to apply

sharpening to only the parts of the image

that need it is to use a layer mask.

fig

ure

21

sharp shooter : 30

select the photograph in the layers pallet

(see Figure 23), and select Duplicate Layer

from the Layer menu. If the new layer isn’t

selected, select it, and then apply your

smart sharpen filter to this duplicate layer.

then while holding down the alt key on

your keyboard, click the

Add Layer Mask button at the bottom of the

layer pallet (circled in red here). holding

down the alt key automatically fills the

Mask layer with black, and remember:

black conceals, white reveals. this is how I

remember to use black to hide whatever is

below that part of the mask, and white to

allow the effect to show through.

select the mask and, with the Brush tool

selected (circled on the left), set the size

big enough to paint over the areas you

want to show the sharpening effect on

with pure white (see Figure 24). use a big

brush to paint in the bulk of the area, and

then reduce the size of the brush to refine

the edges as necessary. the bracket keys

(“ [ ” and “ ] ”) on your keyboard change

the brush size. If you paint too far over the

edges, ensure your background color is

black, and hit the x key on your keyboard

to toggle between the background and

foreground colors. paint over the unwanted

areas with black to hide them again. you

should see your sharpened areas as white

in the mask (circled to the right).

figure 23

figure 24

sharp shooter : 31

figure 25

other sharpenIng tools

another way to sharpen images is

nik software’s sharpener pro 3, raW

presharpener (see Figure 25). For me,

lightroom is often enough, or photoshop

for fine detail sharpening, but I do like the

visual clues as to exactly what is being

sharpened in sharpener pro. Just like the

other nik software plug-ins, sharpener pro

presharpener uses control points, so in

addition to generic global sharpening, you

can apply varying degrees of sharpness

applied to very specific tonal ranges.

the sharpening effect only works on similar

tones to those on which you drop a control

point. you can vary the size and percentage

of the sharpening individually applied to each

control point, and use minus control points

to remove the effect from areas that you

didn’t want to sharpen. In this screenshot,

I have turned on the effect Mask, to show

which parts of the image

are being sharpened. there is also an

effect overlay, which looks similar to

lightroom’s local adjustment display, but

with greater detail.

sharp shooter : 32

sharpening for print

In lIghtroom

no matter how sharp they may be, all

photographs have to be sharpened

for print regardless of any sharpening

that you do to the image in your

usual workflow. lightroom makes the

sharpening-for-print process extremely

easy; all you need to do is to select the

type of paper in the Print Job panel.

there are two options: glossy and Matte.

If you are printing on lustre or satin paper,

glossy will work just fine. standard

usually gives plenty of sharpening,

unless you are printing large. If you

print from a low resolution file or you’re

printing larger than 17 x 24”, lightroom

sharpening may need to be turned up to

high, especially for matte papers, because

the ink spreads a little on matte papers so

they need more sharpening.

figure 26

My usual approach is to use lightroom

sharpening if I have 200ppi (pixels

per inch) or higher. to see how much

resolution your image has to print with,

turn on Show Guides in the Guides panel

and ensure Dimensions is checked.

uncheck Print Resolution in the panel so

your print resolution is displayed in the

top left corner of your image (see Figure

26). If it is lower than 300ppi but more

than 200ppi, click the print resolution

checkbox and type in 300. this makes

lightroom “res-up” the image for printing.

later on we’ll look at what to do if your

image resolution is below 200ppi.

In photoshop

If I need to sharpen for print in

photoshop, I use Smart Sharpen (see

Figure 27). select Smart Sharpen from

the Filter > Sharpen

menu and ensure the

Preview checkbox is

selected so you can

see the effects on the

image in the preview

window, and then

select Lens Blur

from the Remove

pull-down menu

and click the More

Accurate checkbox

at the bottom of

the dialog box.

you’ll need to adjust the Amount and

Radius sliders to get the image to the

point where it starts to look slightly over-

sharpened. an amount of 80 percent

and a radius of 1.0px is a good place to

start, but it will depend on how sharp

your base image is and the kind and size

of paper you are printing on; you’ll need

to experiment to get optimal sharpness.

you can then save presets of your smart

sharpen settings and for various types

of paper and print sizes, in order to

remember what settings you used.

note that you only need to sharpen

this much for print, so don’t apply this

sharpening and then save your original

images. save a copy, and name it in such

a way that you can tell it was for a gloss

or matte print and include the print size

and other relevant information.

figure 27

sharp shooter : 33

enlarging for print

If printing at 24 x 36” or larger or

printing a heavily cropped or otherwise

low-resolution image, you will probably

need to enlarge and sharpen your image

specifically for print. When I need to

enlarge an image like this, I use onone

software’s perfect resize 7.5.

once installed, launch perfect resize

7.5 in lightroom by selecting it from

Plug-in Extras under the File menu. In

photoshop, you’ll find it under the

File > Automate menu.

When using perfect resize for the first

time, I recommend you open Preferences

and ensure that Bit depth is set to 16 bit

and that resolution is set to 300 pixels/

inch (see Figure 28). the reason I call this

out is because when perfect resize 7.5

first came out, it defaulted to 8 bit, which

is going to crush fine gradations in your

photos and should be avoided whenever

possible. although most printers will print

at 600ppi or higher, I usually only enlarge

to 300ppi. the difference in printing with

higher resolution is unnoticeable with the

naked eye, so the additional files size and

processing time isn’t really worth it.

If you are going to print without

borders, to enlarge your image

to a given size, just select a

size from one of the perfect

resize presets or type in your

required size into the Width and

height fields (see Figure 29).

I generally print with borders

around my images, so I enter

the exact size that I need the

image to be in the image cell in

lightroom. For example, for a

24 x 36” print, I need to

figure 28

figure 29

enlarge to 20.8 x 31.2 inches to accommodate

my chosen border sizes. I explain how I

calculate these border sizes in my craft &

vision eBook, Making the Print. I also have

a spreadsheet that calculates the size of the

borders and image cells that you can download

from my blog.

I leave most of the options in the Settings

panel at their defaults and use genuine

Fractals as the Method; this seems to give

more pleasing results. I often just leave the

Image type at general purpose, but if you are

printing a portrait, the portrait preset might

work better. since all of the presets are simply

slider adjustments, it’s a good idea to zoom in

to a part of the image at 100 percent and make

a few adjustments to see how it affects the

image (see Figure 30).

If I’m preparing to print on a gloss

paper, I usually leave the type set to

Unsharp Mask in the Sharpening panel. Matte

paper usually requires more sharpening than

gloss, but I jump between Unsharp Mask and

Progressive. progressive gives nearly over-

sharpened results, but that’s usually what

you need for matte paper. If I’m printing for a

gallery wrap and don’t want to do any further

sharpening before I print, by default I use

progressive as I think it looks better on

a highly-textured canvas surface.

figure 30

sharp shooter : 34

note that at the time of writing

Making the Print, I used nik

software’s sharpener pro before

printing large prints. With perfect

resize 7.5, I’m finding that including

progressive sharpening as part of

the blow-up process is usually as

aggressive as I need to go.

When I’ve sharpened the image

when increasing resolution (even if I

print from lightroom), I usually turn

lightroom sharpening off until I’ve

printed a small part of the image as a

test. If necessary, I turn it back on,

but usually the external sharpening

I’ve done is enough.

as seen in the Pixel Dimensions panel,

this image will be almost doubled

from an uncropped 18 megapixel file—

enlarged by 183 percent—for printing

at 24 x 36” with a border. I’ve also

printed 10 megapixel photos cropped

down to a 1:2 panorama as large

as 24 x 48” and they still look great

after enlarging for print using onone

software’s perfect resize.

sharp shooter : 35

We’ve worked through why our camera and lens decisions make our photographs

sharp—or not—and how to control depth of field for creative effect. We’ve looked at

techniques for focusing on tricky subjects, and holding or supporting our cameras for

sharp images. our cameras are getting better with every generation, but even with the

latest and greatest camera body, you won’t nail focus on every shot. It’s always going

to be challenging; that’s why it’s so satisfying when we come home with an image so

sharp that it makes the hair on the back of your head stand up!

don’t be afraid to pixel peep. anti-peepers are often just defending their decision to

live with soft shots or not spend the time necessary to check. I’m not saying that you

should throw out everything that isn’t totally sharp, but with sharp-shooting techniques

you can be better. shoot with quality in mind, and use the post-processing techniques

discussed here when you got close, but no cigar. there are also times when we live

with the soft image despite hoping we’d done better. It’s an individual decision and

that’s fine, but don’t just sweep it aside as pixel peeping, or give yourself permission

to be mediocre and to stop trying to improve your craft.

enjoy your photography, and be the best that you can.

Martin Bailey

tokyo, 2013

conclusion

W links

camera supports

really right stuff: www.reallyrightstuff.com

gitzo tripods: www.gitzo.com

Wimberley: www.tripodhead.com

software

nik software: www.niksoftware.com

onone software: www.ononesoftware.com

depth of fIeld calculators

My favourite doF calculator is in my iphone app: http://mbp.ac/app

there’s also a great online calculator here: http://mbp.ac/dof

Martin’s Web site

I also encourage you to visit my Blog and listen to my podcast, as

I share information weekly when I’m not traveling. see you there!

www.martinbaileyphotography.com

appendix

sharp shooter : 36

PhotograPhSubScribe to get 4 iSSueS for the price of 3, juSt $24

A QUARTERLY DIGITAL MAGAZINE FOR CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHERS

NEW FROM CRAFT &VISION

I SSUE 1 , FAL L 2012PHOTOGRAPHA QUARTERLY MAGAZ INE FOR CREAT IVE PHOTOGRAPHERS

ART WOLFE

BRUCE PERCY

NATE PARKER

MARTIN BAILEY

YOUNES BOUNHAR

JOHN PAUL CAPONIGRO

KEVIN CLARK

DAVID DUCHEMIN

ANDREW S. GIBSON

JAY GOODRICH

CHRIS ORWIG

AL SMITH

PIET VAN DEN EYNDE

NICOLE S. YOUNG

LeArN photogrAphY, Not pLAtituDeS.

The CRAFT&VISION library has over 45 titles to help you learn this craft, and make stronger photographs. All sold as downloadable PDF ebooks, and almost all of them for only $5. If you’ve grown tired of the nonsense, and just want to learn photography, there are some excel-lent voices out there worth listening to; we’ve got ebooks and pod-casts from photographers and teachers like David duChemin, Andrew S. Gibson, Piet van Den Eynde, and more, including PHOTOGRAPH, a quarterly digital magazine for creative photographers.

The Complete library, PHOTOGRAPH, the C&V Blog, and the latest podcast, can all be found at craftAndVision.com

“JUST USE F/8 AND BE THERE!

FOLLOW THE RULE OF THIRDS!

USE A WIDE LENS!

USE A LONG ONE!

GET MORE PLUG-INS!

BUY MORE GEAR!”

MAKE THE

LIKE A PRO!BEST PHOTOGRAPHS EVER!

SHOOT

craft&vision Pixelated Image Communications Inc.PO BOX 29115, 1535 West BroadwayVancouver, BC Canada V6J 5C2

Got a Question? Send an email to: support@craftandvision.com CraftAndVision.com

David duChemin, Publisher / Editor in Chief Corwin Hiebert, Production Manager Eileen Rothe, Production Coordinator Cynthia Haynes, Copy Editor Rhia Bachynski, DesignerDave Seeram, Affiliate Manager

Notice of RightsAll rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced

or transmitted in any form by any means without the prior

written permission of the publisher.