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Three Reasons to Avoid Relying on the Crop Tool

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Photo by Steve Berardi
Photo by Steve Berardi
In this age of digital photo editing, it’s tempting to get lazy when you’re taking a photo out in the field and just say to yourself, “well, if I don’t like how I framed this, I could always crop it later.” But, there are a few disadvantages to relying on that crop tool too much: [Read more…] about Three Reasons to Avoid Relying on the Crop Tool

How Perspective Affects Your Photos

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Ansel Adams once said, “A good photograph is knowing where to stand.” But, before you know where to stand, it’s important to understand a few concepts about perspective.

I’ve written about perspective here on PhotoNaturalist a few times, but I’ve also written a couple posts about it over at the Digital Photography School (a great blog that covers all types of photography). And, one of those posts was just published today, so I thought it’d be good to put a list together of all the posts I’ve written about perspective: [Read more…] about How Perspective Affects Your Photos

What To Do When You Need Inspiration

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Photo by Steve Berardi
A few weeks ago, I wrote a post about how to tell if you’re in a slump. I made the argument that you’re most likely not in a slump at all–that perhaps you’re just learning and being more picky about your compositions (which is a very good thing).

But, what do you do when you really are in an artistic slump?

Maybe it’s been months since you shot a photo you’re proud of, or maybe you feel like you’re losing interest in photography. What do you do then?

Well, there’s one thing that has never failed for me: [Read more…] about What To Do When You Need Inspiration

Are You In An Artistic Slump or Just Learning?

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Photo by Martin Taylor (used under the CC-Attr license)
When you first got your camera, I’ll bet you took a photo of just about everything. I know I did. When I got my first SLR, I could barely walk ten feet on a trail without stopping to photograph something. I probably photographed every flower or insect I saw.

But, then that pace starts to slow down after you have your camera for awhile. In the beginning, maybe you’d come home with over 400 photos on your memory card, but then after a few months it turned into 200, and after a year it might even get as low as 50 per day.

What happened? At first you might think you’re losing interest in photography, or maybe you’re in some kind of artistic slump (just like baseball players who sometimes go 40 at-bats without a basehit). [Read more…] about Are You In An Artistic Slump or Just Learning?

The Secret Ingredient to Good Nature Photos

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Do you ever wish you could add something to your nature photos that would just magically make them all super awesome and fantastic?

Well, guess what? You can!

That secret ingredient is patience. [Read more…] about The Secret Ingredient to Good Nature Photos

Why You Should Keep All Your Photos

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Providence Mountains
Photo by Steve Berardi
When you get back home with your camera after a long day outside, do you rush to your computer and inspect your photos immediately?

I think that’s a healthy obsession, because it simply means you’re passionate about your results and dying to find out if you captured that sight just the way you saw it with your own eyes.

However, this rush to review your photos will often cause you to overlook some of your greatest shots. That’s why it’s important to keep all your photos and look at them again–a few weeks, or even months after you first took them. [Read more…] about Why You Should Keep All Your Photos