The summer months is usually a time when traveling and vacationing peak. There are dozens of places to visit and even more places to take interesting pictures. Because of the time of the year, some of the most visited places are parks. Outside attractions featuring water like Niagara Falls or on the other extreme, the Grand Canyon make for beautiful picture taking. But if you are strapped for cash, cannot go traveling for great pictures and are looking for more common attractions to photograph, let us consider things that you will probably see in your city for free.

There are more thunderstorms during the summer which can result in the most interesting pictures. After the storm is gone, if we are lucky enough to get a rainbow, the sky is filled with mixtures of all colors from the spectrum. Sounds picture perfect, right? Have you ever been outside and thought that it looked like something right from a postcard?

To take good pictures of the sun and/or moon, first make sure you have a full view of the object in the camera and try to take it from a high angle if you can. If it is too bright, the sun/moon does not have to be right in the middle. Shooting off center can make really nice silhouettes of the surrounding objects in the picture and give more attention to other things in the photograph. Be creative, a picture of it reflecting off of water or something similar would be nice.

The question always begs it’s self. When is the right time to buy a camera? Honestly, there is no right time. The investment of a camera can be years of use and abuse. SLR cameras can last lifetimes; there are families that pass down their cameras. Digitals now last longer, as the technology slows down.

The first thing you need to figure out is, how much you truly use a camera. Most people want what is top of the line. I, as a male, entirely understand that. However, if I had the camera that I want, I’d be a much poorer man. Be a realist, if you’re not Dave LaChapelle. Don’t buy stuff you don’t need. If you’re not a traveler, don’t buy a lot of travel gear. Shop for the use, not for the want. We’d all be professional photographers if you could, but your college daughter doesn’t need a digital camera that could get pictures published in TIME, and you may want a camera that actually takes good enough pictures that you want a dark room.

Do not buy on brand name, or the first camera you see. A lot of camera shops will actually let you hold and look at the camera. Some cameras are awfully cute, and awfully crappy. It’s about how it works, not how it looks. Best buy actually has models you can test. Don’t be afraid to go both places. Do everything you can to get your hands on a model that you want to purchase, before you buy. These aren’t small investments, and an extra day of research goes a long way trust me.

Finally, I cannot stress this enough. Once you know what you want. Price search the Internet. You’d be appalled at the sales on the Internet, and how you can save up to $100 some places on the camera you want. Best buy has a site for business; Circuit city sends emails out to members about their sales. Get inside the loop; Yahoo has member boards about cameras, ask the people. The Internet is a powerful sales tool. Most companies’ price match too, don’t be afraid to ask a manager to match a price, if you like a store better.

Take your time, be a diligent researcher. Come to this site and send emails to the site. We’ll post a few questions and answers!

SD Memory, JPEG files, Mirrors, ISO… All these terms can be so encumbering. I’m here to make all this easier for you. Today, My lesson is on Mega-Pixels. Now I know what your thinking, and I’m not going to get super technical. I want this to be easy, so next time you go shopping you’re a little more educated, and can’t get lied to at the store.

A mega-pixel is 1 million pixels. Pixels are the dots that make up an image. Most 640 x 480 monitors are .3 mega-pixels. The average computer is 800 x 600, or 1024 x 768. Shocking to think most cameras have up to 10 mega-pixels. Now on those lines, the higher quality you get, the bigger image you can make. 5.2 mega-pixels can take a picture of 2560 x 2048, which is rather large.

Consider this when purchasing a digital. If you don’t need that many mega-pixels, DON’T BUY THEM. I know, all the guys just groaned because power is excellent. While I agree, you can really get into the thousands with just mega-pixels alone. If you’re not a super photographer, consider 3 mega-pixels.

Also, remember to ask about the image sensors. They control the blurriness of the pixels. They are meant to make the picture blur a bit, and make it flow a little more. That’s not always a good thing. You want the camera to be as close to natural light as possible.

Hopefully this was easy and education. Until next time!

This New Year bash I promised myself that I’ll take good fireworks shots and managed decent ones by doing the following….

I set up the camera well in advance by getting there early with my tripod got some solid ground and parked myself ready for the show. The tripod is a must and it really helped me stay steady.

The shutter speed on your camera makes a huge difference to the kind of photos you take of fireworks if you have 1 to 4 seconds exposure in your camera and you are sure to capture the great effects of the blooming firework.

The other great tip is to keep your flash off and this gives the best result and if you cannot turn the flash off don’t hesitate to tape the flash screen shut! Finally remember to stay away from crowded areas or you will end up clicking the heads of other photographers.

Taking good pictures of your kids can be a challenge but everyone wants their kid’s pictures… So how can you get great pictures of kids? Let’s look at what you need to do for perfect kids pictures.

1. One of the first things to do is to get down to child’s eye level and this one tip will give you great results and you can get great shots.
2. The main problem with kids and photography is that they are never still so by the time you set up the camera they have already skipped on to another scene. So you need to be super fast. So click away 20-30 shots in whatever activity they are in and you are likely to get a couple of winners!
3. I would recommend to never asking children to pose just click away and you will get happy pictures of your kids and not end up irritating your child and yourself.

Also remember to have fun with them while shooting!

Shopping for a digital camera can be confusing for a first-timer, so here are 5 basic points to remember…

1. The pixel rule: If e-mailing pictures is your goal a digicam with 5 or 6 mega pixel will be sufficient. However, if you want to make large prints or use the pictures for publishing or printing you will need a higher resolution camera.
2. Memory cards: If you plan on clicking hundreds of pictures on holidays that’s when a memory card will make life smooth. Its money well spent and you can enjoy shooting without worrying about downloading to a computer.
3. Macro Focus feature: This you will need for great close-ups of nature like a great flower shot for example.
4. Lense: Costlier lenses come with coated multilevel glass while cheaper lenses are made from plastic and it’s always better to get a camera with a good lens and finally
5. LCD screens: Now here you can go by the price really and enjoy hassle-free spot-deletion and re-shots.

The line goes that the more you spend the better your photographs will be. ED lenses from Nikon, L grade lenses from Canon; B+W filters, Carl Zeiss glass, pro-level bodies, Leica and the list goes on. Canon and co. would certainly like to keep this line going of course. The popular response to this is that it is total bunk and your gear doesn’t matter.

Both camps make for great headlines and are easy to subscribe to but the reality is, as always, a bit more complicated than 0 and 1, true and false, black and white.

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Jesse Crouch has put together a fantastic article on what he calls “small budget photography.” If you only have a limited amount of money to spend on equipment and want to get the most out of your software, Jesse is here to help you out.

He focuses the article on four primary places where you can make your money go further: Cameras, Photoshop, Lighting, and Location. While Jesse’s section on Photoshop is pretty slim, he goes into great detail on the other three. For instance, instead of paying a big wad of cash for some professional lighting equipment, Jesse bought himself a worklight. Very clever!

To see how Jesse puts into practice what he preaches, check out his gallery and examples of how his images look before he post-processes them. Personally, I’m not a huge fan of such extensive post-processing in Photoshop, but the technique definitely has its fans. Whether I like his end results or not, I think Jesse has provided an excellent article on how you can get some fantastic photographic results without having to spend a whole bunch of money.

I know this is not a normal post, but it definitely has to do with photography. I work for Eastern Illinois University and teach photography as an adjunct professor (think low man on the totem pole). There are two other sections of photography being taught here, one by the assistant chair of the department and one by the senior faculty member on campus (teaching for 60 years). So what do you do if the assistant chair wants to adjust the class (which I thought was moving to completely digital) to this:

INT 3123 Foundations of Photography (3-ARR-3) F,S, Course emphasizes basic aesthetics of photography and a historical and critical context for evaluating photographs. Course provides technical skills related to the use of SLR film or digital cameras including depth of field and shutter speed control. Course is designed to show you how to use your computer to capture, edit, manipulate and produce top quality images for all media including photographic prints, web and printing purposes. Topics include study and practice of lighting ratios, and exposure determination in various situations. Students may be required to use some outside commercial lab services. Students must furnish acceptable adjustable 35mm camera or have access to film and digital cameras available through the Gregg Computer Lab at Eastern Illinois University

What happened to forward thinking? Why are we going to use a “historical” context for evaluating photography? Does anyone else have problems with this course description?

Another question posed by the assistant chair - “I am also contemplating offering the course on the internet. Would either of you be interested in teaching an internet version?” What’s your take on this?

I just wanted to mention a couple of things about terminology that I have used and plan on using (unless it really messes with a lot of people, then I’ll change it.) Here’s a few things that may need clearing up:

• Prosumer - any serious photographer who is not a professional photographer, but still prefers middle- to high-end photographic equipment.
• Lens conversion factor - Since the imaging sensor in a digital camera is not the same size as a piece of 35mm film, the images saved by the sensor tend to have a magnified effect. If you check the post about the new Olympus lens, you’ll notice Olympus rated the lens at 35mm, but in actual use, will produce images as if taken by a 70mm lens. This effect can be good or bad, depending on the look you are going for during your shoot. If you need to get a wide-angle shot with a digital camera, good luck. Most of your cameras will not have a 1:1 conversion ratio.
• DSLR - digital single lens reflex camera

As always, if you should have any questions, please let me know.