This may be the wrong forum but my veins bleed Dyna...

Anyway I have a 7MP point and shoot digital camera and my bike pictures blow. Below is my best ever ands it sorta stinks too.

I do many things well... photos are not one of them.

Any tips from the pros?

 

From some page I Googled.


Perhaps the most well know principle of photographic composition is the ‘Rule of Thirds‘.
It’s one of the first things that budding digital photographers learn about in classes on photography and rightly so as it is the basis for well balanced and interesting shots.
I will say right up front however that rules are meant to be broken and ignoring this one doesn’t mean your images are necessarily unbalanced or uninteresting. However a wise person once told me that if you intend to break a rule you should always learn it first to make sure your breaking of it is all the more effective!
What is the Rule of Thirds?
The basic principle behind the rule of thirds is to imagine breaking an image down into thirds (both horizontally and vertically) so that you have 9 parts. As follows.

As you’re taking an image you would have done this in your mind through your viewfinder or in the LCD display that you use to frame your shot.
With this grid in mind the ‘rule of thirds’ now identifies four important parts of the image that you should consider placing points of interest in as you frame your image.
Not only this - but it also gives you four ‘lines’ that are also useful positions for elements in your photo.

The theory is that if you place points of interest in the intersections or along the lines that your photo becomes more balanced and will enable a viewer of the image to interact with it more naturally. Studies have shown that when viewing images that people’s eyes usually go to one of the intersection points most naturally rather than the center of the shot - using the rule of thirds works with this natural way of viewing an image rather than working against it.
In addition to the above picture of the bee where the bee’s eye becomes the point of focus here are some of examples:

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In this image I’ve purposely placed the head of my subject on one of the intersecting points - especially his eyes which are a natural point of focus for a portrait. His tie and flower also take up a secondary point of interest.

In this shot I’ve placed the subject along a whole line which means she is considerably off center and therefore creating an additional point of interest. Placing her right in the center of the frame could have resulted in an ‘awkward’ shot.
In a similar way a good technique for landscape shots is to position horizons along one of the horizontal lines also as I’ve done with the following shot (I’ll let you imagine the lines).

Using the Rule of Thirds comes naturally to some photographers but for many of us takes a little time and practice for it to become second nature.
In learning how to use the rule of thirds (and then to break it) the most important questions to be asking of yourself are:
[ul][*]What are the points of interest in this shot?[*]Where am I intentionally placing them? [/ul]
Once again - remember that breaking the rule can result in some striking shots - so once you’ve learnt it experiment with purposely breaking it to see what you discover.
Lastly - keep the rule of thirds in mind as you edit your photos later on. Post production editing tools today have good tools for cropping and reframing images so that they fit within the rules. Experiment with some of your old shots to see what impact it might have on your photos.

 

Wow Jimmy... can I pay you for that lesson?

How bout making them crystal clear?

 

How about another shot of that chicks ****?

 

Yeah!

 

At this time you will never be able to match the quality of film. If I'm not mistaken, if you were to convert film to a megapixle format it would be about 21 megapixles in its resolution. Technology is about halfway there.

Lighting is another way of making your pics look more dramatic. From the looks of your sig, you missed the "Golden Hour" by a few minutes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_hour_(photography) You could have used your flash, but I don't think it wuold have hellped.

The most important tip I can give you is to learn your camera! Set up a still life, and start shooting. Just make sure you write down your settings for EACH shot, that way you know what you did. You may be able to bypass the wrightin step if your camera has Exif data.

Hope that helps too

 

Flash sucks for taking pix of your bike - especially if you still have the reflectors on it. This thread would be best over in the photoshopping forum. There they told me to just be careful about sunlight and things reflecting in the chrome. Oh yeh, and try to hold the camera still.

 

Framing and composition is everything. The rule of thirds is a good start, although, you will want to break it every once in a while. Natural, filtered light (hazy day, through a screen, etc.) helps even out the light for good, all around photo taking. Shade does wonders too as it will help bring out cool shadows. What you want to avoid is shooting in bright sunlight, especially if it is behind the object you are shooting.

The picture you posted has a bike that's not totally in the frame. You'll want to keep that in mind next time. The car bumpers are a big distraction since they kind of interupt the object we want to look at. With the dog, well...choose one or the other to focus our attention on. Right now he's blocking your bike.

I would move your bike where there is nothing in the background other than houses or distant obects. If you want to have your dog in the picture, perhaps have him lie down next to the side of the bike so we can focus on the star of your photo. He would then be set dressing. :-)

As far as clarity, just make sure you're focusing on the right subject, obviously, but also play around with the different focusing options your camera most likely has built in. You can get some great shots with a PnS camera, however, you will be amazed at the difference a digital SLR camera can make. Lenses, lenses, lenses. :-)

I view photography as an art form, so, I hate rules. However, there are some fundamentals I and others have touched on that you should always keep in mind.

 

I know almost nothing about photography. but someone told me many years ago, to have the background as blank as possible so that there is nothing else to look at except the bike (car, etc.)

I use abunch of new warehouses a few minutes from me that are light colored brick with matching doors and trim.

I alsouse the sunlight to make a "different" kind of look. Again, I know nothing, so I could be doing it all wrong.



That one is taken at the new warehouses.

And the other one is using the sunlight to get a special effect.

But then, I do HVAC work, not photography, for a living.

C66

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Good tips above, I will add that bikes looked a lot better in person in direct sunlight, but will not photo well in sunlight. I've found that if I park the bike in the shade with a lot of sunlight behind me, it reflects a nice golden glow into the bike. Also partial sunlight from an over cast or cloudy day usually looks good. Attached photo has that reflected light, kind of a golden glow. Also just take lots of photos if different lighting to see which ones you prefer.

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