Photography is an art form and a way of documenting different events in your life. But that doesn’t mean that you also can’t have a little bit of fun while doing it. By learning to take yourself a little less seriously and by thinking outside the box just a bit, you can have a little fun with your camera and the end results of your photographs by using these four tips.
Make a Lamp into a Tripod
Are you in a room where you want to take a picture, but have forgotten your tripod? Is there a lamp nearby? If so, you can quickly turn the lamp into a tripod that will hold your camera steady while you shoot, helping to elevate it to the right height for the shot.
Just unscrew and lift off the lampshade. Now take a look at the place where the shade screws in. You may find that it’s a perfect fit for the base of your camera and you can now screw your camera to the lamp and get a quick and easy tripod in seconds.
Convert Day into Night
When you’re taking a photo in any setting, you often have a lot going on in the finished picture. There’s your subject, of course, but also the background to contend with. Well, what if you want to do away with the background and just focus on the subject itself? You can by turning up the power on your flash as high as it will go. Now change the settings on your camera to expose the subject, which will be super bright due to the flash. Now the background will become dark as if you’re shooting at night and your subject will be the primary focus in the pic.
Delete People from a Scene
Have you ever been frustrated because you’re trying to take a picture of a monument or amazing view, but you can getting people in the shot? You can remove them in just two easy steps using Photoshop. First, take multiple shots of the scene all within about 10 to 12 seconds. Make sure the people are moving, not sitting and enjoying a café. Next, upload the photos to Photoshop and go to File > Scripts > Statistics > Median. Select the files you took, and all the people will disappear. This is because the program will look for anything that remains the same between the photos. Because the people are moving, the software will fill in the spots where they are with content from another photo.
Shape Your Bokeh
You’ve likely seen bokeh – those bright lights that seem to float in the background of your photos. But did you know you can shape it to look like hearts, starts, or anything else you’d like? Just cut out a piece of black paper the size of your lens. Now cut out a shape from the center of the paper and tape it over the front element.
Remember to shoot with a large aperture to get the effect, and have a little fun with your art!