Histo-what?

The use of the histogram is certainly not unique to photography–it’s used widely in the field of statistics. In the most general terms, a histogram is a graph of bars, with the bars representing various frequencies of a piece of data. In photography terms, those “bars” represent how many pixels (in other words, how much of your image) are at various levels between full black and full white. Full black is on the left, full white is on the right. In other words, the histogram tells you how much of your image is exposed on the dark side, how much of it is exposed on the light side. More bars on the left means a darker image, more bars on the right means a lighter image.

When you take an image with your SLR camera (if you need a reminder on what an SLR camera is, read this post), take a look at the LCD screen on the back: it should show a black and white mountain-y (yes, that’s the technical term) looking graph somewhere on the screen. If not, scroll through your viewing options and you should come across it eventually. If you still can’t find it, drop me an email, I’ll help you through it. You will also see the histogram if you edit in Lightroom or Photoshop, too.

Let’s get practical: an example

Let’s take a look at an example of an image I took at a recent wedding to see the correlation between the histogram and the actual image. I’ve circled the area on the histogram that corresponds with the area on the image itself. The darkest part of the image (the womens’ hair and their dresses) are shown on the histogram as the large peak on the left. The brightest spot in the image, the burning birthday candles, shows up as a very tall peak on the very right hand side of the image. In this case, the highlights (the candles) have been blown out, meaning we’ve lost all detail in that area; that’s why you see the peak extend up rapidly at the end and not come down before the end of the graph. There’s also slight clipping of the black areas, meaning some detail has been lost in the darkest part of the image. Some photographers will say that’s a cardinal sin–me, I don’t mind a little clipping if it makes a more contrasty, dynamic image. Anyhoo, take a look:

Yes, it’s enough to simply look at the photo to gauge your exposure, but I can’t tell you how many times I’ve looked at that little LCD screen on the back of my camera, the exposure looked fine, and then I get the image onto my computer screen and realize that important parts of the image have blown highlights or shadows. No, you don’t need to live and die by your histogram results…but I like to think of it as another tool in my tool belt that will help me get the perfect image, for when it really counts. As Ken Rockwell says, “Use them as guides, not Gods.”
Happy shooting from Vantage!

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For that lucky 300th fan, if they live in or around San Diego, I’ll provide them with a FREE portrait session. I know all of YOU faithful readers are fans already….of course!….but make sure to tell your friends to get in on the action–they could win a free portrait session!

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We started with the Rule of Thirds…and the Tuesday Tidbit was born. We talked about looking your best in photos, when giant photos ATTACK!, point and shoots vs SLRs, and the color wheel. We waxed philosophical on the power of empty space, amputated our subjects appropriately, and discussed the finer points of posing large groups. Man, we’ve had some good times.

A lot of you have been following this blog for awhile and are probably pretty darn skilled with your point and shoot camera. But lots of you have those new dangfangled fancy schmancy SLR cameras now and could use some help making those cameras do what they’re meant to do (which is go beyond a glorified point and shoot camera).

So this year is about depth. We’ll delve more into ISO, aperture, shutter speed, and shooting in (drum roll please) manual mode. We’ll talk about light and using your flash. We’ll talk about choosing lenses and changing lenses. I’ll do my darn tootin’ best to help you understand your camera and photography better, and I bet I’ll learn some things along the way too.

If you want to get a head start on your classmates, here’s some homework for you: some links from last year on ISO, aperture and shutter speed, and depth of field.

I’m excited for the next year! And, as always, if there are particular things you want to read about, you can comment directly on the blog and let me know or shoot me an email at info@weddingsbyvantage.com.

Happy shooting from Vantage!

Related posts:

1. Tuesday Tidbit: Understanding Aperture and Shutter Speed
2. Tuesday Tidbit: Depth of Field
3. Tuesday Tidbit: Point-and-shoot and SLR cameras. Say what??

If Dear Abby and your therapist just aren’t cutting it this Valentine’s Day, you can tweet at the world’s longest-married (living) couple, Herbert and Zelmyra Fisher, for the scoop on how to score and sustain love.

That’s right, while some of the older set just can’t wrap their heads around Twitter () (unless it’s connected to a fax machine), the Fishers will be all up on the microblogging site this V-Day, dispensing pearls of wisdom to the younger set (for whom the sanctity of marriage has already been destroyed by Facebook). The whole project was dreamed up by blinkbox, which is an on-demand movie and TV website in the UK.

Herbert and Zelmyra — who were married in 1924 and are 104 and 102 years old respectively — are inviting us romantically bankrupt miscreants to visit their Twitter page, @longestmarried, from today until February 12. Simply tweet your question to the pair, who will select 14 questions that they will then answer on February 14.

The couple, who enjoy hanging on their front porch, watching trains pass by, counting cars and talking to their neighbors, are apparently the model of wedded bliss. They each have their own bedroom — so Herbert can stay up late watching baseball. Well, I guess distance does makes the heart grow fonder.

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http://content.photojojo.com/websites/kaleidocycle-photo-origami/

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And check out their other fantab designs at www.whatisblik.com. No, I don’t work for them. I just love me some Blik wall decals! Yippee!

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ANYway, today’s tidbit is short and to the point: people like to see things that utilize odd numbers. Visually, you can use this in a few ways: first, with the rule of thirds; second, by utilizing triangles when posing people; and third (don’t you love that there are THREE reasons to use odd numbers? I do.), by including an odd number of subjects in your image (three people instead of two, three columns instead of two, etc).

The most interesting explanation I’ve heard for this is that our brains naturally want to pair up similar objects and if you have an odd number of those objects, the brain can’t pair anything up; therefore our eyes keep moving around the composition, from one object to the next, in the attempt to find the pairs. Ultimately, it’s this eye movement that you’re after because it keeps the composition dynamic and engaging for the viewer.

Whether or not that explanation holds water in the scientific community….meh, doesn’t matter to me. All I know is I like me some photos that have odd elements in them…

Happy shooting from Vantage!

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Original post can be found here.

PHOTOGRAPHY
By Cody Ellerd

Photography by Cody Ellerd (left-hand photos) and John & Joseph Photography (right-hand photos)

I consider myself a pretty good amateur photographer. I’ve taken a couple of classes, I have a nice Nikon D60 and, as a professional travel writer, I’ve even had a few of my shots make magazine covers and pages. If you didn’t budget for a professional photographer at your wedding, I’m the friend you might call to take pictures.

So when Seattle Bride sent me to the late-winter wedding of Vicky Wu and Chris Nicoll to shoot alongside Joey Hong of John & Joseph Photography, a local award-winning team of two brothers who have been shooting commercial, fashion and wedding photography for more than eight years, I was curious to see how well I could keep up with a seasoned pro.

From the moment we started shooting in the bride and groom’s room at Hotel 1000, I was floored. “Vicky, look down at your shoulders…put a gentle smile on your lips. Chris, look straight at my lens—no, smile. Relax your forehead.” Joey’s attention to such minute detail went way beyond “Say cheese” and brought out the couple’s absolute best. He knew how to manipulate the room’s light and reflective surfaces in ways I never would have dreamed of, transforming what I thought was an unremarkable setting into a photo studio with endless possibilities.

Joey commanded family portraits with a gentle control and confidence that only comes from years of experience. He had the right flashes and steadiness of hand for getting great dance photos, while I snapped shot after blurry shot in a mild panic that my precious memory space was quickly dwindling. I was giving it my best, and in a few instances it showed: an inside shot of Vicky simply glowing in the window’s natural light; a close-up kiss in the sunlight where the couple wore the sweetest smiles. But when those spontaneous moments that are here and gone in the blink of an eye happened, Joey caught them with lightning speed, while I lost many of them to improper focus or exposure.

I now disagree more than ever with the digital-age adage that “now everyone is a photographer.” Tens of thousands of dollars in education, equipment and experience separate me from the pros. Professional photographers, like any other artists or business owners, need to spend money to make money. When you hire them, you’re helping them pay for their investments.

“Photography is a very equipment-intensive business, and the equipment is expensive,” says Scott Squire of NonFiction Weddings, a Seattle-based photography team with 10 years of experience. To each wedding, he and his partner bring six or seven top-drawer lenses, a handful of strobes, three camera bodies, one backup and innumerable accessories. (In contrast, if my equipment had failed, my backup would have been my camera phone.)

Staying on top of new technology in the digital age is its own challenge, one that takes a professional commitment and expense. “The rate of change [in digital media] can be stupefying,” laughs longtime Seattle-based wedding photographer Sharlane Chase. She keeps up with the flow of information at annual weeklong workshops and seminars, and it shows in her final product.

On a side note, like all of you reading this magazine, I also happen to be planning my own wedding. My fiancé and I are on a tight budget and had planned to take a gamble and hire an amateur photographer friend. Now? We’re determined to find a way to get a pro.

Vicky and Chris would have been pretty disappointed if I had been their only photographer. If anyone ever does ask me to take pictures at their wedding, I’ll be happy to show up with my Nikon, and I may even take the best disposable-camera shots of the whole night. I just hope someone like Joey is there, too.

“This was such a cute moment, totally unscripted,” Ellerd remembers. “They bumped fists and it was clear it was a little habit of theirs, one that conveyed their friendship. Joey was right there to catch it while I was fumbling with my focus ring.”

“This image is so painfully inferior,” says our rogue photographer Cody Ellerd about her image. “My angle is bland while Joey’s is creative. His is crisp and perfectly exposed, while mine is washed out and grainy. Joey knew exactly how to take advantage of the sense of motion created by this cool backdrop at Hotel 1000.”

“The couple was getting a little photo fatigued,” Ellerd says, “but Joey turned it into a beautiful and intimate shot. I thought there was enough light, but without using a flash and spoiling the cool light bouncing off the building behind them, I couldn’t get my hand quite steady enough.”

For this “exit shot,”  the clarity and color of Joey’s shot versus Ellerd’s is evident. “Notice the white car in front of Chris and Vicky,” Ellerd says. “Joey magically made it disappear—I’m not even gonna try.”

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