How to take Landscape Photographs

OK, so you may have seen professional photographs of things like the Grand Canyon, a beach, or of a storm brewing, or mountain scenes. However, you try to take a photograph of mountains, a beach, or some other land, and you just can't seem to produce the same effects. I will teach you how to produce professional-looking landscape photographs using the Olympus SP-820UZ camera. I will start off with the Grand Canyon, located in the United States in Arizona.

So, to get the picture shown below, which if you visit the Grand Canyon, you should find the place where practically all the tourists on the South rim are., which is the first place you'll find. You will find these two trees somewhere on the right side. You will want to set the dial on the top of the camera to "Magic." Then, press the left and right arrow buttons on the back of the camera to go to the preset #12, known as "Dramatic." Press "OK." Then, press the up arrow until you get to where the grid shows. Bring the horizon level with the upper horizontal line on the grid. If I am correct, the trees near the bottom will be close to the two vertical lines. Using this grid, which separates the picture into thirds, is using a common professional photography rule known as "The Rule of Thirds." In this composition technique, you set the horizon either on or near the bottom third or top third of the picture.

An example of the grid made by the Rule of Thirds is shown here:

In some cases, you may need to ignore that portion of the rule of thirds and put the horizon in the middle of the image. Here's an example:

To capture this image, which was taken at San Clemente Beach, California,you will want to set the dial to "SCN," or scene mode. From there, use the left and right buttons to go to "Beach and Snow." You will want to still use the rule of thirds in this photo, but in a different way. This time, you will want to center the picnic table in the bottom left third. This will make the horizon be at the middle of the image, if you use the correct zoom.

So, using these simple settings, and by setting the metering to "ESP," you should come up with these great results. Remember, to get the highest-quality images, set the JPEG compression to High (see previous post) and always shoot with the maximum resolution available in the mode being used. Now I hope you get great results! :D

How To Photograph Bees on a Flower

Okay, so you want to photograph bees on flowers, but you don't know how to do it? Are you afraid you'll have to get close to them and risk being stung? Don't worry, if you're afraid of bees, you don't need to get up close to actually take a picture of them. I will walk you through the steps. (Hmm... where to start off, though, is the question.)

In this post, I will be describing how to do it with the Olympus SP-820UZ, which is my main camera. It has an optical zoom of up to 40 times, a Super-res zoom (Olympus version of a digital zoom that does not decrease picture quality) of 2 times, and a digital zoom of 2 times. This gives a total zoom of 160 times.

First off, you will want to put the camera in Program mode, symbolized on the camera dial by a "P." You may also want to set the JPEG compression ratio in the Menu at High. This ensures it will produce all the colors it can with a high-quality image. Next, set the metering mode to Spot in the menu, and also, since you will be outside in the sun, set the screen brightness all the way up. Make sure "Rec. Image" is on, and then exit the menu. It's been a while since I've photographed bees on flowers, so I cannot remember if I had the Macro on. If I had to guess, I'd say yes. Only put it on Macro, since Super Macro will not let you zoom in.

Next, set the ISO to "Auto," and exposure to 0.0. Feel free to adjust the exposure when you need to, especially with bright flowers (test on a flower with no bee), but make sure the color still comes through, otherwise, you have it too high. If the dirt in the image is either brown or much darker than what you see with your own eyes(depending on the type of soil), put the exposure higher. You typically want to have the image look somewhat between what you see with your own eyes and what would be too dark. An example of a underexposed image is shown below:

Underexposed image.

An overexposed image is also shown below.

Over-exposed image, notice flower at bottom left.

By the way, with the camera, you can be 5 or 10 feet back and still get a good image. Sometimes, though, you may want to use a standard photographic tripod to ensure that you get a steady image.

You will need to know how to point the camera in the right position, and this may take several tries. You will also need to be quick at photographing them, as bees can do do their business very fast.

Hopefully this should give you a good start, so go out there and practice when you can!

Properly exposed image

My First Post! (About Me, Family)

This is my first post! I will tell you a little bit of who I am and my family. My name is Robert Lucas, and I live a busy and stressful life as a new college student. I have a niece, Faith, born on Independence Day in 2012, and a younger nephew, Anthony Jr. I have only one sibling, which is a sister that is 11 years older than me. My mom is a former Tupperware consultant, which is where I get my blog's URL (internet address) as sonofatupperwareconsultant. My dad works for BNSF Railroad in the Barstow, CA. yard. He has worked there for over 25 years, and has never been laid off from there. Anyways, I like to undo the stress in me at times by doing photography, or by looking through a telescope at night. I enjoy both of these greatly, and in this blog you might even find tips of how to photograph different things.

I have a YouTube channel, and here is a link to it:
 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChGiUv38bwR3TnB9y_59fnA

I even have Twitter! Follow me at:
@RobertWilliamL5

So, enjoy your viewing of my blog!