Homeschool Diva

One of the things that will take your photos to the next level is how you choose to crop the image. At first you may want to do this after the fact in an editing program. It is a good way for you to train your eye to see things naturally. Pull up any old image and start cropping the heck out of it and see what you like. You may even develop a bit of a style that is all your own.

Here is the first shot. The lighting is nice The composition is okay, but you don’t really appreciate the main subject, the flower, because it is lost in all the clutter.

So get a little closer. Make the main thing the main thing. Open up your aperture a little bit to create that fuzzy background otherwise known as bokeh. (If you are using a point and shoot, trick you camera by shooting in landscape mode, and make sure you focus on the object in the foreground) This is getting better, but it is missing a little something.

Now, swing it around a little, crack that baby wide open. On a standard kit lens, you can get down to a F3.5 so go as low as you can go. Offset your main subject to one side. This will create even more bokeh. I always tend to gravitate towards landscape layout over a vertical layout. As time progresses you will train your eye. You will start seeing stuff like this all the time. Your eye will be drawn to all that yummy light, you will look at the ordinary just a little differently and viola….art for your home.

Now, Give me your best shot! Whatever you like and want to share, no theme this week. Leave a link to your image on your blog or flickr in the comments, and go visit the other links and leave a nice little piece of encouragement for all our artist friends!

Have Fun!