Photo Dodo

How To Convert Color Photographs to Black and White Photographs

// March 2nd, 2009 // No Comments » // Photoshop, book, books, digital camera, digital darkroom, digital photography, photo, photo lab, photograph, photographs, photography, photohack

There is just something about black and white photographs that is just incredible. An unsophisticated color snapshot can look like a professionally-composed photograph if converted properly to the B&W format.

Additionally, you can “salvage” some really grainy color photographs by making them B&W.

There are quite a few ways to take a color photograph and make it black and white. The Digital Photography School describes several ways, all of which work. Scott Kelby also offers some killer ways to convert color to black and white in his outstanding book series, Photoshop Elements.

How to Convert Color Digital Images into Black and White Ones

Creating a page curl effect for your photos

// December 19th, 2006 // No Comments » // digital photography, photo hack, photograph, scrapbook

The link below will show you how to create a page curl effect on your photographs. Not really photography, yes, but it’s fun and can make your scrapbooking look more realistic.

This month’s project: Fall

// October 10th, 2006 // No Comments » // hacks, landscape, photo, photo hack, photograph, photography, photohack, scenery

Fall is here, so it’s time to take some great pictures of the changing colors, falling leaves, clear blue skies, etc. October is my favorite month of the year: There’s usually not much rain, the skies have wonderful blues and clouds, there’s a slight chill in the air, and the leaves are turning on the trees.

Shooting the (Harvest) Moon

// October 7th, 2006 // No Comments » // hacks, moon, photo, photo hack, photograph, photography, tips, tricks

Harvest moon,
originally uploaded by billspaced.

Taking photographs of the moon can be challenging, if you don’t know how. However, once you know how, it’s super-easy. You’ll get great results if you follow these simple rules:

1. Set your camera to full Manual mode
2. Set your shutter to 1/250
3. Set your aperature to f/11
4. Shoot on a tripod
5. Use a shutter release or your timer to minimize shake
6. Zoom in as close as you can get (a 200mm to 300mm telephoto lens works well)
7. Set ISO to lowest possible value (generally, ISO 100 or on some cameras ISO 50)

That’s about it. Your image most likely will need some touch up in Photoshop, but it shouldn’t require a lot of modification. If it does, shoot again!

Tonight offers a prime opportunity to photograph the moon

// October 6th, 2006 // No Comments » // landscape, moon, photo, photo hack, photograph, photography, photohack, scenery, tips, tricks

The moon is set to appear about 12% bigger tonight, due to it being closer to the earth tonight. Even sweeter is the fact that it’s a full moon.

So set up your tripod and start shooting. Recommended: Tripod!, remote shutter release or use the camera’s builtin self-timer. Set your camera to Manual mode and set the f-stop to f/11 and the shutter to 1/250. This should keep everything in focus and give you a good exposure. Of course, try other settings — experimentation is the essence of the art.