Know Your Camera

You cannot take a good photo if you do not know your camera and understand its various functions and features. The best way to do this is to read the manual thoroughly. As you read, have your camera on hand so that you can actually see the feature or function you are reading about and experiment with it. Your manual will contain tricks and tips for getting the very best out of your particular make and model. From the correct exposure in various conditions, to the use of lenses and the effects these will create. Familiarize yourself with all of the basic photography terms as this will be invaluable for further research.

Maintaining Camera Level
Whenever you click, whatever you click, one of the more basic photography techniques is to make sure that you hold the camera steady and level. One of the ways to gauge whether you have held the camera at the correct level is to look for the horizontal lines to use as a guide, for example the horizon. A pilot relies on his instrument panel to keep his plane flying level. When you are photographing a landscape, or seascape, a sunrise or sunset, the horizon is your ‘instrument panel’. If you can see it as a straight line across your viewfinder, or on your LCD screen, then you can be assured your resulting photograph will come out level and not tilted to one side.

The Rule of Thirds
The rule states that an image should be imagined as divided into nine equal parts by two equally-spaced horizontal lines and two equally-spaced vertical lines, and that important compositional elements should be placed along these lines or their intersections. Take a snap using this technique. If you can line up your subject as though your screen was divided into a Rule of Thirds Grid, then you will have a resulting shot that is well composed and centred.

My husband Pete, and I hail from sunny Queensland in Australia. We are keen photographers and have just launched an online store selling Waterproof Cameras. We are working together to co-author a series of articles about the wealth of knowledge we have accumulated by way of our years of research into cameras and the art of photography.

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