Improving photographs

[snake]

Hi all,

I have recently bought myself a new camera. A Fuji finepix S100FS. This is my first camera and I am quite pleased with it so far. I have been getting some fairly acceptable pictures but I was wondering what is the best way to improve them on the computer?

Is there anybody out there who can give me some tips on the way it is done please. ie best photo package and anything else that you can think of that might be of use.

I know that the quality will never be as good as a dslr but there must be a way of improving the pictures. Here is one I took this afternoon without any alterations.

[Chas]

I literally spent no more than a minute in photoshop just to sharpen it a bit, it was a nice shot to start with and now it is a tiny bit improved but it gives you an idea of what is poss.

[Geoff F]

With a little bit of care you can do some good work with the better quality 'point & shoot' cameras. I first went digital with a secondhand Canon Powershot G2. But be warned, when the nature photography bug bites you, it tends to get expensive later on.

Just experiment with camera settings. Try different shutter speeds and aperture settings until you get the hang of things. Nature photography is a bit more involved than snaps of friends, etc but it is basically the same. You need sufficient shutter speed to hold the camera steady and enough aperture to give sufficient depth to the subject. If you start to get serious think about a basic tripod.

For editing software. There are quite a few alternatives; Photoshop Elements is a popular starter, but I prefer Serif Photo Plus. But there are many other good choices ranging from freebies to around £50. You can easily spend around £1000 for top of the range software.

Basic starter editing consists of cropping closer to the subject and resizing; improving brightness and contrast; sharpening the image. There are many free internet photo tutorials to try, which will guide you from starter to advanced level. I particularly recommend The Luminous Landscape and Cambridge in Colour - Digital Photography Tutorials & Gallery but just look around to see what suits you. And then, come back here to ask more questions.

[snake]

Thanks guys for the information.
The tutorials look interesting, I will spend some time studying and hopefully understanding them.
The hardest part seems to be getting close enough to the subject, then having it sit still long enough to get the picture. If I can get this right and work out the way to do it on the computer, then maybe I will have something worth putting in the Gallery.

[Hobjob]

Originally Posted by Geoff F

You need sufficient shutter speed to hold the camera steady and enough

Sound advice from Geoff, but I would also add that for some subjects you need fast speeds to minimize movement - Birds and flowers in all but the calmest of conditons.

And yes, the bug gets expensive

[zan]

For image editting, you can download 'Gimp 2.0' for free. It's an open source image editor and is really good for what you pay for it

To edit your images, it's probably easiest to start with just the basic modifications. Adjusting levels (setting black and white), brightness and contrast, colour saturation (if you want) and learning to apply a bit of sharpening is a good way to start. Since you're using a P&S camera, you'll probably find the camera does most of the work, and you need to do relatively little in terms of adjustment, but it's good fun to play about.

You can also use these programs to crop your images, which allows you alter teh composition as you like and can vastly improve a photo pretty quickly.

Hope this is some help, and enjoy your photography
Zan

[matt_xyz]

that's a nice shot, they're not easy birds to photograph.

My advice would be to get a copy of Photoshop Elements (it doesn't have to be the latest version) it really is very good. This image could perhaps do with a contrast boost and a touch of sharpening and maybe reduce the highlights a bit. This would take literally seconds in Photoshop Elements but can really transform an image.

Matt

[Dalesman]

Just type "picasa" into your search engine.

Picasa is a free download from Google. I use it myself and it is great for basic editing such as sharpening, cropping, etc.
I also use Photoshop for more advanced work.

good luck for the future.

[ron1863]

Originally Posted by matt_xyz

that's a nice shot, they're not easy birds to photograph.

My advice would be to get a copy of Photoshop Elements (it doesn't have to be the latest version) it really is very good. This image could perhaps do with a contrast boost and a touch of sharpening and maybe reduce the highlights a bit. This would take literally seconds in Photoshop Elements but can really transform an image.

Matt

I would go along this route. I have Photoshop CS2 on my main computer and Elements 6, which came preloaded on my laptop. I find that I now use Elements more and more and is excellent value for money.

[kielder]

Originally Posted by Dalesman

Just type "picasa" into your search engine.

Picasa is a free download from Google. I use it myself and it is great for basic editing such as sharpening, cropping, etc.
I also use Photoshop for more advanced work.

good luck for the future.

I can second this! very good