I’ve been following the blogs and forums over at DPS for a couple years now – it’s definitely a GREAT resource for photographers. I think the one thing I love the most about DPS (aside from the friendly and helpful nature of all the people over there) is the fact that they are always trying to keep photographers motivated and give the readers more ideas to attempt. I love the idea of the latest challenge.

Over the next few days set yourself this little challenge.

1. Choose a single focal length. If you have a prime lens use it – if you don’t choose a zoom lens and commit to only using it at one end of its range.
2. Photograph 10 people – with each person only take a single shot.
3. Share your 10 shots with us. The easiest way is probably to upload your 10 shots to a Flickr account (or some other photo sharing site) and then group them all together into one group – share the link to that group in comments below.

Read the full challenge over at DPS!

Congrats to DPS on 3 years and 1000 (and counting) articles. Darren and the admin team over there have done a great job on the site and I know I’ve certainly learned a thing or two over the past year and a half.

Here’s the top 10 DPS posts based on viewers:

1. 10 Ways to Take Stunning Portraits
2. Long Exposure Photography: 15 Stunning Examples
3. How to Make Digital Photos Look Like Lomo Photography
4. 15 Stunning Images Using Blur to Portray Movement
5. 4 Easy Photoshop Techniques to Make Your Pictures Pop!
6. How to Make an Inexpensive Light Tent
7. How to Photograph Fireworks
8. Rule of Thirds
9. 11 Surefire Landscape Photography Tips
10. Wedding Photography – 21 Tips for Amateur Wedding Photographers

Be sure to hit the See the Top 10 Articles from our First 1000 at Digital Photography School article over at DPS. Keep the great articles, tips, tricks, contests and everything else coming!

Catching up on some older posts I’ve been meaning to reference here. The first is a wonderful post over at DPS on Shooting with available light.

Sounds like a contradiction doesn’t it? In fact, shooting available light frees you from all the encumbrances of dragging strobe equipment around with its stands, modifiers, strobes and possibly even power packs. On the other hand, shooting available light chains you to whatever the light is willing to do at a given time of day. So you see now how it can free you or chain you up. There are a few tips and techniques you can use to tame available light and bend it to your will in many circumstances. Best of all, you don’t have to purchase a thing to use this technique.

I’ve shot with available light a lot, I really do enjoy it, especially playing with the manual settings to get the exact look that I am going for.

Check out the How To Shoot With Available Light post over at the DPS Blog.

DPS posted the sequel to Portrait Photography’s Power Posing Part I: The Components that I blogged about a little over a week ago.

The post talks about three power poses and how to achieve them:

1. Standing Tall: Give an air of confident ability and self-assurance.
2. Casual Seated: Express an easygoing attitude
3. The Wall Chill: Describes natural and casual expression

Check out the Portrait Photography’s Power Posing – Part II: The Poses post by Christina Nichole over at the DPS blog!

Great article over on the DPS Blog (when don’t they have great articles?) regarding portrait photography and posing.

Some of the tips include positioning for head, arms, legs, hips, joints (“if it bends, bend it!”), and more!

Check out the “Portrait Photography’s Power Posing Part I: The Components” article by Christina Nichole over at the DPS blog!

To follow up the 10 Ways to Take Stunning Portraits post from the other day, DPS has posted 10 more tips:

11. Frame your subject
12. Go with a wide angle
13. Play with backgrounds
14. Change the format framing
15. Hold your camera on an angle
16. Take unfocused shots
17. Introduce movement
18. Experiment with subject expressions
19. Fill the frame
20. Find an interesting subject

Seems I’ve managed a couple of these in past self-portraits, good tips for the future!

Check out the 10 More Tips for Stunning Portrait Photography for more details!

Being part of the 365 Days/threesixtyfive self-portrait a day for a year project, I found this article over on the DPS Blog today very interesting. Always looking for different ways to shoot myself, and I’m sure this will come in handy for portrait shooting as well!

How do you take Portraits that have the ‘Wow’ factor?

Today and tomorrow I want to talk about taking Portraits that are a little out of the box. You see it’s all very well and good to have a portrait that follows all the rules – but it hit me as I was surfing on Flickr today that often the most striking portraits are those that break all the rules.

I want to look at some ways to break out of the mold and take striking portraits by breaking (or at least bending) the rules and adding a little randomness into your portrait photography.

In a nutshell here are the ten points from the post today:

1. Alter your perspective
2. Play with eye contact
3. Break the rules of composition
4. Experiment with lighting
5. Move your subject out of their comfort zone
6. Shoot candidly
7. Introduce a prop
8. Focus upon one body part – get up close
9. Obscure part of your subject
10. Take a series of shots

My favorite technique, as you can see, is playing with and experimenting with light (photo above). I also find some of my best portraits are when shot candidly – as can be seen in the two photos below.

Be sure to head on over to the DPS Blog and read in detail 10 Ways to Take Stunning Portraits!

I really have to get back to posting every day if I can… anyways, today’s tip comes one again from the Digital Photography School Blog provided by Jim M. Goldstein.

These days digital cameras simplify not only your ability to see what you’re focusing on, but they also give you an immediate view of your photo enabling you to move on to your next photo or to try again. As great as these features are consistently getting sharp photos can still be a challenge.

I know I’ve been frustrated a few times with the lack of sharpness – sure the Unsharpen Mask in Photoshop helps with most images, but is that the real answer?

Whether you’re using film or digital cameras the optics of lenses hasn’t changed as optics are all about math and physics. Don’t worry I don’t want to talk math or physics any more than you want to read about it, but there is a key principle that every photographer should be aware of and that is hyperfocal distance.

Sounds pretty technical!

The short and sweet tip for those using shorter focal length lenses is to focus 1/3 of the way into your photo with a smaller aperture setting to maximize your depth of field.

Note for longer focal length lenses like telephoto lenses this principle still applies, but it becomes less of a factor for most people given the types of subjects photographed with these lenses are generally less foreground-centric.

A bit easier to swallow… anyways check out the rest of the article over at DPS – great little read, as well as links to a Depth of Field calculator and a chart you can download for use in the field!

Well sort of… submitted my article on HDR processing to DPS for consideration. Just found out they published it! Thanks Darren and DPS staff!

If you missed it the first time around, check it out over at the DPS Blog.

Over at the DPS forums, they set up “weekly” assignments… I try to do them when I remember. The last assignment was From the Hip. So I submitted on of my “Street TtV” shots…

I was pleasantly surprised when I started receiving congratulatory comments on the image above. From the “This Week in DPS” blog post:

We finished the From the Hip assignment this week, and we weren’t at all disappointed with the interesting pictures that people managed to get without actually looking through the viewfinder! Our winner this week was Haeretik for his picture taken through the viewfinder of an old camera. According to him, “Shot this with my XT pointed down through my TtV contraption held by my waist…”.

Many thanks for the selection!