Twelve Weeks to Better Photos: Week Seven, Shooting Outdoors

Last week was about shooting inside, this week it's time to take things outside. You can see the full PDF for the lesson here.

This week's lesson discusses taking photos outdoors. Even though we've learned about how light is crucially important when taking photos (see the lessons on aperture, shutter speed, and ISO), sometimes it can be too much of a good thing. Like we learned in flash week, too much light can be bad for photos. In this case, when shooting outdoors in bright sunlight (like at high noon), the light can be very harsh and will simultaneously cast dark shadows while also creating "hot" areas that are washed out and too bright. Not to mention the squinty eyed expressions your subjects will have because they're dealing with such bright sun aren't too great either.

One solution to this problem is to obviously shoot during a different time of day. Shooting earlier or later in the day when the sun is lower on the horizon will avoid all the crazy bright light of the mid-day sun. But that isn't always practical. And if you have to get up early, that means you can't sleep in and that's not fun, right? Instead, another solution is to move your subject into the shade. By simply moving under a tree or other overhang, you'll still get plenty of light without all the distracting shadows.

The Assignment

The assignment this week was to practice taking macro shots (or taking photos of things super close up). Unfortunately for me, I don't have a macro lens so this wasn't super easy for me to do. Instead, I cheated by taking the best shots that I could and then cropped/enlarged them so they look macro. Yay for faking it in post. Unfortunately I only got one shot that's worth sharing.

Here's my best shot:



What I Learned

Taking macro shots without a macro lens is really a lot harder than I thought it would be. It wasn't easy moving in close, but still staying far enough away that my lens would focus. I'm not sure that investing in a macro lens is really in my future though. I enjoy macro shots, but they aren't really practical for me (I'm all about the dog shots of course, haha) so I think a macro lens will probably be one of the last things I invest in.


Are you still following along? Awesome! Link it up so we can see what you did!



I'm leaving the linky party open for the duration of the entire 12 weeks so you can link up as you do the lessons on your own.


Coming up next week: Shooting on the go! How to take photos of things that are on the move.