Five Tips for Capturing the Colors of Fall

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Five Tips for Capturing the Colors of Fall

	Autumn is a great time for taking pictures, especially if you look in unexpected places for your photo opportunities. The following tips offer some easy ways your photography can capture the colors of fall:
	Remember the First Day of School Your child's first day of school is definitely a milestone worth remembering. When you drop off your son or daughter at school, look around for the best setting and perspective for an outdoor portrait. Ideally, you'll want to pose your child in the foreground, with the school in the background. It doesn't have to be the whole building, just something representative like a sign with the school's name or a part of the building that is easily identifiable. Try to isolate your subject so you don't have a lot of distracting colors and movement in the background. If that's not possible, make sure your child is the center of focus (see Tip 3), the new school clothes are neatly arranged, and the lunch box is in full view. This is one case where you don't want to fill the picture frame with your subject, since you'll want to show the proportionate size of your new student to his or her surroundings. Instead, try framing your child in the left or right third of the picture, with the body turned slightly in toward the center of the frame. Take several pictures (with and without flash) of your subject looking toward the school and others looking toward the camera.
	Catch Autumn Colors at Their Peak The best time to photograph autumn leaves is at their peak, when all of the leaves have changed color and before they begin to fall. This is a very small window of time, so try an Internet search on "fall foliage" or "autumn colors" to find a site that reports on the fall colors in your area. Once you reach the best time and destination, use the following tips for great results: 1) Pay attention to the light. Early morning or late afternoon is best for sunny days, when the light is behind the leaves. Cloudy, foggy or misty days can produce beautiful special effects, as long as there is enough ambient light to illuminate the leaves. 2) When shooting trees from a distance, keep the amount of sky to a minimum, no more than one-fourth or one-third of the picture. On the other hand, water is a great accent, especially if you can position it between you and the trees. 3) Don't forget the close-ups. Isolating a few "perfect leaves" on a branch makes a stunning autumn picture.
	In Groups, Make Your Subject the Center of Focus Most school or sports activities involve large groups of people, but zeroing in on one or two key participants makes for very effective photos. First, make sure your subjects are positioned in front of the crowd, putting as much space between them and the rest of the group as possible. Second, make them the central focus of the picture by minimizing depth of field (or area of focus) to only that area immediately surrounding (and including) your subjects. The result will be a sharply focused subject(s) and an out-of-focus background. Depth of field is determined by the camera's lens opening or aperture. The larger the lens opening (f/stop), the shorter the depth of field, and vice versa. Large lens openings have small f/numbers. For example, an f/2.8 opening is much larger than an f/22 opening. So you'll want to use an f/number in the single digits (f/4, f/8) for limited depth of field and double-digit f/numbers for greater depth of field (f/11, f/16, etc.). If your camera doesn't have an "Aperture Priority" mode, use the "Portrait" mode setting for the same effect.
	Find a New Perspective on Football Taking pictures of your high school football star in action can be a challenge, especially if you have a point-and-shoot camera. Most small cameras are not equipped with a long enough zoom lens to focus in on a player rushing into the end zone. However, that doesn't mean you can't find plenty of other photo opportunities at the football game. If you move to the front of the bleachers, you can zoom in on the cheerleaders, who will provide you with plenty of high-spirited emotion. Or, depending on where they are positioned, you could photograph the football players sitting on the bench. (A row of shiny helmets taken from behind makes a great shot.) You'll find just as much to photograph in the bleachers as you will on the field. Look for groups of classmates who go to great extremes to out-dress each other in school colors, face paint and glitter. Check out the band, too. Between the band uniforms, instruments and pure physical exertion, you'll find plenty of great close-up shots.
	Don't Forget the Fill Flash Almost any outdoor portrait, whether it's at night or during the day, will be more successful if you use your camera's "Fill" or "Forced" flash setting. Often the natural light is so low that the camera is forced to use a slow shutter speed and/or large lens opening to let in enough light, which can often cause blurred or out-of-focus pictures. If the sun is out, or your subject is under the harsh lighting of a football stadium, the overhead light will create shadows around the eyes and under the nose and chin. Fill flash helps to fill in those shadows and soften the facial features, creating a much more pleasant effect. If your camera allows, choose a low flash setting to minimize the bright light, or pick a Portrait setting, which should automatically balance the flash with the surrounding natural light. For more tips on digital photography, visit www.imaging-resource.com.