Pottery shop pics, c&c for a n00b welcome :)

[Pwnderosa]

A couple shots from a pottery shop in Sedona, AZ. Trying to learn how to use my new camera (Nikon Coolpix P5000).

C&C most welcome and thank you for looking! :mrgreen:

 

[eggmanmeggan]

You know what to look for- but I don't think you know how to get what your seeing to show up in the camera yet.

Your first shot is pretty standard snapshot, I think what you are going for is the repetition of the pattern "how often do you see that" kind of photo. I think a better way to of shot this would be from down low or up top shooting down. I can not tell you how many times I have made a fool of myself getting low or high for a shot. And 99% of the time I am glad I did.

The second photo does not scream snap shot but it kinda seems to have the same idea- you were going for the strong graphic line pulling us into the photo. However when it pulled us all the way in.. it was just a empty wall. In this case the right wall is pretty interesting. So I would of taken a few steps to the left and shot down the line with the masks (?) The pots on the left are interesting but not enough to carry a photo.

There are some technical issues too. The highlights are blown on both photos- and the light isn't preferable. The focus isn't super sharp- but keep at it. Your eye is there. The rest will become second nature.

Try googling for your sunrise sunset time. That few hours before the sun sets is fantastic and really brings a beautiful light to photos. Even better is the hour as the sun rises. Taking photos in the time frame will instantly give you better photos. And as a side note sometimes- I think blown highlights are rather fantastic.

Looks like you live in a sunny area so one last tip you might get to have more fun with then I do up in the PNW (currently raining and cold...)

If you watched the Planet Earth special a while ago, you might of noticed in a lot of the panning shots the sun was like a star with beams of light in a "star-burst" pattern. That is done by pointing the lens into the sun (or any light source) and using a small F-stop like.. 22 or 16 whatever you want to try. It creates some "flare" that you have to kinda play with from one shot to the next to find a pleasing composition. Might be fun for you to try.

Keep on working on it : ) Looks like you found a fun place to shoot.

 

[WesternGuy]

I agree with what eggmanmeggan has said. You have a couple of fairly reasonable snapshots with some definite technical issues as noted. I won't belabor the point, except to ask a question that I came across a number of years ago...do you want to take pictures or make pictures? - I decided that I wanted to make pictures a lot more than I wanted to take them. Making pictures is a lot more work than taking them - believe me. It requires you (or me) to think about what we see through the view finder in terms of the elements and principles of composition - rule of thirds, lines, colour, focus, balance, light, perspective, etc. I often find that I will take a number of images of the same subject - different angles, different perspective, different focus, move around to get a different lighting effect from the ambient light, zoom in, zoom out, etc. I also find that I may come upon something that I think will make a great image and spend some time walking around looking at it from different angles, etc. I find that I do less and less of what I used to do 10 or 15 years ago, when I would just shoot one shot and that was it...

You say that you are just starting to learn to use your new camera - great approach...learn as much as you can about it and practice using all the "bells and whistles" that come with the camera. You do realize however, that this is just a start - you will have to read and learn about composition, and then practice, practice, practice...and then there is post-processing...what you do to the image after you get it into the computer, but that is a whole other forum

I would also encourage you to keep at it as eggmanmeggan said...looks like you have found a fun place to shoot.

Cheers,

WesternGuy

 

[Pwnderosa]

Thank you very much eggmanmeggan & WesternGuy for your comments, they are very helpful and I will keep them in mind as I keep going. I have lots of fun places to shoot here and lots of bright sun to contend with so I hope I will get better with it.

WesternGuy you pose some philosophical issues but I appreciate it. I started trying to take pictures for my own reference material to draw and paint from so you definitely post some questions that I don't know the answers to yet.

 

[WesternGuy]

...

WesternGuy you pose some philosophical issues but I appreciate it. I started trying to take pictures for my own reference material to draw and paint from so you definitely post some questions that I don't know the answers to yet.

I am not sure that I know all the answers to them yet, but if you are anything like me, you will definitely keep trying...for me it's the only way to go...the only way that I can get better...good luck in finding your answers...they are not necessarily the same as mine...:thumbup:

Cheers,

WesternGuy