How to Photograph Stars: An Easy 9-Step Tutorial

Learn how to shoot astrophotography through this simple step-by-step process

By Tobias Gelston

With the warmer weather upon, there’s no better time to ditch the jacket, grab your camera and tripod, and head out to shoot some amazing star photography. Astrophotography, as it’s also known, can be intimidating to new photographers, which is why we’ve turned to Seattle-based photography instructor Tobias Gelston for his step-by-step... Read more

Photoshop’s Color Range Selection Tool

Making the most of this powerful selection tool

William Sawalich

No matter what edits a photographer may plan to make during post, almost every productive image editing session starts with a good selection. Thankfully, Photoshop offers a variety of different methods for differentiating between which pixels should be included in a selection and which pixels shouldn’t. The manual tools such as the lasso, magic wand... Read more

What Is White Balance on Your Camera?

Learn the basics of how to select the right white balance setting for your photos

By Patrick McNair

(Editor’s Note: This story is by photographer Patrick McNair. You can find out more about him on his website.) Amongst all the settings on your camera you’ll find one for White Balance, usually contracted to WB. This might be a button on the camera body or a menu option or both. But what does it do exactly and how does changing White Balance... Read more

Master Flash Photography with 5 Easy Tips

Flash master Joe McNally explains how to best illuminate your subject

By Joe McNally

(Editor’s Note: This flash photography how-to from professional photographer Joe McNally is part of a monthly series on Digital Photo where top pros from Nikon USA’s Ambassadors program share their simple tips, tricks, and advice on how to be a better photographer.) Flash is a bedevilment for beginners, and it can remain a mystery for even... Read more

Five Lessons For Better Lighting

Lighting lessons learned on a recent assignment turn into effective guidelines for successful lighting of any subject

William Sawalich

I’ve been thinking a lot about art lately. Not just the art I’m trying to make when I’m getting creative with my camera, but the works of art that I’m occasionally hired to photograph. I recently wrote about photographing paintings for a museum collection, and that same assignment had me photographing sculpture too. As I moved my lights around... Read more

Can You Stop People from Blinking in Photos?

Tips for taking group shots without having anyone’s eyes closed (mostly)

By Steve Meltzer

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by photographer Steve Meltzer. You can see his work on his website and Facebook page. Recently, after a big wedding shoot, I had an awful surprise when I reviewed my images on my computer screen. Many of my really good family group shots were ruined by what I call “a pesky blinker.” You know them.... Read more

The Soft-Light Approach To Photographing Artwork

Step up your copywork technique to reap the benefits of soft light

William Sawalich

Photographing artwork is one of those challenges that’s easy to understand and difficult to master. The part that’s easy to grasp is that when photographing something flat—like a painting, drawing or etching—you want to treat it like copywork. That means placing two lights on opposite sides, beyond 45 degrees from the lens axis, and you’re... Read more

How to Remove People in Photoshop in Seconds

The key to this trick is a new tool called Object Selection

By Dan Havlik

Here’s a fast, simple and effective Photoshop tutorial for removing people or objects from an image in seconds. Yes, seconds; 15 seconds to be exact, which is also the length of the video below from PiXimperfect. Led by software guru Unmesh Dinda of PiXimperfect who whips through a demo of how to remove a person from a sample image, the tutorial... Read more

5 Tips for Purr-fect Cat Photos

Cats can be fickle creatures. Here's how to capture better photos of your furry friends

By Dan Havlik

Last week, we shared photographer Andrius Burba’s delightful pet photography series “Underlook,” where he captures adorable images of cats and dogs from below. Digital Photo readers seemed to enjoy it with some requesting advice on how to photograph their own pets in cute ways. So, in the below video, Denver-based professional photographer... Read more

Understanding Exposure Controls

How a camera’s three modifiers of shutter speed, aperture and ISO come together to create an exposure

William Sawalich

My tremendous high school photography instructor, Mr. Colgan, ground into our heads that cameras are deceptively simple, nothing more than a light-tight box with three modifiers. But how we use the three modifiers of shutter speed, aperture and ISO is where things get a bit more complicated and where all the technical magic begins to happen. For photographers... Read more

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