Photo Tip of the Day

It's 2008, so practically everyone has a digital camera (Grandma, check) or a phone with a camera in it. So now the trick becomes showing your photos off. You can always have them printed, but that's a tip for another time. The quickest and cheapest way is to post them online for the world and your friends to see.

Here are some sites that offer free photo hosting that I'd recommend looking into. They serve different needs so just find the one that you like the best.

• Flickr.com - owned by Yahoo!, is very popular but you can max out the free storage they offer quickly, after that, you'll have to pay for more space.
• Picasa Web Albums - owned by Google, so you can use your same login as your Gmail. Picasa is also a desktop program to organize the all your photos on your computer.
• Facebook - Has a fairly good photo album feature. Plus your "friends" on Facebook will be notified when you post new pictures of them. It is easy to limit access as to who can actually see your picture, but if you use that feature your friends have to sign up for Facebook too.
  

There are many many more out there, but its a good start.

Photo Editing Tip of the Day

Want to touch up your photos before you post them online, but don't have iPhoto and there is no way you're going to shell out hundreds of dollars for Photoshop? Adobe has released Photoshop Express. It is all online so there is nothing to install plus it's free! It has an impressive range of features, including removing red eye and stylizing pictures. Plus it integrates with Facebook and Flickr.

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4x6 Tip of the Weekend

Expecting a digital camera for Christmas? Now you just need to print some of your best shots. There are lots of companies providing that service these days, and most of them will give you some free prints just for signing up. Dealmac.com has a complete list totaling 380 Free Prints

Photo Editing Tip of the Weekend

If you're relegated to using a crappy 3 megapixel point-and-shoot digital camera, but need some photos with more pizazz, there fortunately are a few things you can do to make your snapshots look like photographs. These tips are a few basics, but only scratch the surface of what is possible.

• Begin by following principles of good composition. Make the photo as visually interesting as possible while maintaining sharp focus, and good use of lighting


• The predominant things you'll need to fix are your camera's lack of saturation and vibrancy. Typically, the midtones appear washed out, so begin by using Photoshop's "Curves" adjustment. Typically lowering the midtones on the curve will make the blacks blacker and keep the whites whiter. This adjustment can also be made with the "Levels" adjustment if you find that easier to use.


• Adding depth of field is easily achieved as well. Begin by duplicating your background layer, and putting the new layer directly above the background layer. Add a gaussian blur to the top layer. From here you have two choices (below):
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• Option 1: Faux Depth of Field. Add a layer mask to the top (blurred) layer. Using the gradient tool, make a black/white circular gradient on the mask to sort of fade the blur out, keeping the central object focused.


• Option 2: Faux Depth of Field + Lighting Effects. On the top (blurred) layer, play around with some dramatic effects. Adjust the color balance to make it yellowish gold. Cool it down by making it blue, etc. From there, change the blending mode on the top layer to multiply, overlay, vivid light, etc. and see what changes are made. Adjust the intensity of the effect by turning up or down the opacity of the top layer.

You're well on your way to great photos!