Easy camera tips to add impact..

Are you sick of the same camera shots? Do you feel that you need a liitle help to change how you take pics? I have been taking photo’s for over 10 years and have picked up some great hints, tips and easy techniques along the way, I hope some of the below will help you take more interesting shots.

1. Dynamic angles. This is a very simple but effective way to add impact to a scene, angle your camera off the standard horizontal or vertical formats and go for a dynamic diagonal. This can look wrong if you do not have the angle right but just try to imagine a line running from one corner of the frame to the opposite corner. You can now position objects of interest down this line.

2. Be creative with your cameras zoom lens. What most people don’t realise is that the different ends of the zoom give very different effects. Try taking all your photos with the wide end (zoomed fully out) all day or all week for portraits, landscape and anything else that takes your fancy. Then try taking all your shots using the long end (telephoto end) for another day or a week. See the difference to your images.

3. Use a shallow depth of field, this is the distance between  the closest and most distant point in an image that appear to be in sharp focus. A shallow depth of field is where only an a minimal point in your image is sharp. A large depth of field is where everthing in your image is sharp. To set a shallow depth of field set your camera’s Aperture prioty mode (AV) and chose the smallest F number and have a play.

4. Use long exposures for a bit of creativity. By holding the shutter button down for a prolonged period of time and shooting moving subjects you can create some very interesting and creative images. If you want sharp area’s in your shot for example a sign post or a street scene with blurred car lights you will need a tripod. You will need to set your cameras mode to AV and choose a high F number (start with f8 for example) that will give you a shtter speed of 2 seconds or more. Experiment is the key here.

5. Change your view. Most people take shots from eye level but this makes all your shots look rather boring, try for instance to go down on your knees or even lye down and fill the frame, you could try holding the camera higher and take a shot looking down on the subject, or if the subject is tall try try shooting straight up the side of it. Just remember don’t take your shot’s at eye level.

Please let me know if this article has helped you.

Private Parking..

Top 5 Windows XP niggles solved.

To be honest I have far more than 5 Windows XP niggles as I guess you do but I thought I would start at 5 why 5 I am not sure but hey you have to start somewhere:

1. Windows XP reboots for no apparent reason.

STOP errors cause XP to reboot by default. Right click My Computer and choose Properties – > Advanced. Click Settings underneath Startup and Recovery Options. Uncheck Automatically restart and click OK.

2. File associatons hijacked by a new program.

Open any folder and choose Tools – > Folder Options from the Explorer menu. On the File Types tab, scroll through to the file concerned. Click Change, browse to the application you want to associate with and click OK.

3. Sometimes an operating system can be too helpful. Do you want to get rid of Microsoft Windows XP balloon tips that appear when you leave your mouse hovering over many function icons for too long?

Note that this affects only the Balloon Tips, not the more ubiquitous tool tips that appear in most Windows XP- compatible applications.

There’s a fairly easy way to do it, but you do have to touch your Registry just make sure that you back it up before you do anything.

Here’s what you do:

• Select Run from the Start button.
• Type in regedit in the Open: field.
• Hit Enter or click OK. This opens the Registry Editor.
• Select the folder HKEY_CURRENT_USER and then follow the folder path \software\microsoft\windows\currentversion\explorer\advanced\.
• From the Registry Edit menu, select Edit/New/DWORD Value. A new value will appear in the right-hand pane.
• Type EnableBalloonTips and hit Enter.
• Close the Registry Editor.
• Log off from Windows XP and then log on again to enable the change.

4. Mouse buttons reversed (left click becomes right click and vice versa).

Launch the Mouse applet in Control Panel (classic view). Select the buttons tab and ensure that the “Switch primary and secondary buttons” box is not ticked. Click OK. Here’s another tip click the pointers tab and change your mouse pointer for something less boring, there are also a number of good websites that let you download more pointers into this panel.

5. This one is not really a niggle but I find Windows Explorer just too basic and lacks much functionality, but hey try Directory Opus this little beauty will get you hooked.

Do you have any Windows XP niggles if so let me know and I will publish them.

RSS explained..

Did you know that RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication and is a convenient way of staying up-to-date, without having to trawl the Internet for the relevant areas of interest, for example blog entries, news headlines or podcasts etc. It’s akin to a ticker type service and everything you need can be delivered directly to your desktop. Most sites have some form of RSS feeds and can be read using software called a “feed reader” or an “aggregator”. The user subscribes to a feed by entering the feeds link into the reader or by clicking an RSS icon in a browser, there are many software applications that you can use for example Google or Yahoo, but my favourite is Netvibes as it is very easy to use and set up, it has other handy tools but best of all you do not need to download it as it is a web based application which means you can access it on any computer.

5 reasons not to work on a Computer service desk.

Customer: “I received the software update you sent, but I am still getting the same error message.”
Tech Support:: “Did you install the update?”
Customer: “No. Oh, am I supposed to install it to get it to work?”

Tech Support:: “Ok, in the bottom left hand side of the screen, can you see the ‘OK’ button displayed?”
Customer: “Wow. How can you see my screen from there?”

 Tech Support: “What’s on your screen right now?”
Customer: “A stuffed animal that my boyfriend got me at the grocery store.” 

Tech Support:: “What operating system are you running?”
Customer: “Pentium.”

Customer: “How do I print my voicemail?”

G.ho.st updated.

I thought I would just update you on an earlier post as the guys at G.ho.st have added a few updates, you can now view MS Office documents (.xls, .ppt and .doc) on your G.ho.st desktop, play MP3 files, and there is even a simple file sharing mechanism on which you can choose to publish and share your files with friends and they are getting closer to a full browser all of which are safe to run. Not bad for free.

Canon Powershot G7

I have just ordered a Canon G7 camera and cannot wait to get my hands on it, I have been after a new Creative Compact for a while and as usual did a lot of research and searching into the best or better cameras. Although I really like my Canon DSLR I find it cumbersome in certain situations and sometimes have not taken a camera at all. I would love to take more photos but family life comes first and dont get out as much as I would like. So I am hoping that this little camera will be with me at all times. Some excellent photography review websites are www.dpreview.com/ and www.photographyblog.com.  When I get it I will let you know what I think of it and post some pictures.

Same old training routine..

I have been weight training on and off for many years and a few years ago nearly decided to pack it in, firstly I didnt seem to be getting anywhere and secondly I was bored of the same old training routine. It wasnt always like that as when I first started training  in the first 2-3 years I made excellent progress but then I became stale, and for many years after that and I kept training for the sake of it. I decided to train from home and I bought all the weights etc just to try to make my training different, but after about 6 months got bored. I tried one last thing and searched dare I say on Amazon.co.uk for books on Weight training routines and after sometime came across this one by James Orvis, as usual I looked at the reviews and they were good so I popped over onto the Amazon.com site to see what the reviews were like and again very positive, so I ordered the book. A few days later it arrived and I must say I was quite exited, I read the first few pages that gives you some very good tips and advice and went straight to the first training routine, I have been using this book for over 2 years together with his website which has more routines (at a cost I might add) and I can honestly say that I still look forward to training. I am by no way massive as that is not my intension but I always feel good after a workout. I also change some of the workouts to suit me and the amount of time I have, and of course I dont have the same facilities as a Gym.

Try the book it will change the way you train, good luck.

Safari maybe not so goodie..

I thought after my post yesterday I would have a quick look at this browser and download it onto my pc, yes I have to admit it did have a nice look to it but as far as the fastest Web browser in the world I didnt really think it was any faster than Firefox or even IE7, well maybe a little bit faster than IE7. I must admit I didnt use it for very long but noticed that it uses a lot of memory. Its also worth noting that a few security issues have been found in Safari.

Oh well it was worth a try, back to Firefox then.

1 Billion PCs by End of 2008

Did you know that by the end of 2008 there will be 1.000.000.000 computers all around the world, a number that will double itself in just five more years. The reason: the emerging markets of countries such as Brazil, China, India or Russia, which will be responsible for 775 million new PCs and laptop computers. Not only is access to computers beneficial to those users, it also will represent a big bump in sales for PC manufacturers and sellers.