Nikonians Articles

After his inviting article on getting started in astrophotography, David Goldstein (dagoldst) now goes deeper into Deep Sky Object imaging, gifting us with what he has learned about equipment and software. Read more...

New series: With the explosion of social media and image sharing, printing options have taken somewhat of a back seat. What are the possibilities for the photographer who is still looking to produce a physical image? Read more...

Spring has sprung here in the U.S, but even if it’s not spring where you are yet, it will be at some point so read on and you can tuck this information away for that day. In this article I discuss how to achieve good wildflower photographs, which is not that easy to achieve. Read more...

What are the main things to consider for taking and capturing better group shots? This article tells you as a photographer what works (and what doesn’t) in five easy-to-remember "rules". Read more...

In this article, I will discuss how textures and texture layers can transform digital photographs into digital artwork. The article also includes links to two of my Creative Commons images so that you can follow along with the Photoshop tutorial. Read more...

You may have seen and marveled at the images of the sky by David Goldstein (dagoldst) in the Astrophotography forum. His article helps you jump into Astrophotography: What equipment and budget is required without risking big mistakes or falling into the fangs of salesmen. Read more...

What we’re going to look at in this part goes against the grain of what most photographers think. Most Photoshop warriors believe that they can improve the shot in post-processing. Actually, this is impossible. Read more...

I am looking into tips for importing images into Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC today, an important tool for many of us photographers. Read more...

My finger was bouncing around on the keyboard, on an online photography forum the other evening and someone asked this question, “Can mental quickness in responding to a changing photographic scenario be learned or improved?” Read more...

Remember our scale at the beginning? 0-64 points for concept, 0-32 for working with people, 0-16 for planning, 0-8 for composition, 0-4 for lighting, 0-2 for shooting, 0-1 for post-processing? Multiply them all together, and the result ranges from 0 to 2 million. The way you shoot the shot can make an otherwise perfect image $2 million, $1million or $0. Read more...

Darrell Young is busy writing Mastering the Nikon Z7 & Z6 books for the NikoniansPress/RockyNook series. Here he shares with us a good tip on how to use the depth of field (DOF) preview. Read more...

Why did I find myself in Cuba on a Street Photography Workshop? -- A non-streetphotographer tells her story while working her Nikon Z7 and D500 in this target-rich area. Read more...

Let’s recap where we started. To achieve the maximum effect, give yourself from 0-1 points for post-processing, 0-2 for shooting, 0-4 for lighting, 0-8 for composition, 0-16 for planning, 0-32 for working with people, and 0-64 for concept. Multiply these together. You will get a result between 0 and about 2 million. Read more...

Jonathan Kandel (JonK) has been a Nikonians member for almost a decade and a half, and a long-time moderator. He is a semi-professional photographer who just got his Nikon Z7 mirrorless camera. Here he offers his thorough first impressions. Read more...

It goes without saying that Composition is fundamental to any photography project and every professional assignment. Read more...

Nikonians co-founder J. Ramon Palacios presents us a tip for better hand holding when with a long lens, reducing fatigue. Read more...

Shooting property in a thriving real estate market. There’s plenty of property to shoot - custom homes, historic homes, commercial buildings, interiors, custom landscapes, vineyards, and ranches with ample wildlife. Read more...

Nikonians co-founder J. Ramon Palacios (jrp) comes back to us to share what he has learned about the fourth of the seven deadly sins in photography: Missing Distractions. Read more...

When I read the rules a certain line in the wording gave me pause for thought as did other wording about the specific category rules. It seems to me that people are still struggling with what digital photography is versus what film photography was. Read more...

I follow photography conversations on a couple of different web sites, as do many of us. I also take photography trips to various areas with tour guides, again, as many of us do. Recently I took a guided photography trip to Costa Rica. One of the things I like about taking these trips is meeting new people, mostly other photographers, and talking about our shared love of the craft. This trip I was reminded about the seemingly apparent divide over shooting JPEG format versus shooting RAW format. Read more...

The human eye interprets images in the following order: movement, colour, shape, content. If you wish to create images that sell products, change social behaviour, win election campaigns or merely persuade people to invest their evenings in watching a particular TV show, then you need to construct the image with these in mind. Read more...

I often hear Ansel Adams invoked during discussions on photography. Many times, it is apparent that the person invoking Adams knows little about him or his life, but read a few lines somewhere written by some obscure person who said whatever it was about Adams that they then repeated as true. Read more...

Sometimes I cannot get outside in a location that will allow me to take interesting photographs or the weather just won’t allow it. But, I still want to use my camera to take photographs so I’ll try setting up a still life of some sort. At one point, I read about light box photography and saw some beautiful flower images that a photographer, who teaches the technique, had taken. Read more...

My goal, with every photograph I take, is to make each image be the very best that it can be by my standards and by general artistic standards. Read more...

Learning to photograph animals in action takes effort, time and patience and, at some point, will result in successful action shots. Read more...

Most photographers are not natural planners. If you come from a landscape background, you expect to be inspired by what you find. Photojournalists look for the decisive moment. Press photographers were always told ‘f8 and be there’. But even the most spontaneous photographer needs at least the basic planning of having their equipment ready when the moment happens. Read more...

More on the "controlled spectrum" in photography with some thoughts on decision-making and consequences of our actions, or inactions. We will look into taking risks, and freedom as a foundation for creativity. We are also coming back to physical exercise for helping your creativity to flourish. Read more...

Photography on the slopes comes with its own skillset and it is more than just people or landscape photography. This article is for all of you who want to achieve more than just some landscape shots or shooting your resort. Read more...

Many people advocate that we “throw away the rules,” or use them “with a grain of salt.” But it is imperative to learn all of these compositional rules and to know them so well that they can be used without conscious thought. Then, and only then, can you forget about the rules and toss them to the wind. Read more...

The factor which can disrupt whole shoots or, equally, turn dross into gold, is what we call in the trade ‘the human factor’. Read more...

In this fourth part of "mastering the art of photography", I continue to explore what mastering this art form entails. We'll discuss what items you can control for, how to get the most out of it, time scheduling and the areas you have to be aware of as not being well controllable. Read more...

Nikonians co-founder J. Ramon Palacios (jrp) comes back to us with what he has learned about the third of the seven deadly sins in photography: Incorrect focus. Read more...

In this third part of "mastering the art of photography", I continue to explore what mastering this art form entails. We'll discuss "is it really art?" and the creativity required to get "artsy enough". Read more...

In this second part we discuss passion and joy, the motivation of why we should bother about mastering photography. This is a part of the "mastering the art of photography" series, where we discover any of the processes and methods supporting photographers interested in achieving more consistent, better results. Read more...

Concept beats everything else in studio photography. I want to share with you an image shot outdoors, in the dark, with no lights, no photographic equipment apart from a camera and a tripod, but which epitomises the studio method. Read more...

It is said that “familiarity breeds contempt”. We live in a world that demands constant change if we are to remain engaged or interested. Today, children’s attention spans are measured not in hours or minutes, but in seconds. As a culture, we are continually bombarded by imagery designed to challenge, confront or confuse our senses. Read more...

Humans are trichromats. That means we see in three basic colors: red, green, and blue (RGB). These are the additive primary colors. Our brain knits these three colors together to create all the different colors we see. Trichromy is the three-color process used in photography that generates the colors that our eyes can see. Read more...