Just Available Light: Techniques for Digital Photographers

Emphasising the usefulness of ambient lighting, this guidebook gives unlimited access to the methods used by professionals. Starting with a discussion of the advantages and challenges of working with natural light, the text then explores the positive impact it can have on a photographer’s creativity and how to deal with the compromises that using available light sometimes require. Examples from this preliminary section emphasize learning through experimentation. Next, the book explores camera settings including white balance, contrast, and saturation. The authors demonstrate that thoughtful adjustment to these settings can yield images that more closely reflect the mood of the scene and minimize postproduction editing. Several chapters deal with modifying available light through the delicate use of reflectors to bounce light, polarizers to cut glare, and the proper procedure for adding neutral density filters to control brightness. With the techniques presented, photographers will learn to use available light to its fullest advantage. AUTHOR: Rod and Robin Deutschmann are professional photographers and prolific authors with a passion for teaching students how to take manual control over all aspects of their photography. ILLUSTRATIONS: 210 colour throughout