1,2,3,4,5,6. Is this enough for you?
6 photo ideas which are quite challenging to test your skills. And
don't worry, I'm gonna show you exactly how they are done. The best part about it
is that you don't have to go anywhere. They are all done indoors. You can try
them in your home by yourself or with your family. 6 photo ideas to try at
home.
And if you don't know each other yet, Ahoj, my name is Zdenka Darula. If
you want to learn how to take better photos and videos with the latest gear,
consider subscribing. Normally I would announce the best submissions from the
last round right now but let's do it a little bit later right after photo idea
number 1.
I am sure you have at home cutlery or any other shiny or doesn't even have to
be a shiny object. Just interesting object when it comes to shape. On a very
sunny day find an area which is getting quite a lot of Sun through the window.
For background I used white board. You can use white hard paper or any other
white paper. Then I grabbed 3 forks and placed them so they create shadow. I
took a photo with my mirrorless camera and just got lens 15 to 45 millimetres.
I had it at 15 millimetres so I could get close and play with different angles.
When the Sun is hitting from the right, you want to place yourself on the left
to actually see the shadow very well. If you are gonna be straight up, you are not
going to see the big shadow. Don't shoot it from the top. Get as low as you
possibly can. You want to set your ISO low. I had it on ISO 100 and I used lower
aperture as I wanted the objects sharp but the rest softer, so I had it at F 3.5
and my shutter speed was fairly fast. I didn't have to do much editing in
Lightroom. Literally all I had to do is to make the contrast a little bit
stronger and bring some highlights down a little bit and then just convert some
photos to black and white.
I am sure you have at home some kind of
a mirror. Doesn't have to be a big one, can be a smaller one as well. Or maybe
you have a plexiglass and you have a black paper for the background or you
have a black cloth which you can use as a background and flash light. For the
first photo I use Plexiglas with a black background and just placed a camera as my
object. I used two lights to see what I can get. The first one is the Falcon eyes
F7 light which can also change colors and then the second one is just
my flashlight. There is a little trick when you're litting the object. If you
just lit the whole thing, you're not going to see the reflection. If you will
lit only the object but make sure that the light is not going on the Plexiglas,
you will see the reflection. It works actually very well with flashlight. And
for the second shot I just used a mirror but I had to be quite careful so I'm not
seeing the edges because the mirror is not very big. I simply had to zoom in
quite a bit and I had to position the camera from the top. I used here
flashlight again to lit up only the areas I wanted and you could try any
lens for this shot. I had the same kit lens 15 to 45 millimeters just zoomed in
quite a bit. What I was mainly playing with and that is something you should
try to play with is aperture. So you can shoot in aperture priority mode or
manual mode. In this shot I wanted only part of the Rings to be sharp so I left
it at F 3.5 and here I wanted all of them to be sharp so I cranked it up a
bit. So how did I edit the photos? Well, a little bit more contrast and played
with the colours. For the jewelry the same thing. I made those colors pop. Well,
now it's a time to announce the first group of finalists from the last
creative camera challenge round before we move on to photo idea number 3. In
the last round you were supposed to submit meaningful images to you
regardless of the quality. The images had to tell
strong story behind them. First photo is from Henry and as he says, this was
taken sunday at mom's nursing home. My brother is trying to get Mom to
recognize him. Title of this picture is I will always
love you mom. Second photo is from BJ and the author
says. Story behind this is I'm fascinated by light. I'm what is considered legally
blind and totally colorblind so things like this catch my attention. This is a
night shot of dandelions taken with pixel three XL. Photo number 3 is
from Rolf. This photo was taken on July 14 2002 in Russia in an old Volga 1971
model. I love the vibes and sensuality the pics gives me. 26 days later we
got married and a year and a half later she moved from Russia to Norway. She
still looks at me the same way as when the picture was taken. It warms my heart.
Photo idea number 3 is quite trendy. It is quite popular right now on
social media. I actually seen something similar the other day on Instagram. So
what I did here, I built a frame to shoot through and that frame was actually
visible in the image. And it had to do something with the main object of the
photo. I grabbed a small table and placed books in sort of a circle. Left a hole in
the middle to reveal an object. My model is sitting by the table studying. I used
light to lit up the books as it would be way too dark
otherwise. I also tried to use color lights as well to create different looks.
It is all about composition and framing, moving the books around so you have
interesting shot. You don't have to use only books.
How about LEGO pieces as a frame and your object could be child playing or
actual lego model or food ingredients and dish with the final food as object.
When you take photos of kids don't try to post them or
ask them for smile otherwise you're gonna end up with that smile number
three. Instead of that just make them play on their own, let them be in their
element and just kind of watch what they are doing and take photos here and there.
Sometimes you can even ask a question, or you can say something nice in
regards to what they are doing and then you get lucky when they will look at you
in that more natural way. So when you look at the photos down the road in the
future, this is what you're gonna see, how they were really behaving when they were
little. And those moments are very precious. Wider lens is better for this
to see the foreground and the background. I focused on the model so I got soft
frame, the books. I kept lower aperture to have only the center sharp. When it comes
to photo editing or shot like this, you can be very creative. Here you can change
the colors, make it black and white, brighten certain areas, add flare, anything goes.
You can add contrast and make the right crop for the photo to stand out. This
photo idea number 4 is a little bit spooky. I know that we've done double
exposure creative camera challenge in the past and I will link it in the video
description below for those interested because that video will tell you exactly
how to do it with your smartphone or DSLR or in Photoshop in post. This
double exposure is a little bit different. Instead of just face or object
or body part, I try to go with mood. To me, it looks like a ghost. This is just the
way I see it. And you can do all kinds of expressions. You can show frustration,
having yourself or family member acts as a model and then you overlay those two
photos. Or show anger, happiness, hope or try this ghost image. I don't have the
right wardrobe for it because nothing fits anymore but I'm trying to change
that. What I think would work the best is that kind of beige nightgown standing
somewhere by bed holding little teddy bear. That could look
kind of like a ghost or you can have a guy sitting by the table completely
drunk laying on the table, empty bottle there and then the second image
of him standing staring straight at the camera. That could work.
You can do so many things. Just don't make it too morbid. Photos were taken
in natural light on a tripod. I used my smartphone as a remote. You can
totally use timer as well. Make sure you don't move the tripod or camera between
the shots so you can layer the images. Only change the body positions. And you
can try any lens. You don't have to be really picky too much with the settings.
The final photo is created in Photoshop and it is quite easy to do. Just layer
those two images on top of each other and use screen as a blending option. Then
you can still adjust the images individually. To give the final look I
adjusted brightness and color a bit. And now here is the second group of
finalists from the last creative camera challenge. First photo is from Pia. This
was taken in Uganda. I was visiting the work or ministry vision for Africa. It
showed me how privileged we are. We can just turn on the tap and out comes
drinking water. There in Uganda, they sometimes have to go long ways to get
some water. Even the children help and carry the heavy water canisters. So that
showed me to be more thankful for the things we often take for granted. Second
photo is from Jane. I know the quality is not great it is actually a still from
when I was making a video with my dog Sammy. I do not have biological children
so she's very special to me. I swear she was smiling back here. Just a special
look captured that I will cherish forever. Taken with Canon M50 on
video setting. This is quite interesting. I actually had a very similar dog and
past, it was a male and his name was Sammy as well. Here's the photo.
3rd photo is from Frank. In 1982 I got my first film SLR a Pentax k1000 and
shot quite a bit of black and white film and did my own film processing and
printing. Here is a photo I took at a local hockey game with a bit of a story
to it. It's a bit sketchy in terms of quality but it portrays the
confrontation between a player and the referees. Two more photo ideas follow.
Here is a photo idea number five which is a humour, multiply yourself. And this
one is so much fun. You can completely go crazy with your family and it's very easy to
do. I did this as a selfie, so again I used my smartphone as a remote. Pick a room
with even light which doesn't change. Grab wide lens so you're gonna fit the
whole room in it. Just place the camera on a tripod,
don't touch it between the shots so you don't change the view. Use higher
aperture like F 5.6 or even higher to have most of the image sharp and pose
away. Cool poses, funny props.... adults behave though... once you're done, upload
the photos to Photoshop and simply place new layer and erase everything around
but the person and add another layer and erase everything but the person and so
on and so on. Keep going, flatten the photo at the end, edit
further and done.
This is a fun thing to do with kids. Especially kids. They love it.
You can do this one few different ways. What I chose to do is select burst mode
on my camera and also made sure I had selected very fast shutter speed. The
burst mode took series of photos as my model was throwing the carts and then I
saved the photos I needed from the whole burst series and layered them just like
I did at the multiply yourself idea in Photoshop. You can just have one object
flying in a photo. It doesn't have to be continuous like I did. As I was running
out of the light, my photo turned out very grainy. It shouldn't be like that so
just make sure you shoot it in the middle of the day when the light is very
bright. Possibly the best would be to shoot it when it's actually sunny
outside and you are in the room which has large windows or one big window where
there is a lot of lights coming through. And you can be throwing anything. Just
make sure it is soft, not sharp. And I know that we've been spending a lot of
time in the same house or apartment for a number of days and it's probably gonna
be like that for a while and this may be a good time for you to relieve some
anger... no ....please stay away from knives. Last group of the finalists from the last
submission is here. First photo is from Chris. To me this one this photo tells a
story. It is a story of a love, devotion, sacrifice, trust or respect earned and
given. It is the last photo I took of my father about an hour after we had been
given the news he had terminal lung cancer. To get some had time we went for
a short walk along and discussed path where we set and shared a
coffee from a flask. It was the last walk we had. Rest in peace dad. Second photo is
from Rajkumar. This photo was taken September 6th 2015 with my Sony HX
400 V. This was a reunion meet of my 1982 school friends. Believe me, it happened after
33 years. All were from different walks of life and settled of different parts
of South India. The main purpose of the reunion meet is to bring the nostalgic
moments and lost friends together. The last photo is from Russell.
This wooden box was made by my dad. He did so about 20 years ago. I will
always remember that he is much more creative than I ever thought growing up.
I'll treasure it as long as I can and pass it on to his grandchildren when
the time comes. Thank you very much for participating. All photographers are
credited below the video in the video description. Well, you've seen six photo
ideas you can try to shoot in your homes. You can even try to submit them for a
chance to be featured in the next round of camera challenge and the deadline for
this one is April 27th 2020. You can upload the photos to ZD CAMERA
CHALLENGE Facebook group, the link is in the video description below. You
can also upload into your Instagram account and use #zdchallenge13.
Hit the thumbs up if you liked today's video and subscribe to more. If you have
any questions, comments or simply want to say hi or Ahoj, you can do so in a
comment section below and I will see you in the next video. Cau... Ahoj...