You may have heard the term "fast lenses" or "flat glass" o your photography travels, and wondered what the hell that meant, and whether that meant you had to go and get one of them too. 

In this post, I'm going to break down what fast glass actually is, and why having one in your lens arenas is a good idea!

Anyone else noticing how dark it's getting? Winter is on it's way!  As much as I love the dark evenings for a new host of shooting opportunities, one of the things I picked up last year that I had been hankering after for ages was a Canon Speedlite to help with my indoor pictures over the dark winter months. 

I thought it might be helpful for some of you to understand why you might need or want to use an external flash on some occasions, especially now that the day light hours are getting shorter! 

Are you in need of some new photography project ideas?  Here are 15 ideas to improve your photography, kick start your creativity and document your days! 

If you have been shooting for a few years like myself, it can start to feel like you are simply photographing the same things, in the same way, every day.  This is when a creative photography project can help you break out of a rut and have you capturing something different!  It not only gives you a new focus, and something new to reach for,  but it can also help improve your photography skills immensely so they are great for beginners to more seasoned photographers alike. 

For that reason, I have been thinking about tackling a new project next year (to keep me on my toes!) and thought it would be fun to share some of the photography project ideas I have come across in my travels  - see what you think....

I've covered a fair bit on lenses this past week, comparing different focal lengths and understanding lens compression, and I thought I'd rewind a bit for any new photographers, and talk about what the numbers on the lens mean. 

This was one of my very first questions I had when buying my DSLR and it took me a little while to figure out! Hopefully this post will help break this down if you are new to lenses too. 

So, let's take a look at some lenses and break down the numbers to see what they mean, and what you should look for. 

Let's start with a lens that you will often see sold as a "kit lens" with your camera:  

To get tack sharp images, one element you need to be aware of is your Aperture.  Aperture controls the depth of field - in other words, how much of your scene is going to be in focus. A smaller F number means you will have a smaller depth of field (less in focus) and a bigger F number means more will be in focus.

I have been asked many times about which aperture you should use for what, and whilst I always try to give guidance on that,  the truth is that it very depends on the camera model you have, the lens you are using, how far away you are from the subject and the distance between yourself and what you are trying to get in focus. 

When we choose a lens to take an image with,  most of the time we are looking at how much we want to fit into the frame, and far away from our subject we are. For example, if you are shooting indoors in a small room, but you want to leave in some of the surroundings to give the image context, then you are going to want to choose a shorter focal length.  If you are photographing something farther away,  like your child at sports day, you are going to want to have a longer length lens on your camera, so you can be farther back but still have the whole of your child in the frame.  In the post I did yesterday, you can see just how much more you can fit into the frame with a 35mm than a 200mm. (Check out the post on focal length comparisons if you missed it!) 

As I mentioned in that post, there is another reason for using certain lenses over and above how near or far we are from our subjects, and that is the lens compression.

I finally got around to photographing focal length comparisons again this week - I know these can be really helpful as a reference point. 

I gave up on trying to get someone to model for me - since one certain little boy wouldn't stay in the same place for long enough whilst I went through all my lenses (twice!) we have the lovely Dave as our model instead.  I'm pretty fond of Dave, he's very obliging :) 

So, each of these photos has been taken with a different lens, and therefore a different focal length,  so you can see how your field of view changes with each one. For this first set I'm sitting in the same location for each shot, just changing my lens to get the different focal lengths. (If you are wondering which lens were used you can check out the lenses here) 

Today, some tips for how to reduce noise in photos, both in camera, and in processing....

When shooting in low light conditions, we generally have to compensate for the lack of light in the scene by bumping up our ISO setting. This is great as it allows it to shoot without using flash, but the problem with using these high ISO's numbers is that it can introduce noise to your images - the stuff that looks like grain or speckles. This puts a lot of people off shooting with high ISO's, but there are a couple of things you can do to minimise the noise and get the best images in low light.

After investing all that money on your amazing new camera and lenses, it makes sense to spend a little time on DSLR maintenance to make sure that they stay in tip top condition. This is mainly so that you continue to get the best image quality and extend the life of your equipment, but it also helps should you want to sell on some of your equipment at any time. I've sold a couple of lenses now and I've gotten a pretty good price for them: lenses in particular hold their value well if you look after them.   I have a bit of a routine that I have with cleaning and maintaining - this is what I do....

If you find yourself struggling to get tack sharp photos of moving subjects, then i have a little tip for you here today that might just help!

It's called back button focus - and it's another way of focusing that is particularly good for action shots. 

Now, I have to warn you ,it's pretty confusing to begin with, and you will probably hate it at first.  I also don't recommend this until you are comfortable with focus in general, just because it can be too many things to think about at once!  But if you are a bit more experienced, you might want to give this a go. 

Here's the lowdown on back button focus. 

Whilst my home isn't exactly an rubbish tip, it's a normal family home with lots of clutter from day to day life. Many times I find myself wishing I had a home that was a bit more camera friendly (imagine, large windows, white walls, crisp clean furniture, with no lego pieces in sight and no drawing on the walls....) but you just have to learn to work with what you've got! Although for sure I sometimes love to incorporate our usual home life into my images - when I'm documenting -  for other image types I usually crave simplicity, so I try to find areas that give me that "clean" uncluttered look. 

The best way to show you that is to show you some images, and pullbacks on where I have taken them.  

Even before I started a Project 365, most days I would pick up my camera – not necessarily to get a great shot, but simply to snap the candid moments that happened throughout the day.   I've lost count of the number of times I missed a "kodak moment" because I was either fumbling with my settings,  trying to find a memory card, or wondering where the heck I'd left my camera bag! 

That's why I now have a little bit of a system in place that helps me be prepared and ready to capture anything that pops up.   Once you get into the groove of doing this, you'll find that you can quickly pick up your camera and snap away at any time! 

One way to make your compositions more interesting is to try to create triangles within your composition - they help divide the frame, guide the eye, and just add visual interest.  Although it sounds hard, these are actually very easy to find once you remember to look for them!   

Here are some examples: 

I've spoken before about using a grey card to either set your white balance or exposure, and today I thought I'd go one step further and explain the steps you take to do that!  First off, a gray card is just a piece of card that represents 18% gray - in other words the middle gray that your camera tries to expose for (See this post on understanding your light meter for more information on that)  Before I got my Expodisc, I used this one - CPM Delta 1 8 inch x 10 inch Gray Card which costs around $10 - but you can get lots of different ones which are pretty inexpensive. (I don't have it but this Pocket-sized one looks good for being a bit more portable). It doesn't really matter which one you choose, as long as they are non-reflective.

I love a simple classic portrait shot from time to time - having your subjects face as the centre of attention allows to really concentrate on their features and expressions,  and can feel much more intimate than other portrait types.  

And since it's been a while since I've done one, here's a classic "10 tips" post on them for you!