A discovery that was earlier established as a scientific pursuit in the 19th century; macro photography allowed the human eye to study images at high magnification. Bringing the phenomenon ‘larger than life’ into existence, individuals today can use macro photography to capture/study their subjects at a 1:1 sensor size and camera focus. Apart from taking world-class macro portraits, the technology is also being used for live streaming in the digital landscape. You can learn more about how to live stream using numerous tutorials over the internet. Additionally, artists should note that to determine the accurate level of magnification, the correct aspect ratio needs to be measured using a twitch banner size.

Ahead are seven expert macro photography tips and techniques which photographers can adopt for close-up wildlife photography.

Tip 1 – Choosing the Right Macro Lens

Getting up close to capturing a macro image requires using a good macro lens. They have a short focus distance (SFD), so it’s relatively designed for shooting objects up-close. Additionally, a macro lens with a 1:1 ratio is a must – as the tiniest of objects can be captured at the proper distance. With this specific lens design, photographers can observe wildlife interactions using minimum focus distance. Thus, efficiently achieve the zoom ratio using different focal lengths.

Tip 2 – Choosing a Focal Length

Due to the fixed focal length, wildlife photographers can choose between the standard lengths. They can go between 50mm, 100mm, 180mm based on their subject and other factors (lighting, distance, price, etc.) Although lighter, economical, and easily portable, the shorter focal lengths require being to their subjects. If you’re a wildlife photographer at an early stage, it’s recommended to go for an intermediate focal length (greater than 90mm). So, you can focus on optical quality at a less focusing distance.

Tip 3 – Choosing Camera Accessories

Capturing wildlife species requires tremendous effort as small creatures are fun. But more focus needs to be put on the subject to capture it at near life-size. Here is where some recommended equipment can layer an image beyond the surface.  Extension tubes, diffusers, macro rails, flashlights, tripods, amongst other specialized gear, help create sub-genres under your wildlife macro shots. A minimal investment may also trigger and transform your existing work into world-class techniques.

Tip 4 – Choosing an Appropriate Background

Living animals are more complex to capture in still life. Since one has little control over the setting (location, lighting, and even the background but not with the animals.) Photographers need to be highly static and maintain patience. They can start by laying their subject in the image against a background of their choice. Many photographers choose to keep things simple. They place their camera in front of an animal ahead of the contrasting background. So, it results in a lovely background blur. While one can even take a few incredible shots of wildflowers, bugs, etc., with an equally stunning background.

Tip 5 – Focus on Depth of the Field

Getting the right combination of sharpness and depth of field is one of the most challenging aspects of macro photography. Utilizing a smaller aperture has the disadvantage of reducing the clarity of your image. This is due to the diminished and diffracted light and less field depth that can blur important elements of your subject. If you can shoot from a perspective or angle to fit the most important or exciting parts of your subject on a single plane of focus, ensure that it remains sharp. In contrast, the background bokeh should look beautiful. Finding the largest aperture will allow you to do so without blurring your subject.

Tip 6 – Enhance Your Camera Composition

A photographer should understand how to improve their composition on-camera, whether they’re shooting macro or another form of photography. Instead of relying on post-processing to correct your composition, properly framing your subject before clicking the shutter is essential. Don’t just crop an insect photo to make it appear larger. Increase the magnification of your subject while shooting to maintain the original resolution.

Wrapping Up

Now that we’ve developed more ‘focus’ on the subject, wildlife photographers should remember that the profession is extremely rewarding despite its many novices. It becomes a skill after you’ve become used to it. And you’ll be well on your way to enhancing your images with each click of the shutter. While there are many elements to keep in mind to get a decent professional macro shot, practicing the art will only make the craft more remarkable.

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While you have the anticipation of being a photographer, you already create the momentum to be professional in this field.

Photography includes several unique trends and arts that a pro photographer can easily comprehend.

We have heard about the studio or fashion shoot branding shoots, but there is a hidden or lesser-known category in photography. That’s called headshot.

It seems a covert term, but this category of photography will help you in the long run if you have the approach to learn headshot photography tips.

Let’s delve into headshot photography.

What is a Headshot in photography?

Eager to know the term what headshot photography is and how to shoot headshots?

You don’t need to think too hard; just think about plain photography. But it certainly has some sort of rules. Headshot photography includes one person; the person’s take should be from the shoulder and, all in all, the well-lit, sharp photography at the end. That’s it!

To keep you more updated with the term, headshots are primarily taken for business and promotional activity.

Different Types of Headshot Photography You Should Know

Headshot photographer takes photos from a different perspective. Some of them take it because of self-interests, or others take it for professional purposes. Let’s see the types of headshot photography.

Entertainment

In the entertainment industry, headshots have frequently been used to portray a person’s diverse emotions for theater or acting. Successful headshots convey a positive vibe toward casting staff, and the person gets hired most of the time.

Business

A headshot can also help introduce a business. When you see the introduction of a company, their employee list gets introduced with headshot photography to better understand the employee’s face.

Branding

Branding includes the specific brand design or logo that is represented by a person to introduce a company to the public. Some companies hire a professional model or public figure to introduce their company, and for this purpose, they photoshoot the person with headshot photography.

Since a model or public figure has great face value among people, the company uses headshot photography to introduce its logo or brand design.

Fashion/Modeling Industry

In the modeling industry, headshots are called tear sheets. As the modeling or fashion industry requires better shape and appearance, headshot photography is their primary choice for hunting a deserved model.

So, their visual and look, in this case, matter the most. When their photo is taken, the production staff look for their formal look and style and how they react when the photograph is taken.

Headshot vs Portrait Photography – What’s the Difference?

Portrait and headshot images have dissimilarities in terms of the person who is being photographed. Headshot mainly portrays the upper section of a person, but the portrait can show the whole scenario. 

Detailed Photography

Headshot is not detailed photography. When a headshots photographer shoots the photo, they only take the background, subject’s face, and shoulder. So, above all, headshot photography is less detailed photography where the subject’s emotion and looks matter the most.

On the contrary, portrait photography takes all over the image and can be taken anywhere. Portrait mode takes out the background and can include several people. The portrait is quite detailed photography that overtakes headshots.

On the other hand, portrait photography includes artistic stuff and headshot portrays stricter photography due to only the face and upper section included in the whole scenario.

Formal Representation

A headshot usually provides a formal representation of the subject. A person who is willing to portray their profile or actors who represent their latest portfolio to do the modeling is meant to be categorized as a headshot.

But portrait photography provides a less formal and whole scenario of a person. Portrait provides the whole look of a person, unlike headshot. As a headshot provides only the person’s head and shoulder, a portrait always visualizes the complete shape of the person.

Representation of Composition

As headshot provides formal images, this category shows the least coloring, materials, or elements in a picture. A person only prefers to capture their casual look presented in a formal representation. In contrast, portrait photography allows diverse images that include different coloring, framing, dresses, or several persons.

In a word, a portrait pulls out different events, but headshots have less freedom to capture different events.

You might think headshot has no impact against portrait photography. Frankly, headshot and portrait both have importance in terms of the reason the photo shoot is being taken.

10 Quick Tips to Create Fascinating Headshot Photography

You can now comprehend the differences between casual photography and headshot. A better headshot can create the chance of getting your photography accepted as a business professional photo. So, the importance of creating fascinating headshot photography is a requirement.

Here are 10 professional headshot tips for your convenience. 

1. Understand the camera equipment

You need to know the correct procedure for headshot photography. But it is not a hard task to do, get your camera, get additional equipment such as a tripod or monopod or selfie stick to keep your arms in a precise place.

If you think someone else would do better photography, put the tripod or monopod aside and ask for any headshot photographer to shoot the photo. Another tip is a camera that includes outward-facing functionality is better due to better quality than an inward-facing one.

More tips for taking good headshots with camera equipment.

• Choose a camera that includes replaceable lenses
• Choose a camera with a maximum wide aperture
• Shoot with the highest shutter speed to prevent camera shaking

2. Choose the Right Subject

The subject is the crucial part of headshot photography. If the subject is not properly ready for the headshot, it won’t look professional. For professional business headshots or self-interest, casual photography is the essential part.

Your subject should wear something formal that is appropriate for headshot photography. Ask the subject to bring a couple of different outfits to try getting a better headshot. 

3. Choosing the Best Wardrobe

Try to take a snap while wearing a formal dress. Solid and single-color clothing makes the photography more lively. When you are going to take headshot photography for a professional purpose, you need to focus on the formal dress.

Formal dresses may include solid color dresses or less artistic or patterns that don’t look too striking for headshot photography.

Try not to shoot the photo with jackets or wedding dresses.

4. Separate Your Subject From the Background

Choose the headshot background as per your choice. But to choose the precise one is one of the rules that you have to retain to portray a successful headshot.

Try not to stay too close to the background if you use a studio background. While you shoot outside you need to maintain the tone and composition for a headshot.

For branding or other commercial purposes, you may assign professionals for the image background removal to create a more vibrant hint of personality display.

5. Understand the Photo Composition

Photo composition is another vital part of headshot photography. Composition defines the creativity you put in a frame. In this sense, the different elements in a photo are arranged subtly and produce the coloring, style, and all-over criteria that are required for a headshot.

In other terms, when you snap photos, you need to make sure you take the snap-in at every possible moment. Either you sit or stand in a moment where you may not notice the perfect composition unless you shoot the photo.

Take several shots and compare which one you can choose to keep. 

6. Try Different Locations

Just like the background topic, the location carries great importance. You have seen a lot of headshot images staring right at the camera screen with a gray background. But this trend has been quite obsolete. People prefer to take the shot in different locations these days.

Let’s have a look at the list below for different locations.

• Public park or bench where you can easily sit & take a shot
• Buildings in the background of a street
• Trees and beach in the background
• Office environment 

7. Play with Color Psychology

Try with different lighting on the subject is a great initiative to get better headshots. Whether you snap business headshot photos or just for self-interest, the color composition authenticates the headshot more efficiently. 

• Take natural lighting on the subject
• Use a diffuser to make it more natural
• Create shadows, but not too harsh on the subject

8. Take Multiple Shoot

Multiple shots with different headshot photo pose create the chances of providing better output. Snap as many photos as you can if you have the right camera.

Whether you go for corporate headshot poses or the best headshots, you better always count on taking multiple shots. Later, observe for the precise one and fine-tune later to make it ready.

Headshot is all about-face. You don’t need to think twice while taking shots. Just take a few positions and take the shoot with your handheld camera. If your headshots go to any client or for any company profile, shoot with every position you can.

Your all-over shots seemingly would register as a headshot.

If your subject is not comfortable getting in front of a camera, you can let your subject have a seat. Some people would not feel shy or uncomfortable when they sit. Just make sure the subject has still looked in the camera and no wrinkles in clothing.

9. Pay Attention to Small Things

To get better output, for a headshot, you need to make sure of the exact positioning and create the right focus on the subject. Pay attention to the subject and the whole environment it has.

Make sure you have a precise look at the camera. Sometimes the person cannot properly focus on the camera to provide a formal look for headshots. In this case, ask the person how he can comfortably pose for the camera. Take snaps of different poses for the person and observe which one you should go for. 

• Ensure placing head & shoulder precisely
• Precise color matching and background
• Create the right mood, smiling, focusing the eye
• Capture and fine-tune for better result

10. Post-Processing

The post-processing includes the necessary steps for headshot photo editing. While you snap a headshot, you might find some little issues that you can cover up with editing. You may need some color correction, retouching, background fixing, replacing, masking to make the headshot photograph perfect for use.

You need to pay attention to eye focus, hair, and especially head positioning. For casual lighting effects or general editing, you can use photo editing tools like Colorcinch or get headshot photo retouching from professionals to achieve industry-standard photos.

FAQs:

How much should a photographer charge for headshots?

Photographers should charge for headshots based on production, outfits, shooting length, the experience of the photographer. So, the average cost would range from $50 to $1000+.

What is the Best Lens for Headshot Photography?

The best lens for headshot photography is the portrait-length lens. As this type of lens prevent distortion and restrain the depth of field, these lenses are superior. 

What is the Best Focal Length for Headshots Photography?

Popular focal lens lengths for headshot photography are 105mm, 135mm & 85mm. But 50mm focal length is the most preferable among headshot photographers.

What is the Best Color to Wear for a Headshot?

Solid colors are the best choice for headshot photography. Darker or simple patterns and textures are also a great choice. 

Final Verdict

Headshot photography is an appealing part of photography. Though some may find it a rather tedious type of photography, it is always in great demand among specific people. When it comes to instant photography, undoubtedly, a headshot will be a great deal.

We hope our comprehensive tips will emphasize and motivate people who have a passion for headshot photography.

About Guest Author: Amy Grace

Amy is a freelance article writer for photography, photo editing, and eCommerce niches. Working in commercial photography for some years has made her experienced in this field. And now, she is utilizing her learned skills through writing. She has collaborated with some renowned websites. Apart from these, Amy loves traveling.

The post Ultimate Guide to Headshot Photography appeared first on Photo to Cartoon – Cartoonize Yourself & Create Avatar Characters for Free.

What is Self Portrait Photography?

Whenever we come across the term “self portrait photograph”, many think of selfies. Technically, selfies too are a form of self portraits but that’s not where the vastness of self portraiture ends.

Today, everyone has a cell phone with them, and that has helped a lot in making selfies popular. But, you might be surprised to know that the first self portrait was taken around the 1800s.

Self portrait photography is a much more mature genre of photography in itself. It’s a genre of photography where the photographers portray themselves as the focal subject of their images.

Self portrait photography is not just about giving a pose by staring at the camera. It is about creative expression, having fun, and even recreating yourself.

What do You Need for Self Portrait Photography?

1. Camera

What camera you use hardly ever matters. However, for self portrait photography, it helps if you have a camera with a screen that flips forwards. This way, you can be absolutely sure about the composition.

Also, many modern cameras have features that put priority on the face and even on the eye. If you’re getting yourself a camera for self portrait photography as a priority, check if such features are available.

2. Tripod or a Gorillapod

Since you, the photographer, would be in front of the camera, you’ll need a tripod to compose your shot. You could use any stable surface but the flexibility will be greatly compromised.

Alternatively, you can even opt for a gorillapod for greater portability and creative angles.

3. A Remote Shutter Release

If you want to concentrate on getting the best self portrait photographs, investing in a wireless remote shutter release is a very good idea. This way, you can trigger the shutter easily while being in the frame.

Luckily, they aren’t very expensive either. And once you buy one,  you can also use it in other genres of photography like landscape photography, portrait photography, and long exposure photography amongst others.

If you do opt to use the self-timer, keep in mind that you’ll have to hurry up and run to the frame every time after pressing the shutter button. There’s a high chance of making mistakes this way, and it is very inefficient. So, it’s better if you avoid it.

10 Creative Self Portrait Photography Tips

Now that you have an understanding of what self portrait photography is and what all you need to take one, let’s go ahead and see what kind of self portraits you can take.

We have put together these 10 creative self portrait photography tips that will take your self portraits to the next level.

1. Take a Moody Self Portrait with Side Lighting

A mistake that many photographers make when taking self portraits (or even regular portraits) is to always have the light coming in from the front of the subject.

Having the light source in front of you will make you squint and even create unflattering shadows. A good idea is to thus have the light coming in from the side. The shadows and highlights will add to the mood of the image and you’ll appear much more flattering.

2. Self Portrait Photography Using a Mirror

A fun way to take self portrait images is to use a mirror to photograph yourself. Mirrors can help you create interesting perspectives. From a composition standpoint, they also do a great job of framing you which helps in drawing the viewers’ eyes.

Whether you want to show the camera or not is your choice. For this, you’ll need to be extra careful and check the angle of the mirror, and the placement of your camera.

3. Use Gobos

Gobos are anything that you can use to cast shadows on your face. They usually have a regular pattern with a series of openings and blockages.

By placing a gobo near the light source, you can create interesting shadow patterns on your face. You could place anything like a lace, curtain, window frame, or even a fruit basket.

As you can see, the shadows help in adding depth to the image while also making the image much more interesting to look at.

If you already have a portrait of yourself that could benefit from some shadows, you can easily do so using one of many shadow overlays in Colorcinch. Here’s how:

Step 1: Upload the image to Colorcinch.

Step 2: Navigate to Overlays – Shadows.

Step 3: Choose from the various shadow overlays then click on the Settings icon. You can also fine-tune the shadow using the different Blend Mode settings. If needed, you can also Rotate and/or Flip the shadow to better suit the image. Finally, adjust the opacity of the shadow and click Apply.

Here’s how the image appears after we apply a shadow overlay:

4. Self Portraits Don’t Have to Be Boring

A great way to spice up your self portraits can be to add some action to your shot. Use a wide-angle lens, set a fast shutter speed, and let your energy out.

Jump, dance, laugh, play with your hair, simply go crazy. Doing so will not only make your images lively but will also release some happy hormones to make you feel better.

5. Self Portrait Photography Using Props

Props are a great way to make your images appear a lot more interesting. They even help you make a statement and take a break from everyday life.

Don’t be afraid to go over the top and even use heavy makeup if you want to. If you’re not good at styling and makeup, you can always ask your friends and family to help.

6. Take a Self Portrait Using Long Exposure

The long exposure photography technique is not something that photographers often use to take self portraits. Nonetheless, You can still use this technique to take self portrait images that truly stand out.

Close all the curtains and turn off all the lights in your room. Set the camera’s shutter speed to around 5 seconds and slowly move your face after triggering the shutter.

Depending on how fast or slow you move, you may or may not be recognizable. In any case, the image will surely turn out epic.

7. Use Double Exposure for Self Portrait Pictures

Double exposure is a photography technique in which we can overlap two different images, one over the other, to come up with a single image.

In the days of the film, this was achieved by photographing two different images using the same film. These days, some cameras offer the option to do so in the camera itself, otherwise, you can easily do so in post.

Here’s how you can use Colorcinch for the double exposure effect.

Step 1: Upload your first image to Colorcinch.

Step 2: Navigate to Image Manager – Upload Image. Browse to the second image that you want to overlay with and click on Upload.

Step 3: Find the image you just uploaded in the Your Images section. Click on it and then click on Add to Project to load it on top of your original image. Alternatively, you can drag the image to your workspace. Use the controls on the image to rotate and resize the image.

Step 4: Click on Layer Properties to open the Layer Properties dialog box. You can then experiment with the different Blend Mode and Opacity settings to fine-tune your image.

Here’s how the final result looks like after we set the Blend Mode to Screen and dropped the Opacity to 85%.

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Fireworks photography is a great way to freeze a moment that you’ll probably remember for the rest of your life. After all, it’s not that we get to see the spectacular shows every day.

But we must admit, as fun, as it is to watch fireworks shows, photographing them, is not everyone’s affair. You need to have some level of technical know-how, and loads of patience to take bedazzling photos of fireworks.

In this article, we’ll share a simple guide that’ll help you take some spectacular firework photos.

Fireworks Photography Gear

Since the lighting condition is a bit challenging when shooting fireworks, we need to be a bit picky when selecting our gears. Let’s see what we’d ideally like to work with.

1. Camera for Fireworks Photography

You can use any camera for photographing fireworks. You just need to make sure that the camera allows you to dial in the settings manually. Having a bulb mode is a big plus but not mandatory.

2. Which Lens to Use for Fireworks Photography?

The selection of lenses for fireworks photography basically depends on two factors:

• how far you are from the fireworks venue
• whether you want to isolate the fireworks or include any foreground

If the fireworks show is happening around your vicinity, then you’ll do fine with a wide-angle lens; something in the range of 16-24mm. But if you’re pretty far away, you’ll need to go a little telephoto; in the range of 24-70mm or even longer depending on the distance.

Similarly, if you plan to shoot the fireworks while including some foreground element (landscape or cityscapes) then carry a wide-angle lens with you. If you intend to isolate the fireworks, you’ll need to go longer; something in the range of 200mm.

3. Other Accessories for Fireworks Photography

Tripod

As you’ll see later, we need to set the camera to take long exposures photos for fireworks photography. And when we do so, even the slightest camera shake will render the image useless.

Get yourself a sturdy tripod with an adjustable head and that will make your life so much easier when taking fireworks photos.

Remote Shutter Release

Usually, we use the camera’s shutter release button to take the photo. But as we highlighted earlier it is quintessential that we minimize any kind of camera shake.

We may not realize it but when we press the shutter button, we introduce a bit of shake to it. An alternative is thus to use a remote shutter release (either wired or wireless) that’ll let us trigger the shutter without even touching the camera.

Camera Settings for Fireworks Photography

Aperture: To ensure that most of the scene is in focus, we need a greater depth of field. A good starting point is thus to start from f/8 and use an even higher f-number if required.

Shutter speed: Since fireworks are unpredictable, a good strategy is to set the camera to bulb mode. When you use this mode, you can start and stop the shutter at your will using the shutter release or by pressing the shutter release button.

But in case your camera does not have a bulb bode, set the shutter speed between 5-10 seconds and take the photo. If required, go up to 15 seconds.

ISO: Set the ISO to the camera’s native value which is ISO 100 for most of the cameras. This will ensure that the images are clean even in the darker regions of the photo.

How to Take Fireworks Photos

Here’s a simple step-by-step guide you can use to photograph fireworks.

Step 1: Compose your image by setting up your camera on a tripod

Step 2: Switch the lens over to manual focus mode, set it to focus at infinity, and leave it there for the rest of the show

Step 3: Dial in the camera settings and engage the shutter using the remote shutter release when you notice the fireworks being launched

Step 4: Once the firework has died off, press the shutter button on the remote shutter release again to close the shutter

Step 5: Review the image

When you review the image, if you find that the image is overexposed, you can increase the f-number (for instance, from f/8 to f/11). And if it is too dark, try reducing the f-number (for instance f/8 to f/5.6) or increasing the ISO.

You can also make subtle changes to the brightness of the fireworks using the highlights adjustment feature in Colorcinch. Here’s how you can do it:

Step 1: Upload the image to Colorcinch

Step 2: Navigate to Edit – Exposure

Step 3: To brighten the fireworks, push the Highlights slider to the right. Similarly, if you want to brighten the darker regions, push the Shadows slider to the right and then click on Apply

Here’s a before/after for your reference:

5 Tips for Fireworks Photography

Now that you know about the fundamentals of taking fireworks photographs, let’s have a look at 5 simple tips that will help you make your fireworks photography even better.

1. Reach the Venue EARLY

Finding the best vantage point is the key ingredient to taking fireworks photos that really pop. And for this, you’ll need to reach the site early – really early.

Depending on how popular the site is, you may even need to be there 1-2 hours early. Find a good spot where no one else will pop out of nowhere in your frame, or stumble on your setup accidentally.

Use the time you have in finding the best composition and setting up your camera.

2. Use an Interesting Foreground Element

Fireworks are fun for sure, however, photos of just the fireworks in action appear bland. People cannot connect with your image if you photograph just the fireworks going off.

A better idea thus is to compose your image in such a way that you include interesting foreground elements like the city’s skyline, some popular landmark, or even a landscape.

This way your fireworks photos will appear much more appealing.

3. Make the Most Out of the Early Bits of the Show

If you’re quick in taking photos of the fireworks early on, then chances are high that you would’ve already grabbed your best photos from the night.

As the fireworks show progresses, the accumulated smoke, unless blown away by a breeze, usually shows up in the photos. And as you might’ve guessed, they do not look good.

So, be sure to start photographing from early on.

4. Use Mirror Lock-up or Silent Shooting

Earlier, we discussed using a remote shutter to minimize camera shake. But there’s one more way DSLRs introduce camera shake when taking photos – through mirror slap.

In DSLRs, when we click the shutter button, the mirror first moves out of the way to let the light pass to the sensor. This movement causes a vibration that can blur the image during long exposures.

A very simple remedy is to go to your camera settings and enable the Mirror Lock-up function. This will introduce a slight delay between the mirror being raised and the sensor being exposed thereby nullifying the effect.

Mirrorless users don’t have to worry about this as the camera doesn’t have a mirror box. You can however enable Silent shooting mode that will trigger the sensor electronically and get rid of any vibration caused by the shutter movement.

5. Disable Stabilization

You read that right, disable any form of in-body or lens image stabilization. When you mount the camera on a tripod this isn’t necessary.

In fact, having the stabilization enabled while the camera is mounted on a tripod can introduce unwanted results. This is because the stabilizers try to compensate for vibrations that do not exist.

To Sum it Up

Fireworks photography is something that we can take as a form of refreshment. It is therefore important that you take a moment to actually enjoy the show.

Don’t stress yourself as it is not possible for anyone to photograph each and every firework that’s displayed. Mastering fireworks photography does require a bit of practice and a ton of patience.

So, don’t get frustrated rather too soon. Have fun!

The post Dazzling Fireworks Photography: Understanding the Essentials appeared first on Photo to Cartoon – Cartoonize Yourself & Create Avatar Characters for Free.

Nature is the best healer there is and nature photography is one of the best hobbies one can possibly have. Whether you’re a photographer or not, you can’t stop yourself from taking nature photos. This shows how we can’t cease ourselves from appreciating nature.

Nature photography isn’t only about photographing landscapes. It can include taking pictures of even the smallest belonging of nature.

Whether you photograph the grand vistas or a tiny insect, it can still be considered nature photography. The genre of nature photography is thus very broad.

Within this broad scope of photography, there are various other sub-genres that are magnificent in themselves. So, whether you’re a beginner or a seasoned pro, nature has everything for you to photograph.

Types of Nature Photography

1. Landscape Photography

Landscape photography is one of the most popular types of nature photography out there. This includes photographing the grand mountain vistas, the hills, rivers, lakes, and waterfalls amongst others.

2. Woodland Photography

As the name suggests, woodland photography is all about being inside a woodland to capture the vegetation and other natural elements there. Unlike in landscape photography, you get a very limited space here depending on the vegetation density.

3. Wildlife Photography

Another very popular type of photography within nature photography is wildlife photography. This includes taking photos of birds, animals, and insects in their natural habitat.

4. Macro Photography

Macro photography is about capturing small subjects in photographs that are near-to-life-size. This genre of photo requires specialized macro lenses that have the ability to focus very near and are very sharp.

While macro photography too has a wider scope, it wouldn’t be wrong to consider that a majority of the macro subjects tend to be natural elements like flowers and insects.

10 Handy Tips for Nature Photography

Now that you’re acquainted with the major types of nature photography, you know that there’s a lot you can photograph in nature. So, it is a good idea to prepare yourself for a couple of those genres whenever you’re planning to spend some time in nature.

Whether you’re a beginner or an enthusiast, keep these 10 nature photography tips handy to shoot some beautiful images of nature.

1. Choose the Right Lens for Nature Photography

Your choice of the lens makes a huge difference when taking nature pictures. Depending on what you’re planning to shoot, it’s important that you take the right lens with you. Here are some use cases:

2. Best Camera for Nature Photography

With every new iteration of cameras, manufacturers claim their cameras to be the best. But keep in mind that there is nothing such as the best camera.

Instead, when deciding to get a camera for nature photography, think of what you want to do with the results and get the right camera. These days, even the most basic cameras are feature-packed and should suffice for your everyday need.

You can refer to the graphic below and decide on what sort of camera you should get for taking nature photos.

3. Enhance Your Nature Photos with Filters

Filters are physical pieces of glasses that you put in front of the lens for a certain effect. Let’s have a look at the three most common filters used in nature photography.

Neutral Density (ND) Filter

They work like sunglasses for the camera and simply cut down the light intensity. They come in various strengths like 2-stop, 4-stop, or 10-stop ND filters where higher value represents higher strength. They’re useful when you want to take long-exposure images during the day.

If you’ve seen landscape photos with silky smooth water in rivers or waterfalls, or smooth clouds and ocean waves, they were taken using an ND filter.

Graduated Neutral Density (ND) Filter

A common challenge we face during landscape photography is the difference in light intensity between the sky and the landscape. The bright sky and the darker land result in a scene with a high dynamic range that is difficult for cameras to capture.

A simple solution is to make the sky a bit darker by using an ND filter that is only partially darkened at the top. Such a partially darkened ND filter is called a graduated ND filter.

Polarizer Filter

When photographing nature, reflections can be a real issue. The light reflecting off of the water surface or even the leaves can cause glare and reduce the contrast in the image.

A polarizer filter works by blocking the rays of light from the reflection thereby getting rid of it. The resulting image is thus clear and a bit punchier and saturated.

4. Select Your Aperture for Nature Photography Wisely

If you’re familiar with how aperture works, you should remember that a higher f-value will result in a greater area of the scene being in focus, and a lower f-value will have a smaller region of the scene in focus.

So, based on what kind of nature photography you’re doing, you’ll need to set your aperture accordingly. A narrower aperture (high f-value) like f-8, f-11, or f/13 is idle for genres like landscape photography or woodland photography where you want everything in sharp focus.

Also, since macro lenses have a very shallow depth of field, you must use a higher f-value for most parts of the subject to be in focus.

On the other hand, in cases where you want to isolate the subject from its surrounding, use a smaller f-value like f/2.8. If you have a lens with a long focal length like 200mm, then even a higher aperture like f/4 can isolate the subject beautifully.

5. Set the Correct Shutter Speed for Nature Photography

Like aperture, your choice of shutter speed also varies with the subject you’re dealing with.

When the scene is static, and there is minimal or no chance that your subject(s) will move, you can do away with using a slower shutter speed. For instance, your mountains are going nowhere, so even a slow shutter speed like 1s should be manageable considering that you use a tripod.

However, if the conditions are windy, you need to counter the movement of the waves, shaky branches, and leaves with a faster shutter speed like 1/125s or faster. Otherwise, they’ll appear blurry.

In the case of lively subjects like flying birds or a running leopard, go with a fast shutter speed of at least 1/1000s. Depending on the speed of their movement, you may need to go even faster.

6. Add a Human for Scale

When taking nature photos, it is sometimes a good idea to include a person in the frame to add a bit of human touch. This not only makes the viewer feel as if they’re there but also gives a sense of how grand nature actually is.

But, instead of having them pose facing towards the camera, make sure that you take a candid photo. It adds authenticity. And make sure to shoot wide to actually show how small we humans are in front of nature.

7. Shoot Moody Nature Photos

When photographing nature, a common mistake that beginners make is in shooting only in perfect conditions. However, when you go out to shoot when conditions are more than ideal, you’ll end up with some gorgeous moody images.

So, don’t wait for the sky to clear up and use the clouds to add mood to your photos. Foggy conditions also add so much value to the image. Similarly, if you get an opportunity to photograph birds in the rain, you’ll see how easily your photos will stand out from the rest.

If you already have a beautiful nature image that you have taken but want to add a certain mood to it, there’s a way you can do so in Colorcinch.

Using the various overlays available in Colorinch, you can add sun flare and haze, snowfall, rainfall, and even fog. Let’s see how it works. For demonstration purposes, let’s go ahead and add some fog to a boring landscape image.

Here’s how you can do it:

Step 1: Upload the image to Colorcinch

Step 2: Click on Overlays and then on Fog

Step 3: From the various fog overlays that are available, select the one that. best suits the image and adjust its intensity using the slider, then click on Apply

See how the image appears so lively after adding the fog effect. You can use the same method to add other overlays using Colorcinch easily.

8. Get Your Nature Photography Composition Right

While nature’s beauty can definitely mesmerize you, don’t make the mistake of framing everything in the center. Try out the various photography composition guides, shoot from different perspectives, and you’ll definitely land higher number of keepers.

When photographing nature, these basic composition techniques work brilliantly:

• Rule of thirds
• Leading lines
• Symmetry
• Contrast
• Use of layers

Be sure to go through our composition techniques guide and try out some of them for the best results.

9. Shoot in the Right Light

The best time to photograph nature and natural subjects is during the golden hour for sure. The light is soft, wraps around the landscape and the subjects beautifully, and it even adds a gentle glow to them.

However, if you’re looking to photograph some high-contrast nature photos, don’t be afraid to photograph during mid-day either.

10. PLAN Your Outing Carefully

Remember, when you’re out in nature, you are at her mercy. You have no control over what nature has for you so planning is pivotal.

Check the weather conditions, study the animal behavior, use tools like Google Earth, Photopills, or Photo Ephemeris to study the lighting and avoid any guesswork.

Also, don’t forget to dress properly, and carry the essentials, and some extra battery with you.

To Sum It Up

Nature photography can be one of the most rewarding genres of photography. And it doesn’t stop there.

Not only do you get jaw-dropping photos, but being in the arms of nature also helps you with your physical and mental fitness.

If you’re looking forward to getting started with photography, nature photography is one of the best ways to do so. Give it a shot and be sure to try out at least some of the tips that we discussed here.

The post 10 Nature Photography Tips to Improve Your Photos appeared first on Photo to Cartoon – Cartoonize Yourself & Create Avatar Characters for Free.

Why it’s important to optimize images for online resources

Image SEO is often underrated, although the benefits of optimizing images for organic search are really worth the time and effort it takes. With well-optimized images, your site will most likely rank higher across all search engines.

Google offers not only image results, but also a number of rich results enhanced with cover images, thumbnails, and carousels.

Most popular search engines, from Google to Yahoo and Yandex, incorporate reverse image search, highlight trending images, and suggest images broadly matching your search query.

Images have always been the peculiarity of Bing where search results include captivating sceneries of high resolution and artistic value.

Moreover, strong profiles on image-sharing platforms always occupy top results for relevant queries. For example, Pinterest profiles lead for crafts and art, and Instagram profiles show up for pop stars, actors, and public figures.

Tip: the first place to check what images are ranking on your site and for what keywords, use Google Search Console, go to the Search Results > Search type: Images.

Inspect closer, what pages contain ranging images, top queries coming from organic search for them, device types, search appearance (if the data is available). Plus, refreshing old posts with new content and images, per recent SEO insights, can surge organic traffic by up to 111%. Then proceed to optimize your images to attain even better results in organic search.

Without further ado, let’s take a look into nuances of image search optimization that will do good to your website SEO.

10 Tips for image optimization to get more organic traffic

1. Add keywords in captions, image titles, and alt text

Naming images, you write captions for people and alt texts for bots. Alt texts ensure accessibility to images when they are not loaded properly, or when users run screen readers because of visual impairment.

Captions to images are nice to have, but not mandatory. You may leave an image without a caption, and that will be okay if the image is eloquent by itself. Whereas without an alt text, it would be hard for bots and crawlers to identify what’s in the image.

So, add alt texts to images and include your major keywords in them (that’s also a nice place to fit in a couple of long-tail keywords).

The same goes for captions, the file name, and the URL under which the image can be found — use keywords in them, make them human- and search-engines-friendly.

Mind that your alt texts shouldn’t be keyword stuffed. It’s no use adding lots-lots-lots of keywords under one image alt text. Use 3 to 5 words (or 160 characters maximum), separated by hyphens (not underscores).

Besides, you should avoid using the same alt text for all your images on a page because it might be treated as duplication and ignored by the ranking algorithm.

2. Place images in a relevant context

First of all, you should optimize image placement on the page if you want it to be closely linked with your ranking content. Place important images at the top of the page. The snippet for ranking results may be formed from the first images’ alt text. 

Google may generate the text snippet in the search results for the image from the context around it. Besides, page quality content is vital for ranking images. So, it’s important to place the image in a relevant context and make sure your text matches the image. You can use a content brief generator to help with this.

3. Compress and convert images for faster loading

While images may take up over 50% of your page weight, it’s crucial to make them load as fast as possible. Page speed score is important for your website’s on-page SEO. It’s been a ranking factor to Google since its PageSpeed algorithm rolled out in 2017 and Page Experience Update in 2021.

For image optimization, you need to consider the following image characteristics: format, size, quality, and aspect ratio.

There is always a tradeoff between the image quality and load speed on the web. Most often, you will need to compress your images and convert them into a web-friendly format, which always happens at the expense of image quality.

Depending on the user’s screen resolution, images saved in lossy formats may look just as good as the original images or may contain artifacts, look blurry, etc.

Proper website maintenance is also key to ensuring fast page load times.

Most popular image formats

There are pretty many formats for image storing and processing, with two globally recognized image formats being JPEG and PNG. Both are pretty enough for the web, you will only see the difference if you zoom in or print them out. JPEG allows a combination of lossy and lossless compression to reduce the file size and preserve image quality for the majority of user screens. The PNG format does lossless compression, preserves the finest details and background transparency.

Besides, there are a number of next-generation formats like JPEG2000 or WebP format. WebP makes images one-fourth smaller than ordinary JPEG while preserving good quality.

Tip: Use tools like Colorcinch for image compression and conversion to reduce their size.

For company logos, sites commonly have SVG vector graphics format which allows editing sizes with CSS styles. 

If you need animated media, avoid GIFs: the quality is low, the image size is larger than an analogical video would be. So it’s a nice idea to replace GIFs with explainer video.

4. Apply lazy-loading to images

For faster loading of a page, use lazy-loading on images. Your visual content won’t be loaded straightaway once users bump on the page, but only when they scroll down until the place where images are located. Lazy-loading is recommended on all heavy resources, such as large images, image galleries, or videos. This saves up milliseconds of loading the Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), one of the three Core Web Vitals metrics, that made part of this year’s Page Experience Update.

5. Serve images via CDNs

For site speed optimization, use CDN (content delivery network) for images. A CDN is a network of servers in different locations that serve content to the visitor from the nearest location. The CDN caches static content (like HTML, CSS styles, Java scripts that are permanent), stores them in different servers, and renders them upon request. Apart from that, image CDNs may include various tasks: for example, you can define that PNG image format would convert to WebP format on the go, as it loads much faster. CDNs work especially well for sites with worldwide audiences and drastic surges in traffic.

6. Make your images look good on all device types

An important UX factor is compatibility with different types of devices (as you probably know, in 2021 the number of mobile searches globally surpasses the number of those coming from desktops). In fact, mobile-friendliness and user experience became important ranking factors years ago, with the Mobile Friendliness update. So you’ve got to make sure that your images are rendered properly on all device types.

Tip: run the Mobile-Friendly Test, a free tool from Google. Paste the URL of your page and check how it looks on various devices and platforms, and what issues may impact user experience.

All information about the image is stored in your HTML under the <img> tag. The src attribute shows the path where the image is stored on your server.

<img src=”photo_jardindulux.jpg” alt=”Jardin du Luxemburg”>

You can also add srcset parameter in img tags for high-resolution screens.

The srcset attribute lets you define a list of images of different sizes from which the browser will then pick the best image to render on a particular device. This helps to serve images appropriately to the viewport size, user preferences, network connection, etc. Images are separated with commas, the descriptor for the srcset attribute may indicate images’ density, or width, and size.

<img srcset=”your-keyword-320w.jpg,
your-keyword-480w.jpg 1.5x,
your-keyword-640w.jpg 2x”
src=”your-keyword-320w.jpg” alt=”Your long-tail keyword”>

Use responsive CRMs

You may use a responsively designed CRM which does all calculations on the fly. But this may again affect your page experience score. When you do not allocate the height and width of an image, the browser calculates it, and in the meanwhile does not load the image instantly. However, if the image is loaded after the user started to interact with the text, there appears a shift in the content, which Google detects as the Cumulative Layout Shift. The CLS score is part of Core Web Vitals metrics that are directly linked to ranking.

7. Add structured data to get featured in rich results

Adding structured data will make your pages highlighted on search results with an image snippet. For visual content, Google supports structured data for products, recipes, and videos. Follow the structured data guidelines because violation of the rules (or unintentional mistakes in the markup) may formulate conflicting instructions and ultimately lead to Google penalties.

For social media, there’s an Open Graph protocol that makes any page a rich result in a social graph. Adding <meta property=”og:image” content=”image URL” /> in the <head> tag will instruct your images to be displayed in social media shares on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.

There is also ImageObject Schema markup, usually for embedded media, which is used to provide additional information about the image.

You can use Google’s Structured Data Helper to add the data, test them with the test tool for structured data, as well as test a page for eligibility to show up in rich results.

8. Add images to your XML sitemap

Google recommends adding an XML image sitemap so that all your resources are crawled and indexed by the search robot. A sitemap is a list of all your images’ URLs and metadata containing essential information about them. There’s an option to add images to your existing sitemap or create a separate XML image sitemap.

Mind that Sitemaps should be no more than 50 MB with 50,000 URLs maximum. The image sitemap contains information about the image type, title, alt text, and geolocation.

Tip: to have all stuff checked in one place, try WebSite Auditor. With the help of this site audit tool, you will discover all your broken images, empty alt texts, image links, both internal and external, check all your pages’ Core Web Vitals scores, audit the structured data, and OpenGraph markup. There are in-built webmaster tools to generate XML sitemaps and robots.txt files. And run Rank Tracker which is a keyword research tool that finds images ranking in rich results on SERPs.

9. Keep your visual content original

Images may also cause duplication issues. For the search engine reveals duplicates, it may downgrade or remove the resources from results completely. There are great photo stocks like Flickr, Getty Images, or Shutterstock where you can find a lot of picturesque images allowed for commercial use free of charge or under creative commons licenses. Odds are high that the same photo appears on a couple of dozen more websites. It’s up to you to name the images properly but do all the necessary author and source attribution.

To check where else the image has been published on the web, run a reverse image search. Most popular SEs have it, also, there are specialized reverse image search engines like TinEye.

Don’t overdo with stock photos because too many of them in one category of your site will make it look lifeless. It’s better to have a person inside a picture than still life objects, to show dynamic rather than static images, and so on, because images carry a powerful message and increase the click-through rate on the article. So try to be unique, use original images whenever possible. Don’t forget about great free cultural projects like the New York Public Library or Google Art’s & Culture library that expose thousands of world-famous artworks in high resolution.

10. Provide metadata for image attribution

Photos usually contain metadata recorded in Exif standard photo that tells a lot to Google about where the image was taken, by what equipment, and in what conditions. The information helps search engines and tools discover a lot more than a human can find out. Metadata are sometimes edited for fears to breach privacy. For SEO, metadata are sometimes removed to reduce the size of an image.

In regards to SEO, you can add metadata information about your brand copyright, just in case it matters. You can utilize this SEO checker to analyze and optimize your website’s performance for better search engine rankings.

Hope these tips will help your images get more coverage on search engines and get tons of additional free traffic.

The post How to Optimize Images for SEO appeared first on Photo to Cartoon – Cartoonize Yourself & Create Avatar Characters for Free.

There are several WordPress gallery plugins online.

Sadly, not all of them give exceptional results.

Some of these plugins slow down the speed of websites. Others come with fewer customization options. And most of the time, you would have to go over a series of tutorials to create your first gallery.

Working with a WordPress gallery plugin doesn’t have to be so hectic.

In short, everyone should be able to create a clean, fast-loading gallery in under 5 minutes.

Wondering if this is even possible?

Well, in this guide, I’ll be unveiling a simple (but powerful) WordPress gallery plugin you could use to build gorgeous galleries in record time.

Say hello to Modula!

Modula: A Clean, Highly Customizable WordPress Gallery Plugin

Modula is a top-rated WordPress gallery plugin that’s easy to use, highly customizable, and mobile-responsive.

Packed with loads of features, Modula helps photographers and creatives build outstanding portfolios and add stylish video/photo galleries to their WordPress website in only a few clicks.

Modula has both a free and paid version. 

The free version comes with everything you’ll need to create your first beautiful gallery. 

The premium version comes with additional functionalities that further protect your files, speed up your website, and make your galleries appear much more unique.

Modula Lite vs. Pro: Features Overview

Whether you are a photographer looking to sell photos online or a creative looking to showcase some of your best work, Modula has the perfect set of features for you.

Modula Lite comes with lots of great features that allow you to:

• Create a stunning photo gallery and add a variety of styles
• Add and customize image captions
• Add social share buttons to your gallery so visitors can easily distribute your gorgeous work across various social media platforms
• Optimize your images to make your galleries load faster
• Customize your gallery further using CSS

Modula Pro allows you to do much more. 

In addition to the list above, Modula Pro enables you to:

• Enable/disable image filtering/sorting
• Choose from 40+ hover & loading effects to spice up your gallery
• Create stunning video galleries by importing videos from YouTube & Vimeo
• Group your media files into albums to have an organized gallery
• Import & re-use the settings from your existing galleries when creating new ones
• Grant access to multiple users so they can also edit, add and delete galleries
• Make files in your gallery downloadable (and not just viewable)
• Set up EXIF metadata to display alongside your images in the lightbox
• Add a “zoom” option that enables visitors to zoom in/out of your images when it displays in the lightbox
• Password protect your galleries and allow only a few people to access your files
• Turn your galleries into sliders and enable an option that allows your images to display as a slideshow
• Deactivate the right-click mouse function, thereby preventing people from downloading your images (without your permission)
• Automatically add a watermark to every photo in your library
• Create unique indexable URLs for images in your galleries to make them rank in Google for specific keywords
• Speed up your website by optimizing your images even better
• Link out to other galleries using a shortcode and without having to create a dedicated page for them

Creating Your First Gallery using Modula Lite

Ready to build your first Modula gallery?

Below are the easy steps to follow.

Step 1: Install/Activate the Modula Plugin

Assuming you already have your WordPress hosting provider picked out and the website set up, open your WordPress dashboard and navigate to Plugins – Add New.

Type “Modula” into the search bar and then install the plugin. 

Remember to activate it afterward.

Step 2: Create a Gallery

Navigate to Modula – Galleries – Add New to create your first gallery. 

Next, name your gallery and then upload the photos you’d like to appear in it. 

If you already have these images in your WordPress media files, import them from there. Otherwise, upload the photos from your PC.

You can rearrange the images by dragging them around.

Step 3: Customize Your Gallery

After adding photos, scroll down the page to find the gallery settings.

Modula Lite limits the features you can access. Nonetheless, the free version still allows you to edit your gallery’s appearance, add image captions, enable social sharing buttons, and optimize your images.

Step 4: Save & Publish Your Gallery 

After tweaking the settings, click on Save Gallery.

Next, copy the shortcode and paste it wherever you want the gallery to appear.

You should have a beautiful gallery that looks like this:

And when someone clicks on an image, it appears like this:

Unlocking More Features with Modula Pro

You can gain access to the premium version of Modula for as low as $25 to unlock even more advanced features. See the pricing plans here.

After purchasing Modula Pro, download the .zip files emailed to you (or ones on your Modula dashboard) and upload them to your WordPress website (as plugins). The files should include both the main plugin and a series of add-ons (only available to premium users). 

Modula Pro works perfectly only when you have the free version installed also. Be sure to install/activate the free plugin before installing the premium version.

After installing the premium plugin and add-ons, navigate to Modula – Settings and then input your license key.

Quick Tip: Instead of uploading Modula Pro and the add-ons manually, you could install only the Modula Pro plugin, activate your license key, and then install the add-ons via Modula – Extensions.

Now, you should have access to additional features. 

Having activated your license, you can now password protect your gallery, create video galleries, make your galleries display as a slideshow, create albums, add loading/hover effects, and do other advanced customizations.

Modula WordPress Gallery Plugin: A Smart Option?

There are several free & premium WordPress gallery plugins available. 

But if you’re looking for a plugin that’s easy to use and gives applaudable results, then Modula is your best bet.

Modula Lite is available for free and comes with sufficient features to help you build a catchy gallery. And you could upgrade to the premium version at any time to gain access to loads of amazing add-ons.

So, what are you waiting for?

Join over 80,000 savvy professionals using Modula, and start creating eye-catchy galleries from now on!

The post Modula Review 2021: A Powerful, User-Friendly WordPress Gallery Plugin appeared first on Photo to Cartoon – Cartoonize Yourself & Create Avatar Characters for Free.

Ever knew you could sell photos online and earn big bucks?

If you didn’t, now you do.

The demand for stock photos is rising.

Businesses are diving deeper into effective social media marketing and content marketing. 

Photo-saturated platforms like Pinterest and Instagram are gaining even more traction.

In short, brands (and even individuals) will always need good images. 

This high demand could mean big money for photographers who are interested in selling photos online.

Interestingly, you don’t have to turn this into a full-time job. 

It could serve as a passive income stream, leaving you with sufficient time to focus on other businesses.

Want to jump on this?

Perfect!

I assume that you’ve got top-notch cameras.

Now, it’s time for you to discover how to make money selling photos online.

Let’s begin.

Want to Sell Photos Online to High-Paying Buyers? Start here.

Let’s break down the process of selling photos online into three stages. 

To build a successful business around stock photography, you’ll have to:

1. Choose Your Photography Niche

Photographers earn good money selling photos online when they niche down to one type of photography.

So if you haven’t picked a niche yet, then you need to do so.

There are lots of popular photo categories you could explore. 

Unsure of the available options? Here are some ideas to get your creative juices flowing:

• Nature: We never grow tired of viewing pictures of the oceans, flowers, trees, etc. So this is one niche with numerous opportunities.
• Food: Bakeries, restaurants, and other food-centered businesses won’t seize to promote their brand using catchy photographs. Take advantage of this.
• People: Photos of aged people, couples, and even kids are often key elements in social media ads and other marketing campaigns. Portraits are also popular types of photos you could sell online.
• Places: Not everyone has the opportunity to travel around the globe and see the world’s incredible views. You could help capture these fantastic places and sell your shots at reasonable prices.
• Occasions: Pictures from celebrations like Christmas and Halloween are usually in high demand, especially among brands looking to run seasonal promotions. Photos from weddings, birthdays and other occasions are big shots also.
• Health: Fitness brands, clinics, gym equipment stores, and other similar businesses regularly use images to drive attention to their products/services on social media, blogs, and other marketing channels. So you could niche down to this type of photography.

Click here to discover 100 filters you could use to enhance photos of various types.

2. Choose Your Sales Platform

There are tons of ways to sell products (including stock images) online. 

To begin, you could upload your photo to top stock photography sites and marketplaces specifically for photographers.

These marketplaces operate on a commission-based model. Photographers earn a certain amount when someone purchases their photos.

Commissions differ across platforms. Ensure you properly read the terms of a website before signing up.

Another good place to sell your photos online is your website or online store (learn how to build a website for free). You’ll end up keeping the bulk of income from sales this way.

3. Promote Your Business to Drive Sales 

Only a few people will discover your business organically. So you have to promote the heck out of it!

There are hundreds of ways to attract more eyes to your business. Here are three common ones:

a) SEO

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a marketing tactic you should pay attention to, especially if you intend to sell via your website. 

Guys like Adam Enfroy and Pat Flynn are masters in SEO, and their blogs are fantastic sources for learning everything there is to know about marketing and scaling your online business.

Implementing SEO techniques will help make your website (or online store) rank high on Google (and other search engines) for multiple search queries.

b) Social Media

Social media sites like Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, and Twitter are perfect places to showcase your work and attract potential buyers. 

There are strategies for succeeding on these different platforms (like using hashtags, scheduling posts, and using specific tools). Do your research.

c) Paid Ads

Yes! If you have a few bucks to pay for advertising or to spend on social media ads, then go ahead and create a marketing campaign. 

Paid ads can help send targeted buyers to your website or online store. So this is one smart way to promote the photos you’re selling online.

PRO TIP: Consider using a to-do list app to keep your workflow organized and efficient.

Want to Earn $125+ per Photo Online? Sell Gold.

No one spends money on crappy images.

Want to earn good money selling pictures online?

Keep improving your skills, and bring only your best pieces to the table every time!

And this goes beyond taking clear, high-quality images.

Alongside capturing beautiful views, you need to edit your photos beautifully also.

Your photos should capture the attention of passersby (aka potential buyers) at first glance.

So how do you go about editing your photos and making them catchier?

There are two ways:

1. Hire an experienced freelancer
2. Edit like a pro using a specialized tool

1. Hire an Experienced Freelancer

There are several online booths where you could hire freelancers to help edit your photos before marketing them. 

There’s Upwork, Fiverr, Freelancer, PeoplePerHour, and a host of others. And they all have a similar hiring process, which looks more like:

• Sign up as a buyer
• Post a job ad
• Send invites to freelancers
• Sort through dozens of proposals and then make a choice

So you can jump on one of these platforms and hire a designer to help edit your photos. 

But note that the services of experienced freelancers don’t come cheap. And the hiring process for remote jobs on freelance sites may not be as simple as you might imagine.

Thankfully, there’s another way to edit your photo before selling them. And this second method is way cheaper and quicker than hiring an experienced freelancer.

2. Edit Like a Pro with a Specialized Tool

Don’t have a huge budget? Or, you don’t want to go through the stress of hiring someone every time you capture new sets of photographs?

Use an intuitive online photo editing tool.

There are dozens of photo editors you could try. But, if you need an affordable and beginner-friendly option, then check out Colorcinch. 

Colorcinch gives photographers like you instant access to a massive library of graphics (icons, shapes, etc.) and dozens of super-duper effects and filters that can turn any photo into a masterpiece.

You can start editing your images for free using Colorcinch and later upgrade to a premium plan starting as low as $5.99/month (which is far cheaper than hiring a freelancer). 

11 Best Places to Sell Photos Online and Make Money in 2021

Got your perfect photo? Great!

Now it’s time to start making money selling your photos online.

Here are 11 places to sell photos online and make money:

1. Shutterstock

Creatives on Shutterstock have collectively earned over $1 billion and gotten over 500 million image downloads. So this is one place to be if you want to sell photos online and make big bucks. Contributors who stick around much longer on the website end up earning up to $100+ per image.

Shutterstock pays contributors a commission of up to 40% for every photo sold and offers commissions when an existing contributor invites a paying client or other photographers.

2. Alamy

Alamy might not be so popular, but it’s undoubtedly one place where you can sell photos online for reasonable amounts. The company offers 40% to 50% commission per sale, and photographers have collectively earned over $180 million selling on the website.

It’s not so easy securing a spot in this marketplace. But as long as you have quality pieces to showcase, you shouldn’t face rejections after sending in your application.

3. Adobe Stock

Formerly Fotolia, Adobe Stock is one popular stock photo where you could earn lots of money. Adobe Stock offers contributors royalties of up to 35% (depending on the type of picture you upload). But you won’t get access to your earnings until you cross the $25 threshold.

Like Alamy, Adobe Stock features only quality content. So to sell on this website, send in only your best photos. Adobe Stock’s non-exclusive policy allows photographers to sell their pictures in other marketplaces also.

4. Dreamstime

Dreamstime is another popular name in the stock photography business. They offer a commission that falls between 20% to 50%, and they decide on these rates based on the contributor’s photo license and level. Earnings on Dreamstime become available to contributors once they reach the $100 threshold.

One downside of the website is that it limits the number of photos users can publish weekly. Usually, contributors with high approval ratings get more weekly slots than those with lower ratings.

5. Getty Images

Getty Images is one popular stock photo site used by top brands and publishers.

You’ll have to download the Getty Images app and submit a few photos for review to join the website. Once your request to join is approved, your images will go live on Getty Images or iStock (an extension of the company). Getty Images contributors receive a commission of 20%, while those on iStock receive 15%.

6. 500px

Beyond being a stock photo directory, 500px is a platform where photographers can network with each other, share ideas, and learn new things. On 500px, contributors are free to sell photos of all kinds—including ones shot on a mobile phone and those captured using a DSLR camera.

500px boasts of over 14 million members and offers a generous 30% royalty fee for non-exclusive pieces and a whopping 60% for exclusive ones. The only catch here is that you might have to upgrade your membership from free to pro (at $5.99/month) for unlimited photo uploads and broader exposure.

7. Etsy

You probably know Etsy as a place to buy unique homemade products and beautiful arts and crafts. But what you may not know is that it’s also a place where photographers can sell their photos and make money.

Etsy makes selling easy and affordable. Whether you plan to sell digital images or prints, Etsy allows you to set your products’ prices and post to the marketplace (for a listing fee of just $0.20). Photographers selling on Etsy bag up to 90% of the money they generate from every photo someone buys.

8. Can Stock Photo

Can Stock Photo is one place where anyone can quickly get into and start selling their photos. To apply, all you need to do is create an account, submit a few pictures, and then wait for your profile’s approval.

After getting in, you can upload your photos to the website via FTP or a web form on the site. Depending on the license, you could earn commissions anywhere between 20% to 50% for every picture sold.

9. PhotoDune

PhotoDune (by Envato Market) is where buyers congregate to purchase premium photos at reasonable prices. And for photographers, it’s a place where you can sell your photos and make money.

PhotoDune’s application process requires contributors to have up to 5 photos for their profile to be reviewed. Once you’ve crossed the $50 threshold on the website, you can withdraw your earnings via PayPal, Skrill, and Payoneer. You can also withdraw via SWIFT once you earn up to $500.

10. Twenty 20

Once a meeting place for Instagram photographers looking to connect with influencers, Twenty 20 has now turned into a popular stock photo site where you can sell your photos and make money. There are more than 50 million stock photos on Twenty 20 shared by over 300k photographers.

Twenty 20 follows a unique commission model, which allows contributors to share from the net subscription revenue of their photos’ buyers. And unlike similar websites, there’s no fixed threshold on Twenty 20. You’ll receive your money on a specified date, no matter how little it is.

11. Your Website

Your website is one of the best places to sell your photos. Owning a website puts you in complete control. You can decide on the costs of your photos, customize your store as you wish, and keep all the income you generate from the sale of your photos.

You can set up your website on WordPress since the platform allows you to unlock amazing functionalities using free and paid plugins (and a handful of hacks). Plugins like Modula and WooCommerce come in handy for adding a shopping cart and photo gallery to any WordPress website.

Other platforms you could build your website on are Wix and Squarespace.

Want more places to sell your images?

Check out these directories:

• SmugMug 
• 123RF
• Snapped4U 
• FotoMoto
• Pixiest
• EyeEm
• Stocksy

Sell Images Online and Earn Big Bucks

Profiting from stock photography isn’t mission impossible.

Just remember that the process of selling photos online starts with taking quality pictures. And editing comes after this.

Whether you decide to hire a photo editing expert or do it yourself (with an intuitive tool like Colorcinch), make sure the final piece is super attractive (but not overly edited).

Once you’ve got your photos ready, go ahead and upload them to your preferred stock photo site or your website.

You’ve always wanted to make money selling pictures online, haven’t you?

I’ve shown you the ropes.

Go make yourself some cool cash!

The post Sell Photos Online: How to Easily Earn $125+ per Image in 2021 appeared first on Photo to Cartoon – Cartoonize Yourself & Create Avatar Characters for Free.

You’ve long dreamed of learning to edit Instagram photos like a pro, so your images would resemble ones uploaded by your favorite celebs.

Right?

No worries! Here’s good news:

I’m about to turn your dreams into reality.

This guide covers the steps you could take to edit your Instagram pictures like a professional—even if you have zero editing experience.

Before You Start Editing Your Instagram Photos

Stay ahead of the curve and be aware of the latest Instagram trends and don’t just set out to edit random, low-quality images. You won’t love the result regardless of the efforts you put in.

So the first step to uploading a beautifully edited photo on Instagram is to take a clean shot.

Thankfully, you don’t need an expensive camera to capture lovely photographs.

Got an Android or iPhone?

Then you’ve got all you need to take excellent shots.

Here are 3 quick tips for capturing attractive photos using your mobile device:

1. Clean Your Phone’s Lens

Naturally, dirt from a greasy hand, wet pockets, or dusty surroundings could easily accumulate around your phone’s lens, making your images look blurry or faded.

So, it’s essential you check (and clean) your phone’s lens before taking your pictures. 

Soft material like a handkerchief should fix this issue in a few seconds.

2. Choose Natural Light

Don’t go around taking pictures with your phone’s flash on. Unlike natural light, the phone’s flash may alter specific colors and affect your images’ overall quality.

So to get a beautiful and clear image to use on Instagram, rely on natural light instead of your phone’s flash when taking your photographs.

This might mean that you’d have to take your photographs outdoors or take your indoor photos from an angle with rays from a natural light source.

3. Embrace Multiple Perspectives & Avoid Long-Range Shots

To get a clearer picture when taking photographs on a mobile phone, move closer to the subject rather than zooming in from afar. Doing this is one smart way to obtain high-quality images.

Photos that are captured from odd angles, orientation and multiple perspectives often end up unique and beautiful. 

Instead of standing opposite the subject while taking a shot, explore other angles to see which would turn out the best. And don’t forget to play around with negative space too.

Learn more ways to improve your photography skills.

How to Edit Your Instagram Photos Like a Pro

Once you’ve got a clean, high-quality shot, it’s time to add bits of freshness to your picture. 

Depending on the result you’ve pictured in mind, you could edit your images directly within the Instagram app or use an external tool to achieve extra sleekness.

Using the Built-in Editor to Edit Instagram Photos Like a Pro

1. Upload Your Photo

If you already have images on your Instagram page, then it means you know how to upload a photo on the app. So you can skip to the next step.

But, if you are entirely new to this feature of the app, then I’m going to walk you through the process quickly.

First, open the Instagram app on your mobile device.

Second, tap the (+) button on the upper right corner of your phone’s screen.

Third, locate the picture you’d like to transform from your phone’s gallery. 

Tap the picture to select it, then tap the arrow on the upper right corner to upload it.

Once your picture uploads successfully, it’s time to pick up your editing wand and do some magical enhancements.

2. Pick a Filter

Instagram has a series of filters. You’re free to try them all and see which would work best for your image.

The process of choosing a filter can easily become an endless loop. Because, sometimes, more than one filter might catch your attention, even though you know you are to pick just one—and then reserve the remaining for your future uploads.

If you ever fall into this situation, here are two foolproof tricks I always use to break the loop:

1. I scroll through my Instagram feed, find someone else’s edited picture I love, and then use the filter the person used (or one close to it).
2. I check my previous uploads, find a picture that got lots of attention (likes & comments), and then re-use the filter I used there.

These tricks help to cut down the time you’d naturally spend sorting through numerous filters that might all appear cool at the same time.

3. Enhance Your Image

Start your adjustments by playing around with Instagram’s lux feature.

This feature helps to automatically adjust the contrast and saturation of your image, thereby increasing its vibrancy, highlighting little vital details, and making it look more attractive generally.

To use this option, hit the magic wand on the top of your screen and then adjust the slider from left to right to enhance your image’s looks.

After tweaking the lux, navigate to the edit tab.

You can straighten your photo (if it’s slanted), reduce/increase its brightness, add shadows, sharpen your image, and make other adjustments.

There’s no general rule to follow here. 

Carefully move the different editing tools’ sliders and find the settings that’d help make your image look better. Just avoid overdoing things so your photo won’t appear overly edited and unnatural.

After enhancing your image as you desire, hit the blue arrow on the top of your screen to save your settings.

Now you’re done, you can go ahead and post your image publicly.

You can also try out Lightroom presets as an alternative to Instagram filters although you need to be more of a professional to know how to use Lightroom and its presets. In case you’re not familiar with it, check out this quick guide on how to install Lightroom Presets.

Using a Dedicated Photo-Editing Tool to Edit Instagram Photos Like a Pro

You can choose from several mobile and web-based tools to edit your Instagram photos.

In this guide, though, we shall go over the steps for editing Instagram photos like a pro using Colorcinch.

So let’s begin.

1. Upload Your Image

Open this page and click on the blue button.

Next, locate and select the Instagram image you’d like to edit.

2. Choose a Filter

Colorcinch has a load of stunning filters suitable for editing pictures for both business and personal needs.

We’ve previously reviewed loads of Colorcinch’s filters (and ones from other software), so you can read this guide to get some ideas.

When you find a filter that goes well with your image and perfectly fits your needs, move the slider from left to right to adjust the filter strength, and then hit APPLY.

3. Enhance Your Image

Colorcinch has all the basic editing features you’ll find in most editing apps and even on Instagram. 

To adjust the brightness, contrast, exposure, and other features of your picture, navigate to the edit tab, click on a photo enhancement option, and carefully move the sliders from left to right.

4. Download Your Image

After editing your Instagram image using Colorcinch, hit the arrow on the top of your screen, and then click on My Computer (to download the image to your mobile/desktop).

You can now proceed to upload your image on your Instagram page without editing it within the app.

Unleash Your Editing Prowess

Quality is crucial if you desire to obtain a pro-looking, irresistible photo at the end of the day.

So ensure your original image is of high resolution and quality. 

If you would prefer to upload a stock photo rather than use yours, ensure you download a high-resolution version of the picture.

Creativity is one vital ingredient for editing photos beautifully.

Let yours burst forth!

The post The Beginner’s Guide to Editing Instagram Photos (The Pro’s Way!) appeared first on Photo to Cartoon – Cartoonize Yourself & Create Avatar Characters for Free.

Have you ever used a character maker to create an avatar online?

If you’d like to try, then you’ve come to the right place. We’re going to take a look at making avatars and characters in this handy tutorial, and we’ll give you the lowdown on the subject, including:

• Why it’s a good idea to create a virtual version of yourself
• A step-by-step guide on how to use a free online character maker from start to your finished avatar
• How to save your avatar in different sizes and upload it to social media and Gravatar

What’s the Big Deal About Avatars Anyway?

“Aren’t avatars kind of old-fashioned now?”

I hear you, but the answer is that avatars and characters are very much alive and kicking!

Facebook’s avatar maker provided people with a bit of fun and distraction earlier this year, and you couldn’t go on your feed without seeing yet another one of your friends as an anime character!

Character makers aren’t just for kids. There are plenty of good reasons for you to use an avatar or character to represent you online, including:

• Safety – not everyone wants their photo out on the internet
• Personal branding with a little anonymity
• You’re camera shy
• It’s fun
• You can go for a different look and be as serious or as silly as you like!

How to use an Online Character Maker

Ok, so hopefully you’ve decided to have a go at creating a character online. Now we’re going to get to the fun stuff and actually use an avatar maker.

I’ll walk you through the steps, and best of all, it’s free to use so you don’t stand to lose anything if you don’t like your character.

There’s no image editing of an actual photo involved, so the steps are simple to follow.

If you do want to edit your avatar further once you have downloaded and saved it you can use a free image editor like Colorcinch to add some extra touches – like, do you want rounded edges on your avatar, or fancy adding some falling snow around your character?

Hey, you’ve got a blank canvas, so let your imagination roll!

Step 1: Open the character maker

Click here for the free online avatar maker

Step 2: Choose gender

Go to the Get Started panel and choose your gender:

Step 3: Choose face shape and skin color

The character maker will open up to the Face module:

Here you will find a selection of face shapes and skin tones to choose from.

Try different ones out to see which one you prefer.

If you can’t find the exact skin tone you want, you can customize it by clicking on the circle at the end of the square skin color blocks.

A color editor will open up in a small window, allowing you to choose the right color:

To change the color to a custom choice, click on the grab the handle at the top of the color range window on the right-hand side and drag it down to the hue you want.

I’ve chosen Incredible Hulk green for this step just to show you what’s possible! My actual avatar is going to be closer to my own skin tone.

To fine-tune the actual shade, click on the small black dot in the square window and pull it around the square window to get the shade you want:

When you are done, click the circle to apply to the image:

Step 4: Choose a mouth shape

Click on Mouth (next to Shape) and decide what mouth shape and color you’d like:

Step 5: Nose

Click on Nose, and decide what you want your schnozz to look like. Small and dainty, or big and bold – it’s your choice!

Step 6: Ears

Move along to Ears, and follow the same procedure:

Step 7: Eyes

Continue along the top menu to Eyes. The sub-menu will start with Eye Shape, so go to the choices and pick your peepers:

Step 8: Iris shape and color

Next along the sub-menu is Iris.

Have lots of fun here by giving yourself huge anime-style irises or stay subtle.

You can also change your iris color from this page by going down to the choices at the bottom and clicking on them or making a custom eye color as you could for skin tone:

Step 9: Eyebrow shape and color

Click on the Eyebrow sub-menu, and choose your brow shape and color. Go full-on evil villain or glam celebrity here:

Step 10: Glasses

Now you can add your glasses style, from academic-looking to some cool shades. Change the frame color if you wish as well. Or click the X if you don’t want any glasses:

Step 11: Hairstyle and color

Here, you get to be your own hairstylist. Go up to the main menu, and click on Hair. Choose from a range of styles suited to your gender, and add the color you want your locks to be by going down to the color swatches as you did before:

Step 12: Clothes

Go back to the main menu, and click on Clothes. Choose the style you prefer and the color too. Ok, so there isn’t a huge selection of clothing options, but there should be something to suit most people here:

Step 13: Background pattern and color

Last step now! On the main menu, click on Backs. You get a choice of background patterns and colors so you decided if you want to go subtle or psychedelic

You can also choose not to have a background for your avatar – just click on the X. You’re done! I like my new avatar, and it does resemble me (if it had a few more wrinkles, anyway!) so I think I’ll keep it for posterity.

Step 14: Download or share

Now you’ve made your avatar with the online character maker, you have a choice of what to do with it.

If you want to download it, go to the bottom of the avatar generator and click Download. You’ll get different size and file options to save your character to your computer for future use:

To share to social media, click on Share.

A new window with your creation will open up, giving you the choice of sharing to Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or Google +.

Just click on the icons of each social media platform you want to use, and follow the instructions:

If you are a user of Gravatar and want to add your character, click on the Gravatar option.

A window will open up for you to enter your details and for you to upload your new avatar to the site.

I also want to mention that there’s an option to randomize your avatar in this character maker.

Along the bottom of the generator, click the Random button, and see what it comes up with! This one’s a bit scary for me – I think I prefer the one I made…

Want to Take Things Further?

We mentioned using Colorcinch to add further effects to your avatar, but you could use it to cartoonize a photo of yourself instead.

The character maker and the cartoon maker in Colorcinch are two different things, although they may seem similar. The main differences are:

• The cartoon creator uses a photo to build the cartoon from
• You can edit your image before cartoonizing it – adjust the brightness, crop it, etc.
• There are a lot of different cartoon styles you can use
• You can adjust the strength of the cartoon filter

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial (I know I did!) and got something useful out of it.

Using an online character maker can help you and your kids preserve your privacy and safety on the internet as there are no real-life photos of you involved.

You can also choose how you want your avatar to look and what part of your personality you want to express.

Enjoy!

The post Avatar Maker: Create Awesome Avatar Characters Online appeared first on Photo to Cartoon – Cartoonize Yourself & Create Avatar Characters for Free.