Discover Digital Photography

Photos with a soft, low contrast hazy look seem to be very popular at the moment. You can purchase packs of film presets for most image editing software that allow you to easily create this look.

I've also seen several Photoshop tutorials that show how to create a similar look, making use of various adjustment layers. However, the look can also be achieved using only RGB curves, which are available in Adobe Camera RAW, Lightroom, Photoshop, GIMP, and the majority of image editing software. No need to purchase anything additional, and no need for multiple layer Photoshop documents.

In this article I'll cover both creating the hazy look in-camera and using RGB curves. Plus, I'll explain why the curves adjustments create the effect, so you'll better understand how you can modify the curves to fine-tune the effect.

In this article we'll look at six small pieces of equipment that most photographers don't think about bringing with them when going out shooting. The fact is that most of time these pieces of gear aren't needed. But when you do need them, you'll be really wishing you had packed them.

None of these items take up much space, so they're worth just adding to your photography bag and leaving there on a permanent basis. Then on the odd occasion when you do need them, you won't be kicking yourself that you left them at home.

Most photographers have access to a wide angle lens, whether it be a specialist wide angle lens, their camera's basic zoom lens when zoomed out, or even just their phone camera. But using a wide angle focal length effectively can be difficult. The wide angle allows you to fit a wide view into a single image, but it can be easy to end up including a large area (such as an empty sky or uninteresting foreground) that doesn't really add anything to the image.

In this article we'll look at what is usually meant by a wide-angle, what wide angle lenses are good for and how to use them effectively, and what they're not so good at and you should try to avoid.

Cities can provide a large number of photo opportunities, many of which are not available in smaller towns or elsewhere. Whether you live in a city or are planning to visit one, in this article I'll share some ideas for interesting subjects and tips for capturing great photos of them.

Modern cameras offer a plethora of autofocus options to help you get the best focus performance possible, whether you're photographing a fast moving sports car or a static still life subject. In this article we'll look at the various different modes and options, what they mean, and when you might want to use them.

A snapshot is is often used to describe a photograph in a somewhat derogatory sense. A photo that was taken quickly, with little regard to the composition, framing, and camera settings. A photo that was taken without much thought.

However, when a photo is described as a snapshot, that does not necessarily mean it is a bad photo. There have been (and still are) many popular and award-winning photographers who make use of the snapshot style, such as Gary Winogrand, William Klein, Nan Goldin, and William Eggleston, to give a few examples.

In this article we'll look at the snapshot in more detail, covering a brief history, and exploring how technical imperfections can add to rather than detract from the photograph's aesthetic.

Mirror slap and Shutter shock are both problems that can cause blurring when you take a photo. In this article we'll look at what these problems actually are, and how they can be avoided.

Image makes use of Warning by yves_guillou and naughty nick! by Peter Pawlowski (licensed CC-BY)

It's generally accepted as fact that image sharpness is important in photography. When looking at purchasing a new camera or lens, people spend a long time evaluating how sharp the images the camera / lens produces before deciding whether to purchase or not.

Photographers may gravitate towards fast lenses, or those with image stabilization, to help them get sharp shots in low light. And we have supports such as tripods and monopods, to help keep the camera steady for a sharp photo.

But I think sometimes we pay more attention to sharpness than we really need too. In this article I'll look at why sharpness isn't as important as some make it out to be.

With over a billion photos being shared every day on social media, it can be very difficult to have your photos stand out from the rest. With the vast majority of photos being taken on smartphones, one way you can help your photos vie for attention is by taking advantage of the abilities of a compact system camera or DSLR.

Now, using a CSC / DSLR to take your photos is no substitute for a creative, well composed, and beautifully lit image. Using a 'proper' camera rather than a phone doesn't suddenly give you a better image.

But there are some things a CSC / DSLR camera can do that a phone camera cannot. And by combining your creativity with the abilities of a CSC / DSLR you can achieve a strong image with features that help it stand out from amongst the smartphone images.

If you've ever read a review for a lens, you'll probably have noticed how the review will show crops of an image of a test chart, comparing the resolution at the center of the image and the corners. And in most cases the corners are worse than the middle, sometimes considerably so.

For practical purposes, we can say that the corners of such a lens are soft. However, technically speaking the lens may actually have very sharp corners. The softness may be caused by field curvature.

Field curvature refers to when the plane of focus projected by a lens is not flat. This is the case for almost all lenses, though they differ in the amount and style of field curvature. In this article we'll look at it more in depth, and why in some cases it is not necessarily a bad thing.