There’s a reason some people avoid vacation slide shows.
Blurry, dark or poorly composed photos can make the most fantastic family adventure a forgettable one.
Many vacationers can relate to Suki Horton. The Alaskan ski racer is well traveled, but she’s given up on taking travel photos. “My photos just never captured what my eyes were seeing,” says Horton, 27.
Her sunset and scenery shots were lifeless, and friends’ faces were often too dark, too tiny or both.
When shooting with film, Horton’s fingers sometimes showed up in the picture. And when shooting digital pictures, her photos languished unseen and unshared on her computer.
“I decided to appreciate the moment for what it was,” she says, “and just try to remember it.”
Photographers say even the clumsiest amateurs can snap great vacation photos. If you really want to be prepared, consider taking a photography course or weekend workshop at the local camera store or a nearby photography school. These classes can help travelers prepare for such situations as taking pictures at night or in low light, and help them master portraits and landscape shots.
But if you just want to feel comfortable and confident behind the camera on your next picturesque trip, heed these eight tips from the pros to make your travel shots snap.
1. Know your camera
Efrain Cruz directs Denver’s Illuminate Photography Workshops. He says travelers often make the mistake of purchasing a camera right before a trip. Instead, they should buy a camera at least a month before the vacation and take at least a dozen photos each day to get familiar with its settings.
In his course “Get to Know Your Digital Camera,” Cruz says there is a learning curve even with today’s point-and-shoot cameras. Digital photography advances don’t necessarily ensure travelers will get great photos.
It’s also not unusual to be intimidated by a camera. Some of Cruz’s new students don’t know how to put on shoulder straps, load batteries and memory cards, or even display the photo they just shot. Some people have shown up for class with a camera still in the box; they didn’t realize the batteries had to be charged before they could use it.
Cruz says it takes time to learn all of these things.
“If you shoot different photos every day prior to traveling,” he says, “chances are, most camera problems you’ll face on vacation will have already been dealt with in the safety of your home.”
2. Safekeeping
Bring a laptop or external hard drive on your trip to back up images. Film photography limited shooters to 36 exposures per roll. But with digital photography, shooters can now have hundreds, even thousands of photos on a single memory card. So go wild — but back up your work.
It may be necessary to buy extra memory cards, batteries and battery chargers so you can shoot as many high-resolution photos as possible.
“Shooting high-res guarantees the best quality image,” Cruz says. “Don’t try to go cheap on low-resolution images so you can fit more on the card. They will be too small for printing.”
3. Timing is everything
Avoid shooting in direct sunlight. Instead shoot during the “golden hours” of the day — an hour after sunrise and an hour before sunset.
This is when the sun is low, resulting in a much warmer, “golden” quality of light that transforms scenery and landscape photos into pieces of art. Shadows are less pronounced, and subjects don’t have to squint into the harsh midday sunlight.
“Shooting in direct sunlight is what gives people those deep shadows under their nose, chin and eye sockets that cause their eyes to disappear,” says Russ Burden, a Highlands Ranch nature and portraiture photographer who hosts photo tours in scenic locations around the country.
4. Be a flasher
If a family gathering or vacation side trip takes place during the middle of the day, pop open the camera’s flash and use it to fill in shadows, Burden says. Most people mistakenly assume they can only use their flash when it’s dark.
To use a flash during the day, turn the subject so their back is to the sun and use the flash to brighten dark areas under the eyes, nose and chin.
Or seek out a shady spot. This is especially appropriate for shooting family portraits. The light that falls on the subjects’ faces will be soft, even and pleasing.
5. Keep it simple
Less is more in photography. Avoid cluttering an image with too many details, so your subject is well defined. Newbies often try to pack too much into a photo, so the viewer’s eyes have nothing to focus on, says Greg Cradick, executive director of Working With Artists, a Lakewood photography school.
“Try to focus on one idea in a photo,” Cradick says. “If your theme for the day is blue and white, shoot the blue water and the white buildings.”
6. Great sunsets
Taking sunset photos or photographing people with the sun setting behind them is common on vacation. But this is also difficult to master.
“I have so many people who bring in bad sunset shots,” Cradick says.
The solution is to point the camera at the sky with nothing else in the frame and push the shutter button down halfway. While the button is still pushed down halfway, move your camera so the horizon or the people in your shot are back in the frame before pushing down the shutter button fully. This will draw in some of the light from the sky and brighten your subjects’ faces in the picture.
You can also use your flash to fill in shadows and expose the faces without losing the background.
7. Set the scene
As an instructor at Denver Darkroom, Jeffrey Rupp tells students to remember that their eyes don’t “see” the same way as the camera. For the best possible pictures, photographers must evaluate the scene and eliminate distracting elements from the shot.
“Your brain is so active that it filters out tons of things that it sees,” Rupp says. “But that careful inspection of your scene is critical so that you don’t end up with a pole or tree branch growing out of your wife’s head in the picture.”
8. Experiment
Many people let fear of damaging their camera stop them from experimenting with different shots. But Rupp says there is one setting in a camera’s menu that every photographer should know and love: “Restore to factory default.”
This button restores the camera’s original, out-of-the-box formatting. It gives shooters the freedom to play with the settings on their camera without being afraid that it’ll be ruined in the process.
“It’s a beautiful button,” he says, “and one I’ve had to use myself.”
Sheba R. Wheeler: 303-954-1283 or swheeler@denverpost.com.
WEEKEND PROJECT
Photo challenges for kids
Help children discover a new way to relate to the world by capturing what they see in a photo.
The children’s photography course at Working With Artists in Lakewood draws on games to teach kids how to use a Canon PowerShot camera, says Greg Cradick, the school’s executive director. “The world looks very different when you are less than 5 feet tall,” Cradick says. “Any time you can change your perspective, it’s cool.”
DIRECTIONS
Instruct kids to take photos of objects or shapes that reflect letters from the alphabet. An apple could be for the “A,” a boat for the “B,” a car for the “C,” and so on. Kids can also hunt for things that look like actual letters, such as curvy, S-shaped branches or mountain peaks that look like upside-down W’s. “These assignments are fun to do (and) help us train our vision,” Cradick says.
Organize a photography scavenger hunt. You might have kids look for certain animals or things that are all the same color.
Include subjects that kids are naturally drawn to. Jeffrey Rupp of the Denver Darkroom recalls one 12-year-old girl who was bored to tears during a class — until the instructor broke out the Barbies. “Let children photograph whatever they are passionate about,” Rupp says. “It will always translate into great photos.”
Wrap up the photography challenge by helping kids organize and print their images.
MORE PHOTO FUN FOR KIDS
These photography projects are adapted from .
Photographic shrink ray: A child will need two friends to tackle this task. Once the group is assembled, go outside. Have one friend walk off into the distance while the other stays close by. Ask the nearby friend to hold out one arm, with the palm of his hand facing up. The challenge is for the photographer to take a picture in which the person standing far away looks like he is standing on the palm of the nearby friend.
Aspiring Spielberg: Make a movie using still images that the child takes with a digital camera. Use a simple subject like a toy or action figure to snap a series of photos that will “move” when assembled in a continuous stream. Then, go online to . and download a free demo of Boinx IStopMotion animation software. It will translate your child’s still shots into a movie.
The missing piece: Turn one of your child’s favorite photos into a jigsaw puzzle by gluing the print to a piece of cardboard. Let the glue dry, then cut up the image into various shapes and sizes. Sheba R. Wheeler
