What Is Digital Photography? 5 Tips To Enhance Your Skills
Updated on November 3, 2022 in Photography by Alifiya Mustafa
As per Wikipedia, “Digital Photography uses cameras having arrays of electronic photodetectors to produce photos focused by a lens, as opposed to an exposure on photographic film.”
Well, that’s pretty easy to find and much harder to understand! Let me put what digital photography is in simple words.
Now, photography literally means painting with light. So, digital photography is basically the act of painting with light onto a digital sensor.
It’s essentially the same thing as conventional film photography, except, instead of having a piece of side film in the back of your camera, it’s actually replaced with an electronic sensor that acts in a very similar way.
Thus, the photos created through digital photography uses mechanical and photoelectric techniques, and not we-bathy chemical processing.
What Are The Benefits Of Digital Photography?
So far, you must’ve understood that the photos you take with your DSLR, Point, and Shoot, or Mirrorless cameras are all examples of Digital Photography.
And, you must already know why you’re using the ‘camera’ you’re using right now.
Digital Photography has a lot of benefits that traditional photography can’t provide such as:
1. Instant Gratification
Digital Photography lets you immediately see the image you just took on the back of your screen.
It makes learning photography much quicker because you instantly know where you went wrong, instead of having to wait for the films to be processed and the prints to make.
2. More Control
You can easily change the grain quality, ISO, Aperture, and just be able to suck in more light as the technology gets better.
This allows you to capture high-quality and better clarity images with a push of a button.
3. Cost-Efficient
Since the dawn of Digital Photography, as digital cameras got to the point where they began to surpass the quality of the film, the world has seen a rapid increase in digital cameras.
Where the people had to spend more than $4000 for a good quality camera, you can easily get one under $500 with amazing digital quality.
With the increase in demand, increase in production, and increase in competition, using a digital camera without having to buy films, digital photography has become very cost-effective.
4. Easy pairing with TV, PC, and Software
Digital cameras can easily be paired with TVs and large monitors to view your photos on a large screen.
Also, you can transfer your camera data to your PC and create a backup. This is a huge benefit for photographers using digital cameras.
The not only digital camera helps in capturing better quality images and storing data, but you can also easily integrate your device with digital photo editing software like Photoshop.
With tether capture, you can capture the images and meanwhile edit them into Lightroom or Capture One or other digital photo editing software at the same time.
5 Digital Photography Tips
1. Mind Your Camera Settings
The quality of your image will highly depend on what settings you’re using. Be careful of the following things:
a. ISO
ISO figures how sensitive your camera is to light. The use of ISO depends on the lighting you’re using. If it’s dark, increase your ISO from anything between 400-3200 to make your camera more sensitive to light and avoid any blurring.
On brighter days, you can bring down the ISO to 100 or use the Auto setting.
b. Aperture
Keep the aperture in balance to make sure that only the required light passes through your camera.
c. Shutter Speed
Similarly, determining the shutter speed is highly vital. Your motion pictures will have a class if you put a little courage to play with them.
Don’t be afraid to experiment with different shutter speeds. You may use a tripod to support your clicks and avoid any extra shake.
d. The use of flash
Lastly, be careful when you use flash. Avoid using flash indoors and in confined spaces.
Flash can look harsh and create an unrealistic look, especially in indoor photography. Rather than working with direct flash, try adjusting other camera settings.
2. Avoid Shaking
Use a tripod to avoid shaky photos. A slight shake in an image can completely ruin your image.
The tripod helps your lens stay in place and capture sharp, smooth, and detailed images.
3. Use Rule of Thirds
Rule of thirds is one of the most effective composition techniques. This technique adds an ‘X’ factor to your images.
The grid lines work as guides to assist you to capture the best shot possible. You can take breath-taking images with the help of the rule of thirds.
Placing the subject focal length at the center square will help you get the most blanched image. You can focus on the first left or last right intersection to capture beautiful landscapes as it adds dimension to your images.
The more you apply in your photography, the better you get.
4. Use the Exposure Triangle
In digital photography, the exposure triangle again demands you to make use of your camera settings – the ISO, Aperture, and Shutter Speed.
The relation between these three is complex. The change in any one will affect the other, and balance is vital.
I’d highly recommend that you read Best Camera Settings for a better understanding.
5. Choose the Right Background
For every photographer – professional or beginner – it’s a challenge to decide on a perfect background.
Your ultimate goal is to make sure that your background doesn’t steal the focus of your subject, and the second is that it compliments your subject.
Thus, making sure that you’re using the correct background is the key to enhancing the look of your digital photography. Use contrasting backgrounds and don’t use anything that distracts the viewers.
You may read How to decide a perfect background to determine which backgrounds work best for your different photography projects.
I also believe that there must be a combination of photography backdrops every photographer must have. Artificial backdrops are easy to store and maintain and you can easily find them in Walmart or on Amazon.
BONUS TIP
Digital photography has changed the way we captured moments, nature, and everything through a lens. It’s faster, easier, and better.
If you’re a photographer, you must have an idea of how to utilize digital photography in today’s world. However, no matter how many things you check during a photoshoot, it all comes down to which camera you’re using.
Your primary tool is your camera and it’s highly important that you’re using the best digital camera brands in your photography.
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