Avoiding Common Mistakes in Photography Part 2

Red eye is an effect that only occurs in photography and does not occur naturally. Red eye shows up in photographs with low ambient light where a flash is used. The light from the flash is very bright and very quick. The pupil does not have time to filter it out and a large amount of light hits the retina at the back of the eye. It then bounces back reflecting straight in to the camera shot. The red colour is mostly caused by the blood flow at the back of the eye, and the shine by the reflecting light. Interestingly red eye has been used to identify cancer when it occurs only in one eye, or only in part of the eye. Many animals including cats and dogs will get red eye if they have blue eyes, and 'eye shine' if their eyes are of other colours.

Red eye can be solved either pre or post production. Photoshop editing and other suite packages will have tools to edit and remove the red eye effect. You can avoid red eye by not using a flash, staying away from reflective surfaces which could bounce back the light from the flash, using more natural light, or having your subject not look directly at the camera. If you have taken a great shot what has been ruined by red eye, pop it over to us at info@photoincanvas.co.uk or by post at Watermill Studios, Middlebridge Street, Romsey, Hampshire, SO51 8HL and we'll fix it up for you, for free.

Bad Composition

Composition basically means the visual characteristics of your photograph; does it follow natural lines, is there too much clutter within it, is the lighting suitable, is it structured, and so on.

For the sake of example let's use a photograph of a flower in a vase. If you placed your vase on a surface where there was a pen, and a shard of sunlight nearby, you would not include those, as they take something away from the photograph and create bad composition. Use the rule of thirds when taking your photograph as described in our article http://www.photoincanvas.co.uk/taking-photo/. Use the space effectively by positioning your vase along a horizontal or vertical line one on a third you create a Equally think about the shape of the subject. Your vase is long and tall, so a vertical camera position will suit it better than a horizontal one. Balance is very important in a photograph. You wouldn't push everything right to one side unless that was the point of the picture, and by using the rule of thirds or placing your subject off centre you do run the risk of throwing your image off balance. If the shot is long or panoramic you may need to lead the eye of the observer to your focus point. An example of this would be an anchor chain stretched out leading to a boat on a beach. We automatically follow the chain and arrive at the boat, even though it is off centre.

Bad Background

Check your background carefully! There are many hidden surprises and cheeky chappies standing by to ruin your photograph at every turn! A poor background can ruin a great photograph, be it a bag of rubbish previously camouflaged and unnoticed, or Uncle Bob giving your subject rabbit ears. Be aware of your photographic obstacles and enemies so you can avoid them as often as possible.