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The Digital Photography Companion | 
 enlarge | Author: Derrick Story
Publisher: O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Category: Book
List Price: $24.99
Buy New: $13.71
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Avg. Customer Rating:  6 reviews
Sales Rank: 56799
Format: Illustrated
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 230
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.5 x 0.6
ISBN: 0596517661
Dewey Decimal Number: 775
EAN: 9780596517663
ASIN: 0596517661
Publication Date: March 13, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: All orders ship same business day via standard shipping (USPS Media Mail) if received by 1 PM CST.
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The Digital Photography Companion gives you creative tips and technical advice for taking top-notch digital photos in a wide range of conditions. Professional photographer and teacher Derrick Story gives you plenty of examples of how to capture great shots of people, places, landscapes, and more.
Five Fun Photography Tips by Derrick Story, Author of The Digital Photography Companion
Click on thumbnails for larger images
 1) Produce Do-It-Yourself Product Shots:There are two ways to shoot items using tabletop photography: the hard way and the easy way. The hard way involves multiple studio lights, softboxes, umbrellas, and seamless backdrop paper. Professionals use this equipment to produce outstanding images for commercial advertising and high-end editorial work. But if you just want a nice picture of your old film camera to sell on eBay, you probably don't want to set up an entire studio. So here's the easy way: Find a window that you can set up a table next to. North-facing windows are great, but not necessary for this type of shooting. Cover the surface with white paper, and if you can, create a white backdrop too. This will be your work area. Put your camera on a tripod (or another stable surface) and adjust it so it's facing the item that you want to photograph on the table. Move both the subject and the camera to achieve the best lighting possible via the open window. 
Once everything is in place, make a tabletop reflector out of white cardboard, or cardboard (or another rigid material) covered with aluminum foil. Position the reflector opposite the light source (window) so it bounces light onto the shadowy side of the item. Set the white balance to Cloudy and put your camera on self-timer. Now trip the timer and stand back. After 10 seconds or so, the camera will take the shot for you to review. Continue refining your setup until you get the shot you want. This simple setup can produce studio-like results with a fraction the cost or effort. Give it a try.
2) Use Sunglasses as a Polarizing Filter: Point and shoot cameras are the height of convenience, but not always versatility. Case in point is when you want to mount a polarizing filter to saturate the sky or reduce glare. There's no where to put it! But that doesn't mean your pictures are doomed to the blinding glare of a reflective world. You can, instead, remove those stylish neutral gray polarizing glasses from your head and place them in front of the camera lens. Quality sunglasses make great polarizing filters for compact cameras. Make sure that the lens of your sunglasses completely covers the front glass element of your camera. You'll get best results when the sun is aligned along your shoulders. You don't believe it works? Then take two shots, one with the sunglasses and the other without. You be the judge.
 3) Devise a Shower Cap Inclement Weather Protector: The perfect travel companion for compact shooters is the hotel shower cap. These free accessories are the perfect rain protectors when you want to go outside and get the shot. Just poke a hole in the middle of the cap for the lens to protrude through, put your hands through the "stretchy" opening, and let the elastic close tight around your wrists. You now have a water resistant cover that enables you to work all of the controls--perfect for those shots of the kids splashing water in the gutter on a rainy day.
 4) Preview Your Shots in B&W: Many cameras have a Black & White mode that enables you to capture grayscale images. This type of photography can be quite beautiful and is often considered artistic. The problem with B&W mode is that grayscale images are your only option. You may think you only want Black & White at the wedding reception... until the bride asks for color versions too weeks later. I recommend that you capture your pictures in color, then convert copies of them to B&W. That way you have all of your options open. But there's still value to B&W mode, even if you choose to capture in color. It can help you preview your compositions in grayscale on the camera's LCD monitor. By doing so, you can better compose your scene for the best Black & White output later on while working on your computer. Not to mention that it's quite fun.
5) Tennis Ball Tripod Feet: Have you ever tried to use a tripod in the sand? You might as well be trying to steady your camera on chopsticks in rice. But you can bring stability to the situation, Buy a can of tennis balls, cut an "X" slit in each one, and slip them over the feet of your tripod. They will provide a much steadier platform for your three-legged friend.
Product Description
Are you ready to take photos that reflect your creative spirit, rather than just another set of snapshots? Then you want this book in your camera bag. Well-organized so you can look up topics quickly, The Digital Photography Companion gives you creative tips and technical advice for taking top-notch digital photos in a wide range of conditions, and for a variety of occasions. In other words, this book will help you make pictures that look better than everyone else's.
Professional photographer and teacher Derrick Story, whose online tips and podcasts at The Digital Story (www.thedigitalstory.com) have made him a popular photography blogger, gives you plenty of examples of how to capture great shots of people, places, landscapes, and more. He also provides a complete summary on camera features, tips for printing, sharing your images, and an overview of photo management applications.
Chapters include: - What is It? -- Choose the right camera (DSLRs, compact cameras, or hybrids) and get a rundown on all of the typical features they offer, such as face detection, image stabilizers, diopter adjustment, focus assist light, RAM buffer, and more.
- How Does it Work? -- This A-Z guide of digital camera controls explains everything from Aperture Value (Av) Mode and Autoexposure to White Balance, the Zoom/Magnify Control, and everything in between.
- Shoot Like a Pro -- Advice for a variety of photographic adventures, such as capturing existing light portraits, creating powerful landscape images, and shooting fireworks, underwater portraits, infrared photos, and more, along with lighting and filter tricks.
- I've Taken Great Pictures, Now What? -- You get complete advice for sharing your photos, converting from color to balck & white and more, plus an overview of photo management applications, from Adobe Photoshop Lightroom to Apple iPhoto.
- Printing Made Easy -- Printing doesn't have to be a painful experience. Learn various options, including direct printing without a computer, ordering out, and selecting the right inkjet printer for home (and what to do with it once you get it there.).
You also get an appendix with Quick Reference Tables, as well as other useful tables scattered throughout the book.
The Digital Photography Companion offers you friendly advice so you can try techniques that may never have occurred to you -- approaches that will bring you more of what you're looking for when you click the shutter: Great looking pictures!
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| Customer Reviews: Read 1 more reviews...
 Digital Photography Companion May 1, 2008
Digital cameras are great, but they won't do your thinking for you. To get beyond simple point-and-shoot, some knowledge is necessary. This new book by Derrick Story has just the right depth of information for the typical amateur. If you haven't yet bought a camera, the opening chapter has some good advice on camera selection. Among others features, face detection and image stabilization are mentioned as the hot new features to look for.
The book can be read in two evenings. Mastering the techniques presented will take a good deal longer, as you gain experience with your camera. You get pointers on how to shoot portraits, landscapes, wedding pictures, architecture, panoramas, and even infrared images and video. There is a good overview of photo management software programs, including the widely-used Photoshop elements and Apple iPhoto. There are numerous tables throughout the book, which provide recommendations on camera settings, file formats, memory card capacities, and other useful information.
The last chapter is devoted to printing and distributing your pictures by email or web, with recommendations on choosing a printer. The book contains five chapters in 220 pages, with an appendix and index. It is designed to be a handy reference, and is small enough to fit nicely into a camera bag.
 Digital Photography Companion April 30, 2008
Very well written-easy to understand regardless of level of photographer. Really goes through all bells and whistles of both digital and dSLR cameras. Have recommended to several friends who also have purchased this book. I carry it with me just about everywhere I intend to use a camera.
Digital Photography Techniques Made Easy April 23, 2008
This super book is an excellent introduction to the world of digital photography, and will appeal to readers who have had some experience with their digital camera and are ready to embark on more sophisticated uses of their hardware. The book is succinct in its approach and the author makes sure to not overload the reader with extensive, detailed material. Instead, the focus is on the most common, most likely questions asked by digital photographers, especially amateurs who use their digital camera as a hobby or for fun. This title also nicely serves as an introductory companion to Ken Milburn's Digital Photography: Expert Techniques, also available from O'Reilly.
Kudos from a beginner April 20, 2008
I am a complete beginner at the art of photography and, regrettably, have been for some 20 years. No matter how many how-to books I read, I've never found one that I walk away from understanding the difference between an aperture and an f-stop. Until now.
In his books and in his pod casts ([...]) Derrick eschews techno-jargon, choosing instead to use common language and meet his novice students and readers where they are. By choosing this approach he opens entire new worlds of possibility to neophytes like me.
My favorite part of the book (for now) is Chapter 1, which gives a step-by-step guide to buying the right digital camera for your needs. It's great to make an informed purchase rather than opening the Target ad to the electronics page and choosing the camera that comes in the prettiest color. I also love the "Camera Features from A-Z" section (also in Chapter 1) because that's where Derrick demystifies all of those terms in your camera's owner's manual that give you a big fat headache.
Later chapters include cool tips like how to craft a rain suit for your camera from a hotel shower cap and how to protect your camera from bad stuff like dust and condensation by using zip lock bags. Derrick doesn't stop at teaching folks how to take great photos either. He's with you and guides you through buying the best software program for your needs, getting your camera to talk to your computer and even choosing a special printer that makes it so that you can print your pix without a computer.
The book itself is beautiful. Each section has accompanying color photos that effectively reinforce the written word. The size is nice and fits easily in a backpack or camera bag.
Well done, Derrick!
Engaging, Useful, Entertaining April 8, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book is sized conveniently enough, like a slightly oversize mass market paperback. And the intent is obvious. Story wants to create a manual that is easy to take along with you pretty much wherever you go (hint: vacations). He follows it up by writing in a conversational style and includes lots of bright color pictures that further increases the reader's engagement.
Story covers both digital SLRs and compact cameras. And in an excellent opening chapter, he explains the major differences between the two. Some part of the audience for this book might find the information on image sensors to be too technical - and for them there is enough practical advice to help choose a camera. But for those looking for a more in-depth explanation, this chapter is a great hook.
The book really shinesby offering lots of practical advice on how to create take great pictures, sometimes by replicating studio settings with low-tech contraptions. For example, Story shows you how to devise your own light meter, shoot in rain, bounce light off household reflective surfaces and trick your camera's white balance.
Besides being very useful, these tips also offer terrific insights into how the digital camera works. It enhances your understanding of the instrument you are working with.
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