Idea for Advent Calendar

A Kodak blogger had an interesting idea: take a picture of the George Eastman House and use its 24 windows as a traditional advent calendar. That made me reaize that if you had any object with the right number of repeated elements, you could do the same. That could be trees in a forest, cars on a lot, or what have you. If you don't have enough elements in a grid, then you could get a row of several and then set the row out multiple times.

Holiday Photo Tips

With the holidays around the corner, here are some tips on getting better images of friends and family:

• No Group Mug Shots The worst type of pictures that you can get are the type where you line everyone up and take a picture from so far back that it looks as though you shot from a passing airplane. Take relaxed shots, catching people in what they ordinarily do when they think you're not taking a picture. Don't be afraid of zooming in and catching a head and shoulders shot, or from the waist up, or even a pair of hands or eyes doing something interesting.


• Get The Right White Balance Make sure that you're using the right white balance, whether indoors or outdoors, to avoid introducing odd color casts to your images. For the best quality (assuming your camera will do this), bring along a white surface and use your camera's instructions to set a custom white balance. As you change locations or as the light shifts, reset the white balance, because it will change.


• Keep Your Camera Ready The best images will just happen, so be ready with your camera and learn to use it well enough so you can get ready and squeeze off some shots without thinking that much about it.


• Find Iconic Images It's great to have photos of the people you know and love - or at least tolerate - but you don't have to settle for that. Take pictures of decorations,food - anything that will help trigger memories of the event.


• Bounce The Flash If you're using a strobe, bounce it off walls or the ceiling. That softens the lighting, you diffuse the shadows, and the results are more flattering.


• Bring Extra Memory Cards Why take pictures only to find out that you've run out of room for them? Memory cards are getting downright cheap, so keep an extra around so that, should the shooting be easy, you can swap out and keep going.

Good luck, and remember to have fun. Don't hide behind the camera. The more you're involved in the happenings, the more that will show in your results.