Recently, a member of the PhotoCamel.com photography forum I frequent posted a question to the members of the forum; "Are you considering yourself to be an artist? If no, what else? If yes, what's your message?" While I think this is too open of a question, it does bring up a few points about the duality of photography, as a recording device and as an artist's tool. Here are my thoughts on what constitutes an artist and the use of a camera to create art. If you have a different viewpoint or philosophy about the topic, I welcome your thoughts. Feel free to share your ideas in the comments section below.

A big issue with photographers today is the problem of ownership protection of digital images. While there are a few methods and systems that can minimize fiduciary loss one of the easiest methods of image protection is the very basic and very simple watermark . For those of you who may be wondering what a watermark is, let me give a brief description. A watermark is simply a logo or logotype that is placed discreetly somewhere within the frame of your image that identifies you as the owner or creator of the image. A watermark can be placed boldly onto your image or given a subtler look by applying a transparency or incorporating it into a design element. The most basic type of watermark is simply the copyright symbol followed by your name. The watermark is then placed somewhere on your image and it identifies that image as belonging to you. For a more professional look brand the image with a logo or logotype. Anyway you decide to go, if you are going to mark up your images wit...

An old mantra from way back in the film days was to, "get it right in the camera." Now that we are in the digital age I still hear that mantra repeated time and again. Unfortunately it's usually followed with some reference to not needing to do any post processing or some other such nonsense. That should tell you my feelings on that. To prove it, I have decided to show you some post processing on an image that was done right in the camera. I normally start off showing the finished product first, but in this case I'll start with the before image. You can see that it's a pretty decent shot. Exposure is good, composition is nice, we have a nice light trail leading into our frame; a simple, quiet scene of a neighborhood bar on a corner. This is how it looks like with no editing. As with all your edits it should start with an analysis of the obvious. In this example there really is very little, but very little doesn't mean none. Again, I want to re...

There are countless stories of photographers who question themselves about whether they should or should not press that shutter button. In some cases that decision has led the photographer to a Pulitzer prize. Others, to a controversial discussion about the ethics and responsibilities of the photographer. Photo ethics is even a topic of study for almost all photojournalism majors in college. Ultimately it really boils down to what risk the photographer is willing to take and then living with that decision after. For most of us, as casual shooters not involved in the realm of journalism, the decision seldom, if ever, comes up. But it does happen. Take the events of 9-11 for instance. As the horrific scene of chaos unfolded almost every aspect of that day was captured by a camera. Not all of them were handled by professional journalists. I would even go out on a limb and guess the majority of the images from that day were from cell phones and point and shoots. Large, drastic event...

Meet Evan, my grandson, a precocious three year old. As you can see, he is quite comfortable being in front of the camera. I guess when you are born into the family of a photographer you come to accept having a camera in your face as normal. As you can see, he is quite the ham. Every time I point the camera at him he'll look into the lens and say "cheese". He is also fond of pressing the buttons on the back of the camera. At first it was just the fun of pressing buttons. As he became aware that the buttons actually do something he got a kick out of the preview button and the live view button. Trust me, he knows the difference.

There are times when I will take a photo without any clear idea of what I am going to do with it. It could be that something in the subject doesn't spark my creativity or I may have hurried through the process. Whatever the case, I will often take a photo just to document a location or event. We all do this. Such was the case with Motif No.1  located at Bradley Wharf in the harbor town of Rockport, Massachusetts earlier this year. You can see my version of the location here. Diane and I had gone there with a bunch of friends from a local camera group to photograph the various points of interest. Motif No.1 is a fairly famous attraction having been made famous by local artists including Lester Hornby and John Buckley . In this tutorial I am going to show you one process to take a ho-hum image and add a little pizzas to it. Several techniques are utilized that can be adapted and applied to your own work and I'll point those out. Overall, this is a very simple process...