BetterPhotoJim

Cyber Monday: Huge Savings on Photo Courses!!

Stock up on online photography courses during today's Cyber Monday sale at BetterPhoto!

Buy your course bundle now and then use your course credits any time within the next two years.

Bundle up for big holiday savings! Break your purchase down today into three payments. Only pay one today! Pay the other two in 2012!

What I’m Most Grateful For

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. I love this time of year with its focus on celebration, gratitude and family time. I have a lot to be grateful for, both with my journey as a photography enthusiast and as my journey as the owner of BetterPhoto for the past 15 and a half years.

I keep a Gratitude Journal and every morning, during what I call my “Morning My Time” routine, I write at least 10 things that I am most grateful for.

The following are a few of the things I most appreciate and celebrate the most when it comes to photography and BetterPhoto.

• The appreciation of light: How photography has taught me to appreciate light (I’m especially appreciating it right now, btw, when the skies are dark and overcast in the Pacific Northwest).

• Great friends: BetterPhoto has led me to some of the world’s most wonderful people – both on Team BetterPhoto and in the amazing BetterPhoto community… people who are kind, supportive, and compassionate, as well as super creative!

• Guilt-free travel: We’ve had so many fun journeys as we’ve led photography workshops, conducted awesome BetterPhoto summits and filmed award-winning photography DVDs.

• Creative productivity: The joy and pride one feels upon completing a book. I am particularly grateful to Amphoto and Kerry Drager and particularly proud of The BetterPhoto Guide to Nature Photography, and BetterPhoto Basics. But I love them all.

• God’s guidance: We’ve survived a dot com crash and a recession! God guiding Denise and I back around 2000 to avoid the dot com crash and the whole angel investor thing because it just did not make sense to us. This one move caused us to survive the dot com bubble burst.

• Magic memories recorded for our future: I have beautiful records of the big milestone events in my life… my time with my sweet sunshine – my wife Denise… our travels to Russia when we adopted our three beautiful children… all of the fun family trips and adventures we’ve enjoyed, as well as our many magic moments here at home.

And I most appreciate YOU. You’ve been a magnificent member of our great group, and I thank you.

I believe in you and your creative abilities and want to make sure you know how much I appreciate your courage in stepping up to live a creative life.

BetterPhoto and photography have been very good to me, and I thank God for the many blessings I’ve been given over the years.

What are you most grateful for?

How to Shoot Outdoor Portraits

Jim Zuckerman is one of the top pros at BetterPhoto's digital photography school, and he offers some excellent tips for photographing portraits outdoors. Check it out...

(c) Jim Zuckerman

"Successfully photographing people outdoors is not hard at all," says Jim Z. "In fact, it's easy if you use the following guidelines."

1. Use soft and diffused lighting such as from an overcast sky or shade.

2. Make sure the background is in shade, too. Don't photograph someone in the shade and have a background with direct sun or even sunny highlights. That will ruin the picture.

3. Use a telephoto lens, at least 150mm or so.

4. Make sure the background is either out of focus or complementary in some way.

5. Don't ask for a fake smile.

"There are other types of outdoor portraits that can work," points out Jim Z, "but these five guidelines will always give you great results."


Notes:

- See more information about Jim Zuckerman and his online photography courses at his BetterPhoto instructor's bio page.

- In addition, Jim Z contributed wonderful images to my next two BetterPhoto Guide books (both co-authored with Kerry Drager): The BetterPhoto Guide to Creative Digital Photography (just published) and The BetterPhoto Guide to Photographing Light (due out in April 2012).