I present you with my latest list of Photography and design tutorials, articles and tips.

Shooting the new Smirnoff ad campaign

PhotoshopSupport.com has published an interview with Mark Waugh and how he created the stunning “liquid scuplture like” images for Smirnoff’s newest ad campaign where water splashes are shaped as glasses. Mark goes through the thinking process, explains the technical side of the project and how he shoot 1400 images to get the final 3.

Feed Icons

The Mozilla foundation has created a website where you can download feed (RSS) icons and get tips and code-snippets to implement them on your website/blog.
“The feed icon should be used to indicate the presence of information provided via web syndication in an open format, including in particular the widely-used RSS 1.0, RSS 2.0, and Atom 1.0 formats.”

Edit: You can download a lot of cool RSS icons here.

Photoshop brushes and patterns

Brusheezy.com is a place where brush- & pattern-makers share their files, and that makes it’s one of the biggest sites of it’s kind out there.

All the brushes and patterns are free and you can always share your own files if you want.

Understanding depth of field

In this short article by PhotoAxe, the author explains a few examples on how to use a different depth of field and focus to archive a great looking photograph as well as to put focus on your subject.
“Depth of field is influenced by three main factors: 1) Aperture, 2) Focal length, and 3) the distance to the subject.”

Vectorization (aka tracing) is the process of converting a raster image to a vector image. Vectormagic is an online engine that converts bitmap images to vector art – it’s an online auto-tracer.

You can currently convert your JPG, GIF, PNG, BMP and TIFF images to the following formats; EPS, SVG and PNG.

I played around with this tool myself, and the quality of it’s tracing is unbelievable. It’s a great tool worth checking out.

Link: http://vectormagic.stanford.edu

Article by www.gosquared.com/liquidicity
Being a successful creative has a lot to do with the way you work. Sure, you can’t teach good design, but it never hurts to learn a few new tricks, or simply make the most of your talents. So without further adieu, here’s 50 ways to be more successful as a designer. Take ‘em or leave ‘em.

Don’t get stuck before you’ve started: get some good ideas.

1] Metaphors.

Great ideas can stem from using themes and metaphors. Basing a site design around the idea of a school, for example, can open up a whole avenue of ideas. A great design works because the theme houses and conveys the content seamlessly.

2] Don’t take all day to brainstorm.

It always helps to throw ideas around with a colleague or friend (as long as he knows what he’s doing). Try to have a couple of short sessions of brainstorming rather than one massive one as ideas can quickly go cold.

3] Get off that computer!

Sometimes it’s best to just have a break. Leaving the computer can seem like going on holiday in rush hour, but it usually helps if you just take a 10 minute break and get some fresh air. If you can’t do that, try listening to some music, or taking your jumper off.

Click here to read the rest of this article.

I’ve collected a few tutorials and articles I came across on my daily surfing. Some interesting Photoshop tutorials and photography tips & tricks, plus a great Photoshop brush resource (I love brushes!).

The perfect way to spend your Sunday afternoon.

Food Photography Tips from Pixar’s Sharon Calahan,
director of Photography on the movie Ratatouille

How to Light Objects in Photography
at Digital Photography Tutorials

Creating a Stunning Digital Smoke Effect
a photoshop tutorial by psdtuts.com

100 High Resolution Photoshop Brushes
a collection listed by photoshoproadmap.com

Need inspiration for your logo design?
Over 2000 logos at BuzzShout.com

We suffered a downtime yesterday for a few hours, but everything is now running as it should. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Bernie’s Better Beginner’s Guide to Photography for Computer Geeks Who Want to be Digital Artists.
This is the guide I wish someone had written for me when I started 3 months ago. It’s much shorter than photography books that cover the same topics because it’s a computer geek’s guide. I skip right over the basics of using a camera because you can guess your way through the basics or even read your camera manual (wimp!). I skip any advice about composition or artistic technique because there are better guides that cover those (though I might give it a shot next month). I use terms without defining them because I assume you can use Wikipedia if you need more detail.

For further reading covering field technique and composition I unreservedly recommend John Shaw’s Nature Photography Field Guide. Also, the National Geographic field guides are said (by my sister) to be good.

If you want to be a digital artist then you’ll need to be so comfortable using your camera that the exposure controls are second nature to you, so you can focus yourself on composing the scene that you want. This guide tries to get you to that point as quickly as possible. Some otherwise excellent photography guides take ages walking through the basics of exposure before gradually eking out the advanced details. This will never do: you’re a geek and can be dropped in at the deep end.

Guide to Photography for Computer Geeks Who Want to be Digital Artists

More photography links:

How Symmetry and Antisymmetry Impact Your Photos

Learning to See – how to create a composition that qualifies as art

Depth of Field Revisited, by Harold M. Merklinger

Article by digital-photography-school.com
There are plenty of subjects around to photograph at Halloween ranging from the traditional jack-o-lantern through to people in costume, to trick or treat ‘treats’ etc. It’s a time of color, emotion and lots of interesting subjects.

The keys to capturing them are not that different from the normal keys to good composition in photography. As you photograph Halloween this year keep in mind some of the basics of good digital photography. I’ve selected the following tutorials that we’ve written before that should be helpful in your Halloween photography.

Click here to read the rest of the article.

When you are finished reading the article, shoot some halloween photos and submit them to the gallery. We can always use more freaky photos

Todays post is written by our guest poster Chad Lockwood of stockphotoguides.com

So you’ve purchased a quality digital camera, learned how to use it, and are taking brilliant photos. Even if you have no desire to become a professional photographer, you can still earn a little bit of cash from your hobby by selling your picture as stock photos.

The stock photography industry has opened its doors to amateurs and hobbyists with the introduction of so-called microstock companies. These companies offer stock images at extremely low prices. Traditionally, designers had to spend up to several hundred dollars for stock images, but microstock has created another pricing level, in the sub-$50 range. Any photographer can register at a microstock company and submit their photography for review and potential sale.

However, you can’t just sell any old snapshot. There are various requirements for image quality and subject matter. Most microstock agencies have strict approval processes for the photographs they sell. Each agency has its own specific requirements, but most share the key issues of technical quality and subject matter.

Since stock photos are often used in printed marketing materials, images must be large enough to be reproduced in print. Four (4) megapixels is the standard minimum size requirement for stock photo use. In addition to size, the visual quality of the image must be very high. This means no dust, scratches, noise, or other blemishes. Proper composition, lighting, and focus are critical.

Subject matter is another key component of stock photos. Most agencies are looking for creative approaches to capturing an idea, emotion, or concept. Quality images featuring people, groups of people, activities, sporting events, and seasonal themes are in-demand. (Remember you will need a model release for every picture that features an identifiable person). On the other hand, pictures of sunsets, flowers, landscapes, and your pet ferret will not get accepted, unless they are outstanding.

Once you have photos worthy of being stock, you need to know where to sell them and what you can expect to earn. The most popular microstock agencies are Dreamstime, iStockphoto, Fotolia and Shutterstock, but there are many others. Find one that caters to your photographic interests.

In reality, you are not really ’selling’ your images, you are simply licensing them for particular uses. Microstock agencies sell, or license, images as Royalty Free. This basically means a buyer pays once and can use the image multiple times at no additional charge. As the photographer, the images (and copyright) remain your property.

What can you expect to earn? Selling stock photos is a game of numbers. Photographers earn a commission or flat rate each time an image is licenses. Commissions range from 20% to 60%, or $0.20 to $1.00 per image. How much you make depends on the demand for your images and how many images you have available. The more images you have available to sell, the more you are likely to make. You could make anywhere from a few bucks per month, to several hundred (or even thousand).

While you may not aspire to be a professional photographer, if you take great photos and follow a few guidelines, you can earn money from your hobby by selling your images as stock. You might even earn enough to buy that new lens you’ve had your eye on!

Chad Lockwood is the author of stockphotoguides.com, where you can find more detailed information about selling stock photos.

The fall is upon us and now is the perfect time to read Photojojo’s advise and tips on how-to and what-to take pictures of. Their article features techniques, what to photograph and a few good creative tips.

“Fall has up and arrived – kamikaze leaves crash down on unsuspecting passersby, leaf peeping is a thing again, and reports of rumbles coming from the Great Pumpkin have spread throughout the nearby towns and villages. Any time of year is a great time to snap a photograph, but Fall is, of course, at least twenty times more so. (IOHO, of course.)”

Read the whole article here.