It was a unit part of my qualification, went for a semester, 4hrs per week.
Went into developing pictures, light, contrasting, camera settings,etc

But to be perfectly honest, alot of it can be picked up by trial and error, trying things out to see what looks good, the course was still good though, explained alot of things, as well as learning development of photos, using filters and shit.


EDIT: SLR? I have a cannon digital camera, just has a few good modes and a few things you can customise once you work it out.
I didnt buy a SLR for 2 reasons, 1 - Couldnt afford one. 2 - I needed a digital camera that I could buy an underwater casing for when I go out scuba diving, and you cant get them for a mid-range SLR (at least thats what I was told)

I must admit though, I would absolutely love to have a decent SLR

man those pics are grainy, lotsa artifacts possibly from jpg compression, underexposed, blurry AND the horizon is on an angle !! what do they teach u in TAFE? omg....

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E92 BMW M3 - silverstone silver
Ducati 1198S - red

www.lumensphotography.com

its called...reducing the photo size to make it practical for most people to look at, the originals are over 2mb in size (grainy & artifacts).
as for the other comments, I didnt realise i was sitting an exam in a photography class, just because i did a course, am i expected to make every picture perfect, for goodness sake, they were quick pictures taken to see how it looked, if i wanted professional looking pictures i would have set up a tripod and gone to a bit more effort.
I put the pictures up in a thread like this to give a few ideas if anyone wanted them, on locations. Yet, someone cant resist having a real bitch about them because they arent exactly perfect.
Meh, I wont bother next time.

ok maybe i'm a bit harsh and should offer a more responsible post.

at night, you should increase the ISO as high as u can without introducing too much noise. but noise is better than blur, so use high ISO if u must

try and keep the camera level with the horizon so it doesn't look like u've got one short leg

longer shutter times to expose the picture correctly, without blowing out the highlights

use larger aperture or tripod to try and get rid of hand shake blur

try and play with the rule of thirds to balance your picture correctly

and try using fill flash or a rear curtain type flash to light up the car in the foreground when exposing for the background.

for closer car shots use a larger aperture to try and blur out the background to maintain focus on the car.

hope that helps

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E92 BMW M3 - silverstone silver
Ducati 1198S - red

www.lumensphotography.com

like I've said, I do know what I am doing (appreciate you offering tips though), I just wasnt overly concerned with getting a perfect shot this time.

Basically, I was, how shall I say, scouting for a good location, so that when I have more time, Ill go down there and do it properly.

The few photos at shoalwater, not only did I forget to set night mode, but as you can see, I just ran out of light.

Normally, I probably wouldnt have bothered uploading those pictures as I know they arent the best of quality, but I thought it might give some guys some ideas on some locations.

Only other issue I have is my camera, while its a good camera, Im still learning how to do everything on it, the manual that came with it is about as useful as a car with no wheels. So Im on the trial and error basis with it until I work out how to change things.

I do have a couple of photos that came out real good last time I took pictures, unfortunately, I did the smart thing, and deleted the wrong folder on my computer.....and the pictures were in it.

One day......I'll get the time to take some decent photos & I'll upload them.

I've found that the biggest problem with using a flash is the nuisence of the reflectors on the car. Yeah, I know ways around it, it just can be a little annoying at times.

yerh flash and cars don't go well together and it's best to use a well lit up area in the first place, but sometimes it can work awesome...



strong remote flash on the right (firing left) at ground level and a 20% ish flash firing front onto the car to accentuate and highlight the curves and body of the car. silver is supposedly the best automotive colour to photograph lines as well...

__________________
E92 BMW M3 - silverstone silver
Ducati 1198S - red

www.lumensphotography.com

i paid $15 ripped off!

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deaded

Once you start thinking about photos, it can get quite complicated, but the results can be quite nice.
Take this photo for an example, its one I took a few weeks ago, the bright spots on the car from the sun was intentional, make it looks shiny, I didnt use it before because on some spots on the car, you can see evidence of the sloppy car wash I did earlier in the day. (that and I forgot to put the driver side window up)

I should warn you though, the photo is just over 2mb in size. (for the rare few on dialup)
Photo

yerh im not sure how i'd make it a lot better but here's what would be running thru my head before/after even taking the pic...

turn the wheel so that u can see the entire rim facing u

try to get in a position where the shadows from the car don't dominate the photo (or shoot at a better time of day)

try and blur the background a lot more to maintain everyone's eyes on your car and not the machinery in the background

try and compose the picture with less foreground sand as that's pretty boring (maybe crop out all that sand in the foreground)

if u don't have one, use a polariser .. maybe?

try a better angle, usually works best if u'r around headlights level

crop that 1/3 truck out or compose it without it in there

i can't say i take awesome pics, but by letting other ppl critique (and hang shit) on my pictures, i find it an awesome way to learn.

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E92 BMW M3 - silverstone silver
Ducati 1198S - red

www.lumensphotography.com

i did some minor cropping and colour changes to ur picture to get it a bit better (hopefully).

here's what i came up with (I'll take it down if u don't want me to stick ur pic up)

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E92 BMW M3 - silverstone silver
Ducati 1198S - red

www.lumensphotography.com