Blogger Skills: Photography Practice + Giveaway

After attending the Photography Workshop from Mommy Bloggers Philippines last February 21, 2015 at Saboten, Glorietta 5, I have been practicing my new found skills  for my recents blog posts or just IG posts.
Now it is time share with you some of my photo practices and tips I have been applying. For me, I have improved a lot and I am challenged to get better. For now enjoy looking at my photos (crossing fingers) and learning from techniques I used.

1. Natural Lighting

"The Best Things in Life are Free" is a phrase you'd probably heard before right? But did you know that you can apply this in photography too? What do I mean by free in Photography? The sun and it's light that is! Taking photos with the sun's natural light do good in your photos. Its all around, and it's free. It makes photos clearer and the details are seen better. Just remember the concept of "Golden Hour" when the sun is not too high making it suitable to take photos. The golden hour is between 8-9 am and 3-4pm or depending on your location.

2. Learn the basics of your Camera

One thing I learned in the photography worksho is that the instrument is only as good as its user. An expensive camera will only take great photos once a photographer knows how to maximize its use.

I am using a Samsung Galaxy Y Duos. I don't really like taking photos from it before because I find my shots crappy. I could not use it at night, can't focus details on my subjects, in short I was unable to give justice to my photos. BUT that was BEFORE.

I learned to maximize my camera settings, experimenting among daylight, cloudy, incandescent and flourescent to get the best setting for my shoot. I also learned to use the exposure so I could shoot at night. Now I am more inlove with my phone because I get wonderful photos now.

3. Props Styling and Creating Stories

This is the tricky part of photography. Translating a story with just the picture is challenging. The goal is to engage your audience to a story for the eyes. You would want to express more than meets the eye. Admittedly, I find this hard because I dont have a lot of props at home but I try to make use of what I have at home.

4. Refer to the Color Wheel.

The best way to take advantage of a product or a subject is to use colors tht complement it. As for me, I look for what will help my subject stand out. The use if the color wheel can assist you on that. Choosing colors can be challenging but when done properly can highlight your subject perfectly.

5. Practice makes Perfect

What is great now is that we use digital photos which means more opportunity to shoot and practice. Save your practice shots and compare so you could see your progress and what needs to be improved on. You would probably get shot which you would totally love. Be proud of it and let people give feedback so you'll learn better.

Hopefully, you learned a tip or two and be motivated by my photos to practice too. (Hehe!) And because I am feeling generous again, I am giving away the products on my 5th photo just in time for the summer. Mechanics will be explained on my next post, so please stay tune!:)

Blogger Skills: Mommy Bloggers Philippines' Take Blog Worthy Photos Workshop

Today has been truly productive and inspiring. I attended my morning and afternoon classes then went straight to the Photography Workshop of Mommy Bloggers Philippines. It was my first time to attend a photography workshop so I was thrilled. Th best part of it is one of my favorite mommy blogger, Joy Gurtiza of  Joy Bites was the speaker! (Good Job, Joy!:)) 

Here are some of my shots taken before the workshop in Saboten.

 

Before shots

These were some of my tests shots while waiting for the workshop to start. If you were to ask me if my photos looked great,  I 'd say these are a "Pwede na" photos. That is until I learned that the basics of ptography and how these "Pwede na" photos  be turned into its best version.

 

Set up, Behind the scenes

Afte the talk we were then asked to practice shooting and apply our new skills. Here are some of my best shots. (Hihi! Pwede na for a beginner)

 

I showed these to my hubby and he said "Paano biglang luminaw camera mo?" Hihi. That's how great the workshop was to think that I just used a Samsung mobile phone. :) Tama nga, na wala sa brand ang camera, nasa humahawak. :)

Afterwards, I also took some photos of the giveaways I got from the event.

 

There were other giveaways but I'd like to practice the new skills I have on them. There were also to-do lists in the handouts given during the workshop and I am planning to do them so I could see my progress too. I hope you stay tuned on that too!:)

Thank you to all the generous sponsors, #Saboten, #JapanHome #HenrysProfessional, #OilofArgan, #VilladelConte, and #Gouache.

To Mommy Bloggers Philippines, great job on  another successful and enriching event. Kudos to all your hard work and till our next!:)