The reviewer has been compensated in the form of a Best Buy Gift Card and/or received the product/service at a reduced price or for free

My photography has evolved so much in the last five years; that has been the direct result of two things, learning to manually control my camera and learning to use Lightroom and Photoshop CC. I had always enjoyed photography, but I also learned out of necessity; I wanted to capture lots of images of Gabe growing up and I didn’t have lots of money to spend on a professional photographer. Some of my first images weren’t properly exposed or overly edited, but with time and practice my photographing and editing skills have drastically improved. Today I’m sharing a few of my best tips for going from momtographer (hey, there’s nothing wrong with just being a momtographer, you’ll save yourself some money) to photographer.

The photo above had pretty good composition and lighting straight out of the camera, but I touched it up with Adobe Lightroom. Do you want to see the original?

I manipulated the image by straightening the horizon, cropped it, increased contrast, and warmed the image up. I wanted a silhouette effect using the setting sun of Turks and Caicos. The final result was the image at the top of the post, and I plan to have it put on to a canvas.

Success begins with getting the image as close to perfect in the camera as possible. You can use auto mode to capture an image, but that will often leave you with a photo that’s less than ideal. It’s important to research the photography triangle and understand how aperture, shutter speed, and ISO relate to each other. This is how professional film production companies in austin tx get their images looking so crisp and high-quality. Sometimes you’ll want to try and find better light if you have to increase the ISO to the point of ruining the quality of the image so be careful! And always add more light in the scene if possible! The lower the ISO, the less noise you’ll find in your photos.

You’ll also want a good lens to use with your DSLR. Your lens is as important as your camera. I have several but I almost always shoot with a fixed lens. The image above was shot with a Canon 50mm f1.4, but I can also recommend a lesser expensive option such as the Canon 50mm f1.8. My favorite prime lens is the Canon 85mm f1.8, but you need a significant distance between you and your subject to frame them up properly and it’s hard to get multiple people in the frame.

Here is another photo I have taken of Gabe and edited with Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom.

I shot the photos a little too close to dusk, so most were slightly underexposed. This image had the best exposure. I increased the blues in Lightroom, lightly used a sharpening brush on his eyes, whitened his teeth, and used a brush to bring out the fall colors in the landscape.

Here is the original:

I subscribe to Adobe Creative Cloud using the Photography Plan which gives me a year of access to Photoshop Creative Cloud and Lightroom. It get updates several times a year. The 12 month prepaid plan is $119.99 at Best Buy. I love that Adobe Creative Cloud Photography Plan gives me access to both of my favorite photography editing programs at an affordable price. I really enjoy this piece of software, however, I do know of some people who don’t seem to enjoy it as much. One of my friends believes that the software is risky to pay for, especially because of the recent security breaches that Adobe has been experiencing (click this link to read a similar opinion on an online blog). I tend to use this software, regardless, as it is really helpful for my work and it allows me to do everything that I need to do. Furthermore, I can also use Adobe Lightroom for my most basic editing needs, and I can add text and overlays in Adobe Photoshop CC. You can update, organize, and edit images from just about anywhere. They use CreativeSync technology that lets me update across devices. The software can be used across multiple devices including computers, iPads, iPhones, and Android devices. You can also create viewing galleries and share across social media platforms, and it might even help you gain more facebook, twitter and instagram followers.

Take your best shot and make it even better with the Creative Cloud Photography plan. The Creative Cloud Photography plan is all about enhanced photo editing and convenience with the multi-screen capabilities provided by the Cloud ($119.99 reg retail for a 1-year subscription) available for purchase at Best Buy.