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Table of Contents

Choosing the Right Camera.

Choosing Your Type of Digital Camera.

Important Features.

Optional Features.

Advice for Taking Better Photos.

Five fixes for common photo problems.

Five Tips for Taking Great Low Light Pictures.

Six Ways to Speed Up an Old Camera.

Photo Tips for Parents.

Photo Checklist for New Parents.

Take Better Baby Photos.

Best Sites for Creating Baby’s First Year Photo Book.

Photo Tips for Special Situations.

Photo Tips for July 4th Fireworks.

Fun Halloween Photo Effects.

Eight Tips for Taking Great Pictures of Your Pet.

How To Get Great Group Shots.

Organizing Your Photos.

Ten Tips to Keep Your Digital Photos Organized.

How To Digitize Your Old Photos.

The Best Photo and Video Digitalizing Services.

The Best Sites for Sharing Your Photos.

The Best Photo Book Sites.

The Best Photo Sharing Sites.

Choosing the Right Camera

By Suzanne Kantra

Woman with cameraSmartphone cameras are now capable of taking very good photos—certainly good enough for everyday shots. And if you love shooting with your phone, we have great tips for improving your results.

But when it comes to trickier shots, such as low light, fast action and portraits, having a high-quality digital camera will vastly improve your photos.

Thankfully, there are tons of great options that won’t bust your budget. We'll help you understand what’s really important for you to consider when buying, and which options are just an excuse to charge you more money.

Choosing Your Type of Digital Camera

There are basically two types of digital cameras: compact and interchangeable-lens. Compact cameras are less expensive and more pocket-size portable. They range in features from point-and-shoot simplicity to photographically sophisticated. Interchangeable lens cameras, on the other hand, offer superior image quality, more creative freedom, faster performance and a higher price tag.

digital SLR and point-and-shoot camerasIt’s worth noting that while it used to be “interchangeable-lens camera” was synonymous with “digital SLR,” that’s not true anymore. In the past few years, we’ve seen new models that use a simpler internal design to deliver a camera that’s smaller than an SLR, but still lets you swap lenses. These include the Micro Four Thirds cameras made by Olympus and Panasonic, the NEX line from Sony and the NX series from Samsung. Pricewise, they’re closer to SLRs than point-and-shoots, starting at about $600. Image quality is close to SLR levels, too.

There are two key trade-offs to consider when choosing between SLRs and compact interchangeable-lens cameras (CILCs). First is the optical viewfinder that lets you hold the camera up to your eye when shooting. That’s a real benefit on a sunny day, when LCDs can be hard to see, and also helps keep the camera steady. Some of the new breed of CILCs offer eye-level viewing with an optional electronic viewfinder – basically a tiny LCD screen – but they’re the exception rather than the rule, don’t work as well as a true optical viewfinder, and are usually pricey (i.e., around $300 as an add-on accessory).

The other key difference is speedy operation, particularly when it comes to autofocus. True SLRs have an edge here, though it must be said that the latest CILCs are closing the gap. Still, if you’re shooting your soccer-playing kids charging down the field, you’ll have better luck with an SLR.

You can find Techlicious’ latest camera recommendations in our online Camera Guides & Reviews.

Important Features

How Many Megapixels?

A camera’s resolution is measured in megapixels. But, like many things in life, bigger isn’t necessarily better. Every camera on the market today has plenty of resolution for normal picture taking. And when you start upping the megapixel count in a compact camera, you’re squeezing an awful lot of light sensors into a very small space, which can actually translate to a lower-quality picture, most notably in the speckled, noisy appearance you’ll see in solid-color areas. Unfortunately, choosing one camera over another simply based on a higher megapixel count is a losing strategy.

Selecting the Right Lens

Your camera’s lens will have the largest impact on the quality of your images (outside of the skill of the photographer, that is). Nikon and Canon are known for their lens quality, but other manufacturers often include equally high-quality lenses from respected lens makers such as Leica, Carl Zeiss or Schneider-Kreuznach. Look for these names while shopping.

The lens also provides zoom power for those close-ups of smiling faces or far-away action. In this case, bigger really can be better, with some caveats. You’ll find basic compact cameras offer zooms in the 3x to 5x range, which is fine for routine shooting. Cameras that are nearly as small but priced a bit higher now come with lenses in the 12x to 18x zoom range, which gives you more freedom to frame a shot from a distance – a scene in a school play, for example. Finally there are the “megazooms”, offering paparazzi-style close-ups at 30x and beyond. These zoom lengths require a larger, less portable camera, though.

The trade-offs as zoom gets longer are required light levels and wide-angle coverage. The number to keep an eye on for low-light photography is the maximum aperture, which is listed as f/something. A typical camera with a modest zoom will have a maximum aperture around f/3.5. A more expensive lens gets you down to f/2.0 or even lower, making it much easier to shoot non-blurry photos without a flash. When you start getting into the f/4.5 range, handheld indoor shooting without a flash becomes very difficult.

The other key lens spec, which affects how many people you can fit in a group shot, and how wide your landscape photos can stretch, is the “focal length” for the "35mm equivalent." The lower the number of mm, the wider the shot. 28mm is perfect for wide group shots and landscapes, while 35mm-38mm is fine for regular photos.

You can largely ignore anything you read about digital zoom. In most cases it simply enlarges the photo by blowing it up, something you can easily do at home on your computer. In fact, we usually recommend you turn off the digital zoom on your camera when taking pictures.

Display

Both compact and interchangeable lens cameras have LCDs on the back that let you see what you’re aiming at before pressing the shutter. These vary widely in quality. Resolution is one distinguishing characteristic – here, higher numbers are better, presenting a clearer representation of your photo when shooting and when playing it back. Brightness is another challenge, since a dim LCD screen is hard to see on a sunny day. Some manufacturers use coatings to try and tame mid-day glare, with varying degrees of success.

Another potential display advantage is a screen that’s hinged so it can be pivoted to different angles. This not only lets you shoot comfortably with the camera held overhead or down low, it can also be a good way to defeat glare.

Image stabilization and High ISO Speed

Unless you’re a robot, your hands will have some level of shake while holding your camera. This can become a serious issue in low-light situations, when the shutter speed has to slow down to create a proper exposure. It can also be magnified by high-zoom lenses. Optical image stabilization reduces or eliminates this blur. If you’re looking at a camera with a 5x zoom or higher, you’ll definitely want this feature.

ISO is a technical way of measuring how sensitive your camera’s sensor is to light. The higher the ISO, the faster the shutter speed will be. The faster the shutter speed, the less blur in your photo. Most cameras have a top ISO rating of at least 800, which is fine for normal indoor and outdoor use. For better low-light shots, ISO 1600 or higher will help, though at these levels you may start to see a lot of image noise (stray bits of color) introduced--so don’t expect miracles when you take “a shot in the dark.”

For more low light shooting tips, see Five Tips for Taking Great Low Light Pictures.

Picture Taking Speed

A photo is a permanent record of a split second in time – and if your camera’s too slow, the split second you capture won’t be the one you wanted. There are two considerations here. One is the time that elapses between the moment you press the shutter and the moment the camera takes the picture. This is called shutter lag. This used to be a major differentiating factor between different camera models, but in recent years shutter lag has grown shorter and the gap between cameras has narrowed.

The second camera delay problem is the time the camera needs to get ready between shots. If you have kids, a slow camera will guarantee missed shots. These speeds can vary significantly from camera to camera and, annoyingly, they’re not included in the manufacturers’ performance specs. Ideally, you can get a few moments of hands-on time to fire off some test shots in the store – if the camera’s slow, you’ll know it quickly. A good camera reviewer will also point out problems if they exist.

One last speed bump: the camera’s “burst” or “continuous shooting” mode. This tells you the maximum number of shots the camera can take per second, without flash. A high burst rate can be a lifesaver if you’re trying to catch a baby’s fleeting expression, or just the right moment when little Casey is at bat. These figures are available for most cameras, and while you’ll have to take the specific number with a grain of salt, they’re a reasonable basis for comparison.

Taking Good Videos

Nearly all digital cameras today, of both the compact and interchangeable-lens variety, can also take movies. The quality won’t equal a standalone camcorder, but it’s often surprisingly good. You’ll find both high-def video standards represented: the very sharp 720p that’s used in HD broadcasts all the way up to Blu-ray disc quality Full HD, at 1080p. It’s worth noting that even if a camera can shoot at higher definition levels, you can almost always shoot lower-res as well, which makes uploading much easier.

Optional Features

Face detection: If you’ve ever taken a photo with the background in beautiful focus and your spouse’s face an unrecognizable blur, you’ll understand why you need face detection. Cameras with this option are smart enough to recognize faces and focus on them, even if they’re not in the center of the frame or the closest object to the camera. Some cameras do this automatically, others have special modes. In a higher-end model, you can even select your subject or differentiate between kids and adults. And with touch-screen cameras, you can generally tap on the face you want in focus to select it.

Autofocus Tracking: With this feature, once you select your subject, the camera will automatically keep it in focus until you take your picture. When paired with face detection, cameras can also "remember" the person you're tracking, reacquiring a lock even if he or she leaves the frame for a few seconds.

HDR:  HDR, or high dynamic range, refers to a mode in which the camera takes three images—one over exposed, one under expose and one at regular exposure—and merges them together to reveal more detail in all areas of the image. It's great for images where there is very little or no movement, like landscapes or posed portraits.

Smile and blink detection: A camera with smile or blink detection finds a face, and only takes the photo if all the people are smiling and/or if all the subjects’ eyes are open.

Wi-Fi: Cameras with built-in Wi-Fi can automatically download your photos to your computer, email them or upload them to web services like Facebook, Picasa or YouTube. It's a convenient feature for travelers.

GPS: When a GPS receiver is built into your digital camera, the coordinates of the spot where you press the shutter are saved with each picture. Called “geotagging,” this obviously isn’t a necessity, but can be fun for your vacation images. Some cameras and photo sharing Web sites, such as Flickr, let you view your photos as icons attached to a map.

HD Output: Every camera lets you view your images on your TV. But only some have the output jack (HDMI) that enables you to take advantage of an HDTV’s full resolution. Surprisingly, even some cameras that shoot in HD won’t let you play back the results directly from the camera, a major oversight. If you plan on viewing your images regularly on your HDTV, this feature should be on your checklist.

Touchscreen: Some digital cameras with 3-inch or larger displays let you navigate menus with a touchscreen instead of buttons. Whether or not this is an advantage is a matter of personal preference. Some of us love the smartphone-like control scheme; some are more fingerprint-phobic and find physical buttons easier to handle quickly. If possible, try out a touchscreen model you’re considering to see if the screen reacts quickly and easily to your finger movements, and the on-screen menu system makes sense.

Advice for Taking Better Photos

Five fixes for common photo problems

By Steve Morgenstern

The automatic point-and-shoot systems in today’s digital cameras generally do an excellent job, but there are still many shooting situations where a little manual control can make an enormous difference. Here are some simple steps you can take to improve your pictures that will work with both simple and sophisticated cameras.

1. Out of focus photos

When your main subject isn’t in the center of the image, the camera may decide to focus elsewhere. The fastest, easiest solution is to move the camera temporarily so your subject is in the center of the photo, press the shutter button halfway, and hold it. As long as you keep the shutter button pressed halfway, the camera will maintain focus on your subject, even if you move the camera to recompose the shot. Alternatively, you may be able to turn on face detection (if it’s a person you’re shooting) and the system will find the people in the scene anywhere on the screen. And with an advanced camera you can adjust the focal point manually, but this can be time-consuming and result in missed shots.

2. Blurry images

Movement can cause image blur, whether it’s an athlete running down the field or your own hands shaking slightly as you press the shutter button in dim lighting. You can combat this by adjusting the camera’s ISO setting – with a higher ISO, the shutter speed can be faster, making it easier to freeze the action. There is a trade-off here when it comes to image quality, though. As you boost the ISO, the amount of noise, or visible graininess, in your photos increases. The degree to which this occurs differs from camera to camera, so a little trial and error is a good idea, but as a rule you can go to ISO 400 or even 800 with acceptable results, and often significantly higher if you’re planning to post rather than print your picture.

3. Off-color images

We don’t ordinarily notice changes in the color of light – our brains make the adjustment automatically – but in fact sunlight, incandescent bulb light, fluorescent light and so on are distinctly different shades. Your camera automatically adjusts to compensate for this, but it doesn’t always succeed. The most common problems are overly reddish-orange photos in rooms lit with standard household bulbs, and greenish shots under fluorescent light.

There are two approaches to tackling this problem. Nearly every camera lets you choose a white balance setting to match the environment – sunny, cloudy, tungsten (incandescent bulbs), fluorescent, etc. Even better is taking a manual white balance reading, if your camera allows it. This sounds fancy, but it’s actually a fast operation – you point the camera at a white piece of paper and press a button to take the setting. This provides the most accurate color reproduction possible, and you don’t have to take a new setting for each photo. Once you take a manual white balance reading, it will stay in effect until you change it.

4. Faces in outdoor shots are too dark

Your camera tries to ensure that everything in your photo will be reasonably well lit, using an automatic exposure system. In some instances, though, this just doesn’t work. For example, when you’re shooting at a sunny beach or in a snowy setting, the background is much brighter than the people in your photo, so they can come out far too dark. One solution is to use your camera’s preset scene settings. These vary from camera to camera, but nearly all models include settings for Beach and Snow or Backlit situations.

Another option: set your camera to fire off the flash with each shot. When left in automatic mode, the flash won’t fire when the overall lighting is bright, but in an outdoor scene it can help illuminate faces and freeze action even when the sun is shining. This is called a "fill flash.”

For finer lighting control, explore your exposure compensation options. Even cameras without extensive manual controls usually provide this option. Exposure compensation lets you tweak the camera’s automatic setting to match conditions as you see them. Setting a positive exposure compensation makes the photo brighter, while a negative setting darkens the image. Try experimenting in your spare time, when you’re not trying to take mission-critical photos at important events.

5. Cluttered backgrounds

Often we’re so busy looking at the subject of our photos that we don’t notice what’s going on in the background. Then, when we look at the actual picture, we see a ton of distracting detail that ruins the overall effect of the image.

Strategy one for dealing with this: try repositioning your subject and/or yourself to frame a cleaner shot. Does that tree branch look like it’s coming out of your child’s ear? Move three inches to the right and it’s gone. Is the busy wallpaper pattern going to distract from your daughter’s lovely smile? Ask her to move a few feet away from the wall, allowing the background to fade into the background.

A more technological solution depends on your camera’s manual controls – specifically, whether it offers "aperture-priority" mode. The camera’s aperture setting determines how much light enters the camera and impacts how much of the image is in focus – what’s known as depth of field. A shallow depth of field means objects that fall within a narrower distance from the camera will be in focus, which can create a nice blurry background behind the subject of your photo. The automatic setting of most cameras, though, favors maximizing depth of field. If you can adjust the aperture manually – lower numbers equal a shallower depth of field – you can turn distracting backgrounds into fuzzy abstract patterns that make your subject in the foreground the focus of attention.

Five Tips for Taking Great Low Light Pictures

Dinner by candle lightBy Steve Morgenstern

Whether it’s a lit Christmas tree, a child blowing out birthday cake candles or an impromptu dinner party, there are plenty of great low-light shots waiting to be made. Taking these pictures can be tough, though, with dark, blurry images frequently the norm. So here are some surefire tips to taking better photos in low light.

1. Raise the ISO Level

Nearly all digital cameras let you adjust the ISO setting, which controls the camera’s sensitivity to light. The higher the ISO, the higher the sensitivity, which means you can shoot in darker places or take photos faster, which reduces the blur caused by camera shake.

child blowing out candlesAs with most camera settings, though, there’s a trade-off involved in boosting the ISO. As ISO levels increase, you’ll start to see more noise in your photos. Noise is a grainy-looking imperfection, most noticeable in solid-colored areas.

The balance between more image detail and image noise varies from camera to camera as ISO increases. And the amount of image noise that’s acceptable depends on how you’re planning to use your photos. If you’re just going to post them on Facebook or look at them on your computer screen, you can tolerate a lot more image noise than if you’re planning to make 8 x 10 prints, or want to crop a photo tightly after shooting.

You can’t get a good idea of how much noise appears in your pictures based on how they look on the camera’s LCD screen – you need to look at them on a large computer monitor or print out samples.

The fact that a camera offers high ISO settings doesn’t mean you’d actually want to use them – all too often these top settings are more for marketing purposes than practical photographic choices. Ordinarily you'll find little to worry about up to about 400 ISO. To find your camera's top ISO setting, take a series of shots under the same lighting conditions at all the ISO settings. For example, use a collection of canned food for this, since the cans combine areas of solid color with lettering that reveals image flaws in detail reproduction.

This is an area where a more expensive camera usually does a noticeably better job, with interchangeable-lens cameras outperforming compact models.

2. Optimize Flash Results

Ideally you shouldn't use a flash when trying to capture low-light scenes. However sometimes a room is just too dark to take a picture without added light and flash can be the difference between getting the shot and missing it entirely.

Using an External Flash

A few high-end compacts and nearly all interchangeable-lens cameras have a slot on top of the camera called a hot shoe for attaching an external flash unit. Simply adding an external flash that fires straight ahead will cut down the chance of red-eye in your portrait shots–that children-of-the-damned red glow that happens when the light from a flash reflects off the blood vessels at the back of the eye.

To really solve the low-light problem, though, you’ll want a flash unit with a head that pivots up and down. This enables a technique called bounce flash – you aim the flash up at the ceiling, and it illuminates the room with natural-looking light, minimizing harsh shadows. Bounce flash units start at around $50, with high-quality models setting you back $150 or more, depending on the manufacturer, light output level and features provided. It's a worthwhile investment that will radically improve your indoor photography for years to come.

Using the Built-in Flash

LightscoopYour basic camera flash produces a direct blast of light, creating harsh shadows and annoying your subjects. If it’s a question of using the flash or missing the shot, try standing several feet away from your subject to lower the glare.

If you’re using the pop-up flash on a digital SLR, try the Lightscoop, an ingenious add-on that mounts on top of your camera. It has an angled mirror up front, which reflects light from the built-in flash up to the ceiling for an instant bounce effect. It’s not as flexible as a true bounce flash, which lets you change the firing angle to minimize shadows, and it won’t work with all camera models, but at $30ir?t=techlicious-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B0017LNHY2 it’s undeniably a thrifty alternative.

Set a Manual White Balance

When shooting indoors under normal room lighting, you’re likely to find photos come out unnaturally orange (with standard tungsten bulbs) or greenish (with fluorescents). Different light sources produce differently colored illumination, and cameras have a tough time adjusting to those variations automatically. All but the cheapest digital cameras let you improve results by taking a manual white balance reading.

How to Set Manual White Balance

The procedure is simple, even if the specific button presses vary from camera to camera. You aim the camera at a white surface (could be a white wall, or a sheet of printer paper works fine) and tell the camera “this is true white, adjust your color reproduction to match.” Yes, you can tweak color after the fact, using image editing software, but spending 30 seconds taking a white balance reading is much easier.

Use a Tripod

If you’re shooting low-light scenic shots as opposed to people or other moving subjects, a tripod is a tremendous assist. With the camera mounted securely, you can stretch shutter speeds to let more light in without raising ISOs to quality-crushing levels. It’s best to set the camera’s self-timer when shooting on a tripod in the dark, to avoid the brief shake that inevitably occurs when you press down on the shutter button.

Use a Fast Lens

Finally, some camera lenses allow more light through than others, making them superior performers in low-light photography. The figure we’re looking at here is the maximum aperture (the number after "f/" in the specs)–the lower the number, the better the lens performs.

A typical zoom that comes with an interchangeable lens camera might have a maximum of f/3.5, which isn’t great for low-light photography. Good zoom lenses with maximum aperture figures of f/2.8 or lower are available, but they are double or more the cost.

The alternative: ditch the zoom and pick up a low-light-loving fixed-focus lens. You’ll find 50mm f/1.8 lenses from camera manufacturers selling for under $150. A 50mm lens produces an image that’s about the same size as what you see with the naked eye, and an f/1.8 lens will greatly increase your ability to get a nice sharp shot when shooting handheld in low light conditions.

Six Ways to Speed Up an Old Camera

By Jack Howard

There's little more frustrating than missing an amazing picture just because your camera takes too long to shoot after you press the button. There are some quick and easy adjustments that can speed up the first shot and reduce the time between shots, increasing your chances of making that magic photo. The following tips are generic, so read the manual on your camera to determine how to adjust the settings.

Quickview1. Turn off “instant preview”

“Instant preview” is the feature that lets you take a quick peek at the shot you just took before you take another one. But when the action is happening, you want to keep shooting! To check the shots, just tap the playback button. But keep yourself in capture mode when there are pictures to be made.

2. Turn the flash off

Flash buttonWhen there is good light (and only if there’s good light), make sure the flash is turned off. That’s because many point-and-shoot digital cameras will not fire another shot while the flash is recycling. So you will be waiting, waiting, waiting for the flash to recycle before your next shot.

If you were using the flash as a fill-flash to “fill-in” details or soften shadows in bright, outdoor light, make sure to check your camera for shadow and highlight-adjustment modes (new models only). Turning theses modes on will produce a similar effect, showing more detail with less contrast than models from just a few years ago, without requiring the flash to be on.

3. Turn the flash (and AF-assist beam) on

multi-zone focusIn dark rooms and outdoors at night, turn the flash and AF-assist (autofocus-assist) beam on. Your camera needs light and contrast to focus, and the onboard pre-flash and/or AF-assist beam will significantly reduce the time it takes the camera to find your subject and focus, and decrease the number of out-of-focus shots in dim situations.

4. Skip the fancy focus modes and go with the center focusing point

When it’s all happening pretty fast, use center focus instead of multi-point or any other focus mode. Then turn on continuous focusing mode if your subject is moving. Lenses are sharpest and have the best resolution at their centers. If the composition seems off, you can always crop it afterward. Better a sharp picture that’s cropped, than a missed photo any day.

prefocus5. Prefocus your subject

When you've got a subject that isn't moving (or moving parallel to the camera), prefocus the camera by pressing the shutter button half-way. Once the camera focuses, just wait for the magic to happen and fire the shutter at the right moment! (You can also use this trick to lock focus on a centered subject and then recompose the shot to be an off-centered composition. Only use this trick on subjects that are several feet away, though. In close-ups you’ll notice unacceptable softness if the focal point is even slightly off).

6. “Pre-capture” to make up for slow reflexes

If you simply cannot train your reflexes to nail the winning shot no matter how hard you try, check to see if your camera has a pre-capture mode, which starts taking shots and then buffering several once you’ve prefocused. This mode is available on some Olympus and Casio cameras.

The most important thing is to be familiar with how your camera operates, and prepare accordingly. Don't wait for a once-in-a-lifetime moment to see if your camera is quick at focusing in low light. Read the manual (as boring as it is) and do a little experimentation. You’ll be amazed by how much better your photos become.

Photo Tips for Parents

Photo Checklist for New Parents

By Jack Howard

The first year of your baby’s life is filled with so many don’t-miss photos. Follow these tips for making the most of the memories and moments you’ll want to remember and you’ll have everything you need to make that baby’s first year photo book.

1. The Big Day

This one is specifically for the dads! Pack a trusty camera that does a good job with interior lighting in auto mode, with a wide-angle to normal lens, and you should be okay. If there’s daylight, open the shades in the suite. The extra light will help prevent blurry pictures and is a lot more flattering than on-camera flash.

Shot List:

¨  Mother and baby

¨  Baby hand in parent hand

¨  Dad and baby

¨  Baby sleeping close-up

¨  Baby sleeping from bird’s-eye view

¨  Parents and baby

2. Coming Home

Be sure to take at least a few photos on your first day home. You may look slightly less exhausted than you did in the hospital photos and it’s a great way to get into the habit of taking photos to remember your child’s journey.

Shot list:

¨  On the front porch or in front of the house (weather permitting)

¨  In the nursery room

¨  In the crib for the first time

¨  On the couch with Mom, Dad, sisters, brothers, and pets

3. Week One

The first week will fly by – you won’t believe it has been seven days since you had a baby. The one-week mark is a nice milestone opportunity for more pictures.

Shot list:

¨  baby sleepingSleeping

¨  Eyes Open

¨  Active

¨  In the crib

¨  From a birds-eye view

¨  Cheek-to-cheek with Mom and/or Dad

¨  Close-up of little hands and feet

4. Tummy Time

After a few weeks, baby will be able to hold her head up for short periods of time during tummy time, which is a great milestone in both your baby’s development and in your photo album!

Set your baby up in tummy time on the middle of a bed and shoot with a zoom lens from a distance – this will help blur any distracting background. If your camera has a burst-shooting mode, where it rapidly takes a series of photos when you press the shutter button, try using it here. It’s a great way to capture your baby’s rapidly changing expressions.

Shot list:

Capture a number of frames to see the different nuanced facial expressions your baby is making.

5. Supported Sitting

Once your baby is a few months old, they’ll be able to prop him/herself up in a Bumbo-type seat, on your lap, on a few pillows and in the corner of a couch for short spells. Be sure to have an assistant nearby in case your wee one starts to topple.

Shot list:

¨  Smiles

¨  Eyes

¨  Varied expressions

¨  Full body shots showing off little feet and cute outfits

baby messy foods6. Messy First Food

Once you get the go-ahead from your pediatrician to introduce your wee one to baby mush, plan ahead for this milestone, as it will make for a messy, memorable experience. This is absolutely a two-adult photo shoot, so Mom and Dad should decide who’s feeding and who’s taking pictures.

This is one of the few baby photo ops where an on-camera flash pointed straight at the baby can make for a stronger picture, since it will emphasize the messy baby food.

Shot list:

¨  Tight shot of face covered in baby food

¨  Wider shots with messy bib & hands

¨  Profile shot of baby & parent offering food

7. Sitting

Once your babe can sit by herself, you’ll want to capture her new perspective on the world. Put yourself in “tummy time” position to capture some shots of your little one on the floor amidst her favorite toys. Shooting on the floor, from a baby’s level is a great way to see and share your world in a new way.

Consider setting up a white sheet as a seamless backdrop off the back edge of a sofa for a quick “studio style” shoot.

Shot list:

¨  Wide shot of your little one with favorite toys, stuffed animals, and books.

¨  Close-ups interacting with objects she picks up.

8. Standing Up Against Crib

You won’t believe how quickly you’ll move from birds-eye views of your newborn in the crib to a shot of your little one standing and peering over the edge of his crib and Pack ‘n’ Play. Be sure to mark this moment with some in-the-nursery shots.

Take advantage of the low height of the Pack-n-Play to shoot some straight-down shots with a wide-angle lens as your baby will surely look straight up at the camera, and this is a fun forced-perspective shot to share. In the main crib in the nursery, back up a little bit to get your baby standing up straight-on, with his feet planted between the bars of the crib.

Shot list:

¨  Straight down from above in the Pack ‘n’ Play

¨  Straight-on in the nursery

9. Crawling

Here’s another shooting opportunity where you’ll want to be in “tummy time” position yourself to get the best angle of the action. Keep shooting and keep reviewing your shots till you’ve got a sharp photo with good action, implied motion, and pleasing expression. Don’t get discouraged if you don’t nail it the first day – your baby will give you more than enough chances to get a winner.

If the controls are available, set your camera to continuous autofocus or sports mode – a crawling baby can move very fast!

Shot list:

¨  Overhead view of scooting baby

¨  Head-on shot of approaching baby with photographer lying on the floor

¨  Rear view of crawling baby approaching the other parent

10. Halloween and Autumn

Outdoor autumn shots can be made at any time of day, but early morning and late afternoons are best for warm, dramatic directional lighting. Some great autumn shots ideas include sitting amidst the gourds in a ground-level pumpkin display at a local farm market one crisp fall afternoon. Weekdays are much better for trying this than weekends, as the markets will be much less crowded.

Halloween shots are a particular type of fall shot, and the best time for Halloween shots is twilight. There’s a short window of time late in the day when the sky, jack-o-lanterns, and lighted displays will all be nearly equal in exposure. This is the best time to make photos of your kids in costume in front of the house. You’ll want direct flash, but dial it back a little bit if your camera offers this control to make the direct light appear less artificial.

Use a tripod for the twilight Halloween shots to avoid camera shakes. Alternately, set a long shutter speed (½ second or more) and don’t even try to hold the camera steady as you take your shots with flash – all the background lights and displays will go all ghosty on you.

Shot list:

¨  Baby surrounded by autumn icons

¨  Interacting with seasonal props (masks, pumpkins, etc.)

¨  Group shots with appropriate Halloween/Thanksgiving themes

11. Winter Holidays

December is the time of Christmas trees, menorahs, and more holiday lights than you can imagine everywhere you turn. These lights can be wonderful design elements to convey the sense of season, but they can also trip up your exposure if you aren’t careful. As with Halloween, twilight is best for outdoor displays, and a tripod is a fantastic way to keep the camera from shaking during longer exposures.

Indoors, try out different camera settings to balance the exposure on your baby’s face and the background lights. Try using a stuffed animal as a sit-in for your baby while experimenting, which proved much less stressful for all concerned.

Shot list:

¨  Baby with holiday lights

¨  Presents!

¨  Different groups of family members with baby, surrounded by holiday decorations

Take Better Baby Photos

by Tobey Grumet Segal

New parents have a lot to worry about when they bring baby home, not the least is getting a good shot of the little one to email out to family and friends. Let's face it, nobody wants to show the world a pink, shriveled face bathed in bad light.

But if you're not a professional photographer, getting a glamorous shot of your newborn is not easy. Olympus Visionary Nick Kelsh - a professional shutterbug with numerous books under his belt and images that have appeared in Life, Time, BusinessWeek and National Geographic - understands your pain. Here are his 10 tips to better immortalizing your precious new addition.

Nick Kelsh photo of baby with foot in mouthGet closer

Most amateurs never shoot a close-up and close-ups are so powerful. Fill the frame with your baby's face and leave out the lamps and furniture and all of that other visual clutter. A good close-up of a baby can be other-worldly.

Push the button a lot

That's another way of saying take lots of pictures. The more pictures you take the luckier you get and when you're photographing babies you want to do everything to increase the luck factor.

Experiment with the flash off

Nick Kelsh photo of baby in highchairA flash on a camera is a very handy thing; it allows you to take sharp pictures in dark rooms. But it does something else, too - it ruins the mood. It's about as romantic as the headlights on your car. A picture taken with a flash is the signature look of amateur snapshots. Use it if you're shooting snapshots, but if you want to take pictures that will make other people say, “Hey, you're a great photographer!” turn off the flash.

Find some beautiful light

Nick Kelsh photo of baby in bathIf you want to shoot some beautiful baby portraits this may be the most important step. With your flash off, put your baby in some soft window light or the light of an open outside door. This is the light Rembrandt built a career around. If you get just how profound this tip is, you are well on your way to moving up the photographic food chain.

Don't try to out-think your baby

Shoot pictures when they're in the mood. That's probably after a nap and after a snack.

Keep your backgrounds simple

You could not possibly err on the side of too simple with this. Try to find clean, simple backgrounds.

Take advantage of the moment

You have what every professional photographer wants—access. Store your camera in the same place all the time and always turn your camera off with the same settings. Be ready for the stuff only parents see.

Crank up your ISO

Some people rarely take a picture with the ISO below 400. Do pictures get a little noisy (grainy) when the ISO is high? Sometimes. How often will get you get complaints from viewers when you've captured a great moment and there's a little noise? Never.

Learn to file your pictures

If you can't find them you can't share them and sharing these gems is what it's all about. The birth of a baby is a great time to get photographically organized. Create a logical system on your computer that you understand and will use. Key word: use.

See our Photo Organizing Tips

Back up your pictures

If you don't have an external hard drive for your computer, you need one. All of your valuable family pictures need to be in two places. You can also regularly burn your family photos onto CDs and store them together – don’t forget to label!

Best Sites for Creating Baby’s First Year Photo Book

by Jen Rabulan-Bertram

With a first child, traditional baby books are common. With your second child, it’s easy to become busy, distracted and not be as diligent with your child’s milestones. Fortunately, it’s easy to get caught up. Photo book sites do pretty much all the work for you, guiding you through the process of creating your photo book for the first year, with layouts that prompt you for photos of important milestones.

After handpicking your photos, you choose from a variety of baby-centric templates, and many photo book sites can auto-fill the book for you. Memorializing that first year couldn’t be easier...even for the second, third and fourth child.

KidmondoKidmondo

Kidmondo offers a detailed online journaling experience. Parents can keep tabs on baby's growth with online features such as weight, height, medical and dental charts, and diary entries, which are integrated into your “KidBook”. The KidBook begins at $28.00 for a 20-page softcover book.

Shutterfly

ShutterflyShutterfly's Custom Path lets you customize just about every element on each page, including scrapbooking sticker-like embellishments. For someone who’s looking for more handholding, you can choose a baby template and add helpful Idea Pages, which prompt you to include photos of major milestones, such as baby's first steps and first foods. There are even pages to highlight each month of the baby's first year. Prices start at $12.99 for a 5x7 photo book.ir?t=techlicious-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B005G3QSF2

MixbookMixbook

Mixbook is a favorite site, with its easy-to-use software, large selection of cute baby themes and selection of virtual stickers for a scrapbook-like feel. You can also tap into your Instagram photo stream. Mixbook offers fun page suggestions in its Baby’s First Year theme, where mom can explain how baby’s name was chosen, insert a copy of baby’s birth certificate and show baby’s first bath. Prices start at $12.99 for a classic square photo book.

Photo Tips for Special Situations

Photo Tips for July 4th Fireworks

by Suzanne Kantra

Heading out with the family for July 4th fireworks celebrations is a time-honored tradition. And, if you're like me, you enjoy capturing those memories in pictures. But photographing fireworks with no camera shake and proper exposure is difficult, unless you know these simple tricks.

Joby Gorillapod1. Use a tripod

Fireworks scene modeWhen you take picture of fireworks, the camera needs to hold the shutter open long enough to “see” the fireworks. The longer the shutter is open, the more susceptible your photo is to motion blur. So use a tripod to make sure there’s no movement. For open areas, use a standalone model with telescoping legs like the Dolica AX620B100 Proline (about $40 on Amazon). A more mobile option is the Joby Gorillapod (see photo, around $14 on Amazon), which wraps around trees and poles or stand up on the ground.

2. Use the “fireworks” scene mode

Most point-and-shoot cameras have a button or menu item with “SCN” or “Scene” that lets you choose various scene modes. Select the one that looks like a spray of fireworks and/or says "fireworks". Most cameras sold today have a "fireworks" mode.

Landscape scene mode3. No “fireworks” mode? Put it in “landscape” mode

Your camera automatically tries to find an object on which to focus. When presented with a black featureless sky, the camera doesn’t know what to do. Putting your camera in “landscape” mode presets the focus to infinity and narrows the lens opening, which keeps both near and far objects in focus.

Flash button4. Turn off the flash

Turning your flash off will let the camera know that it only has available light to take a picture. This is important because the camera will then keep the shutter open long enough to capture the fireworks. The flash button is usually a separate button on the back of the camera. On some cameras, you can’t turn off the flash unless you put it in a scene mode or program mode (P).

5. Turn down the ISO

High ISO will crank up the sensitivity of the camera so it can see details in the dark. However, the fireworks themselves are quite bright. So, to avoid overexposure and reduce film noise, take your camera out of Auto ISO and change the setting to ISO 100 or even lower. The ISO setting is usually found under the main menu. You may have to put your camera in program mode to change this setting.

Fun Halloween Photo Effects

By Suzanne Kantra

Between the kids’ costumes, jack-o-lanterns and trick-or-treating, there are a lot of photo moments to capture. To get great photos in these difficult lighting situations, though, you’ll have to do a little more than just point and shoot. Here are some tips for taking your photos up a notch, plus ideas for special effects that will make an already spooky holiday even spookier.

Photographing jack-o-lanterns

Jack-o-lanternGreat jack-o-lantern shots capture both the glow coming from the pumpkin and the textures of the pumpkin’s skin and surrounding objects in low light.

Take this shot at twilight (about 20 minutes after the sun goes down) when the glow from your pumpkin will produce about the same amount of light as the sky. With the exposure for everything same, your camera will easily capture details in the entire shot.

If you miss this window, put your camera in HDR mode (High Dynamic Range) mode. In HDR mode, the camera takes an overexposed shot to capture the pumpkin skin detail and an underexposed shot for the candle’s glow and then merges them together without your intervention. If your camera doesn’t have an HDR mode, you can merge photos of different exposures together using Adobe Photoshop Elements’ Photomerge Exposure editing mode.

Be sure you can’t see the flame of the candle when taking your shots. It will appear too bright as a spot in your picture. And use a tripod and set the camera’s self-timer to avoid the brief shake that inevitably occurs when you press down on the shutter button.

Creating ghosts in your photos

You can create ghosts two ways. If your camera supports long exposures—at least 8 seconds—you can have the person or object remain in the frame for part of the exposure, about 5 seconds. The space where the person was is double exposed, making your subject appear somewhat translucent.

The other way to create a ghost is to take two photos and merge them together. In Photoshop Elements, you create two layers. Make sure the photo containing the person is the layer on top and then experiment with the transparency of that layer to create your effect.

Making ghost writing

Jack Howard: Ghost writingFor ghost writing, you’ll need a camera that supports exposures of at least 8 seconds, with 16 or 30 producing even better results, a tripod or flat surface, a flashlight or two and darkness. The trick is to use the flashlight to draw pictures or words in the air. The long exposure captures the trailing light as a bright image floating in the air.

Keep in mind that the camera captures the mirror image of what you draw, so you’ll have to write your message backward (hard) or flip the photo in your photo-editing program (easy).

Shooting spooky silhouettes

Around sunset, take photos against the beautiful orange and red sky without a flash to create a silhouette of your subject. Make sure you have a clear sightline to the sky, so your subject doesn’t have to compete with other objects on the horizon. The technique works great with kids in funky costumes.

Eight Tips for Taking Great Pictures of Your Pet

By Josh Kirschner

Andy Katz, professional photographer and a Sony Artisan of Imagery, has eight great tips that will help any pet owner take better photos of his or her treasured companion.

1. Create an effect of movement

Shoot at a slow shutter speed while holding the camera still so the background is still but your pet is in motion. If you’re not using a tripod, keep image stabilization on to keep the background sharp.

2. Take a lot of photos to get one great shot

With the large memory cards in modern digital cameras, “Pixels are free”, says Andy, so keep shooting your pet and sort through the shots later to find the best.

3. Beautiful light makes for beautiful photos

The best light is early morning and late afternoon, it has warmer color and creates more interesting shadows than at noon. If you are shooting at noon, place your pet in shade or shadow for prettier light and more detail. Flashes look unnatural, so stay with natural light, use a slower shutter speed if necessary.

4. Use color if it adds to the photo, or B&W to bring out the details

Always set your camera to shoot in color and then decide later whether color adds to the photo. If not, remove the color with your photo editing software, such as Adobe Photoshop, to accentuate the details.

5. Shoot RAW, if possible to ensure you get all the details

A RAW file contains all of the information captured by your camera’s sensor. When your camera converts an image to a JPEG, it compresses the image and some data are lost. It’s better to keep the files RAW and convert them to JPEG after you have finished editing or cropping them.

6. Use selective focus to change a photo’s mood

Choosing whether to place your pet in focus or the foreground/background can completely change the mood of the photo. Try it both ways and see which image you prefer.

7. Highlight the eyes        

Find a shot that creates highlights in your pet’s eyes. If the eyes look good, your pet will look good. Look back at the photo in #3 above. Your eyes are drawn to the dog's eyes and there's a vibrancy that you wouldn't get if the highlights weren't there.

8. Let your pet be a pet

Don’t get caught up in having your pet pose for a photo. First of all, given that they’re animals, pets don’t listen very well and you're likely to get frustrated. Secondly, letting your pet act like a pet will give you more natural photos that capture your pet’s true character.

How To Get Great Group Shots

By Suzanne Kantra

Family group shotGraduations, weddings, reunions, birthday parties—there are many occasions that call for a group shot. Taking the perfect group photo, though, can be challenging. People look away, blink, fix their hair.

Her are easy tips you can follow for getting that group shot right. But you don’t have to take the perfect shot to end up with one; you can easily merge two or more photos together using applications on your smartphone or computer.

1. Get in close

The closer you get to your group, the more detail you can capture in their faces. Have people lean in toward the center to create a smaller target area.

2. Pose your group

For larger groups, you’ll want to stagger people in rows, so you can still see everyone’s face while fitting them into a smaller area. Don’t make the group too deep, though, or not everyone will be in focus.

3. Keep People Still

If you’re going to merge your shots, you’ll want them a similar as possible to make the merge easy and undetectable. So encourage the group to remain in the same place.

4. Take Multiple Shots

Digital shots don’t cost anything, so fire away. If there’s good light and you’re shooting kids, try putting the camera into burst mode.

5. How to Merge Photos

If your group shot didn’t work out as you expected, a little processing after the fact can often fix things up. For iOS devices, try the GroupShot app from iTunes.

Select two or more photos you want to use from your camera roll.

Select the best photo in the set as your base photo by tapping the swap icon

Take your finger and swipe across the sections of the picture you want to swap out

Tap on the picture you want to swap in.

Repeat steps 3 and 4 until you’re satisfied.

For Macs and Windows PCs, use Adobe Photoshop Elementsir?t=techlicious-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B0093FROMA

Open the photos you want to use and then select two or more photos from the Project Bin.

Choose File→New→Photomerge Group Shot in any of the edit modes.

Take your best overall group shot and drag it from the Project Bin onto the Final window.

Select one of your other photos in the Project Bin to use as your source image. Drag it to the Source window.

With the Pencil tool, draw a line around the portions of the Source photo you want to merge into your Final photo.

You can choose to show your pencil strokes and/or show your regions, which will be highlighted with an overlay.

Repeat Steps 4 and 5 with any remaining photos.

Organizing Your Photos

Ten Tips to Keep Your Digital Photos Organized

By Kristy Holch 

Over the years, your photo collection will swell to the tens of thousands, you’ll migrate from one computer to another, you’ll go through several different cameras and industry formats will change. Fortunately, organizing your digital photos has become easier and easier, thanks to new automation tools. But you still need to pitch in.

Follow these tips to keep track of your memories through all the changes.

1. Set your camera to the correct date and time

This simple step will permanently tag every photo with the correct date, allowing you to search and sort chronologically for all posterity. And if you often import other people’s photos to your own library, make sure their cameras are set correctly too!

2. Delete the junkers as soon as you take them

Fight the instinct that says every photo is precious, because in reality, bad photos are just clutter, making it harder to find the good ones. Delete them from the camera. Over your lifetime, you will thank yourself for keeping the collection manageable.

3. Know where your photos go

Put all your pictures in the same folder, such as your PC’s existing “Pictures” folder. One universal folder means that photos will be easy to back up and move to a new PC for years to come. Override any attempts by your camera’s software to store them in a proprietary folder on your drive.

4. Use a sub-folder system

Within your “Pictures” folder, organize your photos into sub-folders that will make sense over the long-term. A common method is by year – 2010, 2011, etc., and inside those, more sub-folders by month, topic (Little League), and event (vacation). Or, rely on tags instead for organizing by that sub-level of detail, as explained below.

5. Backup your photos

Make sure your photos are stored in at least two locations, such as your own PC and an external drive. External drives are relatively inexpensive now. For added safety in case of fire or theft, also store photos at a reputable online photo site, such as Shutterfly, SmugMug, or Flickr, or an online backup service, such as Dropbox or Carbonite.

6. Give star-ratings to your best photos

Each time you import photos from your camera, give star ratings to the best photos in each batch to quickly find your best photos in the future.. Most image management packages use a 5-star system.

7. Use image management software to tag and find photos

Picassa face recognitionExcellent image management software is downloadable for free, such as Google’s Picasa, Microsoft’s Windows Live Photo Gallery, and Apple’s iPhoto, which comes pre-installed on Macs. These help you navigate your collection easily. You can further hone your searching with “tags”, keywords you apply in the software to photos, such as “Summer Vacation”. Most tags will stay with the image and remain searchable, regardless of which brand of software you're using, thanks to emerging industry standards. Image management software is your gateway to helpful tools like face recognition, geo-tagging and more.

8. Make use of people tags

Shutterfly photo booksFacial recognition is a breakthrough technology included free with the image management software mentioned. It uses advanced intelligence to find faces in photos and guess who the people are—an incredible time saver. No need to manually tag every person in all your photos and searching your archive to find someone’s photo is now a snap.

9. Print an annual photo book

Search on your star ratings to instantly call up your best shots of the year, and choose a service such as Blurb, Shutterfly or Snapfish to print them in an annual photo book. Regardless of what happens to digital standards over the decades, the printed photo book will always be viewable by anyone, anytime.

See The Best Photo Sites for more recommendations.

10. Form good habits

Just like brushing your teeth or doing the laundry on a schedule, photos require basic maintenance habits. Getting in the habit means having access to all your photos in the coming years.

How To Digitize Your Old Photos

old photosby Steve Morgenstern

We all have boxes of photos stuck away in a closet or drawer, unseen and unappreciated. Turning those lost treasures into digital files that can be preserved, printed, posted online and shared with family and friends is a great project.

1. Select a scanner

There are basically two choices here: a flatbed scanner or a film scanner. Dedicated film scanners (which can handle both strips of film and mounted slides) can be an attractive choice if you have lots of photos in these formats, but there are pros and cons to consider. On the plus side, the negative or slide has all the detail available in the original image. However, it has to be blown up far more than a printed image, so every speck of dust becomes a significant flaw. Also, dedicated high-quality film scanners are more expensive than flatbeds – expect to spend at least $200. There are cheaper models on the market, but they don’t offer the even illumination and precise alignment required for high-quality results.

For most, the best bet is a flatbed scanner, some of which can also handle slides and negatives (though not with the quality of a dedicated film scanner). Flatbed scanners basically work like copying machines, with an illuminated scanning bar that moves across the image when it’s laid facedown on a glass sheet, capturing digital data and saving it to your computer. This can be a single-purpose device, though for many users a combination scanner/printer/copier/fax machine will offer better value. Canon, Epson and HP now offer multifunction models starting around $70 (a bargain price based on the assumption that you’ll spend far more on inkjet cartridges over time).

2. Setting up your scanner

Your choice of settings will depend on how you’re planning to use the image you scan. There are basically three settings to consider: resolution, file format and color. When it comes to resolution, the higher the setting, the larger the file. If you’re simply planning to post your scanned image online, you can get away with as little as 72 dpi (dots per inch). However, it probably makes more sense to archive images at a higher resolution that allows effective editing and printing – 300 dpi is a reasonable setting, and 600 dpi isn’t excessive.

Regarding file format, the standard when shooting with a digital camera is JPEG, a compressed file. When scanning, storing in the uncompressed TIFF format produces much larger files, but it also offers higher quality when it comes to editing your images. Given the fact that you can buy an external hard drive with a terabyte of storage for less than $200 today, it makes sense to scan your images as TIFF files.

Finally, you’ll need to decide between black-and-white and color scanning. It actually makes sense to scan even black-and-white originals in color. Not only will you retain the warmer tones frequently found in the original images, but you’ll have more flexibility when editing the resulting files.

3. Fix your photos

Inevitably, scanned images will have flaws you’d like to eliminate. While there is no shortage of inexpensive photo editing software, a great tool of choice for several years has been Adobe Photoshop Elements, available for both PC and Mac.

The Autocorrect feature generally does a nice job boosting saturation, fixing color problems and sharpening your image. If you’re not satisfied with the results, there are easy-to-use controls for adjusting these parameters. The “Adjust Color Cast” tool especially useful – you click on a spot that’s supposed to be black, white or gray and the software automatically adjusts the overall color tone to match. The Healing Brush tool is another extraordinarily useful feature: you brush over flaws in an image and the program intelligently fixes them based on the surrounding area. Another time-saving feature when dealing with scanned images is the Dust and Scratches filter, a highly customizable tool that can fix image flaws without obliterating detail.

Between the scanning and the tweaking, turning your photos into good-looking digital images is going to take a little time. It certainly makes sense to be selective about which images are worth preserving out of the stack of photos in your drawer. Don’t forget, every photo you rescue from shoebox limbo becomes a valued keepsake not just for you, but your entire family.

The Best Photo and Video Digitalizing Services

by Kristy Holch

Wouldn’t it be great if all your old photo prints were digital, to fill out your photo history in Facebook’s timeline or add to the anniversary slideshow you’re making for your parents?

Converting old prints and videos into digital formats is a project that we dread, akin to cleaning out the garage or organizing the attic. How to even begin? It is a huge project, but worthwhile. The rewards do come, though. Family members near and far can have fun with forgotten memories, chat over childhood photos, and post their own. And now you can sleep well knowing that something like burst water pipes won’t wipe out a lifetime of memories.

The size of your task depends on the size of your collection, how organized you want to be and whether you can afford premium services that streamline the task. Of course, you could scan your own photos, but for many it's too time consuming and you're unlikely to get the same quality as the better commercial services. So how do you select the right digitizing service? Here’s what you need to know.

Why convert?

Your physical media is degrading every day. Videotapes and other magnetic media are the top priority. The magnetic molecules and substrates erode, losing sharpness and color, till nothing remains in as few as 10 years. How do you decide which tapes to convert, if you don’t remember what’s on them, and you don’t own a working VHS player to review them? Don’t worry. Just send them all in, preview the converted tapes online, and with the right service you pay only for the DVDs you order. You’ll get back all your videotapes. Luckily, videos are easy to convert, so plan to do that right away.

Prints, film, and other physical media are also breaking down, more slowly. You will see a big difference between prints made on archival paper versus those from cheap processing and paper. Much depends on how they’ve been stored, whether exposed to air and light. All your physical media is at risk of total loss from degradation, fire, flood, or getting lost in the shuffle.

Gather your photos, films, and videos

Gather everything you want to convert: all your photo albums, pictures, videos, reel film, and memorabilia. Arrange it in piles chronologically. Label your stacks by year with index cards, which you’ll need later in the packing step. If the project is overwhelming, hire a professional through the Association of Personal Photo Organizers to consult by phone or even come into your home and do it all for you, though this option is not cheap.

What to convert

If you are a photo historian, you may want to convert everything. Everyone else, prepare to winnow. The sorting part of this task will take the most time. You’ll be faced with many decisions – scan the negatives, or the prints? (Hint: negatives deliver superior quality, but cost a little extra.) Scan the whole stack, or just pull out the few keepers? How will you ever reunite the ones you pulled out back into the stack where they belong after the scanning is finished? Try to capture what’s written on the back of the image? Take photos out of the albums, or pay a premium to have it done for you? Include special or odd-sized documents and photos? Keep mediocre photos because they show a slice of life that will become valuable as the years go by? Is there a chance you have the only surviving photo of Uncle Andrew?

Some of these questions might be answered after you look at the services offered, and their associated costs. There are services that can handle whatever you throw at them; it’s all just a matter of what you’re able to spend.

Choosing a digitizing provider

Your needs will determine which provider to choose. Look through the considerations below to figure out what you want. We’ve tested many services, and recommend our favorites here. There are local mom and pop providers as well, but the centralized large scale providers have sophisticated systems in place to prevent any mixups or damage to your media at their site, including safeguards like sprinkler systems, dust removal, and video-surveillance. Yes, it has happened that a fire burned down a site’s facility, and all the work inside was destroyed. Sprinklers matter.

Flatbed vs. Sheetfed Scanning – A site that does flatbed scanning is your only choice for odd sizes that won’t fit through an automatic document feeder, and they deliver better quality. Sheetfed scanning is cheaper and requires that you to bundle everything by size and orientation so the feeder won’t jam.

Prep Time – If you don’t have time to devote to this project, go with a premium service that does all the organizing for you, such as taking your pictures out of the albums for scanning.

Negatives and Slides – If you have the choice, scan negatives instead of prints. You will get far better quality so it’s worth the extra cost. The problem is that it’s hard to preview film to see what is worth scanning – bite the bullet and scan it all. You may discover hidden gems. Prices for film conversion can vary widely, so check around if you have lots of film.

Quality – Opt for higher quality scanning if you can afford it, because you just don’t know what will be precious down the road. Choose add-ons such as higher resolution, image optimization, and rotation.

Preview Prints and Video Online – Some sites include online previewing and sharing, usually for a limited time. This is useful for sharing quickly with friends and family, though you’ll want to upload to your own site of choice for the long term. iMemories and YesVideo let you custom-build your video DVDs online with clips from your videos.

Shipping – If you are afraid to trust your life’s memories to a postal service, you can drive your media to your choice of provider and drop it off personally. If you’re not near one of the major players, find a local provider that scans onsite, though the cost may be higher and quality and other safeguards lower.

Options during ordering

Orientation – If you have lots of photos, it’s worth it to pay the site to automatically rotate your images so they are all right-side-up.

Extra Copies – When you place your order, you’ll be offered the option of ordering extra copies of your DVDs. Get at least one extra set up front, one to keep and one to share with others as a backup.

Writing on the Back – If your prints have notes on the back, consider whether to capture that data. A few services offer back-scanning for an extra fee.

No Copyright – Conversion services won’t touch copyright materials such as professional school photos or TV shows on VHS. If you're not sure, send it in and they’ll decide.

Date Stamping – Ask if provider can set the “EXIF” date to match the year the picture was taken, so you can sort all your photos chronologically. Although only FotoBridge offers it as of April 2012, others plan to add this important feature shortly. Alternatively, intrepid users can edit the EXIF data on scanned digital files using a program such as EXIF Date Changer.

How to prep and pack

Read the prep and packing instructions from your chosen provider. The digital files will come back to you with sequential names like “IMG0001, IMG0002…”, so it will help if everything is scanned in chronological order. Look for instructions from your provider, such as numbering each bundle with an index card on top, with the year and number identifying sequence. The index card itself will be scanned, and that will be a tremendous help when you are scrolling through the endless photos trying to find something in a particular batch. Most will recommend stacking and bundling your prints in bunches of 100 (about 1” thick), secured with a rubber band in a plastic bag.

Providers say that too many users choose too flimsy a box, with too little tape and packing material. The contents arrive damaged or falling out. Protect your memories at this stage and follow their instructions carefully

Our favorite sites

Our current favorites are below. All are well-established vendors that handle multiple types of media, from VHS to negatives, and have systems in place to protect your images. Some of the pricing bundles are complicated; it may be fastest to get customer service help for choosing the right package.

iMemories

If money is no object, iMemories is the easiest solution and offers top quality. This full-service premium site can handle all kinds of media including delicate documents, photos stuck inside photo albums, and slides in their carousels. Put everything into one box, no counting or sorting or prep required, and they take it from there. Images are 49 cents per print, slide, or negative, and include rotation, image optimization, etc. via flatbed scanning. You have the option to edit videotapes online, which cost $10 to convert, and $10 for each DVD ordered. For example, use the online video editing tools to combine multiple videotapes onto one DVD, which can hold about 2 hours of material. Your digital media is stored at its online site for free initially, $5/month for ongoing online archival.

YesVideo

If you prefer to walk into a local retail store and save on shipping, YesVideo is another large scale provider that excels at video conversion, handles prints and film, and offers online storage. The company has retail partnerships with many major chains including Walmart and CVS, and takes online orders. It also offers online editing of videos allowing the option to customize your DVD. Your converted videos and prints will be automatically added to its online sharing/archival site, free initially, then around $50/year to maintain. Video pricing is similar to iMemories, and prints/slides are about 40 cents, including all the auto rotation and image optimization. YesVideo’s facilities have extensive safeguards and a great workflow in place to prevent customer content from getting lost or damaged.

PhotoBin

PhotoBin is especially attractive if you have a variety of media, such as prints, negatives, videos. The MixPics option gives you one flat price – you can add quantities to it during the ordering process and end up with pricing less than 20 cents/image, and $8 videotape conversion. Scanning is sheetfed. The site also offers online storage, with a free basic service and subscription for advanced features.

ScanMyPhotos

If low price is the objective, ScanMyPhotos is the way to go. Choose pay-as-you-go sheetfed scanning at 12 cents a scan, or pack as much as you can into a pre-paid box (though it uses the postal service, not a tracking service like UPS). Quality add-ons like 600 dpi resolution, scanning in sequence, image rotation and optimization will push pricing up to equal those of other services, and mixing media like negatives and prints requires separate orders.

FotoBridge

FotoBridge combines a focus on quality with low cost, using sheetfed scanning and package pricing, particularly attractive at high volumes. The company is working on features that will more easily integrate legacy memories with digital life, including a partnership with the Association of Personal Photo Organizers, photo upload to SmugMug, and efforts toward date-stamping.

ShoeBox App

The innovative ShoeBox app on iPhone and Android snaps pictures of prints to add to your digital collection. The app optimizes the image quality and sets the date-stamp to your specifications. The site aims to be the repository for your extended family’s photo storage and sharing.

The Best Sites for Sharing Your Photos

The Best Photo Book Sites

by Suzanne Kantra

ShutterflyFamily albums tell the stories of a family. Today, you don’t see many albums with printed photos – you see photo books. Fortunately, photo book sites have attractive templates you can use to fill your books, so they require a lot less artistic talent and time to produce a good result.

First, the process of compiling photos for a book is easy. Many sites will pull photos in from Facebook and other sites where you're already sharing your photos, as well as from your computer.

Once you have your photos, most photo book sites can auto-fill your book based on when and where you took your photos. You choose a template that complements your photos—summer vacation, trip to Europe and many, many more—and the site does the rest.

You can then go in and tweak the pages to highlight the most important pictures. If you want to include old photos or a menu, receipt or postcard, you can simply scan them and treat them like any other photo. The results are quite remarkable.

iPhotoIf you do have the time and talent, it just gets better from there. You can change the fonts and page backgrounds (including your own photos or scans of documents), add embellishments and resize, crop and edit your photos right on the page. The resulting books are beautiful and truly one of a kind.

There's also flexibility in pricing. You can go all out for a hard-cover book with acid-free archival paper and a photo wrapped into the cover, which will start around $20. Or, you can get a small, color, 20-page softcover book for less than $6. It all depends on its purpose—a thank you gift for a memorable weekend or your family's archival photo album.

Walgreens

For a low-cost option with plenty of design flexibility, you'll want to check out Walgreens. For $6.99, you can get a 4.5-by-6-inch softcover Brag Book, with 20 color pages, a photo cover and layout options. For $5.99, there's a 2-by-3-inch Mini Photo Book with single photo pages—no captions—and a photo and title on the cover. The printing is done by Snapfish, and the finished product is high quality. You can always use Snapfish directly, but it doesn't offer these two low-cost options.

iPhoto

Mac users can use iPhoto to create photo books starting at $3.99 for a 3.5-by-2.6-inch book (3-pack only). The software has all the layout bells and whistles, including face recognition for quickly and easily sorting through your photos. Plus, there's a smart auto-fill based on date and time, your ratings and face detection. You can also always change the book type, size and color with just one click at any time.

Blurb

If you're looking to create the ultimate coffee table book or album, you can't beat Blurb. This site is all about book publishing and provides tons of custom options. A great is feature is the ability to lay out your book offline, a big time saver, especially for those with slower connections. If you want to give others the option of buying a copy for themselves, you can easily share your book without giving them all your photos.

Shutterfly

At $12.99 for its entry-level book, Shutterfly may be a little pricier than the others, but you get a huge variety of auto-fill and custom options to choose from. Shutterfly also lets you switch between book sizes and styles at any point, letting you create multiple versions at different price points.

The Best Photo Sharing Sites

by Suzanne Kantra

There are many ways to share your photos with friends and family today, including social networking sites, photo communities and sites that sell prints and photo crafts. The key is finding a site that suits your photo sharing needs and sticking with it.

If you're only looking to share your images with others online, you should go where your friends are, which often means social networking sites like Facebook. If you want to archive your photos, make prints or create photo crafts and slideshows, you'll need a different type of photo sharing site. There are a bunch of them out there, so see which one that delivers what you need.

Photo Sharing Communities

If your focus is on sharing your photos with friends and strangers around the world, a community-centric sharing site will be a good place for you. These sites let you contribute your pictures to themed communities or create a space to collaborate with others. They can also function as a central clearinghouse for your photos, offering many different ways to get photos into or out of the site. Don’t get too carried away, though. Expect total storage and file-size limitations on free memberships–as little as 1MB per file for some, which means you'll have to resize images before you upload them.

Flickr
Flickr has some of the best online tools for organizing your photos and has partnerships with Getty Images (if you want to sell your photos) and various printing services for getting your images on anything from business cards to coffee mugs. With a free Flickr account, you can upload 300MB of photos and two videos per month (90 seconds and 150MB for each video), but only the most recent 200 images will appear in your list of photos and you only have access to low-resolution versions of your files. With a Pro account ($24.95 per year), you can upload an unlimited number of photos (up to 20MB each) and HD videos (90 seconds and up to 500MB in size), access all of your files and download full-resolution copies (even ones you uploaded with your free account).

Google Picasa Web Albums
Picasa offers a large database of public images and video that can be searched not only by topic, but by location, whether there are people in the photo, even the camera model used. Add to this public database or share just with family and friends through Picasa Web Albums or Google+ . Free downloadable Picasa software provides editing tools and a great image organizer let you tag photo manually or using face recognition or automatic tagging. Picasa offers full-screen slide shows and HD video support. Free accounts get 1GB of storage and paid accounts start at $5 per year for 20GB.

Photobucket
With unlimited photo storage, the ability to add fun special effects and competitions, Photobucket is a great place to discover and share photos. Upload from iPhone, Blackberry and Android devices and choose to share with Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and Windows Messenger. With a pro account ($24.95 per year), you can save high-resolution images and enjoy ad-free albums, among other benefits.

Print and Photo Craft Sites

The big print and photo craft sites are designed to sell you prints, albums, greeting cards, and other merchandise with your images printed on them. You'll see lots of ads to entice you to buy photo crafts and buttons to order prints. Ordering is easy online and you can pick up at a local retail chain, or have photos mailed to you.

These sites also do a good job of letting you store and share your photos with friends and family. You can even get a customized look and feel on some sites (though you'll still see ads). Your photos here are private, only viewed by those you invite. So if you occasionally want something printed, but also want free online sharing of photos, albums and slideshows, these sites are the way to go.

Shutterfly
If showcasing your photos and videos is important, Shutterfly is the site for you. Its Share section lets you create a custom photo sharing site (with its own Web address) where you can upload photos and videos, share photo crafts you've made on the site, share journal entries and family calendar information and create polls, among other features. You can also allow others to add photos and comments, which makes it great for group collaboration and events. Shutterfly also has one of the best and easiest photo book creation tools. There is no minimum annual purchase required for Shutterfly to continue storing your photos and there's unlimited storage.

Sites for Photo Enthusiasts

If you’re a photo enthusiast, you’ll want to head over to a paid service that will give you the most control over sharing and storing your photos. There you can create beautiful custom albums with no advertising and a custom Web address. The services have smartphone apps for managing your photos, as well as editing and uploading mobile photos on the fly.

You can use paid sites to reliably back up full resolution versions of your photos. Plus they enable you to allow friends to download the full-resolution version of your images. If you’re a pro, you can easily create a shop to sell your photos.

SmugMug
With searchable photo galleries, photo contests and communities, SmugMug is geared toward photo enthusiasts who want to showcase their work. Choose from 50 free, templates or step up from a standard membership ($40 per year) to a power membership ($60 per year) for a completely custom look without SmugMug logos and HD video sharing. Beyond the unlimited storage of JPG, GIF and PNG files that are free with your subscription, you can back up any type of file for $0.14 per GB per month.

Phanfare
Phanfare offers full-screen slideshows that you can create with your own music from iTunes, the ability to create a drop box for friends to upload photos to add to your albums and the service’s easy integration with FrameChannel, for syncing with digital photo frames, and Eye-Fi, for automatic wireless image transfer. Phanfare provides image editing tools for rotating, cropping and correcting exposure and color issues—and the ability to rollback your changes or even undelete photos. $99 per year for unlimited storage.