photography style

trasver

Hi there

So I'm starting to get into photography (very slowly!!).

One of the key reasons is that I really want to get into taking quality pictures of people and I particularly love photos that look like the following site.

http://onelovephoto.typepad.com/

In my ignorance I don't know this style of photography...the colours and overall appearance of the photos look fantastic. How is this achieved? Is it known as a particular style? Is it photoshop editing or using filters or how can such effects be obtained?

Can anyone recommend books/websites that might point me in the right direction as to learning to shoot like this.

Thanks for help with what is probably a silly question!!

Simon

Paulw

They offer workshops to show you how they do it -

http://onelovephoto.typepad.com/workshops/

*eadaoin

Hi Simon,

I fell in love the first time I peeked at One Love Photo, I just adore the style too and would love to be as good with portraits!

I know that they use some homemade lenses in their photography, and in fact the blurb from their about page reads like this:

We capture weddings using a combination of cameras and techniques. In addition to using digital gear, we also shoot with a Hasselblad medium format film camera, homemade custom lenses and even a couple plastic toy cameras. Images shot with our film cameras and lenses have their own look and feel. Some produce beautiful vignettes, some are square, and some make things soft and dreamy. Our images combine the style and sensibility of today's generation with yesterday's vintage look and feel.

So they're creating their look from a variety of different types of camera. Some of the styles you can emulate a little in Photoshop or Elements/GIMP, the selective blurring for example (similar to what you might get from a tilt and shift lens) is pretty easily done, if you want I can send you a tutorial that someone was kind enough to write out for me. You can also add effects like vignettes and textures with an editing programme too.

I tend to feel that the effects added by photoshop are sometimes not as nice as those achieved in camera, but obviously for some of us the cost of buying special lenses & cameras is just not possible, so we have to make do with editing techniques instead!

You might like to start by trying out a toy camera like a Holga or Diana Mini. Or look into getting a Lensbaby or learning the TTV (Through the Viewfinder) technique (TTV is next on my personal list!). It's also not a bad idea to learn to take good portraits as that will be the basis of your work.

Search around on Flickr/Deviant Art/Pix.ie for similar photographers and learn from them. You might also like these photographers:

http://simplybloomphotography.com/blog/
http://olivejuicephotoblog.com/
http://is-theblog.blogspot.com/

artyeva

i have some lightroom presets that achieve this very effect, dreamy, muted, 70's/80's kinda look. they work better on certain colours, but yeah, basically you can fake this in lightroom and maybe a bit of photoshop if you really wanted to. i *love* their stuff. wish more wedding photographers here would offer this kind of style. it's a lot more flattering and romantic than the over sharp grey dull stuff you see so much of here.

trasver

Cheers guys for that info

Ah OK I hadn't realised the equipment was that specialised, more things to add to my wish list so when I learn more!

@*eadaoin: I'd love a look at that tutorial if you don't mind...I'll PM you my email address.

Looking forward to getting a look at those websites ye suggested when I get a bit of time on the weekend.

Thanks again

Simon

magicbastarder

bear in mind that as you're starting out, your tastes or skills may take you in a direction you hadn't originally intended.