Creating Special Effects in your Photography

In photography or digital photography, creating special effects or illusions, can be very fun and rewarding. Many photographers are content in creating realistic photos that copy the world as everyone sees it. Since we are so accustomed to these types of photos, when a photographer creates illusions, the results are far more immediate and impressive. This article will help you with the fascinating world of special effects photography, and I will try to explain some of the special effects that you can use to make surrealistic images. Some of the ideas I will offer are not beyond the reach of the newcomer to photography. One great thing about shooting special effects, is that you set the rules. You do not need to worry about the results being unpredictable, this is the fun part, and pleasure of special effects photography.

Often, by using an unusual camera position and viewpoint, you can turn a simple subject into an intriguing image. If we look at something from a odd angle, our brain automatically corrects the distortions of perspective and scale. Your camera can't make these corrections, and by photographing from very extreme angles, you can really exploit this type of limitation creatively. Simple example, pointing your camera directly at a subject, flattens the image, everything appears to be on the same plain, reducing forms to simple shapes. But if you can change the angle of your camera, and use lines and shapes, or a contrasting background, your image will be almost like an abstract.

Using reflections are excellent for special effect photography. Using something as simple as chrome on a vehicle will give strong reflections, but if you use a curved part of the reflected subject, the distortions will be more illusional, especially using a wide angle lens. Water if another form of creating reflections, which produce highly varied effects. Using a window as a reflective source, it offers you the possibility of superimposing one image on another, the reflection and the scene through the window, they can blend successfully.

Camera movement has always been looked at as a No-No, producing blurred photos. But using camera movement during a long exposure can give a photo an impressionistic, or sometimes a strong abstract quality. Details are softened and distorted, colors flow into each other, and very bright highlights can produce gleaming patterns across the photo. By moving your camera in different ways, you can create a whole new range of blur effects. For the camera movement, you can use your imagination. You can move up or down, rotate side to side, or even shoot from a moving object, creating a static scene of streaks across the frame. I suggest you rehearse the movement you plan to use before making the photo, so that you can work out the degree of motion and exposure time needed for what you want to create. Remember, results are never predictable, and you should experiment with different exposure times to be sure of capturing the effect you are after. And lets not forget, using a zoom lense, and zooming in or out, will also create some very special effects of your subject.

Using slower shutter speeds can also create special effects in your photography. The deliberate choice of a shutter speed that is to slow to stop the subjects movement can produce exciting and original photos. Depending on the subjects speed and direction, you can convey movement with slight blurring while still capturing a recognizable image. Or on the other side of the coin, you can use long shutter speeds to make the subject dissolve into a formless blur. When shooting with slow shutter speeds, you will need the use of a tripod. If your shooting in bright light, as in daytime, the use of a Neutral Density filter will assist you in compensating for the slower shutter speed. The ND filter will also enable you to set a wider aperture for shallow depth of field, so you can blur a distracting background. Shooting at dusk, you can create beautiful scenes by slowing down the shutter to 1 or 2 seconds.

Once you have gotten your feet wet in special effects photography, you will soon want to extend your level with the help of various lenses and camera attachments. Apart from your camera and lenses, all you need is the willingness to break the rules. Filters are by far the cheapest way for extending your creative special effects photography. Single and multicolor filters are effective for controlling the appearance of a landscape, either be adding atmosphere or by dramtically altering its hues to produce a dream like view.

By skillfully using filters to alter the color and quality of light, you can manipulate the mood of a image without making it look obvious that a special effect is involved. Diffusion and fog filters, can evoke a dreamlike sense of the past. If you are after that delicate pastel effect, you can use a fog filter and a pale color filter with each other. I like to use a fog and warming filter together. Graduated filters, with a colored half and clear half, I use to increase the drama of landscape photos.

Filters that radically transform nature require a very careful choice of subject matter if photos are to avoid looking merely gimmicky. Filters are no substitute for imagination. However, used with sensitivity and understanding, the can help produce effective images. One very simple example is to put a strong color filter over the lens so that a scene appears bathed in an unnatural light, as in the photo below. Its simple with just a blue filter on a bright sunny day. Strong red, blue or green filters can deceive your TTL meter so watch exposure carefully, or increase the exposure by the filters recommended filter factor. For best results using strong colors, simple, bold compositions are best.



Dazzling flashes of sunlight on a cool blue pool of water enchant the eye, but in a photo they often look disappointing to the photographer. A starburst or diffraction filter can bring back the brilliance of the reflected light, and create an image that resembles what you remember seeing at the moment you snapped the shot. How it works is that the filter has tiny little groves in it that spread light from the bright highlights into the darker areas of the photo, while the diffraction filter has an additional effect. It splits light into component colors, surrounding each bright highlight with rainbow colored streaks or even with halos. The effects you get with these types of filters depend on the focal length of your lens and on aperture your using. Take several photos using different apertures, and pick the one that you think has the best overall effect.

There is no limit to the many number of ways a photographer can manipulate the reality the camera sees and records. The clever use of props and models and any other front of the lens tools can produce images that can baffle the eye and stimulate each persons imagination. Many commerical photographers who create photos for album covers, posters, and any other form of advertising, have a very extensive repertoire of special effects. You can use their knowledge and techniques to create the images that speak for themselves. Setting up such photos, whether you do it in a studio or outdoors, requires lots of patience, and meticulous attention to detail. The advantage is you have the time that you need to compose the subject just as you want it, and arrange it in many different ways and using a variety of different lighting arrangements, along with different camera positions. Having total control over the results you get, is the biggest reward of this approach to special effect photography. By manipulating every aspect of the scene your shooting, you can be creative in the widest sense of the word. In chapter 2, we will go into more depth on things like defying gravitiy and props you can use for outdoor illusions.

I have been a freelance photographer for over 30 years. I shoot everything from portraiture to commerical. My love is landscape and bird photography. I am now assisting models with their portfolios and shooting product photography for commerical web sites.