What are your favorite photography tips and tricks?

Want great pictures, marry a photographer. That's what I did, and my pictures have never looked better!

TES before you shoot:
Know your THEME. EMPHASIZE your subject. SIMPLIFY the frame.

The best thing I ever did for my photos was to buy an external flash, and always bounce it off the ceiling when possible. Using the direct flash of the on-camera flash results in red-eye, washed out faces, and black backgrounds. Aim a flash at the (usually white) ceiling and the entire room fills with natural-looking light, drastically improving your photos.

When you're out and about, don't bother taking photos of the usual attractions/popular scenes. Those were there before you, and will be there when you're gone. Instead, capture the people around you. Photograph the interesting individuals who also happen to be strolling through. You'll start to notice things you never saw before, and you'll learn to appreciate the moment for what it's worth.

So many tricks when it comes to photography...

For organizing and managing large photo libraries I really love Bridge

You can make almost any photo look good in Photoshop by creating a new layer and applying the Gaussian blur filter, multiplying it over the original image and then messing with the curves until you get the look you want.

A remote will be your best friend when shooting in low light - especially if you don't want to use a flash.

And if you take iPhone photos I highly recommend CameraBag for stylizing your photos a bit.

The best photo tip I've had is using the built-in timer for taking night-time or low-light shots using a tripod. This prevents any shaking you might get from pressing the shutter button and you don't have to purchase a remote trigger for your camera.

Best tip ever given to me that i always pass on:

Take pictures of everything and often. Simple as that. There are plenty of tips on how one can take a better picture but the best is that practice makes perfect so take your camera DSLR, P&S, or other and start snapping away. You will be amazed with how much you will learn about the camera and photography.

Best of luck to everyone with their picture taking.

Look at photographs of how to perform brain surgery. Have your brain replaced with that of an expert photographer, and then you can skip all the steps of having to learn different techniques, and avoid spending time on "experience".

The rule of thirds: Imagine the photo is split into nine equal parts. The most important elements of the photo should be placed at one of the intersecting points. Look at some photos you find interesting and chances are the photographer has adhered to the rule.

Another thing is the perspective/angle you choose to shoot from. Change it up, so many amateurs just walk up to something they want to photograph and snap a picture. Get down on the ground, climb up a ladder, venture a little off the beaten path and get the shot most people are too lazy to get.

I think the best tip to give new-ish photographers is to play with the camera frequently and to take many many shots. Simplify by using the built-in photo profile settings and focus on two different types of shots: Portraits (subject fills the frame) and landscapes (wide and sweeping). Concentrate on getting good people shots and landscape shots by playing with the auto controls. In other words, focus on composition versus the mechanics. Once you start feeling restricted or are feeling adventurous, put the camera in manual and start playing with the aperture, shutter and ISO settings, all while building on your "eye" towards framing a good composition.

For the amateur, an improperly exposed, but well composed, shot will look better than a perfectly exposed shot of nothing.

Use a Lampshade as a tripod. The threads at the top of any lamp (the place where the lampshade screws on) are precisely the same diameter as a tripod mount. Just take off the lampshade, screw on your camera, and voila: instant tripod.

The best advice I ever got was from a friend who takes sporting event photos (Hockey, Soccer, etc.) Take ALOT of pictures and spend the time later to pare them down to a couple really good ones. Especially now with digital camera memory cards being so cheap, it's the best thing I've found to do, not to mention cheap and easy!

I have discovered that my favorite photos are the ones where I went macro or off center on the subject of my photo. When I say macro I mean zoom your frame in so close that the subject is actually bigger than what you can see; this allows you to capture more of a smile or a laugh than just a face. When I say off center, I really mean capture negative space. Take a photo of a person where they are off to the right or left, often with movement, showing where they are headed to or from. Both of these allow me to display the emotion of the subject in my photography.

Always take a second look at what's around your target. There's nothing like taking a gorgeous snapshot of a woman only to realize the awkward telephone pole protruding from her head.

The best advice I can give anyone with a digital camera is simply to take as many photos as you can and bring your camera out everywhere.

I struggled with this for a while, you want the photo to be perfect all the time and you don't want to look like a doofus doing it. I suggest bringing your camera out and just snapping as many as you can. You will often find the shots that you thought weren't very great at first turn out to be your best ones.

I always find the ad hoc natural pictures of people in action while they are unaware of the photographer, ie. not posing in the pictuers, those candid shots always end up my favorite out of the bunch.

I think once you get that perfect angle, focus, and lighting on the picture, the best tip to impress people is using nice photo paper and a high quality print for the picture to stand out, depending how you will display the picture and frame, a nice high gloss print and nicely framed picture goes a long way.

Here's a few:

STAND BACK AND SHOOT WIDE
If in-camera composition is not your thing, take a wide shot, get everything in and then crop later in your software of choice. Particularly with group shots or photos of children. Most digital cameras have plenty of extra pixels for you to zoom in and crop for the best photo possible.

USE YOUR FLASH OUTDOORS EVEN IN DAYLIGHT
The brighter the sun, the more harsh shadows obscure details, especially faces. Force your flash to turn on and it will fill in those dark areas.

TAKE CANDID SHOTS (A LOT OF THEM)
While hamming it up for the camera can produce fun results, the most meaningful pictures are often captured moments where people can reveal more natural smiles and true moments of beauty. While you may need to shoot 50 frames to get 1 good one, the 1 good one is certainly worth it. Besides, how often do you fill up that giant memory card. You're more likely to run out of batteries...

TAKE EXTRA BATTERIES
Enough said. Buy an extra set and bring 'em along. Most manufacturers sell replacements for proprietary batteries. Spend the money to save the day when the juice runs out in the middle of your kid's performance.

Here's a few:

STAND BACK AND SHOOT WIDE
If in-camera composition is not your thing, take a wide shot, get everything in and then crop later in your software of choice. Particularly with group shots or photos of children. Most digital cameras have plenty of extra pixels for you to zoom in and crop for the best photo possible.

USE YOUR FLASH OUTDOORS EVEN IN DAYLIGHT
The brighter the sun, the more harsh shadows obscure details, especially faces. Force your flash to turn on and it will fill in those dark areas.

TAKE CANDID SHOTS (A LOT OF THEM)
While hamming it up for the camera can produce fun results, the most meaningful pictures are often captured moments where people can reveal more natural smiles and true moments of beauty. While you may need to shoot 50 frames to get 1 good one, the 1 good one is certainly worth it. Besides, how often do you fill up that giant memory card. You're more likely to run out of batteries...

TAKE EXTRA BATTERIES
Enough said. Buy an extra set and bring 'em along. Most manufacturers sell replacements for proprietary batteries. Spend the money to save the day when the juice runs out in the middle of your kid's performance.

THE ONE QUESTION YOU MUST ASK YOURSELF in order to create a great image.

We live in a time where the technology has advanced to such a level that most of the technical aspects of an image is set automatically by the camera. Most of us don't understand or even care to understand how this is done and to be honest, it doesn't even matter.

The most important aspect of an image is not something technology will be able to predict.
In the end, the thing that really matters is how the image makes you feel.

Like a great movie or a classic piece of art, an image should immediately pull you in and make you feel a certain way or take you to another place. Think about some of the great images we have seen in Time Magazine or National Geographic.

Great images all have something in common. They all pull the viewer in and make a statement.

So the best tip I have heard is to just ask yourself one question before taking a picture.

What do I want this image to say?

EYE-FI EYE-FI →

If you just want a tip, then zoom as little as possible. Get close and shoot as close to 50mm as possible. No compression and no distortion.

If you want to become a better photographer, buy a completely manual film camera and shoot it as much as possible. Once you have to slow down and think your way through your shots, instead of just relying on your camera to do the work, your photos will become actual photographs instead of just snap-shots.

The best thing you can do, even with just a basic point-and-shoot, is to learn a little about ISO, Aperture & Exposure and how you can control them.

Want to get that blown-out, candid portrait of your girl in Ibiza with a blurry, background of colors from the party? No problem!

Want to shoot a great silhouette shot of your 5th Generation Champion Chesapeake Bay Retriever up on the bow of your schooner, "The Other, Other Woman"? Easy-peasy!

Want to capture a scene of the Massai warrior Zebra Surfing on the Serengeti Plains and not have it look like just a red speck on a brown canvas. You'll know how!

I'm constantly amazed at what you can do with a little knowledge of the basics and a point-and-shoot. Digital Photography School or DPS is a site that has very accessible tips and techniques for just about any sort of photography, even if you're not trying to catalog the life of Lord Richard Rockwell Kennedy Julius IV.

No relation...

RTFM and learn what relationship shutter speed, aperature and film speed (ISO) have to get the right exposure. Shutter freezes or blurs motion. Aperature changes your focus to isolate subjects or focus on everything. Film speed is a function of what shutter/aperature settings you can use with the available light. If you can, always shoot in manual until you are comfortable with these three things and then you can always capture what you want.

I would also vote for the "Rule of Thirds" which is when you make an imaginary "tic tac toe" board in the image you are viewing. Images where the focal points run along one of those lines (either horizontal or vertical) are interesting, and where those lines intersect is the most visually interesting.

Also, play with your depth of field. You really can make interesting pictures by really shrinking the depth of field to be very narrow and it puts your subject in better focus. Here is an example of the last two tips.

I would also say sometimes it is good to use a flash if your subjects are backlit. A perfect example is if you are taking a picture of people in front of a sunset. This way they wont be silhouetted shadows and you will still get that great sunset in the background.

The last tip would be to look at whats in the background as well as the foreground. You want to avoid the telephone pole sticking out of the person's head and avoid distracting backgrounds.