Just made a flickr account, looking for tips :)

[Jixxur]

I thought I would make my own Flickr account to upload pictures of myself so people could see.

Making this post to see if anyone has any tips for me, what kind of pictures I should upload and any tips on becoming better at taking pictures of myself.

I'd like to learn how to take better pictures so people would be more willing to follow me and stuff, are there any tips for me to becoming better?

I'm still pretty new to SL, only about 13 days in so far. I know how to take pictures and stuff but is there stuff people do to make their pictures look better? Am I suppose to get photoshop or some sort of picture editing software to make them look better? I'm clueless and don't know anything, I'd love to learn it all.

Thank you! :3

 

EDIT: If anyone is interested, here it is =  Boom

Edited December 31, 2017 by Jixxur

[Jixxur]

I like the word "stuff". 

[suzyst]

Gimp is free image editing software that does (just about) everything that photoshop does, but both have a steep learning curve.  Playing with windlights can improve pics. Main thing is just have fun and don't worry too much about getting "favs".

[Jixxur]

3 minutes ago, suzyst said:

Gimp is free image editing software that does (just about) everything that photoshop does, but both have a steep learning curve.  Playing with windlights can improve pics. Main thing is just have fun and don't worry too much about getting "favs".

Oh it's all for fun, but what is fun for me is making them look as good as possible. I am in no way doing this to gain a big following or make money off of it.

Thank you for telling me about GIMP, seems I already had it installed on my PC. Must have downloaded it a LONG time ago, thank you!

Although not quite sure what people do exactly to make their pictures look better. 

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

I don't really take a lot of pics myself but I hear the Black Dragon viewer is quite popular with SL photographers, it has a lot of nice ease of use features for tweaking your viewers environmental/visual effects.  Whether you choose to do any post-processing work on your photos is entirely up to you but if you're looking for free alternatives to Photoshop you may want to try Gimp or Krita 

[Ceka Cianci]

You can take really good pictures just from the viewer lighting also..If you go to the world tab there are photo tools in there along with sun positioning and environment editor and stuff..

You can click on my flickr  in my sig if you want to see some results of just taking images right from the viewer with no photo programs involved.

I just get my lighting and stuff where I want it and throw them up there and go back later and pull off the ones I don't want on my flickr..

 

I'm not very serious into photography in SL,but I like to mess around with it at times..

Edited December 31, 2017 by Ceka Cianci

[Jixxur]

So far the only thing I know, from a friend, is use "ctrl + 0" and "ctrl + 9" to zoom instead of using mouse wheel.

Are there any items I would need to buy in-game to help me with taking pictures?

I'll look more into the "Black Dragon Viewer". I also already have GIMP so hopefully it's good enough, I'm not trying to become a professional or make this my job or anything, just for funsies.

If anyone has more tips let me know! :3

[Callum Meriman]

Don't use the same password for Flickr as SL. Yahoo are not the best company for keeping passwords secret.

[Jixxur]

2 minutes ago, Callum Meriman said:

Don't use the same password for Flickr as SL. Yahoo are not the best company for keeping passwords secret.

Hahaha, already used a different one. Thank you!

[Ceka Cianci]

You could have a look at Lumipro which may come in handy..

It has lots of neat things you can do with lighting and projectors and things like that.. it's pretty neat..

There is a little bit of a learning curve for it but not too bad really and there are lots of videos on youtube for it..

it's kind of costly though..

I actually forget what I paid for mine..maybe 5k,but I'm not sure off hand.. Definitely would research it a bit first to make sure it's something that would be for  you..

 

This can give an idea of what it can do..

 

Edited December 31, 2017 by Ceka Cianci

[Jixxur]

17 minutes ago, Ceka Cianci said:

You could have a look at Lumipro which may come in handy..

It has lots of neat things you can do with lighting and projectors and things like that.. it's pretty neat..

There is a little bit of a learning curve for it but not too bad really and there are lots of videos on youtube for it..

it's kind of costly though..

I actually forget what I paid for mine..maybe 5k,but I'm not sure off hand.. Definitely would research it a bit first to make sure it's something that would be for  you..

 

This can give an idea of what it can do..

 

Thank you very much, I will definitely look more into this. Thank you!

[Solar Legion]

Krita is - from what I have seen when a room mate here uses it - a very good alternative to Photoshop and even GIMP. As far as Second Life clients are concerned it should be noted that Black Dragon is Windows Only so if you're using a Mac or a Linux distro ... You're SOL there.

As far as image storage goes: It amazes me that people assume that Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and their own Second Life Profile feed are their only options - though honestly it really shouldn't, seeing as the Snapshot floater in the client does not list any other services by name.

One such service requires you to use the Send to E-mail function in the Snapshot floater but if memory serves also allows for direct web interface uploads: Snapzilla.

To each their own though.

[Ceka Cianci]

23 minutes ago, Solar Legion said:

Krita is - from what I have seen when a room mate here uses it - a very good alternative to Photoshop and even GIMP. As far as Second Life clients are concerned it should be noted that Black Dragon is Windows Only so if you're using a Mac or a Linux distro ... You're SOL there.

As far as image storage goes: It amazes me that people assume that Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and their own Second Life Profile feed are their only options - though honestly it really shouldn't, seeing as the Snapshot floater in the client does not list any other services by name.

One such service requires you to use the Send to E-mail function in the Snapshot floater but if memory serves also allows for direct web interface uploads: Snapzilla.

To each their own though.

Myself I just use Flickr because when it first came around they gave you much more storage than a lot of the other places..Also if you did their yearly premium account ,which at the time I think was 24.00 a year, it was even more storage and some other perks,which I can't remember at the moment..

I've been with them for so long and never really ever had any issues with them,so seen no reason to really go elsewhere..

I always send my stuff to my desktop and then upload from there..

I used to have my own server for things like that when I was messing with making web pages..but not doing those things anymore..So Flickr was kind of nice for me after that..

Edited December 31, 2017 by Ceka Cianci

[Jixxur]

Hey if anyone reads this, is there a place or a way to get my Flickr account noticed by more people? I'm new to the whole social media thing, I never had a Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or anything like that. Flickr is the very first thing to do with all this stuff for me, so I was just wondering if there was a way to show people.

I'm not begging for followers or anything, just would like to have people see my photos. Would make me feel better and people could also tell me what I can do to improve and also tell me good places to take pictures maybe. 

Or if anyone reading this wants to check out the very first picture I took, feel free too! My Flickr - Not sure if linking your own stuff is allowed on the forums or not, if it's not then I will edit it out. Still new to the forums, sorry!

Thank you! :3

Edited December 31, 2017 by Jixxur

[Chic Aeon]

8 minutes ago, Jixxur said:

Hey if anyone reads this, is there a place or a way to get my Flickr account noticed by more people? I'm new to the whole social media thing, I never had a Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or anything like that. Flickr is the very first thing to do with all this stuff for me, so I was just wondering if there was a way to show people.

I'm not begging for followers or anything, just would like to have people see my photos. Would make me feel better and people could also tell me what I can do to improve and also tell me good places to take pictures maybe. 

Or if anyone reading this wants to check out the very first picture I took, feel free too! My Flickr - Not sure if linking your own stuff is allowed on the forums or not, if it's not then I will edit it out. Still new to the forums, sorry!

Thank you! :3

You can add your photos to various SL Flickr groups to get them seen by more people.  Look at the "Submit Your Photos for Picture of the Day" link at the top of this page (or most of the Forum pages). That is one group. You can find more SL Flickr groups by looking at pictures in that group and seeing what OTHER groups people have added things to.

My biggest tip would be to learn about Windlight (takes a while - small doses good :D).  

Here is my Windlight page (ancient but updated) with some links. No need to download any of my Windlight settings unless you are using the Linden viewer. They are a part of most 3rd party viewers already. 

https://chicatphilsplace.blogspot.com/2009/09/windlight-settings.html

 

[Ceka Cianci]

plus you can do pic of the day,which the link for that stuff is at the top of this page,right above your thread title..

[Jixxur]

Oh nice!!! Totally did not see that, thank you. I joined the group and posted my picture in it, woo.

Thank you very much.

[Janet Voxel]

I opened a flickr about a year ago and I'm still learning. I'm not a blogger or anything and I experiment a lot, because I just enjoy doing pictures and learning.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/pumpumsnacks/

 My only caveat is a lot of what flickr is, is a quid pro quo system. Some people will favorite your stuff because you favorited their stuff. Some people take pictures that aren't great but they like everything so, people like their stuff because they liked theirs too. Hope that makes sense.

Having glossy, shiny pictures is what is popular right now. A couple of years ago, burn and dodge pictures were really popular. It varies and there are different scenes, so the best thing to do is do what you do and stick with it. Some groups are nothing more than pic dumps where people just put their pictures and that's it. But the best thing to do is like what you like and really examine the pictures that you like, after a while you can figure out what they did. When I started, I used bigger bodies, got a lot of favorites using those, but when I switched to one of the big three....lost a lot of favorites in the beginning, because people only like certain things. If you're going for favorites and followers, stick with one thing.  So if you're doing cutesie stuff, stick with cutesie stuff, if you're doing sci-fi, stick with sci-fi. It's best not to diverge, but I do because I'm enjoying trying things out.

Ideally, you want to do your own lighting and you want to chose high contrast windlights. I use lightme! and it's relatively cheap, but great lighting. 

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/LightMe-Professional-Lighting-for-Scenes-and-Photography/13350437

You could create your own lighting using prims, it's just a lot easier to use something prepackaged. I would say start by creating a backlight for yourself though, that you can make invisible. There are also prepackaged backdrops you can buy and use. But I would say start with a lightbox like this:

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/StrawberrySinghcom-Simple-Photo-Studio/5745423

Free and adjustable! Using that can go a long way to understanding about lighting.

For photography itself, you want to take a picture as large as your PC will allow. Right now I do them at about 4000 pixels, but I've gone up to 6000 pixels. And save it to disk, not a straight up upload to flickr. The reason you want to do this, is so you can edit out any imperfections you notice and do some post processing. Then resize the picture to something reasonable and upload it to Flickr. If you're using DoF (depth of field), you can't make the picture too big, because it just doesn't work over a certain size.

 

Hope that helps and that's just scratching the surface!

[Jixxur]

5 hours ago, janetosilio said:

I opened a flickr about a year ago and I'm still learning. I'm not a blogger or anything and I experiment a lot, because I just enjoy doing pictures and learning.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/pumpumsnacks/

 My only caveat is a lot of what flickr is, is a quid pro quo system. Some people will favorite your stuff because you favorited their stuff. Some people take pictures that aren't great but they like everything so, people like their stuff because they liked theirs too. Hope that makes sense.

Having glossy, shiny pictures is what is popular right now. A couple of years ago, burn and dodge pictures were really popular. It varies and there are different scenes, so the best thing to do is do what you do and stick with it. Some groups are nothing more than pic dumps where people just put their pictures and that's it. But the best thing to do is like what you like and really examine the pictures that you like, after a while you can figure out what they did. When I started, I used bigger bodies, got a lot of favorites using those, but when I switched to one of the big three....lost a lot of favorites in the beginning, because people only like certain things. If you're going for favorites and followers, stick with one thing.  So if you're doing cutesie stuff, stick with cutesie stuff, if you're doing sci-fi, stick with sci-fi. It's best not to diverge, but I do because I'm enjoying trying things out.

Ideally, you want to do your own lighting and you want to chose high contrast windlights. I use lightme! and it's relatively cheap, but great lighting. 

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/LightMe-Professional-Lighting-for-Scenes-and-Photography/13350437

You could create your own lighting using prims, it's just a lot easier to use something prepackaged. I would say start by creating a backlight for yourself though, that you can make invisible. There are also prepackaged backdrops you can buy and use. But I would say start with a lightbox like this:

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/StrawberrySinghcom-Simple-Photo-Studio/5745423

Free and adjustable! Using that can go a long way to understanding about lighting.

For photography itself, you want to take a picture as large as your PC will allow. Right now I do them at about 4000 pixels, but I've gone up to 6000 pixels. And save it to disk, not a straight up upload to flickr. The reason you want to do this, is so you can edit out any imperfections you notice and do some post processing. Then resize the picture to something reasonable and upload it to Flickr. If you're using DoF (depth of field), you can't make the picture too big, because it just doesn't work over a certain size.

 

Hope that helps and that's just scratching the surface!

Thank you very much for the reply! I just woke up so sorry for responding so late.

How do I know how much pixels I am taking my picture at? I put the size to "custom" and as default it gave me a 1344 x 768 size. The size of my monitor is 1600 x 900 though. Should I bump the size up to the size of my monitor? And where does pixels come into play, I don't see anywhere it saying how many pixels I have my thing set too.

I feel so dumb sorry I'm such a noob .. if anyone could help me with this that would be great. I'd like to make my pictures look as good as possible!

[Janet Voxel]

You did the right thing by setting your image to custom. The x by x is already in pixels. You can make it whatever size your pc will allow in custom settings. If you take the constraints off the sizing you can set the image to whatever size you like. The more pixels the higher the resolution.

if you take a picture in SL there is a size limit, I think it’s 1280 or 1096. So to avoid the restriction you can save the image to disk. Try one at 3000 x 3000. Fire up your photo editing software and open up your image. If 3000 pixels work, next pic bump it up to 4000, then try 5000. You want to do this so that you know what the max resolution your pc can handle.

Good luck and Happy New Year!

[Orwar]

My top 3 tips from one aspiring photographer to another:

1. Take the shots in as high graphic settings, and image resolution, as your rig can handle. The better quality photo comes out of SL, the less editing will be required. Some things will need to be touched up on, though; shadows that come too sharp may need to be softened even with Ambient Occlusion maxed out, and neck seams tend to want a bit of touch up.

2. Experiment with Windlight and local lights. Personally I prefer setting the Windlight to 'Phototools - No Lights' (completely dark) and use local lights (projectors), but that's a question of taste. You can get some beautiful effects with WL, but to me it's easier to get the lights I want, then run it through editing in Gimp to get the effects I want. It might be worth pointing out I mainly shoot people, though; if you're shooting scenery you'll probably find Windlight easier - especially if you don't have rez rights where you're shooting.

3. Use the photo tools. I'm not sure about the other viewers, but Firestorm has some very good photo- and camera tools. Explore the view angle (zoom) and angles for your shot, and once you have it framed - store the view angle. This way you can go fiddle with the lights or help your model adjust their eye position or accessories without having to re-frame it from 0. 

[AlexandriaBrangwin]

Looks like youre on the right track already dear.

Focus on telling your story, not fitting into established trends or chasing an audience.

[Kytteh Wytchwood]

You don't have to be amazing in your pics to get people to follow and fave your pics. As long as you get nice lighting on your face and body and use a pose while in a sim with an interesting background, people will click your pic to view it. Of course your faves will go higher if you use high graphic settings and you make use of the shadows. People are obsessed with shadows lol. You can use the phototools menu to increase your resolution, paired with advanced lighting model. Then make your photo at least 3000 pixels before saving. When it comes to being popular on Flickr, you have to do a lot of hard work. Join a lot of second life groups for moments type of screenshots and sl "photography" groups. You want to choose opted out groups, which means you can get your pics in groups over your group limit. 30 groups for free members and 60 for pro members. Then you play the Follow and fave game. Fave at least one pic from a photostream that you found in one of the groups you joined. Then click the follow button. You want to do this with people who are active on the site. It takes a lot of hours to do it but you will be rewarded with faves and follows. The more followers you have, the more views you get each time you upload. But you don't want to stop this game because the more you do it, the more followers and faves you get. Not just on one pic, some are serial favers and will dive into your photostream and click the fave button like crazy on many of your pics. Also try each week to go back to the followers you already have and fave another pic, but this time pick the most recent pic. People love to have their newest pics faved. This will help you get a fave back. Good luck!  

I want to add I did that game for a pic of a club I was promoting that I work at. I ddn't like doing it but I wanted as many views as possible. If you only fave but don't follow, people won't follow you back. It's strange lol. 

If you like to interact with people, making constructive and observation comments on pics can make people feel good about the work they did on the pic. You'll either get a thank you, a conversation or a follow and some faves or a bit of each. I did it because I like to give feedback and was astonished they would come view my stream and fave/ follow me. Also, there are groups you can join that give out tips in the discussion section of the said group if you ever buy Photoshop. They aren't for sl groups, just those who use it for art and real life photography. But they are friendly and active in the discussions.

Edited June 22, 2018 by Kytteh Wytchwood