Create Photography Magic With These GoPro Photography Tips
- Get the Specs and Prices on GoPro Filter Kits
- The Most Important Filters for Landscape Photography
- When to Use (and Not to Use) a Polarizer
- Use the rule of thirds to create a balanced composition that shifts your primary subject to the left or right of center.
- Pay attention to the horizon line, ensuring that it's absolutely level.
- Use leading lines to draw viewers into the shot and create an image with improved depth and dimension.
- Look for good lighting that adds drama to the shot. Sidelighting is great for adding depth to landscapes; backlighting is nice for Golden Hour portraits.
- Pay attention to the background of the shot. GoPro's have a wide angle of view, so you'll need to work a little harder to eliminate clutter.
- Frame the shot such that the primary subject is strong in the frame. You want the subject to grab the viewer's attention.
- Make Your Photos Better With These Photography Composition Tricks
- 10 Rules to Follow When Composing a Photo
- 6 Easy, Yet Effective Tips for Better Composition
I'm not sure there's a camera that's more associated with adventure and photography than the GoPro.
After all, it's small, powerful, and can shoot video. You can mount it to your chest, to a tripod, to your helmet, or even to your car to get interesting stills and video, too.
But to unleash the true power of your GoPro, you need to give it a little help, just like you'd do with any other camera.
With that in mind, I've put together a quick list of things you can do to make photography magic with your GoPro.
Get Some Filters
The value of having filters for your camera - GoPro or otherwise - cannot be understated.
Though there are plenty of factors that separate images by amateurs and images by the pros, the use of filters is probably the simplest and easiest of them all.
If you pick up a GoPro Elite Kit by Formatt-Hitech, you get a variety of filters that will help you take your photos to the next level...
With a neutral density filter, you can help your GoPro take gorgeous long exposures.
With a polarizer, you can eliminate glare off of water, reduce atmospheric haze, and boost the saturation and contrast of the sky.
Even a simple UV filter is helpful for your adventures with your GoPro as it will help protect the GoPro's lens from damage.
Of course, having a GoPro means you can take your photography to places you typically wouldn't like under the surface of the ocean.
In that case, you want to have filters that help correct the colors in your images when diving in blue or green water.
The Formatt-Hitech GoPro Dive Kit has all you need for taking breathtaking underwater shots.
As seen above, the kit comes with a variety of tinted filters for correcting color casts when diving. Also included is a filter holder.
In other words, no matter if you're diving off the coast of California, riding your bike in the mountains of New Hampshire, or something in between, with the right filter kit, you can turn your GoPro into an even more effective photo and video-taking machine.
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Think About Composition
I know it's hard to consider how your images and videos will look when your camera is strapped to your chest or mounted on top of your helmet.
But if you mount your GoPro to a tripod, you can use it like any other camera to capture well-composed images of everything from your kid playing soccer to the sunset over the field behind your house.
Just bear the traditional rules of composition in mind when creating your shots:
Additionally, work to find interesting perspectives and points of view to take your shots.
That might mean setting your GoPro on the ground for a worm's eye view or hooking it up to your drone for a bird's eye view.
The point is that the more effort you put into the manner in which your GoPro photos are composed, the better they will turn out.
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Stabilize Your GoPro
Just like any camera, your GoPro will take better photos if it's stabilized.
The great thing about GoPros is that they can be mounted just about anywhere, as I noted earlier.
Granted, you'll get sharper images if your GoPro is mounted to a tripod than if it's on your bike handlebars, but the point is still the same - the more secure and stable the GoPro is, the better the results will be.
You don't need anything big, expensive, or fancy, either.
Since GoPros are so lightweight, a small tabletop tripod like the Sirui 3T-35K shown above will do the trick.
If you want to create smooth videos, get a fluid pan head for the tripod as well.
For the adventurous types, you can get improved image and video quality if you add a gimbal to your GoPro.
Essentially, a gimbal acts as a counterbalance to any movement that causes the camera to shake, whether that's bouncing around on a sailboat or simply having shaky hands.
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Wrapping It Up
As I've outlined above, getting better images and videos with your GoPro is really a lot like getting better images and videos with your regular camera.
Get outfitted with the appropriate filters, focus on composition, and find a way to stabilize your GoPro, and you'll find that the results you get are vastly improved.
Now all that's left to do is figure out where you'll take your GoPro to take epic shots!
Get even more tips for better GoPro photos in the video above from Kingston Technology.
