Im thinking about buying a new point and shoot camera as my DSLR is sometimes too big to take to everywhere.
And Someone mentioned last week that they were looking for a new camera so today im showing you a couple of my favourites. I wont go into too much depth on each one as you can click on the links to take you to amazon.com for more information should you need it! `

My number one choice is by far the Cannon Power Shot S31s. Biggest draw card for me is price. On amazon its $295.81 (I’d pay more here in aussie dollars, but hey thems the breaks! LOL) Plus it has 12x optical zoom, image stabilization, and 20 shooting modes. Down side is it weight quite a bit more than most of the cameras on the market (14.6ounces). But It does get my vote for best overall features for the price.

Cannon is by far the most popular brand of point and shoot camera but just to compare i had a look at a few other models of different brands.

Sony Cyber shot DSC-H5 has some nice features. 7.2 mega pixels (thats more than my DSLR!), image stabilization, nice and light at 8 ounces and my favourite thing, 3inch display! My best friend has one of these and i tell you i love that big display screen! Down side tho is the price. $799.00 on amazon. I feel like your paying for the brand name here more than the actual equipment.

and just to be loyal i had to look at a nikon (i have always had nikons SLR’s! i love em). But what i found was that Nikon are much more focused on SLR’s rather than point and shoots. The Nikon Coolpix 5400 was cheapest at $189.95 on amazon. 5 megapixel, 1.5 inch screen, 15 shooting modes and 11.3 ounces. Probably still quite a nice little camera if your on a budget and i will guarrantee that anything NIkon will be reliable and give you nice prints. However i think for an extra $100, you can get a whole heap more with the cannon power shot.

You can go here for more comparisons and here if you want to check out some comparisions of Digital SLR’s.

Hope that helps those of you that are thinking about buying a new camera! In the meantime be sure to come check out my store or my blog!

Luv Lani – xxx -

Almost all digital cameras now, even lil point and shoots have a command dial (or an exposure mode dial – whatever you choose to call it, you know the turn-y circle thing LOL)

So Hands up those of you who never take your camera off auto?????? huh, huh??? yea i see you! LOL I challenge you this week to take your camera off auto!
Try it! and hey if its crap theres always the handy delete button! So heres a few hints as to what each of those lil pictures mean!

Auto: Pretty self explanatory! The camera does everything for you. Especially handy when the baby will only pose for 30 seconds or your at a party and have had too much wine…. Yes thats normally me hehe

Portrait: The pretty lil lady. This is one of my favourites. Basically the camera will keep the subject in focus, and then blur the background so the subject stands out more. Good for when theres alot of distraction going on in the background. Perfect for portraits (as the name would suggest! duh hehe)

Macro/Close up: The Flower. This is the one to use to take photos of your pretty roses, or that cute lil lady bug. It allows you to get a bit closer to your subject and like the portrait mode, it will blur the background to help your subject stand out. The shot here of my command dial was taken on macro – u can see the dial is in focus but the side of the camera and the table it was sitting on is blurred.

Sports/Action: The lil running man. This mode basically gives you a fast shutter speed in order to “freeze the action”. Good for the kids sports or a quick toddler. Using a fast shutter means that the camera lets in less light though, so it does tend to work best on a sunny day. My camera allows me to shoot in continuous bursts in this mode – a definate must for capturing that perfect shot of a fast moving subject!

Night Portrait Mode/ Night Landscape mode: Normally represented by a star or moon. My camera here only has night portrait mode which lights up the subject by firing the flash but also captures any light in the background. I once had a camera that also had a night landscape mode, which didnt fire the flash but instead left the shutter open for longer so to let in as much light as possible. Be careful of blur in these modes. You have to hold the camera really steady,rest the camera on an unmoving surface or use a tripod.

So get out there this week and give it a go! Next week we’ll do part II – tackling the more advanced exposure modes!

In the meantime be sure to visit my store or my blog!

Luv Lani -xxx-

Hi all! Hope you had a great week!

So we all like to look great in photos right? But you cant help wrinkles, pimples and all that other great stuff that can make you cringe when you look at a photo of yourself.  So today I thought id share with you guys a photography retouching program ive been having a bit of fun with the last few weeks. Yes i know, you can get exactly the same results in Photoshop or Paintshop Pro but this way is sooooooooooo quick and easy! Its called Portrait Proffessional. Its very basic and simple to use but you can get quite stunning results in about a minute. You just follow the directions (click on the corner of the eye, click on the tip of the nose – basic stuff like that) and the program will turn you into a supermodel. LOL. well close enough anyway!

I find its best to dial back some of the settings so you still look like a real person because left to its own devices you may end up looking somewhat barbie-ish.  You can smooth skin, remove blemishes, whiten teeth, make lips look plump, pink and shiny. The program will even drop a few of those unwanted kilos!

Heres an example using my best friend (who is gorgeous just the way she is, but loves this program more than me!). This photo was retouched about half of what is possible.  You could keep going to remove every little imperfection or you can be more subtle. I personally dont think its necessary to look like you should be gracing the front page of a magazine!

BEFORE

AFTER

The website has lots of other examples. Some are quite amazing. The program has a free trial which lets you use the full program but you cant save the finished image, which is a bummer but its still a bit of fun to see how “glamorous” you can look.  If you want a good laugh try turning the dials all the way up! You get to see what you’d look like after too much plastic surgery. LOL

Luv Lani

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