#photography tutorials and tips

[lutaviacosplay]

A cosplay tutorial on how to pose for photoshoots, no matter what you look like and what you're wearing -- with example shots to help guide you along.

[fabrickind]

Finding Cosplay Photoshoot Locations: Part 1

📸Want to do cosplay photoshoots but don't know how to find that perfect place to shoot? This tutorial covers how to brainstorm a location for your shoot, logistical and cost concerns with shoot locations, and how to actually find your dream location.

📸This tutorial can be applied to shoots of all types, including but not limited to self shoots, shoots with friends, and shoots with hired photographers. Self shooting or shooting with friends only requires a camera (a phone works!) and possibly a tripod.

Part 1: Location Types

Coming up with the general type of location you want requires some brainstorming about what you want from the shoot. Think about your specific goals and types of photos you want and how certain types of locations would work for your goal. Remember you can always do multiple shoots for the same costume with different concepts!

For example, if you want big, sweeping shots, you will need a location that allows for wider framing and still looks good, while if you are primarily after shots with closer framing, you can go with a location with only a small usable portion. If you are looking to primarily showcase the costume itself or your posing, a flatter and simpler background works better than a busy background, but if you want cinematic shots or shots where you are existing in the environment as the character, somewhere that can show off the location itself as well as how you exist in it would work better.

Types of Locations

There are three main types of locations for cosplay shoots in relation to the cosplay itself. Of course, you can combine these types and there is a lot of overlap, but thinking of these three location types will help you conceptualize your shoot.

The first type is locations that are similar to something in the series, or an exact location from the series. My cover image is an example of this, where I took photos at the location of the climactic battle of the manga. Most fictional locations don't exist in real life so exactly, however, so think of locations that look similar to where this character might be found. The example on this slide shows a cosplay at a nature preserve with grassy fields and oak trees, which is similar to the locations the character traverses several times throughout the game she is from. This category can also include locations with similar vibes, such as a studio made up to look like a fancy European castle for a character from a series about European royalty, or a shoji screen backdrop for a character who lives in a Japanese-style house.

The second location type is locations with symbolic meaning. These locations showcase something about the themes or character arcs present in the series, and this can be accomplished with anything from specific props and setpieces to the entire background. One shoot I'd love to do with this concept is of Lady Blackpearl staring into a mirror -- this would symbolize her dual personality nature -- or of Lady Oscar wrapped in thorns, with the rose thorns symbolizing her glorious but fragile life. I chose to represent this location type with Ultimecia, a sorceress who wants to compress time so she is the only one who can live in the combined past/present/future, set among ruins. The ruins aren't accurate to the game, but show her crumbling reign marked by the passage of time.

The third location type is locations chosen for pure aesthetics. Obviously all locations are chosen for aesthetics, but these are locations with no deeper meaning and may not represent anything from the series at all. These can range from a simple colored wall backdrop to a sweeping landscape that simply looks good with the colors of the costume. Some examples are the Yasuho Hirose ocean shoot on the slide, where it doesn't represent a particular scene or location in the series but simply looks good with the cut and colors of the costume and the sailor theming, or my Princess White Rose milk bath photoshoot, where again the character never takes a milk bath, but a bathtub full of milk and roses shows off the detail of her floral hat and showcases the opulent nature of a rose-themed princess.

Requirements of your Shoot

Once you have a general concept, think of what is required to fit that concept. This can be as general as specific backgrounds or types of backgrounds to as specific as particular items at the location or particular lighting setups. Some shoots might need specific props, such as furniture to sit or lounge on, and props that won't work in a public location, such as realistic weapons that may cause panic or worse. Also keep in mind any accessibility needs, whether it is an accessible location in general to accommodate a disability or a need that is caused by the costume itself. Check not just the specific area you want to shoot, but how to get there from the parking lot or transit stop. Finally, keep in mind that unsecured outdoor locations, such as a park or beach, are locations where you can't change things about the location and you may encounter other people. Discussion of how to be respectful of such locations is in part 5.

Stay tuned for the rest of the parts~!

Links to other parts: 1 Location Types, 2 Discovering Locations, 3 Indoor vs Outdoor Locations, 4 Location Permissions, 5 Location Logistics

[leota-nexus]

^ the process

v the result

[barananduen]

Art Advice: Composition pt. 1 - Leading Lines and Focal Points

Composition is a vast topic that would take a long time to talk about in full, so I'm breaking it down into parts of more manageable size. This article is for people who draw/paint and for photographers.

In this issue, we will talk about guiding the viewers' eyes using: I. Leading lines II. Focal points

Every artpiece (drawing/painting or photograph) has visual pathways that guide the viewer's eye from one point to another in the piece, whether you intended to include them or not. It's important to be aware of them and learn how to use them to your advantage.

I. LEADING LINES

One way to guide the viewer's attention through a piece is by using explicit and implicit lines. An imbalance in these can cause your drawing to appear lopsided. (Imbalance, however, can also be used to your advantage; we'll talk about that later in this article.)

"Cupcake Love" [link]

Explicit lines are easier to identify: they're actual lines in your drawing. Here, we have three explicit sets of lines:

The sprigs of greenery: the two main ones are shown by the solid green lines on the diagram on the right. Here, they have a top left ↔ bottom right motion;

The black and white lines on the coaster, running in the opposite direction; and

The creases on the cupcake paper, fanning out from bottom to top.

Implicit lines are harder to spot, but your subconscious does catch them, so it's important to train yourself to see them. Here, there is an implicit line, marked on the diagram by the red arrow, that goes from the strawberry on the bottom left (notice its alignment) to the "Love" sign on top of the cupcake (notice that the "L" also forms an arrow that points back to the strawberry).

There is also another implicit line (shown by the dotted green arrow) going from the strawberry on the bottom right and connecting with the explicit lines formed by the sprigs on the top left.

🌱Tip! For people drawing: While training yourself to see implicit lines, a good way to spot them more easily is to flip your canvas. When working traditionally, you can use a mirror or take a photo of your work (make sure you paper is straight/not bent, and that your camera or mirror is perpendicular to your paper). You may not notice where the implicit lines are, at first, but you're more likely to spot a skew/slant this way.

The "red" and "green" lines here are perpendicular to each other, giving the painting a balanced appearance, despite the cupcake being off-center. You may have noticed that, if we were to remove the "Love" sign, we would still have more bottom left ↔ top right lines, from the sprigs behind the sign. So there is not just one bottom left ↔ top right line; there are more, and this also contributed to the sense of balance.

II. FOCAL POINTS

Another way to guide the viewer's eye across the canvas, or make them pay attention to a specific area, is to use focal points smartly.

Here, I've marked with Xs the secondary focal points of the painting (the main focal point being the cupcake). These are the points on which a viewer's eye will rest (after spotting the main subject first).

Like with leading lines, you want to use these to guide the viewer's eye around your piece in the way YOU want. This visual pathway can vary from piece to piece. You can try to arrange them in such a way that you keep the viewer's eye within your drawing, as opposed to leading it off the canvas. In this painting, they form a circle, but they can have any number of shapes.

IMBALANCE CAN WORK FOR YOU...

So far, we've talked about maintaining a balanced composition and keeping the viewer's eye from wandering off the canvas, but there are situations where you may want to do the opposite, to achieve a certain effect. For example:

To create a sense of bigness of smallness, or of open spaces

To cause an uneasy feeling in the viewer

To guide the viewer's eye in a specific direction

Let's look at some examples:

from my photography account: @barananduen-photo

These two compositions have very strong bottom left → top right leading lines (explicit), and nothing bringing the viewer's eye back. The focal point(s) are also all clustered toward one end of this line (in these cases, they're in the bottom left). This is done intentionally to create a feeling of open-ness.

You could also use a group of leading lines all pointing toward one focal point off to one side, to create a feeling of both isolation and focus/stress on said figure ("all eyes on..." type of concept). On the other hand, keeping the focal figure on one side, but, instead of lines pointing toward it, using curves leading away from it, can create a feeling of exclusion or loneliness for the figure.

So, you can use imbalance in composition in different ways to convey different messages.

...OR AGAINST YOU

"Christmas Chocobo" [link]

This (the painting by itself), on the other hand, has pretty bad composition. I have one leading, explicit line: bottom right ↔ top left. If you take away all the stuff I placed on and around the sketchbook, that composition is not really doing anything for me. The subject is centered, and there's nothing in the spaces around it, so it's not creating a pleasant sense of open-ness. It just looks skewed. There's a weak implicit "swoop" in the feathers on the bottom right, but it's not enough. The figure balances off a little bit because it's very bottom-heavy, so the body of the bird is like a horizontal mass.

The photo as a whole is more balanced out, because there is an implicit line going from bottom left ↔ top right, from the orange/reds paint wheel, through the bird, and to the paints on the top right (and this line is top-heavy). There are also various items forming a circle around the painting. Also, the darker leaves on the top left blend more into the background, keeping the bottom right ↔ top left explicit line of the painting from extending farther (therefore not diminishing the effect of the bottom left ↔ top right implicit line mentioned before).

🌱So the important takeaway is: Learn to identify leading lines and focal points, and arrange them to suit your purpose, whether it be creating balance or breaking it, and experiment to see when breaking it is good and when it is not.

CLOSING

Composition is a very important skill for both drawing/painting and photography, but the way each of these two types of artists goes about it is usually the opposite: While, when drawing, you start with a blank canvas and fill it up, when making (I prefer this term, used in German, over the English "taking") a photograph, you usually (unless you're doing still life, etc) start with a whole scene that you have to figure out how to fit into the frame.

For this reason, I'd like to encourage both types of artists to try each other's medium as an art exercise in training your sense of composition, because changing your approach often leads to you discovering new things you can use.

For people who draw: Take your phone (or camera if you have one) and try to frame things "artistically," taking into consideration the things we've discussed in this article.

For photographers: Try making little stick-figure doodles (for drawing/painting, this is called "thumbnailing") of what you'd like a scene to look like. This is something you can use in the planning stage before a photo session, sort of like a "wishlist."

And, like I said, there are more topics in composition, but this is a good chunk to digest in one sitting, so we'll leave the other topics, including other ways to guide the viewer's eye, for future Art Advice Articles.

I hope you found this helpful, and see you next time! 💗

MORE ART ADVICE ARTICLES

You can find the index to all Art Advice Articles [here] including:

How to Deal with Art Block

How to Have a Positive Outlook

Advancing in Art: The 3 Ps

The Misconception Behind "Study Realism"

How to Develop Your Own Style (coming soon!)

How to Photograph Traditional Artwork (coming soon!)

etc.

[ghostoffuturespast]

There is in game sound from the radio, so don't turn your speakers up too much lol.

@merge-conflict since you asked for the behind the scenes of these shots!

So far, the only workaround I've discovered to get around the NPC collision physics in vanilla photomode is to get some height and clip through the top of the character. Which is why there's a lot of me jumping on the light fixtures and furniture and then wiggling every single pose slider. The setup for objects in this apartment isn't great, most stuff is either too tall or too short of ideal and placed too far away, which made it a lot trickier to get these photos setup. And the reason I did this in the Glen apartment is because it has enough ceiling clearance to do all this, most of the other apartments don't. The Corpo Plaza might have high enough ceilings, but I'd have to scout it out.

I unfortunately didn't get footage of the exact moment where I managed to get the setup correct. Which was me going up to the second floor with the bed, jumping onto the railing while crouched, sliding down to the spotlights just below, and then somehow pulling out photomode at just the right time mid-fall.

I'm explaining all this in case anyone else is also on console and is interested in taking their own shippy pics. It's pretty goofy and requires a lot of persistence, but it's not impossible. And this technique does work for all NPC models, so you can get in with any of the other LIs too.

[dread-red-queen]

Welcome to my Little CharLI and VP spotlight tutorial I will be going over a few things I have learned since starting Virtual Photography in the hopes I can help out people unfamiliar with CharLI and want to learn how to light there model, make characters look at each other and how to use AMM to help get that perfect shot.

I'm not an expert but I have improved alot since I starting using these simple tips I will share with you.

Here is what CharLi looks like when you open it, it may seem a little overwhelming at first but once you get used to what does what, its prety simple to use

I'm going to be sharing how I use spotlights in this tutorial so don't worry about the other lights for now.

first of all I usually only use a single, or a set of 4 or 8 spotlights in my shots, you can use more of course.

this is what the spotlights look like, they are in two parts, the main spotlight mesh, this is the physical spotlight that emits the light, and the pink triangle (Pin) this gives you an indication of there height for reference, this is useful when you are getting your lights in position as you can physically see them to get them in the right spot.

Here you have your radius, this is how close the spotlights are to your model,

your rotation this does as it says and rotates your lights around your model,

your intensity is how bright your lights are. each as two sliders, the top is subtle the bottom will be more extreme.

For example with radius if I use the top slider it moves the lights further away but only a little, if I use the bottom slider it will move them even further away. be careful as you can push them so far away light no longer hits your model or they disappear through walls. so its a little trail and error.

Here you have colour, position and angle

colour - is self explanatory, you can use the red, green and blue sliders to change the colour of your lights, it can be a bit of trail and error to get the colour you want

Position - you can adjust your lights position in the X, Y and Z axis i.e to the left, right or up or down.

Angles - tilt you lights to the left, right or up or down

Ok now we know the basics of what does what.

There is more stuff you can adjust but I'm still learning so we will only be covering what I use and know which is the basics

When you first spawn in spot lights, they will likely be to close to your model and the light will be a little too bright, so once you spawn them in we can make a few quick adjustment to there radius and light intensity to make that lighting a little less harsh.

See how much better this looks already? a good tip I follow is to lower your exposure in Photomode down, then bring up lights with CharLi so you have a better control of the light on your model.

multiple spotlights spawn in a ring around your model, if you want to use different colour lights ect, I usually converge my lights so they are closer together then rotate them to one side of the model.

Once I have my coloured lights in position I duplicate them, this duplicates all settings from light intensity, radius, colour ect, then I use the rotate function to bring the duplicate lights to the other side of the model and adjust my colours.

here I have made the left lights pink and the right lights a pale blue. looks kind of cool right?

I noticed when having lights on either side, the middle of her face was not lit so I added a single spotlight in front to give her face some light. I also zoomed in using the FOV slider in Photomode. you can zoom with the scroll wheel but this can result in some distortion like making her head look bigger than her body at some angles. using the FOV slider gives you much better quality and far less distortion.

Once you are happy with your lights positions you may find the lights are in the way when trying to get your shot as at some angles the lights will be in the shot blocking your model. to solve this you can hide the mesh and pin we talked about earlier with these icons here. this will hide the lights while still lighting your model. giving you more freedom to get that perfect angle.

you know when you click look at camera in Photomode the body twists with the head, spoiling some poses and causing clipping ect. well with AMM you can make it so only the eyes look or only the head does.

using AMM if you head to tools, then either target your replacer or V then toggle if you want just the head to tilt to look at camera or just the eyes.

Here I have toggled just eyes so now Raven will track me with just her eyes rather than rotating her torso and head as well. if you want to swap to just the head, open AMM select just the head. then close AMM you will need to then toggle the look at camera of and on for it to change.

Another thing to bare in mind is when and if you decide to change the rotation or position of your model in Photomode. your lights will follow V so sometimes this can change your lighting. you may need to adjust rotation ect to get them back where you want them so bare that in mind if you adjust your models position after you have your lights in place.

simply use the tabs at the top to select each light and make any adjustments you need to get your lights back where you want them. un toggle hide mesh or pin if you hid them to make it easier to see where they are when making adjustments then you can re hide them when your done.

Lets say you have a replacer spawned and you want your characters to look at eachother. this can be done using the look at camera feature with a little help from AMM

open AMM and go to tools, now depending on who you want to look at who will decide who to target. in this example I will show both. first I will target Raven (V) and select head only for look at camera. then close AMM. I will rotate the camera to the other side of my replacers head then select V and look at camera. then open AMM and target V. then open Target tools and you should have an option to freeze target.

once you freeze the target close AMM and you will see her head will stay in position and is now looking at Goro

Bare in mind once you freeze a target this way you can not unfreeze despite that being a button, If u change pose while frozen it can get pretty cursed pretty quick. its a pain in the ass. some poses you can swap to without it getting to cursed but again its trail and error. if you need to change pose ect you will have to exit Photomode and re-enter it to unfreeze it can be prety time consuming. if there is away around this I'm unaware of it currently feel free to share if you know.

Here I repeated the look at camera trick with Goro so now my models are looking at each other yay

another thing to bare in mind with CharLi is the lights focus on V so you will notice here Goro is not as well lit as Raven. Spawning more lights and adjusting there position with X, Y and Z will come in handy here. it can take some experimenting though.

Here I have added additional lights and positioned them on Goro so he now has light to.

Here we have taken a photo after doing all our adjustments to lights, there position and making our models look at each other. sometimes there will be an error where it will go darker then you want when you hit space to take your shot. I think its called auto exposure error or something basicaly its the game being poopy its annoying but sometimes unavoidable so you may need to keep adjusting your lights and taking shots until the game behaves.

One final thing I like to do when tweaking my shots in photoshop. I usually adjust exposure. offset and contrast to make the pic really pop

Here I have adjusted the offset up a little and tweaked the contrast up a little. it really softens blacks and the light and makes the pic look better in my opinion.

And there you have it. all the tips and tricks I have learned while doing Virtual Photography. I hope this helps peeps out that want to get into VP.

If you have any questions regarding anything I have said my Asks are always open. I'm happy to talk you through stuff if you need some help. I'm also willing to do screen share discord calls to help you follow along or show you in real time how to do stuff if your interested in something like that drop me a DM.

🚫 Do Not Re-Upload/Edit My Shots/Art Without My Permission🚫

             [Pillowfort][Instagram][Tumblr][AO3][Nexus][Ko-Fi]

[bricktoygrapher]

Combining photos to achieve the desired mood 🖼️

What I've learned over the last two years doing toy photography is that lighting is extremely important, but not only to make a good picture in low light conditions – it can drastically change the look and mood of the photo. However, the images don't always turn out the way I envision them.

Fortunately, I found a way to overcome this problem – by combining photos in Adobe Photoshop. I wrote about it in a new article for the Toy Photographers blog.

[imaginarycyberpunk2023]

Blood splatter(ed) tutorial by @halsin

Okay, so @halsin was gracious enough to send me this lil tutorial in my DMs and I thought it might be useful for others, too so I asked her 8f it was OK to screenshot and put here.

So splatter away friends!

Thank you, babe, for being so kind 🧡

[eman-cosplay]

I JUST MADE NEW VIDEO PLEAS GO CHECK IT <3

[photosandtalking]

My first post!

Please continue reading this post if you're self conscious in any way.

--

I'd like to start off this message to all photographers (I'll get to the rest of yah soon) that I took the photo above on accident while in a moving car and I'm not able to take photos like these intentionally, this is an example of what I'm about to talk about.

What I'm saying is.

((*Snap snap* (blue balls on the colors lol.) you're almost to the end of the post. Take some pretty colors along with funny fonts and FOCUS. you are a TUMBLE WEED... OR A TUMBLR!! FOR TUMBLR AND YOUR MENTAL HEALTH. CHAAARRGG-))

It's very common to see things online that are made by people who have been practicing for years, are skilled at Photoshop, or who are just lucky like I was with the photo ((Yes, I know. I'm amazing, feel free to comment about how cool I am 💅))... Or made by people who are pretty and good with angles, Photoshop, or makeup. But the algorithm pushes those lucky and talented people TOWARDS you. This goes for ANYTHING, even if it isn't beauty influencers or photographers. Also, sometimes seeing cool things online at such a rapid rate can lessen your view on your own creations ((Whatever they may be.))

This concludes my very healthy reminder that you and whatever you do is amazing, no matter if you're just starting out of have practiced for a long time. Now please either take a cookie or a donut. 🍩 🍪

[belladoesmakeup]

Hi guys,

Looking for ways to make your makeup last longer in a heatwave? In the UK it is currently boiling and as someone who is pale and hates the heat, I need products that help me survive the day!

Here is a tutorial chatting you through my favourite products I recommend:

How to make your makeup last in a heatwave video link

If you have any products you recommend please let me know in the comments.

Lots of love,

Bella x x

[pinkverge]

What Is Photography? Photography Definition, Meaning (2023)

Photography is nothing but the art of capturing light with a camera to create an ‘image’. It’s a powerful medium to showcase your memories and express your creativity, and tell your stories to the world in an art form!

The term “photography” comes from the Greek words “photos” (light) and “graphos” (to draw or write). Joseph Nicéphore Niépce is the first man who took a first photograph back in 1826. Photography has made our lives have been shaped by it ever since. We have used it to document our memories, share our experiences, and tell stories.

Generally, photography has plenty of genres like Travel, Wildlife, Fashion, Documentary photography, etc… All of them serve their own purposes!

No matter what your interests & genre are, there is a type of photography for you. So what are you waiting for…? Just be curious and start taking pictures now!

Different Types of Photography?

Portrait Photography

Headshot Photography

Fashion Photography

Editorial Photography

Food Photography

Architectural Photography

Landscape Photography

Event Photography

Street Photography

Sports Photography

Product Photography

Wildlife Photography

Read More...

[fabrickind]

DIY Cosplay Shoots in the Wild panel

Can't get a cosplay photographer? Want to yeet yourself into the woods and come back out with great photos? Join veteran cosplayer Fabrickind to learn the logistics, safety, and basic photography know-how for solo location shoots. Get those self timers and tripods ready!

This is just the bare bones of the panel, as many of the examples were elaborated on in-person, and it is just the slides, not any of my notes. It is not meant to be exhaustive or definitive, and is just meant for general advice and suggestion purposes only. If anyone has feedback they would like to give, feel free to do so. That said, I hope that people find this information useful.

Here is a link to a pdf of the presentation. You may download for personal use, but please do not alter the presentation, repost without permission, or do any sort of other unauthorized use. (If you have a question about how you can use this presentation, please send me a message with your question and we can work it out. I promise I’m not scary. ;]) Feel free to reblog this post as much as you want, though. I do these panels and post them because I want the information to be shared.

I hope someone finds this helpful! :]

[leota-nexus]

^ the process

v the shot

[miz-sophie]

cant really way I did a good job but this is my first attempt at trying to make to photos look natural together.

I used this 10 step guide to help and it had some very helpful tips, although I did find it hard to relate to their mostly white object to my bright colour full one.

[ghostoffuturespast]

Glitching The Matrix: Portrait Photos and Getting Up-close And Personal With NPCs In Cyberpunk 2077 Vanilla Photomode

Howdy, folks! Ghost here, back with some more tips and tricks for vanilla photomode. Some of you may have read my previous tips and tricks guide (laundry list?) a few months back, but I’ve learned some more fun things since then that I thought I’d share with you all. Specifically, in terms of taking portrait style photos and getting intimate with your favorite NPCs. (Well, as intimate as vanilla will allow.)

With the 2.0 update and the release of the PL expansion, I imagine a lot of people might be going minimal with the mods until they get up to speed, or maybe you just want to take some bomb photos if you’re running on a console, or you don’t have access to mods. Whatever the case, just know that with the right application of cheese whiz, you too can get dope photos.

I don’t claim to be the world’s best anything, but I’m always happy to share what I know and what I've learned.

Portraits

I have yet to actually play any of the expansion, but I’ve seen that there are some sweet new outfits and some hella cool new backdrops, and who doesn’t want to show off their Vs & OCs?

Now, there is nothing wrong with pulling out photomode and snapping a photo with the standard settings and not touching any of the sliders. I'm not here to ruin anyone's good time or dictate style. However, if you're looking for techniques to add a bit more panache to your photos, I’m going to do a quick rundown of some key things that I keep in mind when I'm taking portrait-style photos.

If you've been taking VP for a while, you may already know these things. But, hey, never hurts to review the basics.

Field Of View

The Field of View (FOV) slider is one of the most important tools in your toolbox and is basically the zoom on your camera. (Okay, it's a bit more complicated than that but I'm not that technical) It’s located on the far left tab. I utilize the shit out of it, and, if you aren't already acquainted, I’d recommend you become friends with it.

Rather than simply moving the camera closer to your subject, which, if you leave it at the standard 60 setting produces a lot of distortion and doesn’t give you much detail of your subject, slide that setting all the way to 15 to zoom in and then adjust the position of the camera to frame your shot how you want. At this point if you want to you can pull the Field Of View out to a higher setting or play around with where exactly you want the camera, for instance if you want to include more of the background or if there’s additional characters. 

By using FOV in conjunction with the camera position, it’s possible to get crisper detailed shots of your subject with less visual distortion. And if you have decent lighting and play around with some of the other settings (exposure, contrast, highlights) you can get some stellar shots with minimal editing. 

Just for reference, I usually don’t do any post-production on my photos. They’re all straight off my PS5. Photo editing is a bit of a time sink so it's personal preference that I don't do it. I barely have enough time for most of my other hobbies, so it's one less thing for me to do. If you want to do photo editing after the fact, more power to you.

Play with poses, look at camera, rotate poses, and camera location

I know that heading is a long list, but seriously, play with the angles! Since we’re working in vanilla photomode, all the poses are canned, everyone’s got the same stock poses and unfortunately some of them are just downright goofy. Which is fun on occasion, but maybe you're looking for something a bit more natural. So, in order to jazz things up and give yourself as much variety as possible, you’re going to want to keep angles in mind.

A lot of times I’ll cycle through all of the poses to find one that gels with the photo I’m trying to take, and at times I’m surprised at which ones those end up being. You zoom in close enough, you can barely tell you're using the JoJo poses. And rotating your character, rather than having them face straight on, can also help spice up the stock poses.

Swinging the camera around wildly in a circle also helps me scout out interesting compositions and backgrounds. I'll pan the camera around 360 so I can find the spots with the most visual interest. And I typically will make attempts to jam the camera in the weirdest places possible. (Through door ways, behind furniture, along walls, in between people and other objects etc.) I often think I know what I want when I go into grab photos, but often times a change of perspective helps me find something even cooler.

Not every pose has a look at camera option, but some of them do. Rotating your V/OC or changing camera position while using this feature will allow you to add some extra variety to your poses and expressions. You can get your character to look straight at the camera (which can be very striking), get some side-eye action, gaze off into the distance, and my personal fave, over the shoulder shots.

You can also add some additional flair by doing low-angle or high-angle shots too. And if you want a portrait orientation instead of landscape? Rotate the camera 180 degrees. It’s a bit disorienting at first, and try not to crik your neck, but now you can get full body shots. The only editing you'll have to do after exporting is rotating the photo to the intended viewing orientation, which you should be able to do in most photo viewers. No editing software required.

NPCs

If you’re taking photos of an NPC, you don’t have the option of posing these characters in vanilla, but if you time it right you can grab some awesome shots! The easiest time to snag photos of NPCs is usually right before you select dialogue options. They’re static, will cycle through a handful of actions, and main NPCs also eye-track V, so you can use this to your advantage if you need them to turn or want them to look in a specific direction.

It’s possible to grab action shots as well! They’re a bit trickier as it requires a lot of timing and you may need to hop in and out of photomode or even reload a previous save if you miss the monent, but totally doable. It also helps to be familiar with the flow of action for the quest by having done it at least once, that way you know when to bust out the camera. (I've lost count how many times I've played this game... Too many.)

Unfortunately, lighting is going to be very hit or miss during missions. If you keep your eyes peeled for good lighting opportunities it's possible to find them, and sometimes you can even kite NPCs over to it if they're following you. (Turning the muzzle flash on when your character is in a gun pose also works in a pinch, but might look a little silly depending on the context and if you're also trying to get your character in the frame.) When you're out and about free roaming though, it's much easier to come across good lighting sources as you can adjust the time of day or utilize the lighting you do come across.

But remember field of view, camera angles, playing with the poses, and adjusting the effects sliders can all help enhance a portrait shot.

Glitching The Matrix

Sooooo, I may have mentioned previously that I couldn’t do anything to help you all take shippy/otp pics… I’m more than happy to have proven myself wrong. Obviously, there are limits to this (you're not going to be able to get anywhere close to posed pics like you can with mods), but it’s a hell of a lot more feasible than I thought it was.

With help from this post (Thanks again, Heather!) and applications of sheer stubbornness on my part, I did in fact manage to glitch the matrix. It is entirely possible to bypass the collision physics around characters and certain objects with a little ingenuity.

Grandpa V & Old Man River are my otp, but I went ahead and took some additional photos for the sake of science. They aren’t cannon to my V’s timeline, but I just wanted to show you all the realms of possibility. And for all you SilverV shippers out there running vanilla, yeah, you can finally kiss your own brain worm.

This is as close as I'm gonna get to kissing Keanu Reeves lol.

(SilverDyne shippers… I’m sorry, I have no control of either rockerboy. It’s out of my hands, they’re just too spicy for vanilla. Or if you got a multi-ship or rare pair outside of the player character, can't help you there. Ask your local modder for assistance.)

Be advised, in order to take these kinds of photos, there are specific environmental parameters that need to be met and getting your V/OC posed correctly is going to test your patience the first couple tries. It's a finicky technique but once you get a feel for how to do it, it gets much easier and you'll know what to look for in order to setup this kind of photo.

Steps:

Find a time when your NPC is static (i.e. not moving from a particular spot. Doesn’t matter if they’re standing or seated. I don't want to say it's impossible to attempt from moving, but getting everything timed right is mega tricky and I haven't had much luck with the times I've tried so far.)

Make sure you have plenty of overhead clearance and that you have some room to pan the camera around. (If there’s an overhead barrier like a ceiling, cabinets, umbrellas, awning etc. it’ll impede your ability to move your character into position. For those of you that know me, I tried on the water tower and in the kitchen with River. I really did, but no dice. Dumb cabinets, and there weren't any objects at the right height that were close enough to use on the actual water tower.)

Get some height in proximity to your destination. You want something relatively close and around shoulder/head height of the NPC. (Can be anything really so long as it's the right height and close enough. If it's too high up, or too far away, you won’t be able to get your character in range. Too low, you won’t be able to circumvent the collision physics.)

Open photomode and hope you have access to all the action poses.

Find an action pose that has the up/down slider (Off to the Races is a good one to start with) and move your character all the way up. Then position character above NPC, lower them down into the NPC, and pray they clip through.

Mess with all the poses and pose sliders until desired results are achieved.

*If you cannot complete 4 or 5, exit out of photomode, adjust position, and repeat until you can clip through the NPC. If you can't get any kind of clipping to occur or you keep sliding around the NPC when you're positioning, you may not have the right environmental settings and may need to try in a different spot. It happens.

(Trust me, the horror face sucking is a good sign.)

Panning around so it looks less awkward, make some camera adjustments, and voila! (Good thing Judy's rocking that asymmetrical haircut.)

Your object also does not have to be right next to the NPC, like with Judy and the van. I used the white box thingy that Grandpa's hovering over in the photo above. The roof did get in my way on a couple of my attempts, but I did get it to work.

If you can get the full catalog of action poses to populate and you can get your V/OC to fully clip through your desired character/object without suddenly rubberbanding or deflecting when you move them around, know that you made it. 

Getting to this point though, may take several attempts. It’s also important that you use the action poses to move your character around as most of those have the up/down slider positioning, which is not available on the idle poses with a few exceptions. I’ve had the best luck with Roundhouse Shot to the Face, Just a Peek, Take Cover (left or right), Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, and Off to the Races.

Unfortunately, I don’t have any solid advice on best practice for getting them into position however. You’re just gonna have to feel it out as the position sliders have a tendency to behave very erratically since you’re doing shit you’re not supposed to.

Do your best to not accidentally exit out of photo mode, be patient, and if you get a half-way decent shot or even kinda close, snap pictures for posterity in case something goes awry and you have to start over. If nothing else, you can have a good laugh about it later.

Utilize the tips from the portrait section above as well. You can’t change the NPCs expression or make your characters close their eyes (unless you get really lucky with your timing), so you’ll have to pull out all the camera tricks in your arsenal to make the setup look sort of natural.

Behind the scenes is pretty hilarious though.

And you can use this technique for objects and certainly for non-ship pics too. I demoed kissy pics because those are the hardest to set up. Maybe you just wanna hang with the chooms instead, y’know? S'all cool.

Grandpa gets tired and sometimes she needs to sit down. There's no pose to get your character to sit, but with some creative camera angles and poses, it sure does look like she's sitting.

Or you can finally just annoy the crap out of Johnny.

Anyway, hope this was helpful, and feel free to hit up my inbox if you’ve got questions!

May all your cheese be fine and remember the most important thing:

Have fun!

Grandpa's got the best seat in the house as far as I'm concerned.