The post 10 Great At-Home Creative Photography Ideas appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Simon Bond.

There is really no better time to practice some at-home creative photography ideas. There are lots of ideas you can experiment with, and with some basic equipment, you can really work wonders. Let’s get into it and discover some creative photography ideas you can work on at home, and work into a series of images.

1. Photographing water droplets

This is a classic project that you can try at home. It’s also relatively simple to set up, though you will need some specialized photographic equipment.

The equipment needed here includes a camera with a macro lens, a tripod, and an off-camera flash. You’ll then need to set up a location where you can drip water into a bowl of water. Learn more about how to take these photos here.

Water drop photography is another form of refraction photography.

2. Food photography

Everyone loves to practice food photography, especially when the food looks amazing! This genre is huge, and potentially lucrative, as the images you take could be sold as stock.

So what are some of the things that can lead to successful food photography in the home? Take a look at this list, but for a more detailed guide take a look at this article.

Lighting – This is key to good food photography. Natural light such as window sidelight works well. If you use off-camera flash, the light should come from behind the food, but be sure to reflect the light back to avoid shadows in your photo.Backdrop – Standard still life backdrops like photographing the food in a lightbox can be effective. Otherwise, make sure the background provides context to the food you wish to photograph.Food layout – Make sure your food is well presented. The best professional food photographers use food stylists, so see how you can produce something with style. The use of repeating elements is one potential solution here.

The best bit about food photography is eating the food!

3. Lensball light painting

A lot of Lensball photography will be carried outdoors, however, the Lensball is an excellent still-life object too.

One popular indoor project for Lensball photographers is light painting. You’ll need a dark room, tripod, and sheet of glass to go on the table as your initial setup.

Keyring – Use this under the ball to prevent it from rolling on the glass.Table – Place the glass sheet on a table, and then put the ball on this.Camera – Set the camera up on the tripod, and focus it on the ball.Dark – Turn the lights off in the room, and ensure no ambient light seeps into the room.Exposure – The exposure length should be around five seconds, but could be longer.Light painting – With the camera setup, hit exposure, and light paint behind the ball with the light-emitting device of your choice.

In this photo, an iPhone was used to produce the light painting.

4. Freezing objects in ice

A fun project to try when you have a bit of time at home is freezing objects in ice. You’ll need a few days to complete each photo since there is a process involved in freezing an object. The main thing you need to achieve is getting the object to freeze in the middle of the block of ice.

If you want to read about how to successfully carry out this technique, then click this link.

Take your food photography in a different direction with this technique.

5. Still life photography

Once again, this is a huge genre in photography. The most professional photos will always have good lighting.

This style of photography could dovetail nicely with another hobby you may have. For instance, if you’re a quilter, photographing your finished product is a great idea.

If you want to get the best out of your still life photography then you can learn more by reading this article.

A nice simple image with a white background can look nice.

6. Mixing oil and water

Another of the at-home creative photography ideas involves getting into the science vibe with a bit of hydrophilic and hydrophobic action.

That’s mixing oil and water and then photographing the resultant oil “bubbles.”

You’ll need to add your oil and water mix to a glass container, and then suspend this glass container above the ground a little. Now you’re ready to photograph downwards and through the oil bubbles.

To get the best results, use colorful backgrounds underneath the glass container.

A classic project to try at home is mixing oil and water.

7. Water droplets on glass

Another science-based photography project you can try is placing water droplets on glass.

This style of photography utilizes refraction and repetition to produce great results.

You can experiment with the number of water droplets, or varying the background to increase your output. To learn more about this read this article.

Use an interesting background to get great results.

8. Learn a new post-processing skill

One of the more obvious candidates for at-home creative photography ideas is post-processing.

Everyone knows this is a vital aspect of photography, it’s basically the new darkroom. Yet investing time in learning new post-processing skills when you’d rather be outside photographing? Well, if you have to be inside, then learning some new post-processing skills is a great idea!

Digital blending – A great technique to learn for landscape photographers, you’ll learn some key Photoshop skills like layer masking through learning this procedure.Cloning – Whether it’s cloning an object out of the image, or cloning yourself multiple times, this is a great skill to learn.Sharpening and softening – An essential skill for portrait photographers to learn. Sharpen the eyes and soften the skin for best results.

In this photo, cloning and selective coloring were both used in post-processing.

9. Creating bokeh shapes

This is a great project with a little hands-on craft to it.

Bokeh is produced when your camera blurs the background, and this area of the photo is referred to as bokeh. When there are points of light in the background they will enlarge to “balls of light.”

To create bokeh shapes, you need to put that shape onto the front of your lens. This involves attaching a black disc to your lens, with the desired shape in the center of this disc. Want to try this out? Take a look here.

This photo used shaped bokeh with colored fairy lights in the background.

10. Light spirals

Another kind of light painting you can try at home is light spirals. This is a lot of fun, and you can get quite creative with the patterns you produce.

You’ll need a completely dark room to get the best results from this. You’ll be spinning a light source attached to some string, and this will be above your camera.

This is a long exposure photo, so of course, a tripod is recommended. However, you could go without in this case by placing the camera faced upwards on the ground. If you want to learn more, then check out this excellent video.

Light patterns like this can look great.

Which of these at-home creative photography ideas will you take on?

With time at home it’s a great chance to take up an indoor photography project. Have you ever tried any of these at-home creative photography ideas yourself?

If you haven’t, which of these is the most interesting to you? Perhaps you have another technique like water-drops on a CD, that you’ll try out?

As always, please leave your thoughts and comments below, and if you have any images you’re willing to share that would be great as well!

The post 10 Great At-Home Creative Photography Ideas appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Simon Bond.