If you’ve ever tried to take to take a photo at night without a tripod you know the results can be very blurry or very noisy or, in most cases, both. But sometimes it’s difficult to use a tripod when, for instance, you’re photographing a street scene in a well-known location where there might be lots of people, aka tourists.

Shooting portraits on location with a wide aperture can result in some great images, but if, like me, you want to underexpose the ambient light for a more dramatic effect, you’ll quickly realize there’s a problem with shutter speed and off camera flash.

When teamed together properly, your image files, monitor, image-processing software, and printer can produce prints that you will be justly proud to show. My aim here is to provide tips that will give your prints that extra touch so you can produce wall-worthy work that displays the characteristics of color, tone, and contrast that fully expresses your vision.

The classic definition of macro photography is that the image projected onto the digital sensor (or film plane) should be the same size as the subject. With a 1:1 ratio, a DSLR with a full-frame chip should be able to produce life-size magnification and focus on an area as small as 24x36mm.