You know us, we’re not really the preachy type.

But hey, it’s Earth Day tomorrow, right? So we’ve gathered a few useful pointers on how to keep your photographic habits from smacking the environment around too much. We’re firmly anti-smacking.

If you want some help cleaning up your act, we got ya covered. If not, that’s cool too.

We like you either way.

Ten Green Photography Tips

p.s. It’s Photojojo Photo Month at Instructables. Add your photo-themed Instructable and win awesome stuff from the Photojojo store! Enter here!

eBay: Last bastion of the truly awful product shot.

The fuzzy focus, the baleful tinge of the fluorescent lights, the blinding glare of the flash. It’s almost depressing.

(Except for that one listing where you could see the naked photographer in the reflection of the mirror he was trying to sell. That was hilarious.)

If you sell stuff online, you know that you need attractive pictures to sell your wares. If you’ve ever done a tutorial for sites like Instructables, you’ve run into the same issues.

Don’t sweat it. It’s not really too difficult, you just have to put a little thought into it.

Remember, if you can make somebody want to buy Aunt Tilly’s ceramic owl collection, you can conquer the world.

How to Take Better Photos for eBay, Etsy & Instructables

p.s. On Twitter? Follow photojojo for more cool photo stuff. Including members-only Photojojo store discounts.

p.p.s. We’ve got new episodes of “You Suck at Photoshop” and they’re gooood. But don’t forget some folks might be offended. We’re just saying is all.

Food has an agenda. It wants you to eat it, and it wants you to eat it now.

If you dilly-dally around Food, trying to photograph it instead of eating it, its defense mechanism kicks in. It immediately looks terrible in pictures, forcing you to give up, put down the camera, and eat the Food. Natural selection at work.

The time has come to subvert Food’s Evil Agenda. Read our tips, take up your cameras, and join the glorious food photography revolution!

Ten Tasty Tips for Photographing Your Food

Say you’re out for a photographic stroll, taking pictures of that cool old power plant on the edge of town. Suddenly seventy security guards swarm you and demand you hand over your camera.

“What is this,” you ask yourself, “a Michael Moore movie?”

You’re sure you haven’t done anything wrong, but you don’t know whose side the law is on. Fret no more- we’ve got a list of things you can and can’t do, and it’s a lot more permissive than you might think.

Now grab your camera back from that Rent-A-Cop and let’s hit the books.

The Ten Legal Commandments of Photography*

*Charlton Heston not included

p.s. Thanks to everybody who entered our “Monday Stinks!” contest! Congratulations to Notorious D.A.V., Warren Photography, evaded, mommaozzy 84, biancaprime, berdandy, spade, AnasBananas, trenity00, andreskrey, determinedforce01, ladibug, killbyte, Nellofcourse and Mia!

You’ve decked the halls with miles of tiny bulbs. Your front lawn is a gleaming monument to electric lighting. Even the neighbors have taken to wearing sunglasses 24/7.

It’s the Christmas wonderland of your dreams… now if only you could get a good picture of it.

Photographing holiday lights is no easy task.

Luckily, we’ve had the Photojojo elves round up the best tips and guides to taking successful Holiday photos. Call it our gift to you… now go make Clark W. Griswold proud.

Fall has up and arrived – kamikaze leaves crash down on unsuspecting passersby, leaf peeping is a thing again, and reports of rumbles coming from the Great Pumpkin have spread throughout the nearby towns and villages.

Any time of year is a great time to snap a photograph, but Fall is, of course, at least twenty times more so. (IOHO, of course.)

And since last year we wrote about how to get those perfect Halloween shots, this year we’re tackling Fall. We’ve jam-packed this edition with tips for photographing our leafy friends and fun ideas for fresh-new Fall shots.

Grab your camera and enjoy this Autumnal Equinox to its fullest!

We’re not big fans of following the rules, and we have a hunch you’re not, either.

But we know a good thing when we see it, and this list of 12 photography suggestions from our friends at Popular Photography came up on our phodar* more than once over the past couple weeks.

Photography’s as much a science as it is an art, so consider this a brush-up of your fundamentals. Of course, we know you know that we know that you know how fast a shutter speed you need to freeze a person running across your frame versus running at a 45-degree angle to you, or how to expose a sunset so it looks like it’s a half hour later than it is.

But a little review never hurt.

12 Essential Photo Rules from Popular Photography

* Yeah, it’s like radar, but for photography. It’s strong with us.

If we’ve learned anything from Hollywood’s recent penchant for pairing muscle-bound leading lads with toddlers, it’s that taking care of tykes ain’t easy.

But if you think changing diapers is the hard part, just try getting one to smile on demand.

We’ve already shown you how to get adults to smile, so here’s a quick tip for the little humans in your life.

1) Acquire PEZ dispenser. 2) Carefully cut away at the bottom with an exacto until it’ll slide into your camera’s hot shoe. 3) Train camera at unsuspecting child. 4) Capture a rare moment of unexpected joy.

Mix and match dispensers for variety, and take a gander at the how-to pics by Federico Sartorio for the details. [via reader sarah lee]

Tell us your favorite way to get kids to smile!

In the Forum… Share your best photo of something green, tell us what music gets you snapping, talk about the NYC photo ban, and more…

So you’ve got one o’ dem shiny new iPhones and you’ve been pinching and flicking and browsing and occasionally even making phone calls all week.

What next?

How about some killer custom contact photos? We adore these trapped-inside-the-iPhone style contact pics we found via our pal Brad Smith.

If you’ve got a Jesus phone, grab a friend, gently prod them face-first into the nearest scanner (or glass door) and get going! (And if you have a friend with an iPhone, be sure to forward this along.)

The technique yields amazing smooshed contact photos (”smooshtacts!”) for an iPhone, but it also makes a great background pic for any other mobile phone.

You’re twirling. The warm sun is falling on your face, the soft grass is under your bare feet and an ecstatic child is beaming at you. That’s the sort of moment that makes us love summer.

No such a memory? Fear not! With a willing small human and a helpful friend, you can make your very own magic moment! (And a stunning photo record to boot.)

Step One
Position your friend behind you and the child in front, with your friend holding the camera above your arms and pointing it down toward the child. Select a slow-ish shutter speed of 1/15th sec to blur the background.

Step Two
Altogether now: spin!

Step Three
Once our giddy little subject is aloft, advise your friend to start snapping.

Step Four
Review your photos, and repeat as necessary. (We’d wait for your head to stop spinning first.)

Take it further…
Check out the Spinners and Saints group for more topsy-turvy fun. And have a little more fun with your shot with a Photojojo Photo Block kit.

Thanks to reader Linda LaSut for the tip! Photo Credit: Philipe Tarbouriech

p.s. Be the first to try the new Photojojo Super Awesome Photo Forum! Got questions about what camera to buy? Want critique for a photo you took recently? Got a great idea for a photo project you want to share? Our new forum is getting ready for its big debut, and we’re looking for some friendly beta testers. Jump on board and be the first to give it a try!