Category: creative

MINI PHOTO LESSONS, PART II: Six steps to creating better photographs

Do you find yourself getting frustrated with your photographs?

Do you look at others’ work and wonder why your images fall flat?

Do you wish you could refresh and reimagine your photographs?

Here are six short lessons that have helped me create better images.

1. The only things that really matter

No matter who you’re photographing, what camera you’re using or where you are… look for the right light and the right moment.

2. It starts with intention

Who decides what the right light is? Or the right moment? You do.

Ask yourself… What emotion are you trying to capture? How does this person, this place, or this moment make you feel? What would you like to communicate? Who is this image for?

Understanding intention will help guide you towards what is “right” in each moment. Everything — your composition, lighting decisions, interaction with your subject, gear, etc. — should all be informed by your answers to these questions.

3. Every great photographer has one thing in common — a unique vision

Their perspective on the world is fresh, unexpected, or interesting.

How can you develop your own vision?

Go out into the world. Seek new inputs. Adopt a curious attitude. Make new friends. Be a sponge.

With your camera in hand, explore halfway across the world or halfway across town — it doesn’t matter.

Intentionally seek new roads, new relationships, new foods and new cultures. Absorb it all and let it inform your work.

4. Gear is only a tool

At its worst, gear is a distraction.

Go find the necessary equipment you need to fulfill your vision, learn how to use it, and then get to work.

Spending $3,000 on a road trip will have a greater impact on improving your vision compared to buying that brand new camera you’ve been lusting over.

5. Show us a glimpse into your world

You have access to a life that most of us will never experience.

You’re a mom or a social worker. Your father might be struggling with a terminal disease. Or you work so hard to provide for your family that the most beautiful moment you see is the sunrise every morning on your way into work.

Show us what stirs your soul. Share what makes you happy, sad, mad, joyful, depressed or hopeful. Your photographs give us the opportunity to stand next to you through that captured moment and feel what you feel.

6. Build community

Seek out the work of other photographers.

Ask them what they see, what they feel and what they want to convey. Get inside their skull and find out what they think is interesting, beautiful and worth photographing.

Go make new friends, support one another, and continue to document the interesting and meaningful experiences of your life.

No matter what your intention is with a camera — the people you meet and the moments you experience are super awesome bonuses to making photographs.

If you incorporate the above ideas, your images — and your life — will become better… and even a little more interesting.