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The importance of emotion in landscape photography

07 Feb

A land that time forgot: Iceland.

When you think about landscape photography you may not immediately connect it with emotion in the same way as if you see a portrait, documentary photo, wildlife photo or indeed pet photo (that emotion is why my dog, Pebbles, gets more love than me on YouTube!). But as with all art forms, landscape photography should connect with the viewer in a way that means something, and it has the potential to be more than just a gorgeous scene.

I remember when I started photography 35 years ago, a mentor at that time, when I was definitely the youngest in the camera club, 13 years old, said to me, “You photograph how you see and not what you see.” At that point I didn’t really get it but I never forgot it.

It’s interesting as there are thousands of videos and articles on technique, cameras and settings, but the photos that stick in your mind don’t get there because they were really sharp, had good bokeh or were shot on a certain camera. Have you ever looked at Van Gogh and said, “He must have had a good paint brush?” However, there aren’t as many on emotion and feelings in photography.

“A great photograph is one that fully expresses what one feels, in the deepest sense, about what is being photographed.” –Ansel Adams

I think there are two forms of emotion in a photo: the one that the photographer has when they captured the image and the one the viewer has when they look at it.

They don’t have to be the same, but I believe that when you have an emotional response to the landscape that translates into a photo, it’s more likely to create an emotional response in the viewer. It’s why I don’t believe you can create a photo out of nothing. Too often, people say that you can add light and create dramatic impact with Lightroom and Photoshop. But they should be there to enhance what you saw and not create something that didn’t exist. After all how can you ask a viewer to connect with something you didn’t first observe?

What emotions do you feel with landscape photography though?

Sometimes a photo makes you stop in your tracks and look deep into it. It isn’t just perfect exposure or a beautiful scene. It has instant impact and creates a quick emotional response. Take the next image for example:

Kalsoy Lighthouse, Faroe Islands

Other times, you can pass by an image many times and eventually grow to love it and have an increased emotional attachment to it as you see new things and explore the intricacies of the scene.

Winter Colour, Lake District

Unfortunately modern social media favors the first of these two emotional responses. Instagram is all about that five second impact. Take the following photo from my Instagram feed. It got 50% more views than my average photo but it doesn’t really have any long lasting emotional response.

It’s why I love printed media so much and feel that having an image printed out and on a wall offers so much more value to the photographer and viewer alike. If I show my prints on a workshop or to other photographers then they spend a lot longer looking at each image than they would if I gave them an iPad to view the same shots.

Let’s look at the photographer’s and viewer’s emotion in more detail.

The photographer’s emotion

For me, getting out in the landscape is one of the most relaxing and fulfilling things to do. I love observing the scenes around me and just staying in the moment. Nothing is better than arriving at a location, finding a rock, pouring a coffee and taking in the surroundings.

Taking photographs is part of what I find relaxing. This process of taking in the scene around me, then taking out my camera, setting it up, visualizing the scene and capturing that emotion I have at that time.

“I think that emotional content is an image’s most important element, regardless of the photographic technique. Much of the work I see these days lacks the emotional impact to draw a reaction from viewers, or remain in their hearts.” –Anne Geddes

But emotion in photographs is a personal thing and if I look back at my photos a lot have stories associated with them that others wouldn’t know. I believe this helps to create a better and more emotional response. It is very interesting for me as when I spend longer in a location I find I almost always produce a more interesting photograph.

The viewer’s emotion

Emotional response is regarded as a critical element to experiencing all forms of art. Various research such as this by Cupchik et al , ‘Viewing artworks: Contributions of cognitive control and perceptual facilitation to aesthetic experience’, show that the brain regions involved in emotion experience activation when seeing art compared to objects.

But, how do you go about creating something that invokes strong emotion in the landscape? It’s all about connecting with the viewer. Maybe it is through the changing weather or the patterns in the scene. Or maybe a photo leaves something out and the viewer has to get more involved in the image to understand it.

“I like photographs that leave something to the imagination.” –Fay Goodwin

This quote holds a really important element of landscape photography that people often miss out, and that is imagination. We all have amazing imagination, and a landscape photograph that shows less is often more powerful than one that shows the whole scene. It is something that I often say in workshops, leave more out than you put in.

The Power of Imagination

I am dyslexic and reading is difficult, so words have never meant a lot to me and photos have said so much.

“A true photograph need not be explained, nor can it be contained in words.” –Ansel Adams

So I thought it would be interesting to see if people would think differently when they looked at an image with a title compared to without.

The results were really interesting. Here they are for Passing Storm (below) when the title was shown. This was based on 1000 responses (500 had each image / title / no title)

Passing Storm

Response with title shown:

And response when no title was shown:

First of all, people are different and think differently about a scene. In fact it probably isn’t just about a person but the current circumstances that person is going through. A powerful photo is like a conduit to tapping into that emotion. You can see from above that the title has little impact on the emotion felt by the image.

Watch my video on emotion in landscape photography to see more survey results and detail how to provoke emotion in your art.

How do you react to a image? Do you feel an emotion when you see certain images? Let me know in the comments below.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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The Importance of Shadows in Portrait Photography

25 Mar

The post The Importance of Shadows in Portrait Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by John McIntire.

When you’re starting out with learning how to light your photography, it’s easy to fall into a pattern of blasting your subjects with light from all angles. The results are often bright images without a hint of a shadow anywhere. Sometimes that’s exactly what the job calls for: bright, cleanly lit images with very little contrast. However, obliterating the shadows in your images can have a negative impact.

The difference between heavily lit images and those with the shadows maintained can be astounding.

Deliberate and effective use of shadows in your images can help to create a natural contrast and depth, convey drama and emotion, and provide you with powerful compositional elements in your photography.

This article will discuss these reasons why it’s not only important to retain the shadows in your imagery, but to keep them in primary consideration while you are still planning your images. There is also an outline of a simple exercise you can do to help you to start better seeing shadows, and how they affect your images, that you can use to improve your understanding of light.

Not just low-key

Obviously, low-key images rely heavily on shadows, but shadows are important in all styles of photography.

It is important to clarify one thing here. This concept doesn’t just apply to low-key images where the vast majority of the space in the frame is dominated by shadow tones. In fact, shadows are just as important to brightly lit images as they help to define the shape and features of your subject.

Why shadows are important

Retaining the shadows in your images can do a lot of things for you, especially in terms of image design. Listed below are a few of these for you to consider.

Depth and contrast

Retaining shadows in your images can help give you a natural contrast and add depth to your images.

Contrast, in terms of this article, is the tonal difference between dark and light. This contrast is how we see things in three dimensions and it’s exactly how you can create the appearance of three dimensions in your two-dimensional imagery. The thing is, it’s hard to do this without shadows. (It’s also difficult to do it without specular highlights, but that’s a different discussion for a different day.)

For example, to illustrate the three-dimensional nature of a nose, you need a highlight that graduates into mid-tones. The highlight indicates the closest point of the nose to the light. Assuming the light is above your subject, shadows will fall underneath the nose. This provides a visual indicator that the nose is protruding from the face. Without the shadows, there will be little, if any, differentiation between the nose and the rest of the subject’s face. This results in a flat, unsettling image. Even if your viewers cannot figure out what they’re looking at, they will still be aware that something seems wrong.

Ensuring that you have shadows in your images will help to have pleasing, natural-looking images in any type of lighting.

Add drama and evoke mood

Shadows are a fantastic tool when you are trying to create images that evoke mood and emotion.

Generous use of shadow tones in your images is one of the quickest and most effective ways to evoke a sense of mood and helps you to create images with bags of drama.

You can do this in a number of ways including:

Backlighting and short lighting

Short lighting is a great tool to help you place shadows where they have the most impact.

Lighting your subject from behind will render most of the foreground of your frame as shadow tones, with only certain aspects of your subjects rendered with highlights.

To control the strength of your shadows, you can change the size and shape of your light source, change the distance between the light source and your subject, or fill the shadows with a secondary light source.

Lighting choice

Making a deliberate lighting choice (like the 2’x2′ softbox used here) to emphasize your shadows is one of the easiest ways to take control of the shadows in your imagery.

If you use a small(ish) light source in close to your subject, you can make use of the faster rate of light fall off to help introduce shadows into your images.

For an even better grasp of this, pick a few movies or television shows (especially dramas) and study the lighting choices during dramatic scenes with a lot of dialogue. In a lot of cases, you will find that there was a conscious choice to light the actors in a way that highlights specific features while throwing most of the rest of the actor in shadow.

Compositional elements

Shadows are a great way to help compose your images and can help you to draw attention to your focal point.

Shadows can be used to wonderful effect in crafting compositional devices within your images. Using darker tones to frame your subject, or to lead your viewer’s eye to what you want them to see can help to make more dynamic and interesting images.

Fill

Shadows don’t have to be dark. Even filled in with additional lights, you can still use shadows for contrast and depth.

When you’re talking about shadows, that doesn’t mean you have to stick to ultra dark tones with little or no visible detail. By using fill lights, you can still light every single part of your image while retaining shadow tone. If you expose your fill light two or three stops below your key light, you will still have the appearance of contrast in your images, but you will retain all the finer details that would be missing if you hadn’t used fill.

An exercise in shadows

To get the grips with this concept, try this simple exercise with a lot of different subjects.

First, choose a subject. Any subject will do, but you might want to start with something static.

Take a good, critical look at what you’ve picked to photograph and start thinking about the lighting. However, instead of thinking about the highlights, try to focus only on where you want to place your shadows.

With that decided, pick a light source (a desk lamp will do) and light your subject so that you have the desired effect.

If you want to take this further, once you have your shadows in place, you can further modify and manipulate your light so that the highlights behave in a way that compliments the shadows.

That’s it

While this is a simple concept, it can seem counterintuitive. When you’re approaching lighting, of course it makes sense to think about the highlights first; however, incorporating some extra thought about your shadows can help take your lighting skills to a new level. Try the exercise above with a few different subjects, and evaluate if and how you can make shadows work for you in your photography.

The post The Importance of Shadows in Portrait Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by John McIntire.

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The Importance of Connecting With Your Photography Subject

28 Jan

The post The Importance of Connecting With Your Photography Subject appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Kevin Landwer-Johan.

Photography is more about connecting with your subject than the connection you have with your camera. If you love photography, hopefully, you will love your camera. Connecting with it will not be a problem for you.

Paying more attention to your camera than to your subject is a mistake I see so many photographers make.

Pretty Smile The Importance of Connecting With Your Subject

Technical settings are important. But making well-focused and exposed photos is just the first step.

Making photos which communicate more than what something looks like takes practice. Express your experience. Your relationship with and connection to your subject.

Your connection with the world is unique

Nobody else sees the world in exactly the same way you see it. This is what can make your photography special.

Communicating not only what you see, but how you feel about your subject produces more interesting photographs. Anybody can pick up a camera and take technically correct photos. Do they always have appeal? No. Do they always communicate meaning in a manner that’s attractive? No.

Telling the story of how you see the world must be an intentional pursuit. Be mindful of your message before you pick your camera up. Without doing this you will only be taking photos that anyone else with a camera can make.

Bubble Fun The Importance of Connecting With Your Subject

What are you connecting with?

Are you connecting with a person, a landscape, your dog, or a concept? Whatever you choose as your subject, the more fascinated with it you are, the more this will be expressed in the photographs you make of it.

Photograph what you love, what you enjoy. Show your experience of your subject in your photos. To successfully communicate this you must connect outside yourself for others to really be able to appreciate your photos.

“If your pictures aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough”

This is a famous quote from Robert Capa. He’s best known as a war photographer, but I think this advice has a far greater reach than with just conflict photography. I think it also has a deeper meaning than just physical closeness.

Getting closer to your subject in relational ways will make your pictures better.

Monk in a Saamlor The Importance of Connecting With Your Subject

Study your subject. Get to know it, or them. The better understanding you have of something the more dynamic your photographs of it will be.

Getting close takes time and commitment. Sometimes you’ll have years to build a relationship with your subject. Other subjects you may just have a few moments to make a connection. Getting close must be intentional.

We often visit the same locations in the photography workshops we teach. Over the years we have come to know the feel and flow of life in these locations. We have built a relationship with a lot of the people. Sometimes this can lead to tardiness in the way you approach photography.

Keeping a freshness of mind, thinking relationally, not just visually, keeps you motivated. Doing this, you’ll be able to continue making creative photos in places you visit often. By proxy, the people who join our workshops also reap some benefits from the relationships we have worked hard to build.

How do you get close enough?

Attach a wider angle lens to your camera. Standing back with a long lens will mean you are physically and relationally more removed from what you are photographing.

Fresh Market Butcher The Importance of Connecting With Your Subject

Be bold and step closer. Being in close proximity to your subject will make connecting more intimate. This requires you to present yourself well to your subject, especially when you are photographing people.

Be open and friendly. Approach a stranger with a smile and a warm greeting in their own language. Most people will reflect your warmth back to you. Making eye contact with people in most cultures will deepen your relationship instantly. Don’t be overbearing or too demonstrative, as this may put people off.

Take a little time to observe a situation and consider how you can best make a connection. This takes practice.

In big cities, this can be more challenging as people are typically more personally guarded. In smaller towns and rural locations, people can be more comfortable with being photographed.

Give something back

When you’re photographing people, show them the photos you’ve made. I love this about digital photography, that it’s so easy to share.

Be ready to take some more photos to capture their response. This is one reason I love making portraits with a 35mm lens. I can show my subject the pictures and be close enough to turn the camera back around and quickly take a few more of their reaction. With telephoto lenses, this is not possible because you have to be further away.

Portrait Print The Importance of Connecting With Your Subject

Ask for their email address or Facebook profile. Tell them you’ll send them a few pictures. If you photograph close to where you live, get prints made and take them back. People love this as it’s so rare these days to see a printed photograph of yourself.

Connecting with places and things

Photographing your favorite beach or city street can become more personal with mindfulness. Concentrate on why you like being there. Think about how you feel when you go to these places. Try to convey this in your pictures.

If you love photographing your car or pet, bring your experience into your expression. You’ve probably photographed these things many times already, so fresh concepts can be hard to come up with. Instead of looking for a new visual angle, seek one that reveals more about how you feel.

Thailand Mountain Sunset The Importance of Connecting With Your Subject

Time of day, quality of light, colors and other factors will influence feeling in your photos. Consider how the visual elements you include in your compositions reflect the way you feel about your subjects.

Conclusion

Practice your camera technique. Know your settings well. Give your brain more room to concentrate on what you want to convey about your subject.

Think what your photographs are about, not just what they are of.

Contemplation The Importance of Connecting With Your Subject

Some of these ideas may be challenging or seem rather abstract. Build a habit of connecting with your subjects. Over time you will see your photographic style develop. You will become more creative and your photographs become more appealing.

The post The Importance of Connecting With Your Photography Subject appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Kevin Landwer-Johan.

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The Importance of Getting the Image Right In-Camera

06 Sep

When you strive to get your images right in-camera at the moment you take them you’re going to reap many benefits that you might not even realize.

“Just Photoshop it” has become a recurring theme in photography when it comes to fixing image errors. Depending on who you talk to it can seem like Photoshop is a magic pill that will solve all manner of photographic problems. While it’s true that image-editing applications can help deal with a variety of issues, from correcting exposure to removing objects to swapping a cloudy sky for a sunny one, there’s a lot to be said for the philosophy of using as little editing as possible.

The Importance of Getting the Image Right In-Camera - butterfly on a red flower

I didn’t need Photoshop to get this image. Instead, I needed to get up early, know where the light was coming from, and understand how to use my camera equipment.

This is a tricky subject to tackle because there is so much wiggle room when it comes to defining what the term in-camera really means. To some, it means allowing for no post-production at all, even simple cropping. Others define it as getting things mostly correct at the time you press the shutter button, even though some basic adjustments such as straightening or exposure correction might be needed later.

There are photographers for whom getting it right in-camera means looking out for background obstacles, stray hairs, or wayward arms and legs that might otherwise ruin a good picture.

I don’t like to get caught up in the minutia of what in-camera means. But I will say that if you can strive to have more aspects of a picture correct at the time you make the image, the end result will be that much better.

This holds true for most types of photography save for the outlier examples like extreme focus stacking in macro photography or the types of artistic creations and collages that require post-processing.

two kids with arms around each other - The Importance of Getting the Image Right In-Camera

An ounce of prevention

There’s an old bit of wisdom you might have heard that goes like this:

“An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

It applies to many areas of life and the same holds true for photography as well. If you can take a few seconds to fix problematic areas at the time you take a picture it will save you untold minutes or even hours back at your computer. This took me a while to learn when I first got started with portrait photography. But the more I operate by this philosophy the more efficient my workflow becomes.

portrait of 3 ladies - The Importance of Getting the Image Right In-Camera

Do you see the green recycle bin on the left side of the photo? It might not look like much, but if this is printed on a large canvas it would stick out like a sore thumb. Background distractions like that are much easier to fix by adjusting things during the session instead of spending time Photoshopping each image later.

Years ago the only things I knew to look for when taking pictures of clients were things like smiling faces and good posing. As such, I often found myself banging my head against my keyboard while going through my Lightroom catalog afterwards because of unwanted distractions in my photos.

Automobiles, pedestrians, trash cans, litter, animals, street lights, and a host of other imperfections can all be fixed in Photoshop but it’s so much easier to just make sure they don’t even show up in your photos in the first place.

portrait 3 ladies in trees - The Importance of Getting the Image Right In-Camera

Eventually, I did see the recycle bin so I altered my point of view just slightly, which took a few seconds but saved me a lot of post-processing time.

This works for other things too like stray hairs, bits of dirt and debris that can get blown around and land on clients, or unwieldy shirts that like to get un-tucked. These problems can all be solved to some degree or another using computer software but it’s never going to be as fast or simple as just dealing with them when they occur.

The trick to doing this is to be looking out for such things at the time of the photo shoot. That is what took me so long to really learn, and to be honest I’m still learning even now! There are so many things to look out for when taking pictures. That background flotsam or bits of rubbish on the ground might be the last thing on your mind, but they can easily ruin a photo or at the very least cause you to spend much more time eliminating them afterwards than you would like.

My best advice to you in this regard is to simply train yourself to be aware. Look at your surroundings in addition to your subjects, and work on seeing background elements and other distractions that might normally escape your eye.

When you see things, take corrective action and even let your clients in on what’s going on. I have paused many photo sessions to say things like, “Oh no, there’s a street sign in the way behind you. Let’s all take a few steps this way…” and every time it has been appreciated by the people who are paying me to do a good job. It sends a message that you know what you are doing and care enough to get the shots right.

portrait of tweens - The Importance of Getting the Image Right In-Camera

A more extreme version of this, but one that’s just as important, is to take note of problematic points that cannot be altered in Photoshop and deal with them at the time of the photo session.

Issues like sign posts sticking out of heads, heads turned in the wrong direction, hands in awkward places, or having people with complementary outfits in close proximity to one another can easily ruin an otherwise outstanding photo session and are all but impossible to fix in post-production. The more you look for these problems and fix them on the spot, the better your photography will be.

Lighting and exposure

Years ago with early digital cameras, it was crucial to get the exposure just right at the time you took a photo. But today’s digital cameras have such incredible dynamic range that you can clean up a great deal of exposure issues in post-production. However, this should be used as a last resort and not relied on as a general rule, almost like a safety net below a trapeze artist.

When shooting in RAW you can lower highlights, raise shadows, and adjust color all day long to get just the right look you are aiming for. This is a huge benefit if you are doing work for clients. It’s even useful if you just want to squeeze the most out of your shots as a casual photographer. This type of exposure correction has saved my bacon more times than I can count when doing work for clients.

expecting couple in silhouette - The Importance of Getting the Image Right In-Camera

This couple was severely backlit which made for a very challenging photo situation.

Despite the flexibility of the RAW format and the editing possibilities offered by many photography applications such as Lightroom, Photoshop, and Luminar – you will find that it’s best to mitigate potential exposure and lighting issues at the time you take the photo instead of on your computer.

It’s not that you can’t fix exposure issues in post-production later, but that if simple exposure adjustments can make them disappear before you even take a picture then why would you want to spend time fixing it later?

The Importance of Getting the Image Right In-Camera

It took a lot of editing to wrangle a good result from the RAW file, but I could have just adjusted my exposure settings on the spot and saved myself a lot of time afterwards.

Your time is valuable

The more time I spend as a photographer the more valuable I realize my time really is. Even if you are a working professional who makes 100% of your income from photography, the less time you have to spend editing your images to fix exposure issues means more time doing other things that would help you hone your craft or grow your business. Or time you can spend with your family!

Even though you can fix a host of photographic issues ex post facto there’s no substitute for doing what you can to get it right in-camera and make sure those issues never even happen in the first place. Aside from saving yourself untold hours of time fiddling with sliders and layers on your computer, you will also be growing your skills as a photographer.

It will take some practice as you learn to reduce unwanted distractions and get accurate exposure settings when you press the shutter button. But you will reap rewards in terms of knowledge, confidence, and sheer experience. In the end, the result will be better photos taken by a better photographer, and that’s the kind of benefit you just can’t get by moving sliders around in Lightroom.

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The Importance of Light While Shooting in a Studio

30 May

One of the most important things about professional photography is lighting. Light is the one element that can make or break a photo shoot. Having the correct lighting at the right time is of the utmost importance. Yet, many photographers, especially beginners, tend to overlook this fact. Every aspect of photography relies heavily on lighting. After all, light is the Continue Reading

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The Importance of Learning From Failure to Help You Grow as a Photographer

07 May

There’s a scene in the 1995 movie Apollo 13 when Gene Kranz, flight commander of the ill-fated moon mission, tells his team that, “Failure is not an option” as they struggle to find a way to bring three astronauts home from the depths of space. While that moment certainly makes for dramatic storytelling, it’s often far from the case when photography is concerned.

I would even go so far as to say failure is not only an option but necessary for you to grow as a photographer. There will be times in your photographic journey that things just don’t go as you had hoped despite how much you plan ahead. While some of these instances might slow you down the important part is learning from failure, growing from your mistakes, and becoming a better photographer as a result.

This picture turned out great, but there have been plenty over the years that didn’t.

I would like to share some things I’ve learned over the years from times that I have failed. Hopefully, this will help you benefit from my experiences.

Know your gear well

On some of my first sessions with clients, I had a very difficult time getting my camera to do what I wanted it to do, and many of my images were ruined because of it. A few were too bright, others were too dark, and some weren’t even in focus.

Luckily I shot in RAW so I could fix some of the issues in Lightroom. But things would have gone a lot smoother if I had just taken the time to understand my camera, learned how to use it, and knew what to do when shooting instead of spending hours adjusting images afterward.

The Importance of Learning From Failure and Your Growth as a Photographer - DLSR camera

Your camera is loaded with buttons, dials, menus, and options. Do you know what they all do?

Example

To illustrate what I mean by this, take a look at the following image I shot almost five years ago. Thankfully I did this session as a favor for some friends of our family because looking back on it I would feel terrible if I charged them money for these pictures!

dark family photo (underexposed) - The Importance of Learning From Failure and Your Growth as a Photographer

I remember being frustrated at seeing the LCD screen of my Nikon D7100 as I took these pictures because they were all coming out so dark! I didn’t know what was wrong, and I didn’t know what to change on my camera to fix the problem.

Looking back there was any number of remedies for this overly-dark photograph that I could have used. Had I only known how to actually work the knobs and dials on my camera, simple things like the follow could have solved it:

Adjust the exposure compensation (duh!).
Change to spot metering instead of matrix metering (of course!).
Locked exposure on a bright part of the scene and recomposed the shot (why not?).

Thankfully I used RAW and not JPG so the image wasn’t a total loss, but the skin tones are washed out and the picture is not nearly as vibrant and dynamic as if I had just gotten it right at the time of the shoot.

family portrait in the park - The Importance of Learning From Failure and Your Growth as a Photographer

Clearly, I had a lot to learn about lighting, composition, and why having clients sit on a canvas drop-cloth with their feet out is not a good idea.

This advice is not just for newbies

This advice isn’t just for professional sessions with clients either. Something happens when you get new gear and want to put it through its paces. I attended a wedding recently as a guest, not as the official photographer, but I had my shiny new Fuji X100F with me and even though I thought I knew how to operate it, I made a crucial mistake that cost me a lot of good shots throughout the evening.

For a good 20 minutes I couldn’t figure out why my camera wasn’t focusing right and all my shots were coming out poorly exposed. Finally, I realized that I had accidentally activated the built-in ND filter. There was even an icon on the LCD screen indicating the ND filter was turned on, but I didn’t see it because I just wasn’t as familiar with the camera as I should have been.

people dancing at a party - The Importance of Learning From Failure and Your Growth as a Photographer

Suffice it to say I felt like a complete amateur when I realized that a mistake I made had ruined so many good photo opportunities, but I quickly learned from it and hopefully now you can too!

Familiarize yourself with the location beforehand

Years ago, not too long after I got my Nikon D200 and 50mm lens, I thought I was a pretty big deal and knew everything there was to know about pictures. After all, I had a prime lens! What else was there to understand? (Spoiler alert: A lot. A whole lot!)

One of the biggest mistakes I made during this early period was to show up for photo sessions without ever having been to the location beforehand. This made it impossible, as any seasoned photographer would know, to plan out some of the basic essentials of a photo shoot and look for things like lighting, foreground and background elements, and even where to have my clients sit, stand, or walk.

Hard lesson to learn

The worst offender of the bunch was a session I did for a high school senior where most of the pictures turned out – well, let’s just say less than ideal because I failed to plan ahead in terms of the physical location. We agreed to meet at a cross-country track, with almost no natural shade, at 5 pm. This is what happened:

portrait in the shade - The Importance of Learning From Failure and Your Growth as a Photographer

From one of my first high school senior sessions, and one I wish I could erase from existence altogether.

After searching for something, anything, to block the sun so he wasn’t squinting – I finally found this set of metal bleachers behind a tree. But because I didn’t understand how to operate my camera to get the exposure right (see failure tip #1) I got shots that were lit like some kind of circus act and were far too over or underexposed.

If I had taken some time to visit the location first I could have at least mentioned some alternative places at the track, or even suggested a different location entirely. Instead, I got out of my car and met the client and his mom with the kind of overconfident swagger that only a new wet-behind-the-ears photographer has, and ended up biffing most of the shots.

I did scrape by with enough competent shots to make it worth their while, but nonetheless, I walked away having learned something I will never forget.

senior portrait - The Importance of Learning From Failure and Your Growth as a Photographer

This was from one of my more recent high school senior sessions. I think it’s just a bit better, don’t you?

A few more for good measure

There are a host of other times I have failed as a photographer but each time I have tried to engage in some self-reflection and understand where I went wrong, As well, I tried to talk with other photographer friends, so I don’t make the same mistakes in the future.

My work has grown, and so have I, as a result of these failures. I would almost go so far as to say that failure is downright essential if you want to refine your craft as a photographer.

dogwood flower - The Importance of Learning From Failure and Your Growth as a Photographer

It took years of poor decisions and overlooking the obvious for me to learn enough about photography to take this simple picture of a dogwood flower.

Without going into too much detail, here are just a couple of other times I have swung and missed, photographically speaking, over the years along with a bit of caution for others thrown in for good measure.

When in doubt, take more photos

I was born in 1980 and grew up in the era of physical film, so when I got my first digital camera I carried that mentality with me. As a result, I missed out on a lot of good shots, especially with clients, because I thought I already had enough and didn’t want to fill up my memory card.

With the price of memory cards being so astronomically low, there is no excuse for not taking enough pictures, and you can just delete them later if you need to.

Control your depth of field

After I got my 85mm f/1.8 lens I took it out to a photo session with clients before thoroughly using and understanding it, which is always a big mistake. I also thought that I could shoot everything at f/1.8 because it gave me such a cool background blur!

What I didn’t realize at the time was the extra-large aperture was also causing half the people to be out of focus due to the insanely shallow depth of field. Just because your lens has a super wide aperture doesn’t mean you should always use it. When in doubt, stop it down a bit.

family portrait outdoors - The Importance of Learning From Failure and Your Growth as a Photographer

I focused on the mother, front and center, and shot this with my 85mm lens at f/1.8 to get a blurry background. What I didn’t realize was that also meant the husband was out of focus as a result.

Know when enough is enough

This one is going to vary depending on the type of photography you do. But as someone who takes a lot of family and child photos, it’s important to know when to hold ’em and know when to fold ’em.

Kids, and even parents, can be fickle and there were times early on when I would drag out photo sessions long after I should have called it quits. “Hey let’s get some more shots over there!” I would say. My clients would begrudgingly oblige while I scampered off ahead of them in a vain effort to capture authentic smiles and emotions.

Dragging out a photo session won’t help you get better pictures. But it will make your clients roll their eyes and think about booking someone else next time. Someone who will take a hint and pay attention to their needs!

family photo - The Importance of Learning From Failure and Your Growth as a Photographer

I learned over the years that kids just don’t last long at family photo sessions, so I took a ton of pictures and tried to keep things interesting by switching up the poses. 20 minutes later these kids were ready to be done, and I could have tried to stretch things out further but it would have only led to frustration.

Conclusion

These are just a few of the many lessons I have learned over the years that, while painful at the time, have served me well in the long run.

What are some of the ways in which you have failed, fell down, or otherwise came up short and what did you learn from it? I’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in the comments section below. Hopefully, we can all learn from each other’s mistakes.

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The Importance of Diversification as a Photographer

11 Jan

There’s an idea that has been perpetuated, however unintentionally, that photographers do one thing and one thing only. The illusion is that someone who carries the title of “professional photographer” must simply make photographs, sell them, and that is the sole source of their income.

It’s true that there are some of us who do in fact make our way exclusively through our photography as an end in itself. I feel that most if not all of us camera jockeys (especially the landscape and nature types) hold as an ultimate goal the notion that one day we can reach a point in our careers when our photographs alone can carry us through life.

The Importance of Diversification as a Photographer

A few years back I was happy to learn and am equally glad to tell you now, that most if not all photographers are extremely diversified in the way they make a living from photography. Even most of the greats…from Ansel Adams to Cartier-Bresson, did other forms of photo-related work until they become famous enough to concentrate on their photography as a full-time job.

Almost every photographer diversifies to some extent. In this article, we’re going to talk about why it’s so important to branch out into other areas of photography beyond just making photos.

The Art of Diversification

It’s not generally disclosed to us when we first start out in photography that the majority of professional shooters don’t simply make their living from selling prints. This is especially true during these enormously competitive days when everyone with a cell phone is a “professional” photographer.

The truth is, it’s just plain difficult to make money from the sale of prints alone. You have to diversify in order to survive. The great thing is, if you’re truly in love with photography, everything that you do that centers around your beloved medium doesn’t seem like work. And it’s that word, “work”, that makes the world go round.

The Importance of Diversification as a Photographer

Diversifying yourself means that you will likely need to take a tiny step just outside the perimeter of your comfort zone. You must actively be on the watch for new opportunities to either market yourself through new outlets and to investigate what possibilities might be available to you. The key is to not limit yourself just because a certain opportunity is new to you or because it may not involve actual camera work.

Ways to Diversify Yourself

You may be thinking, “Alright, I need to diversify…but how and with what?” This goes back to what we spoke about a little earlier about how today’s world of digital photography has become more far-reaching than ever before. There is an incredible number of new ways for you to branch out into other areas of photography. Really, you are only limited by your ambition and your willingness to seek out brand new streams of creativity and dare I say, fresh revenue.

The Importance of Diversification as a Photographer

The most rewarding method to diversify yourself and your horizons, is by helping your fellow photographers through artistic and technical education.

I got my own start in the photographic educational world right here at Digital Photography School. That opened up amazing new opportunities for me to not only expand myself as a photographer but also to help others who are just beginning their own journeys. Look for ways to give back to your peers and teach what you know. This could be through writing, giving photography workshops, educational videos, and even gear reviews.

The Importance of Diversification as a Photographer

By no means are these the only ways to branch out and diversify yourself. The key is to start looking for the outlets to begin with. Once you do, you might be shocked to learn about all the ways photography impacts people’s lives beyond the obvious.

If you’re not keen on the educational route (you should really try it) then keep searching and be open to other areas of enrichment. Start a newsletter showcasing your work and link to gear you use (there are some great affiliate programs out there to help you make an income that way). Try blogging about your photo outings. Building a simple blog space is easier than ever these days. Most importantly, don’t allow yourself to grow stagnant and stop looking for ways to grow.

Some Final Thoughts….

Is it possible to make a living from only selling prints or through only making photographs? Absolutely. Depending on your own genre of photography it could be more or less difficult. Generally, the majority of photographers whose main income does, in fact, come from print sales find themselves looking for other ways to incorporate photography as a part of a larger professional whole.

I found that I loved teaching others about photography and writing about all the aspects of making photographs. This led me to produce my own Lightroom presets and a whole host of other unlikely photography related jobs that I could never have imagined were possible only four or five years ago.

The most important thing to remember is that diversifying yourself and your talents can do nothing but good and help you to grow as a photographer. Never stop looking for ways to advance yourself not only monetarily but also creatively in your work. Branch out. Reach out. Carpe consequat…seize the photography.

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The Importance of Being Honest With Yourself and Your Clients

08 Dec

If you do any photography for clients, either on a regular basis or whenever work comes your way, there can be a tendency to be somewhat creative when answering questions about your skills, abilities, and expectations. You might be asked to shoot a wedding when you don’t necessarily have the gear or experience to do what the client expects. Or someone might ask you to take product photos when your background is in portraits.

It’s not uncommon to be on location at a photo session and have things suddenly go awry or get strange requests from your clients. Even in the editing phase, you could very well find yourself dealing with a situation that you aren’t ready for. In times like these, it’s important to remember three simple words we have all heard since we were kids – tell the truth. You might not like the immediate results, but it will work out for the best for you and your clients in the long run.

The Importance of Being Honest With Yourself and Your Clients

Set your client’s expectations

Not long ago I was asked to do a portrait session for a high school senior. I knew the family and we were all looking forward to the session. But about a week before we were scheduled to take photos, we hit a bit of a wrinkle. Her parents asked if their daughter could have her two dogs in the photos as well. I had a moment of panic because this was a situation for which I was quite unprepared.

After I thought about it for a little while, I realized I had two choices, neither of which was all that appealing. I could have said yes in which case I would be agreeing to something that I was not ready for. Or I could have said no in which case I would have run the risk of angering the client and maybe even losing their business to another photographer who would agree to take the photos they wanted.

The truth of the matter, though, was that I simply didn’t know the answer so I told the client just that. Rather than say yes or no, I laid my cards out on the table and hoped for the best. I explained that I would be willing to give it a try but I had no experience with this sort of situation, and there would be a chance the pictures wouldn’t turn out at all.

The Importance of Being Honest With Yourself and Your Clients

This high school senior wanted some pictures with her dogs. I obliged but tried to be as honest as possible regarding my comfort level and experience with this type of photography.

Honesty is the best policy

Instead of being upset or angry, her parents were quite pleased with my response and told me they appreciated me being upfront about it. They felt more comfortable working with someone who was willing to tell the truth rather than spend money on a photographer who just told them what they wanted to hear and might not be able to deliver on the results.

On the day of the shoot, I continued the trend of being open and honest and suggested a couple options for photos, many of which the family quite liked. I even enlisted the help of the parents. Even though the photos aren’t going to win any awards or get printed in magazines, the family was more than pleased with the results. They liked the collaborative nature of the photo session as well. They felt like they could trust me and knew that I would do everything in my power to get some photos they would like, and in the end, that’s what really mattered.

We enlisted her mom to help!

This type of honesty can go a long way towards making sure your clients know what to expect when they book your services. Getting everyone on the same page before, and during, the photo session can help make sure they know what they are getting and you know that you haven’t promised something you can’t deliver.

Work with a safety net

Being open and honest with your clients is a little tricky and can involve walking somewhat of a fine line because as a photographer you are getting paid to know what you’re doing and you have to project a certain degree of confidence. After all, people are paying you to know what you’re doing so you had better know how to do it!

That being said, if you are honest with your clients about what you can do, it can give you a great deal of wiggle room when out actually doing a photo session. It also helps build a relationship of trust with your clients.

I normally shoot photos on location at parks and open areas around town. When I was taking pictures for another high school senior the two of us met up at a local garden, talked about school and college, and then got to work on the photo session. I started by giving him some very specific directions to get some good shots in the bag – the slam dunks if you will. He politely obliged, and we took some pictures that turned out just fine when I reviewed the images on my camera.

This young man was willing to try some new locations and poses for his senior photos. We got some good ones in familiar spots first, and then tried a couple of experiments just to see what would happen.

Get the safe shots then experiment

After that, I spoke to him quite plainly about some ideas I had and asked if he would be comfortable trying some pictures that might be different than what he expected. Instead of just barking orders I explicitly said: “I’ve got an idea and I’m not sure how it will turn out, but would you be up for trying something and see what happens?” This sort of talk put him at ease, and he told me he appreciated that I was straightforward and plainspoken with him, and he gladly agreed to experiment with some poses and locations that were new to both of us.

I don’t have quantitative data to support this, but I have a strong suspicion that if I had played the classic “fake it ’til you make it” approach I would have been nervous, fidgety, and a little on edge the whole time. Instead, my honesty about the photos we were taking helped make the session comfortable for both of us and we got some pictures that both he and his parents liked quite a lot.

Neither of us had ever been to this spot before, but I asked if he was willing to try something new and he was all for it.

Be open to ideas – but be honest if you aren’t sure about it

Here’s one final example of how important honesty is when working with clients. Not long ago I was asked to shoot photos of a family in early November in time for them to get their Christmas cards printed. We discussed the details of the shoot beforehand and she gave me examples of the types of pictures she was hoping to get. I assured her that I could certainly get that same look and feel. (I really meant it too because I knew the location, I knew my own capabilities, and I was entirely confident I could get the shots she wanted.)

The Importance of Being Honest With Yourself and Your Clients

During the photo session, one of the family members asked about some different types of pictures. Rather than blindly agree with everything she asked for, I slowed down and discussed the details with her on the spot. I knew the capability of the lenses I had with me, I knew the setting and the lighting, and I asked her several questions in order to make sure I was giving her honest and straightforward answers.

Soon enough I found myself standing atop an eight-foot ladder shooting straight down at a collection of hands on a tree stump. While it was certainly something I had not imagined beforehand I was able to set expectations with the client, build a safety net in case things didn’t work out, and ultimately get a shot that everyone liked.

Not the type of picture I’m used to taking, but I explained that and the family didn’t mind at all.

Be honest with yourself

I want to make it clear that as a photographer working with clients you should absolutely possess a high degree of knowledge regarding your craft. You should understand lighting and composition, and know how to work with your subjects (even if they’re inanimate objects) to get the pictures you want. You should know your camera like the back of your hand and have a firm grasp on the fundamentals of exposure like aperture, shutter, and ISO.

But you should also know your own limitations, and understand what you can do as well as what you haven’t yet learned. Essentially you need to make sure you don’t over-promise and under-deliver when crunch time hits.

This is a mistake that a lot of new photographers make, myself included. It’s thrilling to get a new camera and some lenses and think that you can suddenly start taking on paid jobs. I know, I’ve been there! But if you take time to learn your own limitations and be honest with yourself about what you really should and should not be doing, you will find yourself producing better results while also having a clear idea of how you can improve over time.

Here’s a photo that illustrates what I’m talking about

The Importance of Being Honest With Yourself and Your Clients

I took this picture without being honest with myself. When I look back on it now I notice so many problems that were plain as day if only I had been willing to see them. This mother and her girls look great, but as their photographer, I really should have known better before agreeing to do their photos.

I had gotten a DSLR and a 50mm lens about a year before this and I thought I knew everything there was to know about photography! But in reality, there was a vast chasm between what I thought I knew and what I actually knew.

I didn’t understand the relationship between aperture and depth of field, hence the reason the girl in the foreground is out of focus.
I didn’t fully understand the capabilities and limitations of my gear and shot at much higher ISO values than I should have in this scenario.
My knowledge of light, shadows, and composition was lacking.
I didn’t know how to edit my RAW files to get the final images to look how I really wanted.

The list could go on, but the lesson here is that if I had been willing to own up to my shortcomings I would have either waited to do the photo session until I actually did know what I was doing. Or I would have been more forthcoming with the clients about what I could do and what they could expect.

This shot turned out okay, but there was a lot I didn’t know about using external speedlights when I took it. I should have taken more time to learn what I was doing first.

Do the right thing

One final note, or perhaps a bit of advice, is to be forthcoming with your clients about the limits of what is culturally and legally permissible. If you’re in this business long enough you might be asked to shoot photos at a spot where photography is prohibited by custom or by law. (Note: if you are ever asked to take photos on train tracks, do not do it. Not only is it dangerous and life-threatening, but train tracks are private property and you will likely be trespassing if you shoot photos on them.)

Alternatively, someone might inquire about taking pictures at locations that are particularly dangerous to themselves or you as the photographer. Sometimes even the subjects you are shooting might want to engage in risky activities or behaviors that are either illegal or, as your gut instinct might tell you, just plain wrong.

Trust your instincts

It’s best to be upfront and honest if you find yourself in these situations. Tell your contacts or potential clients, “Thanks, but no thanks.” and explain that you just aren’t willing or able to meet their request. “But my friend did it, and it was no big deal!” they might reply. If they do…stand your ground, maintain your integrity, and advise them to look elsewhere for their photos. Don’t compromise your integrity and professionalism to get pictures you know you shouldn’t be taking.

The Importance of Being Honest With Yourself and Your Clients

Conclusion

One of the best feelings in the world is when I see someone pick up a camera, get inspired, and start using it to create images with meaning, impact, and a sense of artistry. Digital cameras make photography easier than ever before but if you are working with clients whether it’s shooting weddings, portraits, products, real estate, or any other type of transactional relationship you have to be honest with them and yourself to build a rapport and sense of trust that can lead to long-term partnerships.

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The Importance of Setting Photography Goals for Yourself

23 Sep

A wiser person than myself once said that if someone does not know to which port they are sailing, no wind is favorable. I heard that advice early in my photographic journey and it has stuck with me throughout the years. Learning about photography is important. Developing your skills as photo maker is even more important.

However, one of the most important things that you can do in order to grow as an artist (and business person) is to recognize the importance of finding a direction, setting photography goals for yourself. Without a direction or goals, all the passion, skill, and creativity you possess will not be enough to help you reach your full potential as a photographer.

Direction

Finding your direction

That is the hard part. Figuring out which direction to focus your energy on can be frustrating and at times extremely confusing. There really are no shortcuts. The key is to shoot, shoot, and shoot some more. Shoot a lot. You won’t know what kind of photography you truly love until you let yourself go and become lost in your own work.

Don’t limit yourself to only one type of photo when you’re just starting out in the art; meaning don’t exclusively do street work or only shoot portraits. Make photographs of anything: people, landscapes, architecture, food, toasters – anything. You might find that your true passion strangely discovers you when you least expect it. The important thing is to keep shooting and keep yourself open to new opportunities.

Shoot

Bear in mind, however, that directions can and often do change. Even though you may be firmly set on the path you want to pursue with your photography remember that you are not confined to it exclusively. As you grow as a photographer so will your tastes and your inclinations may evolve. Again, keep your creative mind free and be willing to try something completely different if the muse strikes you to do so. You make the photograph…the photograph does not make you.

Applying your direction

For a moment let’s imagine that you have found your direction. You’re elated and you can’t describe how great it feels to have that overwhelming urge to create photographs. Now what? Do you just go out into the world and hope for the best? Of course not. Instead, take all of that excitement and artistic energy and channel it into something tangible.

Sample 1

In short, you must set clear goals for yourself as a photographer. Setting goals for your photography will help you immeasurably. There are so many things to consider when first starting out. At times it becomes shockingly easy to lose your focus which will lead to frustration. Developing goals will keep you grounded in your work and heading in the direction you have chosen. Not only will having clearly defined goals keep you focused but will also keep you motivated and make you more determined to accomplish what you have set out to do.

Learn to set goals which are realistic

No one that I know of ever had their first photograph published on the cover of National Geographic Magazine. If that’s your goal that’s great. But understand that while setting goals is essential to success, they must also be realistic goals.

Find goals for your work which are challenging but attainable. Examples of realistic goals could be learning a new technique or getting your work in a local gallery. Don’t set yourself up for disappointment because you set the bar unimaginably high. Success is a ladder that must be climbed one step at a time.

Acheive

Confidence

Gaining confidence is somewhat of a paradox because you need confidence in order to find it – think about that for a moment. Boosting your confidence level is perhaps the most important reward that will come out of setting goals for your photography.

Taken as whole, going from a beginner to a professional photo maker is a daunting task to say the least. There is just so much that can go wrong on the journey from point A to point B. Instead of attempting to cover the distance in a single leap, lay out achievable goals that will eventually take you where you want to go. Along the way, with each goal met and overcome, you will naturally build confidence. The next goal will be met and then the next and the next, and so on.

As you become more confident in your work and your abilities each new goal you set will be more and more ambitious. One day you will look back to see how far you’ve come and how much you’ve accomplished just by focusing on each step one at a time.

Steps

Be brave

You found the courage to follow your dreams and take up the mantle of “photographer”. It’s not always going to be an easy road, but by simply finding your direction and setting photography goals you will be able to achieve things you never thought were possible.

Learn to understand what it is that truly gives you a spark when you photograph, then develop a game plan by setting small goals to help you along your way. Those goals will be your signposts. With each goal you achieve you will build skill, confidence, experience, and knowledge. As you learn and grow you will undoubtedly change as an artist. Be mindful but don’t fight the natural current and healthy evolution of your own creativity.

Trees 1

Whether the goals you set are designed to facilitate a transition from hobbyist to pro photographer, or to just reach the next stage in your photographic journey, the important thing to remember is to never stop moving. Always strive to learn something new, set new goals, and reach new heights.

What are your photography goals? Please share in the comments below.

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The Importance of an Anchor – Why Foreground Matters

13 Mar

Most everyone is familiar with the concept of an anchor in the nautical sense. The anchor keeps the vessel from drifting away, due to current or wind. It fixes the vessel to a certain position. While this is easily understood, fewer people are aware of the need for a similar concept in photography.

I enjoy using wide angle lenses for landscape photography, but I also recognize that a wider focal length brings additional compositional challenges. While a wide focal length can produce visually exciting images, it can also produce really boring, empty feeling images. The nature of wide angle lenses is that they create the feeling of space, of distance. That distance can really disconnect the viewer from your subject, if you are not careful. When using a wide focal length, it becomes incredibly important to anchor your image with a strong foreground.

The trailhead in the foreground of this image, leads you into the grander scene.

The nature of a wide angle means that it distorts the perspective of the objects, closest to the camera. There is a feeling of distance from your background, so the eye needs something closer to engage it, before moving on to the grander scene beyond. I’m sure you’ve seen visually stunning images of famous mountain ranges, sunsets, waterfalls, or wild natural scenes. I’m willing to be that your favorites all feature a small scale object in the foreground. Patterns in the ice or snow, wildflowers, rocks, or fallen autumn leaves. These serve as the visual anchors of the scene. Without them the image becomes much more boring, and far less grand.

There are many beautiful places on our planet, but photography, much like everything else, is very trendy. It is rare that you have an opportunity to capture something that has never been photographed before. The challenge then, is to find a way to set your work apart from the crowd. Anchoring your image through something unique is one of the key ways to accomplish this. Take for example, the new One World Trade Center in New York City. It has an incredible amount of emotional capital invested in it, because of the events of September 11th, 2001. So, it’s been photographed hundreds of thousands of times already since its completion. I wanted something different, and I saw the opportunity while in Battery Park further up Manhattan Island. Green space is at a premium in the big city, so when I saw an opportunity to shoot the tower, with the anchor of some flowers in the park in the foreground, I jumped on it, and am happy to have a different perspective on a familiar sight (image below).

The City

The sunrises and sunsets of Arizona, in the American Southwest, are breathtaking, but can be challenge to capture because of the scale of the wide open spaces. This particular morning brought a gorgeous sunrise with a great, nuanced sky. I composed with a 15mm lens that could capture a lot of the context, but to keep it visually interesting I got about as close as I could to a clump of cholla cacti, that was catching the directional morning light. That grabs your attention first, and as your eyes move on through the scene, you have a great sense of depth of the wide open space because you are already visually anchored to the scene.

Cholla

Here’s another example from Ontario, Canada. This was the first snow of the winter, and the rivers and lakes were still not frozen. I shot a long exposure, that has a lot of subtleties in the sky and vibrant blue, wintry tones. But it’s made special by the patches of snow, caught amongst the plants, on the water’s edge in the foreground. These anchor the image, and give depth to it, along with providing some bright points in an otherwise dark scene.

Snow

Your anchor can also help to lead you into the scene. In this snowy scene on a cold, clear, winter day, the footprints featured in the foreground help lead your eye through the scene below.

Snow Footprints

Finally, the path that anchors this beautiful autumn image, eventually leads you to the elderly couple walking hand in hand. The name of this image is “Seasons of Life”, and the use of the anchor to lead the eye through the scene has helped me tell a story, and provide some emotional resonance.

Path

Another purpose of the anchor is to make a scene more visually engaging. Use the wide angle distortion to your advantage. I was driving through Ontario, Canada’s famous Algonquin Provincial Park, and noted the cool frozen cascades along the road. I wanted to include a road sign for more visual interest. Note how this first image, while not distorted, is not particularly interesting.

Less Interesting

In this second image, however, I got close enough to this sign that the wide angle lens I was using, distorted it. Distortion sounds bad, but the end result here is a more visually interesting image, where the sign helps point the eye into the scene, where you can see the frozen cascades along the road.

Sign

You can also use this to tell your story. I shot a visually lush scene, but wanted my anchor to tell the story of people “Dumping in Paradise”. By getting close to the old tire it becomes unnaturally prominent, but by shooting it with a wide angle lens I’m also able to give the larger context in one shot. I’ve suddenly got an image with a cause attached to it, because of the anchor. Shooting a closer shot of the tire stuck in mud wouldn’t have had the same visual impact.

Dumping in Paradise

One final way that an anchor is important, is to prevent a scene from feeling empty. The way that long exposures blur water is very cool, of course, but this image would have felt very empty with nothing but blurred water. It would have lacked any true feature. But the foreground rocks that I’ve included in the composition, give the eye something to look at, and that in turn causes the brain to appreciate the image more as a whole. The rocks also point you toward the island in the distance, creating some tension between the little rocks in the foreground, and the big rock beyond.

Zen

These are but a few examples to help you understand the relationship between the foreground and background of an image. The foreground is your anchor, and without that anchor there is a good chance the image is going to, well, drift. A good anchor will help build strong, visually appealing images that will help to set your work apart – and isn’t that what we are all looking for?

Do you use anchors in your wide angle landscape photography? Share your ideas in the comments below.

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