5 Golden Rules For Great Photos

Photography can be an overwhelming topic however in this blog I want to share with you 5 rules or best practices that have helped me grow as a photographer and without a doubt will help you too.

Less Is More
We all fall into the trap of amassing a ton of gear, watching every tutorial under the sun and trying to memorise how to shoot in full manual whilst reciting the entire user guide. So the first rule is keep things simple and take a minimal approach to every aspect of your photography. From a gear perspective, it means stick to one body, one general zoom and a couple primes. An iPad for editing, a spare battery, spare SD card, charger and a nice small backpack or sling is all you need. Rather than shooting in manual and having an argument with your camera, just stick it in auto and actually try to get some photos. The manual settings come come later.

When it comes to taking photos, again focus on one thing at a time. For the next 3 months just focus on finding good light. The 3 months after try to find interesting subjects. The 3 month after experiment with different shutter speeds. When you’re learning, rather than trying to cram everything in at once, only learn one thing per month and really make sure you understand it. Don’t try to learn composition, editing, story telling and panning techniques all at once for example. Even when it comes to your images, rather than trying to fill the frame with 1000 different things, really try to figure out what’s important to you and leave everything else out.

So once again, look at every aspect of your photography and really think how you can simplify everything you do. Because simplicity equals clarity and a clear mind will connect the dots quicker and produce the best work.

Enjoy the process
Regular readers will be rolling their eyes now because there is nothing that I bang on about more than learning to enjoy the process. Unless you’re a freelancer and you get paid to deliver photos, your enjoyment of this craft should come before anything else. This is because if we enjoy something, we will do it more often and for longer. So just like any life long endeavour be it getting into shape or learning a new language, photography is something you will carry with you for the rest of your life in one form or anther. Rather than chasing the highs and lows of getting an instagram banger, just focus on enjoying being out with your camera. When you enjoy the process, everything else falls into place. What do I mean when I say enjoy the process? I love packing my bag before a day out and getting the train in to town. I love walking for miles with a camera in one hand and a nice drink in the other. I love finding a great composition and fishing for the right subject or working the scene. I love stopping for lunch, going to museums, being a tourist, going to investigate a patch of light and being present in that moment. When I get home, I love getting a drink, putting on some chilled music and spending a few hours editing. I enjoy every single part of the process from start to finish. This is I why I have never lacked motivation or ever needed to find inspiration for photography. Not to mention that my best photos came from the days where I enjoy the process the most. Not the days where all I care about was getting a good shot.

Understand Light
Photography is the art of capturing light and how that light interacts with the subject and the scene. I am a firm believer that without good light, you don’t have the foundations of a good photo. What constitutes good light will differ for everyone. For me it’s having a clear source of light that is coming from either behind the subject or 90 degrees to the subject. For me it also means shooting on sunny days or in well lit situations if at night. Of course that’s just what works for me. Other photographers prefer cloudy days or to have their subjects flat lit. Either way become very good at spotting interesting light and figuring out how to use that light in your images.

Become an observer
Your job as a photographer is to see the world around you, process it and then convey that vision through a photograph. So one could argue that to get better at your job, learning how to be a good observer is critical. What do I mean when I say become an observer? Well when you’re walking the streets with your camera, always be looking for patterns, lighting, subjects or anything that catches your eye. When you do see something, go and investigate or if you’re already there, wait and see how the situation plays out. Over time you will have a pulse on the location you’re in. You will be able to read people’s body language. You will know when you can get closer or when you should hang back. In other words, being a good observer means you’re not just running round like a lunatic praying and spraying. Instead you’re in tune with your environment and your photography is intentional.

Create Depth & Change Perspectives
I’m kinda cheating by lumping depth and perspective into one however ultimately it is about you moving your camera around and placing it in places where people generally don’t see the world from. Creating depth simply means intruding elements in your image that can create separation between your mid ground, foreground or background. For example shooting though objects or having something in front of the lens can achieve this result. The main goal other than to separate the elements is to place the viewer in your photo. To make the viewer feel like they could be there. Another good use of this technique is to tidy up the frame and block off the busy parts of the scene. This will create a more minimal composition and all the attention will be on your chosen subject or point of interest. Changing perspectives simply means altering from where you take a photo. So rather than always shooting eye or chest level, why not shoot from the ground up or looking down? Of course many times the best viewpoint is eye level but even so, don’t forget to experiment a little.

Get it right in camera
The final thing I want to touch on is the idea of trying to get as much right in camera as you can. Specifically the lighting, exposure and composition. Sure, I edit all my photos and very often have to fix the exposure. Equally very often I have to recompose in editing by cropping the image. Matter of fact very often I shoot for the edit by either over or under exposing or shooting wider with the intention of cropping later. However in my experience the best photos in most cases required the least editing. Also by trying to get it right in camera, you not only save time later but you are being more mindful with the photo you’re taking thus honing your skills even more. By no means am I saying getting it right in camera is some holy grail skill. In my opinion your editing style is just as important to the overall photo. All I’m saying is try your best to get it right in camera and use editing to enhance an already great photo…. Not polish a turd.