SIX Tips

• Photograph purposefully
• Take lot of images and fail often
• Slow down
• Take multiple compositions per subject
• Pay attention to your background
• Don’t miss opportunities for other subjects

Are you struggling to improve your photographic skills? Are you new to photography and feeling overwhelmed by the jargon, camera controls and technical details? If either of those apply to you, then this post is for you!

Below are a few of my simple tips to help you start making a positive impact on your photography with every image that you take.

Follow These Six Tips To have an immediate impact on your images

STEP #1: Be Purposeful In Your Photography

Start with a plan of what you are going to shoot on a particular session. Be as specific as possible. Maybe the first goal is just to get out and shoot. So, the the plan leaving the house might be ‘let me just get out to take some photographs’.

Regardless of whether you have a specific subject in mind when you head out, or if you are winging it, once you are out actually shooting, you should create a specific execution plan for each and every photo you take:

1. What are you trying to accomplish with the photo?
   1. Do you want everything sharp in the photo?
      OR
      Should the background be blurred?
   2. Is your subject moving? 
      How do you want that movement captured?

This about seeing in your mind the end goal you are trying to accomplish for EVERY photograph you take.

TIP #2: Take lots of Images and Fail Often

A professional photographer will often take hundreds or thousands of these purposeful  images per week.

Their experience has come from carefully executing AND often failing to achieve their desired outcome on these images.

However, when they do fail they have carefully assessed and evaluated what went wrong. They use this information to improve and correct mistakes, putting each mistake into a virtual filing cabinet, so that the next time a similar challenge presents itself, they are prepared to handle it.

This is called experience – and it only comes from failure. So make plenty mistakes, but only try to make them one time. Learn through these failures – correct them – and turn them into strengths, not weaknesses. 

TIP #3: SLow Down

This tip really goes hand in hand with tips number one and two. For beginners, one of the best ways to do this is to use a tripod. Setting the camera on a tripod forces you to slow down, to really take the time to frame your shot and to pay attention to the controls and settings of the camera.

Once the shot is framed:

• Ensure your focus is where you want it and move your focus point – or better yet, manually focus for ultimate control
• Check out your exposure
  • What f stop are you set on? 
    Will it give you the depth of field you are after?
  • What shutter speed are you using? 
    If your hand holding, use the old 2x your focal length to set your shutter speed.
  • Do you need to overexpose or underexpose based on what the scene contains?
    If so, set up exposure compensation to match the desired result.

Now take a test shot and review it on the screen or in the viewfinder.

Does it accomplish what your initial objective was for the shot?

If not, now is the time to make adjustments.

NOTE: For beginners I recommend choosing static subjects to start with. Trying to master framing, camera controls, exposure, focusing and other challenging photography concepts while trying to shoot your kid’s soccer game is a sure recipe for frustration. This frustration will ultimately slow your progress down (or halt it altogether). 

So, stick to static objects until you have mastered the basics.

TIP #4: COMPOSE MORE THAN ONE SHOT OF THE SAME SUBJECT

Since you are already here, you may as well move around your subject and take some more images. You may or may not ever have the opportunity to capture this location, subject, lighting and atmospheric conditions again.

Look at changing your perspective. Try to move away from the standard eye-height photographs. You will often find subjects will be more interesting from low or high angles.

TIP #5: Pay Particular Attention To your Background

While executing on Tip #4 above, be sure to notice changes to the background as you move around your subject. 

Does moving right or left or up or down affect other elements in the photograph? Do these elements add value to the subject or are they distracting and take away from the objective of your photograph?

Try to eliminate as many distractions in your image as possible.

Watch the play of the light – ensure that there aren’t extremely light objects or sky in the corners that will pull away from your main subject (or make a plan now that you will fix those issues in post).

TIP #6: DON’T MISS OTHER OPPORTUNITIES AND SUBJECTS

While you may have left with an exact plan of what to take images of, a good photographer is always looking for other subjects, plays of light or ANY other image opportunities that present themselves.

Don’t get so focused in on your one ‘topic subject’ that you miss the opportunities around you. Look in front, behind and to both sides as well as high and low for other interesting subjects. 

You’ll often find that these other subjects may be more interesting or produce better photographs than what you originally intended to shoot.