So would you like to take better pictures? There are a few things you need to know and do. Yep, it isn’t about what gear you have. Okay gear can help, but it isn’t the ultimate qualifier.
If you adopt these ideas and practices your picture quality will improve. Some of these things may not be new to you, and some are hard to do each time you press the shutter button (and sometimes they aren’t needed, but you really need to be careful when you choose not to include an item). I know that I struggle regularly to do all of these things, so it isn’t just you. The good news is that even professionals have to take these steps (they make sure they do to stay ahead).
- Know how your camera works, what it does, and how to make it do it. Many people have cameras that are among the best cameras ever created for taking pictures (because of what the camera can do) and they often don’t know what their camera can do, and how to make it do it (I can add that understanding what it is that it can do is important, there are some things my camera does that I still don’t understand what the heck they are, probably to my loss). They get sold on the hype of the camera, on the marketing of it.
- Remember that the camera is only a camera. It honestly only records the picture to a media of some time (film, sensor, or glass plate if your old school). The user of the camera is what makes it come together. It is all about you the user not the camera. Different types of cameras have the ability to record pictures in different ways and perhaps doing different things while doing it. That is all they do, it is about you!
- Understand what contributes to a really bad picture and a really good picture. Insert the characteristics you desire into the picture your taking as much as possible.
- Use your light wisely! Photograph when the light is nice (sunset, sunrise times) or control it all together with artificial light sources and or light modifiers.
- Reduce camera shake with a tripod, and radio/cable release or timer. Unless you want the characteristics that will inevitable come with not using these things, use them!
- Do everything you can at the time of taking the picture to make it what you want. Don’t plan on photoshop or other fixing later in the computer. Those things are for refining your work, not any type of alchemical art of turning poop into gold.
- Consider your pictures composition. Remember to balance your image, not only the light, but what you include in it. Think at least on the basic level of foreground, middle ground, and background. Then get rid of the things that are distracting. Pictures that strike you as quite amazing aren’t made up of only amazing light, or an incredible subject matter they are also composed well.
- Understand what your trying to do or show with your photography or a particular photograph and work to express that in the picture taking process. Develop your personal vision, and show that in your photographs. Many photographs are wasted because they are made without any vision and so there is no motivation to really show something except what was in front of the camera at the time.
These 8 things aren’t all you can do to take way better pictures, but they will make a huge difference!
Also I would add that we have these tools and many others available to us as photographers and creative artists. If you want to make better pictures, then work to understand the tools available to you and apply them correctly, at the right time, and in a way that will express what you want to be expressed in the final photograph. In the end it is all about what you want to show, not what your camera can do!
