Here are 10 photography tips to help you improve your photography skills. These are tips that have helped me SO much throughout my photography career!
- Take images that aren’t shot from the eye-level, when you find the subject of your photo, experiment with different angles and levels. Photos from an unusual point of view are often more interesting.
- If you have a 50mm lens…spend a week or so using only that lens, this will limit what you can get in the frame, making you really think about your compositions. If you don’t have a 50mm lens…try just using another lens, limiting yourself will help your skills improve.
- In bad weather cover your camera with a plastic bag with a cut-out hole for the lens. Tape the lens to the plastic bag. Look through the open side…this will protect your camera! It’s a DIY coat for your camera and lens.
- If you’re going to be taking the photos for black & white, look only at lines, shadows, shapes and textures.
- Learn the rules…then break them. This will help you find your own photographic style. Creativity is going beyond the rules and creating something different and unique.
- Photography rulebooks will say “shoot with the sun behind you”…don’t always do this, it will make your images appear flat and boring, instead, take photos with the sun to the side of your subject, this will make interesting shadows and enhance textures.
- Avoid shooting portraits at midday…the lighting is not flattering, at all! If this is something you can’t avoid; you will need to take some gear along with you to diffuse the midday rays, you could use reflectors to bounce the light back onto the subject or camera flashes (external or pop-up) to fill in the shadows.
- Use a tripod when you’re taking long exposures…if you don’t, your images will be blurred.
- Avoid thinking “I can fix this photo later” when taking photos, at the beginning of their photography career, photographers tend to overuse Photoshop (I know I did!). We all get a bit excited about being able to remove something from the background or adjusting the light…the before and after examples always look great too! Taking photos without the intention of fixing them later will lead to stronger
compositions, and better images.
- Consider contrast within your images, A bright subject will look better against a dark background and vice versa.
I hope you find these tips useful! Happy photographing…!
Emily x
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