Last Updated on 06/20/2017 by Chris Gampat
Lots of folks consider themselves hobbyists and amateur photographers–and they always wonder how they can take better pictures. Lucky for those folks, The Project Photography came up with a number of great tips the advanced photographers use and consider (because of course they have experience) but that others may not. Even those more experienced in photography may find something they have forgotten about.
The tips include a number of things every photographer doesn’t necessarily think about, like perspective. Changing your angles can be a really big one and that doesn’t necessarily mean changing the focal length, but moving around your subject. This is part of the reason why drone photography is popular these days–it’s an angle you don’t see very often.
But then there are other tips, like being creative with your ideas (which is super subjective). Essentially, you’ll need to be expressive because photography is an art. It isn’t just an issue of documenting–which is what seems to dominate simply because humans aren’t creative…which is sad.
The host also talks about going out and shooting a whole lot of photos. This is obviously easier now that we shoot digital primarily so when you go out you can shoot to your heart’s content. After a while though, you’ll learn how to take images that suck a whole lot less. Part of this comes from being discriminating about your own portfolio.
What isn’t talked about here though is that I really recommend a very simple thing: learning how to see and pay attention to light. In every day life, we typically don’t do this. So what I recommend is taking a photo, rendering it in black and white, and then printing it out. After that, use a pencil and color over it. With that pencil, you’ll need to pay attention to the varying shades of blacks, whites and greys. Getting those shades right will teach you a whoooooooooolllleee lot about lighting.
Check out the video over at the Project Photography’s YouTube Channel.