All images and text by John Reid. Used with permission.
I am a travel and architectural photographer based in London, UK. Over the past six years, I’ve traveled to 55 different countries around the world for Expedia. My purpose is to photograph and film places in a way that will stir interest in that location. My approach to photography is simple: be intensely curious, fall in love with a place, and then use the medium of photography to communicate why I love the place. It is based on the advice of Ralph Valesco who said something like, “Photograph what you love and with 6 billion people around the world, someone is bound to love it too.” Technique is secondary to this approach. It is the language that enables me to communicate, but it does not answer the question, “What do you love about this place?”
Why did you get into photography?
I grew up in a South African city called East London. It is a beautiful city, surrounded by nature on all sides. It is also relatively unknown and under appreciated, even by other South Africans.
When I got my first job as a programmer, I was taken aback by the negativity I sensed in the office about the city. I spent my weekends searching for perfect waves to surf. I got to experience the beauty surrounded the city and I became desperate to share it. Around this time, I spent Christmas with an uncle who had bought a camera earlier in the year and was sharing his photos during the holiday. His photos were incredible. They also showed me how I could share the beauty of East London. A few weeks later, I bought my first camera and I was hooked.
How long have you been shooting?
I bought my first camera in 2003 and have been working full time since 2013.
What photographers are your biggest influences?
When I started, the first genre that I tried to get into was landscape photography. The work of Marc Adamus and Hougaard Malan blew my mind. As I started venturing into travel photography, the multi-layered work of Sam Abell as well as his talks inspired me and continue to captivate me today.
Why is photography so important to you?
I have a need inside of me to share how I see the world. I’ve never been able to express this through words and I definitely can’t paint or draw. Photography is the only medium I’ve found that enables me to share my vision.
Do you feel you are more of a creator or documenter and why?
I think about this all the time as I desire to be a creator, but I am certainly more of a documenter.
If I had to use taking your portrait as an analogy for the travel photography that I do, your portrait would be you on a very good day. I would choose lighting and an angle that would bring out your best features and minimize your flaws. I would try pull out an emotion that would captivate the viewer. I’d find background that would make the portrait more intriguing or I’d simplify it to bring more attention to your face. I’d make numerous other tweaks to make the best possible image of you, but it would still be you. You were already there, I simply highlighted an interesting part of you.
This is how I feel about photographing a location.
What’s typically going through your mind when you create images? Tell us about your processes both mentally and mechanically.
I’m constantly asking myself, “what do I love about this place?” Another way of phrasing this is, “what do I want to show others about this place?” Typically, I’m thinking of a specific person when I ask myself this question.
After doing this for 6 years, I can arrive at a location and immediately answer the question, regardless of the location. When I started, it was much more of a process. Some places would strongly appeal to me and I’d know immediately what to show. Other places required a bit of scratching beneath the surface to find something that I want to show.
When I was starting, what helped me “fall in love” with a place was to research them. For example, if my subject was a cathedral, I would read up about the history of the cathedral, what it meant to the locals, where it featured in popular culture and so on. These days I prefer to arrive blind, with no preconceptions.
Want to walk us through your processing techniques?
A typical trip is between 20 and 30 days. In that time, I might shoot as many as 10, 000 images. A successful shoot provides about 100 images that I would like to share. By selecting 1% of the images that I shoot, it allows me to be very selective. If the exposure is off or the lighting isn’t ideal, I don’t bother with the image. This means that very little is required for retouch.
I do a basic retouch in Lightroom – contrast and colour adjustments and then I fine tune these adjustments in Photoshop. I don’t do composites are change the proportions of the elements in the image. I feel that travel photography should represent reality.
More recently, I’ve been doing the Lightroom edit and then sending the images to a professional retoucher.
Tell us about the project that you’re pitching, or your portfolio.
I like to do an edit straight after a trip but in 2016, I spent 10 consecutive months on the road. This meant that I fell way behind and I have never been able to catch up. My portfolio was full of images taken before 2016. I decided to change this by going through all of my Expedia work from 2012 until now. The process took about 9 months, going through over 300 000 images. I managed to edit down to my favourite 98 images and now I would love to share these.
Through the work, I would love to inspire others to travel.
What made you want to get into your genre?
I leaned naturally towards travel photography as I am driven by curiosity, but I didn’t know it was a career option. I tried venturing into wedding photography, portrait photography, and even fashion, but the opportunities that came my way always happened to be in travel photography.
Tell us a bit about the gear that you use and how you feel it helps you achieve your creative vision.
Currently, I’m using the Canon DSLR system — the Canon 1DX Mark II and the Canon 5DS. I’m using this system mostly due to my collection of Canon lenses that I’ve collected over 13 years of photography. In 2016, I spent the year working with the Sony A7RII and loved it, although the files took a lot of massaging to look natural.
Crucial in my kit are the Canon 17mm and 24mm TSE lenses as well as the Lee filter system. This gear is important as I shoot a lot of video, which means I need to get the correct perspective and a balanced exposure “in camera”.
As a travel photographer based in London, the vast majority of my assignments take place in Europe. If you think about some of Europe’s most attractions — palaces, cathedrals, historic old towns — the vast majority are buildings. Photographing buildings from the ground with a standard lens requires pointing the lens upwards. As soon as you do that, the vertical lines of the building start to converge, the further they are from the camera. We expect buildings to appear as they do to our naked eye, with vertical lines going straight up. There are two ways to achieve this in camera: either by elevating yourself to the mid-point of the building (which is usually impossible) or by using a perspective corrective lens, also known as a tilt shift lens.
Most photographers correct perspective using software tools like the upright tool in Lightroom. This works well most of the time. But if you’re working with a high volume of images or if you’re shooting video, it vastly reduces the post production time by getting it right in camera.
What motivates you to shoot?
I seem to have a driving curiosity that is never satisfied, but there are times where I start to get what I refer to as wander fatigue. I visit a place that should be taking my breath away, but I feel a bit blasé as I’ve seen too many amazing sites in short succession to fully appreciate it. To prevent this from happening, I photograph a different genre – architecture. I try alternate between the two genres which helps me stay enthusiastic.
Check out John Reid’s travel portfolio, Expedia photos, and architectural photography portfolio for more of his work.