Keeping it Simple


One of the biggest mistakes I see with beginning photographers who are trying to learn how to create impacting images is that they make their images too complicated. What do I mean too complicated? Well, it's not an easy thing to explain, but let's try:

Let's say that I give you an assignment to take the best landscape image that you can find. You go out and photograph some place that you really find beautiful and you show it to everyone. Immediately, I start pointing out some distractions in the scene, some composition flaws, and maybe the sharpness isn't the best. You might walk away thinking: "But it's a beautiful place. How did I not photograph it well?"

The answer might be that you tried to tackle something that is a bit too complicated visually. Sure, anyone can walk up to a beautiful scene and photograph it and get lucky, but part of nailing a good shot is knowing things like what to include, what to exclude, where the horizon lines are, whether the background is too busy. For some of us, starting with a more simpler subject can propel us into better things.

Case in point: I recently gave my students the assignment of photographing lines, where lines or a line was the dominant element in the picture. EVERY student came back with a great image. Some of them were print-worthy I'd say. Why? What's the big deal about lines? Well, nothing really. But what each student did well was that they kept it simple. Because lines are everywhere and all around us, they didn't have to worry about the whole scene. They were able to focus on the small things, and it paid off very well for them in how they composed and what they included.

Try doing that for yourself: pick something simple, a shape, a color, a pattern, and just shoot that. Try to make a simple, yet impacting image of something like that. And here's a key hint to help that assignment take off: get closer.

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