Pics Can Talk

So, having fiddled with your new toy, by now you would have taken that photo of your girlfriend or boyfriend posing with their hands placed on their hips, your little baby’s smile, a friend huffing and puffing to blow out a candle on a cake, you would also have probably asked a bunch of people say “cheese” many times over to get them to give you a genuine smile on your photo and pulled your camera out a couple of times for the occasional fun snapshot of a “teh tarik” session. Perhaps now it’s earning a well-deserved spot on the shelf among the rest of your decorative items.

Is that all there is to it? Okay, let’s look at your approach to photography. You may have bought that little snapshot digital camera to take all the special occasion mentioned above. Of course you couldn’t be bothered to go through the pages and pages of manual describing the little features and tweaks on your camera. The most common setting your camera would be on is “Full Auto”. Kudos to you I say, as I believe most of your photos will turn out fine.

Now, add a little creative shot here and there, and it would make your photo album much more interesting, special and livelier. It is definitely a treat to hear “oohs and aahs” as your photo album is being flipped through.

Here are some tips and ideas of how you can make your photography experience more interesting.

Lighting

Lighting is the single one reason for the existence of photography (actually for the existence of everything too). We could go on to describe in a whole book on lighting alone. In the future, we will have an entire article devoted to this subject. For now, just remember that lighting is not just daylight and the little flash mounted on your camera.

Sometimes, what makes for an interesting picture is the type of lighting you use on your subject. Be creative, have your subject hold a candle to light up her face, sit your subject by the window where the sun’s rays are coming through, have your subject stand in front of the sun or a bright light source and get a silhouette shot of her, shoot under bright sunlight with their shadow streaking across a flat surface or get your subject to stand near a pool of water and see how light is reflected off her face.

Give a little thought as to how light falls on and off your subject and it should give that little extra sparkle.

Emotion

Get into the habit of taking “emotional” pictures. Many great pictures evoke emotions. These pictures manage to “touch” the viewer beyond just colours on prints. Of course there is the more common type of emotions, namely happy, sad, angry, shocked, surprised and so on. To capture faces genuinely showing these emotions are a sure way of capturing a special picture. Try and discover all the other type of emotions as well, like serenity, loneliness, elation, quirky, excitement and love just to name a few.

Sometimes emotions do not only mean focusing on faces, but rather the feeling which is resulted from pictures of a scenery, memorable items, or simply the general ambience of a picture.

Angle

Have you ever asked yourself, “How did the photographer get that shot?” and you are turning your head left and right wondering at what sort of angle was the photographer in. Many of us take the all too common, “eye-level” shot. All of us see from eye-level and that is what we perceive as normal. Professional photographers often realise the impact of a uniquely angled shot or one that is taken from a different height. They use this method to distort perspective and to give the viewer a unique perception of an otherwise “normal” scene.

The advent of digital photography eases the use of this technique in taking a picture. Simply delete the pictures that you are not satisfied with. The next time you take a picture of a building, try shooting straight up the sides of the building. Perhaps when you shoot beautiful scenery, try going down to knee level and shooting between the blades of grass and if you are capturing that informal picture of a group of friends in a small room, stand up on a chair and have everyone look up at the camera.

Colour

We are surrounded by a harmony of colours. So much so sometimes we take this for granted. Photographers have a knack for getting the right combination of colours to create a good photo. Look out for different temperature of colours in your shots. Colours such as orange, red and yellow, exude comfort, warmth, sensual or even active at times. In contrast, colours like blue, green, indigo shows off cleanliness, purity and coolness. Think about how you would like to “colour” your picture.

There are also exceptions when a dramatic shot is composed with bright contrasting colours. These picture often “jump” out of pages of an album. Take a little time to walk around your subject to see how you can mix the colours in the surrounding.

Sometimes the lack of colours such as in black and white photography, sepia toning or monotone colour enhances the picture by giving focus to shadows and shapes. This is of course done intentionally and with a clear thought about the entire composition.

Shape

Look at shapes as how you would with colours. A shape is more than just the physical characteristic of an item or a subject. Shapes are also related to composition, perception, creative placement and how lights fall on and off your subject. You would probably come across this mostly when you take architectural shots. Take time to plan what sorts of shapes could be placed in your picture at certain angles. And whether this is a pleasing composition or one that may be overly complex.

You should take note of shapes even when you are taking a live subject. Taking a picture of your subject against a bright background would result in a silhouette shot emphasizing on her shape. Look again and you may realize that the shape creates and interesting shadow.

Patterns deriving from shapes are very distinctive features. Patterns are found in the repetitive petals on a flower, the windows on a building, a paved walkway, the roof tiles on a building, clouds formation in the sky and I could go on and on. Patterns can be the main subject of your picture or they may serve as backdrops to pictures of your subject.

Be creative, take a shot through a tyre swing at the playground, frame up your shot with a square window frame or compose your picture with a lotus with multiple angular petals on a round lotus leaf.

These are just some of the basic things which you should consider even when taking a common shot. With practice, it should come naturally to you.

The next time you take a picture,

1) Wait for a couple of seconds

2) Think about these key words; Lighting, Emotion, Angles, Colour, Shape

3) Compose; and

4) Shoot

Eventually, you would be hearing your first chorus of “oohs and aahs” and perhaps even some “wows”.