An Exercise for Seeing — How to Become a Better Photographer
Some of you have highlighted a line from my previous article on Medium. That line was about the importance of seeing (rather than just looking) in photography, so I decided to try and put together an article about this topic. Well, at least my thoughts about this topic.
This article (or series of articles, if time will be kind with me) is for the medium tier photographer. Her/his knowledge about the technical part of photography is vast, the exposure triangle is almost an instinct, but the results are not what she/he is thinking about. The problem might be somewhere else. And that “else” is the light, our eyes and our brains.
A short story about our brain
One day I was looking for my keys. Of course, they were on the table, in a very visible spot, but my brain kept ignoring them and kept thinking about spots I could have left them. Has this ever happened to you also? Of course it has.
This happens because an immense part of the information that passes in front of our eyes is completely ignored by our brain (don’t believe me? Take a look at this experiment). This has many probable causes:
- maybe we have a problem that we are meditating over,
- maybe we are not interested in that particular object,
- maybe we don’t know how to understand that particular scene or what exactly to look at,
- but most probably this is because our brain is hard-wired for survival. And how light falls on an object is anything but survival.
This would be the bad news. The good news is that we can overcome all of these problems.
Training your eyes to see
Observing the world around us is something that has to be trained. People say about photographers that “they see the extraordinary in the ordinary”, and this is exactly what you want to do. Remember, the vast majority of information is discarded by the brain, so you should take the time to absorb as much as possible.
Do the next exercise the next time you go out. Let’s pretend that it’s a beautiful summer evening, the sun is about to set, and it bathes the whole world in beautiful orange and reddish colors:
- Stop exactly where you are (in a safe spot that is, not in the middle of the street). Stop moving. Look at the bush near you, at the flowers, the city blocks, even cars.
- Thoroughly analyze all the details of those objects. See how light falls on them, how it shapes their contours, how it generates shadows.
- What type of light is that? How does it affect the shaded parts of the object? Do shadows add or subtract the 3D sensation of the object?
You may know the answer to these questions, but let go of prior knowledge and just see all that in action. Creativity is not about pre-conception, even if that knowledge is correct. You can be inspired by a leaf, by the texture of a concrete wall, the modernism of a building and so on.
Do this everyday, do it all day. Concentrate on the exact moment where you are, not the future or past. Feel the wind in your hair, the feeling of texture on that wall near you. Live the moment. And above all, see it.
The Creative Adult is the child who survived — Ursula K. Le Guin
Be a child
What does being a child mean to you? When I was a little boy, I had the idea that every country is a planet and traveling to other countries meant taking a rocket there. In my imagination, I could see the planets orbiting the Sun and rockets flying in all directions.
But being a child also means that we are not locked in the box that society is enforcing. We are not embarrassed to stop in the street and kneel next to a common flower, just to see what makes it beautiful, while everyone is watching. So what? Kids do it. Why should you not? Why should that be embarrassing?
Next, you pull out your camera and everyone thinks: “Oh, she/he’s a photographer. Nothing weird then.” Seeing the world takes time, effort and letting go of prejudice.
This kind of behavior is exactly the behavior that enables children to be such fast learners. They are curious. The like everything and want to know everything. Why is the sky blue? Why do birds fly? Why can’t we? Asking questions that you think you know the answer to may lead you on new paths of knowledge. And knowledge is the most important way to great creativity.
Snap a photo
Have you ever been in front of a great landscape, a great detail of something and said: “Aww, too bad I don’t have my camera with me…”? I suppose we all have been there too. But guess what. There’s a good chance that you are reading this article on a smartphone. And that smartphone has a camera on its back. These days, smartphone cameras are ridiculously great. Sure, you won’t be able to print a 10 foot (that’s about 3 meters for us europeans) photo out of it, but that’s not the point.
An A4/Letter print, with a 300 dpi resolution, takes about 12 MP of information. You surely have much more available on that smartphone. Just take the phone out and snap that pic. Snap all day long. Look for fine details that you can snap. Look for details that you like. In time, results will surprise you. Guess what, all the pics in this article are smartphone pics, edited in Snapseed, and I have lots more on my Instagram. Actually, on my Instagram just 5–6 are made with a dedicated camera and they are not the most interesting ones. Smartphoneography, if that term exists, is my only photography related pleasure these days.
Take more than one photo. Change angles. Change framing. Try to modelate the light. Create shadows or fill them with light. Usually, the first photos are crappy, the good ones are somewhere near the end on the session.
In conclusion
Learning to see is like learning to walk. At first it’s rather hard, you get unbalanced, maybe you fall. But in time you get better at it. You run and maybe even walk on cables. Nothing is impossible, you just have to put time and effort into it.
And never forget to make it fun. When you stop having fun, stop doing it.
Any thoughts? Let’s discuss them in the comments.
