The Wild Photographer
Learn techniques, tips, and tricks for improving your wildlife, travel, landscape, and general nature photography with Court Whelan. Whether you consider yourself a beginner, serious hobbyist, or advanced professional, this is the way to rapidly understand and implement new skills to elevate your photography to new heights.
The Wild Photographer
Five Techniques to Inject Creative Vision into your Photography
In this episode, Court discusses five techniques to inject creative vision into photography, emphasizing the importance of breaking traditional rules and experimenting with different perspectives and methods. From composition to intentional motion blur, each technique is designed to enhance creativity and encourage photographers to think outside the box.
Takeaways
- Inject creative vision into your photography on any camera.
- Exaggerate composition to break traditional rules.
- Intentional motion blur adds a unique element.
- Top-down perspectives provide a fresh view.
- Black and white photography enhances contrast and mood.
- Change camera angles for creative effects.
- Spot metering can create unique lighting.
- Experiment with different techniques for creativity.
- Photography is an art form that thrives on creativity.
- Always strive to refresh your perspective in photography.
Court's Websites
- Check out Court’s photo portfolio here: shop.courtwhelan.com
- Sign up for Court's photo, conservation and travel blog at www.courtwhelan.com
- Follow Court on YouTube (@courtwhelan) for more photography tips
- View Court's personal and recommended camera gear
Sponsors and Promo Codes:
LensRentals.com - WildPhotographer15 for 15% off
ShimodaDesigns.com - Whelan10 for 10% off
Arthelper.Ai - WILD for a 6 month free trial of Pro Version
AG1 - Daily (and Travel) Nutrition (use link for free travel packs and other goodies)
Welcome back, friends, to the Wild Photographer. I come to you today with an episode I'm really excited about recording and it's one that you know I really try to add and inject the creative vision into a lot of my podcasts, especially with interviews with guests where they are pro photographers. They have different views and visions than I might. They add to the conversation tremendously and I, of course, try to do this with all my episodes, but this episode, specifically this, is one where it's all about the techniques for creative vision. I have five techniques I want to share with you today on how to inject creative vision into your photography, and while I feel like a lot of my listeners probably have fancier cameras a little bit more advanced, this one, I can say for sure, is for any camera out there Smartphones, introductory point and shoots, all the way to the biggest, fanciest cameras out there. This one is fully applicable equally across the board. So, yeah, we're going to talk about various things today that will allow you to inject creative vision into your photography. These things could be treated as homework assignments the next time you're out photographing street scenes to nature, to wildlife, to markets, to anything. These aren't about just wildlife, they aren't about just nature. They aren't about just cultural photography or travel, they are about the full gamut. Before we get into the episode, I of course want to thank the sponsors that helped make this possible.
Speaker 1:First up, shimoda Designs. I think I may have found the perfect camera bag and I know that's a lofty big statement. I've even done previous episodes, a year or two ago, just on the elements of why it's hard to find the perfect camera bag, and there's really a bag for each situation. But Shimoda Designs has come out with this bag. They're calling the Action Series. They have a couple different series, but Shimoda designs has come out with this bag. They're calling the action series. They have a couple of different series, but there's one that I have in particular. It's called the action.
Speaker 1:It is phenomenal. It is not just a great camera bag with all the compartments and the safety and security, the access, and it's not just a great backpack, it's an exceptional backpack. It's kind of this next gen backpack where it has a high level of water resistance or, dare I say, waterproofing. It's got that roll top to it so it's really easy to access. It's even got a top compartment for gear things like a rain jacket or extra layer or sunscreen and then a main camera compartment completely separated below. It's got hip belts or that that part that goes around your hips. If you are carrying a heavy pack. You can obviously take those out if you don't need them, and it's just really comfortable, really ergonomic. It's got the water bottle pockets. It's got the tripod holds. It is a smart design and it's not too heavy either. So, yes, the Action Backpack Series from Shimoda Designs. I'm in love with it. They are sponsoring this episode. I want to give them a big thanks and shout out.
Speaker 1:In addition, I want to thank arthelperai. This is an online software and, as you could tell from the ai, this is an artificial intelligence program. It's pretty darn amazing because it takes all the guesswork. It all you know, just takes the work out of having to promote and market yourself as a photographer. A lot of times we creatives, we might like marketing but not know exactly how to do it, or we might like marketing but not know exactly how to do it, or we might not want to dabble in that at all. We want to spend our time taking the photographs, processing the photographs, learning how to take photographs by listening to this episode, but arthelperai takes the reins after you create that photo after you inject your creative vision. Just a little callback to today's episode. It's an amazing program and I've been dabbling with it over the last month or two and I'm really impressed with what I find it does everything from create content like blog posts and social posts. It helps you with keywords and titling of your photos and just this massive, massive suite of things that we need to be doing today in order to stay competitive as photographers, in order to kind of raise that bar and always go beyond what the next photographer might be doing in order to be marketable. So if you are into photography, especially if you're looking to get into some sort of paid type photography, it's an incredible, incredible asset. If you use the code wild that's just W I L D, like the name of this podcast as a promo code, you will get your first month, 30 days of a free trial of this software so you can try before you buy. So W-I-L-D there, I'm really really quite a big fan.
Speaker 1:Last but not least, lensrentalscom. They've been a longtime supporter of this podcast. If you use the promo code WILDPHOTOGRAPHER15. You guessed it you get 15% off your entire order of LensRentalscom and I'm a huge advocate of what they do, not just because of the style they do it and the professionalism and the incredible assortment, but just the ability to rent lenses before you buy them, or just rent lenses that are specialty for a certain trip. So go on LensRentalscom, shop around, look around. They are an incredible outfit. Can't recommend them highly enough, and I want to thank them very much for sponsoring the podcast.
Speaker 1:Okay, now one last little thing, a little bit of quick self-promo. I invite you to not only subscribe to this podcast, but go over and check out my YouTube channel, where I post a lot of these videos. They do have a video component. It's usually just me yapping at the camera, but it's another way to listen to my podcast. Let's say, if you're on a computer and you want to stream from the internet, if you don't want to play from the podcast platform you're used to playing, it is now available on YouTube, and subscribing to my channel on YouTube is honestly one of the best ways you can help me. So if you would like to do that, I certainly invite you to do so and without further ado, let's get into today's episode.
Speaker 1:We're talking about five techniques to inject creative vision into your photography. The first thing I'm going to talk about is composition. So we've of course heard well if you've listened to this podcast or read other photo articles about other more traditional types of composition. So I'm not going to go into the rule of thirds, although it's super important. That's kind of old hat at this point especially if you've been listening to me for a little while not going to talk about leading lines.
Speaker 1:I'm going to talk about a different type of composition here, and this is again getting back to that core of the episode which is injecting that creative vision. I'm talking about exaggerating composition, and what this does I always say, especially when I talk about the quote unquote rules of composition is that all rules are meant to be broken. Exaggerating composition is a really in your face breaking of that rule of thirds. It is exaggerating composition such that you purposely use well, let's call it like the rule of tenths or the rule of fifths or the rule of 20th, when you have that horizon line but a big, beautiful sky, when you have incredible shimmery ocean water on an otherwise relatively uneventful horizon, I'm going to exaggerate composition such that that median line, that horizon line or even lines found in nature, I'm going to put that at an extreme end of my photo.
Speaker 1:What this does is it really showcases the grandeur of the scene. So, as you can imagine, it's not necessarily used for every shot, but when you're in big scenes or you're in front of big features like massive towering waterfalls, even with big wildlife, I use this technique. Now I will use it in different ways depending on the scene, but the overall idea is, instead of placing that horizon line at the third points and you want to showcase that massive sky, that sweeping meadow, that huge forest that's just lined with trees or a massive braided river system, I'm going to think about how can I exaggerate composition to put part of that scene in just a little sliver of my shot. It creates this really, really artistic version of your photo. So intentionally breaking the rule of thirds and exaggerating your composition. The other way I'm going to do it I kind of alluded to this with wildlife is oftentimes if I have an animal especially, I really like this with big, charismatic animals bears and whales and things like that I will actually put that way, way in the corner of my shot.
Speaker 1:So you've heard me say before, with traditional rules of composition, like the rule of thirds, is you generally put the animal, the wildlife, the subject. If it's a person, same rules apply here is you usually put them at one of the intersecting points of the rule of thirds. With this exaggerated composition technique, I'm showcasing this big animal in an otherwise very, very massive landscape. And so that scale, that comparison, that contrast, that juxtaposition, let's say, of putting it deep in the frame, at that bottom 10th of the frame or just very far in the left-hand corner, it makes attention in the photo. That's like wow, why is it so far out of my main viewpoint? You know, of course our eyes are drawn to those intersecting points, which is why we use them so much in photography. But then, when you tell the viewer to scan the photo and look all the way in the corner, when you see that polar bear, you see that big bull, elk, and then you see this massive landscape that has a meadow and mountains and wildflowers and a river, all of a sudden it minimizes that animal in a very, very deliberate way, through exaggeration, to then showcase hey, big animal, cool animal. I could have obviously showcased this animal, but let's look at this landscape, let's look at this forest, let's look at the rest of the scene. So exaggerating composition is something that I always well, at this point, kind of subconsciously look for, but it's something that you might want to start paying attention to, especially as you line up photos to things like the rule of thirds and start thinking how could I break these rules and exaggerate my composition? Try it out. It's going to give you what I believe to be really, really dramatic creative results.
Speaker 1:The next thing we're going to talk about has to do with shutter speed, and it's known as intentional motion blur, and this falls into two main categories, and essentially what we're trying to do is add blur into the scene through slow shutter speeds. Usually, what we're trying to do is, when we're photographing wildlife or photographing even landscapes, we're trying to stop the motion. There aren't many cases where we're trying to intentionally blur. There is that one exception that I've even done entire episodes on of the silky water effect, one of my favorite ways to add motion blur. But this goes way beyond that. We're talking about adding blur into the scene that generally nine times out of 10, 19 times out of 20, you're not going to expect to see blur in the scene. So what am I talking about here?
Speaker 1:Well, this might be on a breezy day, photographing a big forest or a landscape scene where you know there's movement, you know the leaves are swaying, you know the grasses are moving and you're shooting at a slow shutter speed and actually capturing that movement of the vegetation, capturing movement of the grasses. Wildlife falls into this bucket as well. What if you have a cheetah running across the plains of Africa? What if you have two polar bears sparring? The first thing that comes to mind which again I'm trying to tune you and kind of get you off of that first thing we're talking about the next level, creativity here is what if you go to a slow shutter, like one 10th of a second, one 20th of a second, and actually get the motion of that polar bears paw sort of slapping the other polar bear? What if you get that cheetah where its legs are blurred but its body is a little bit more stationary and you see that motion?
Speaker 1:It's almost like adding a video element into your photography and this works really really darn well. Let's talk for a moment about what those shutter speeds are, because you may accurately be thinking well, I can't shoot so slow that I need a tripod, because I'm probably going to be handheld in these cases, especially wildlife, right? So we're really talking about a shutter speed that allows you to hand hold but also captures movement of the animal. So the next thing to think about as well we're we're probably looking at animal that does have some sort of pretty rapid movement, because we're going to be shooting at a shutter speed of something like one over 30, one over 40, where if we hold our camera really still, we can probably get most everything else relatively crisp and in focus. But that animal is going to inject a lot of movement in the scene. And don't Look at my 1 over 30, 1, 40th of a second as a hard and fast rule. Sometimes even 1, 100th of a second will work, especially with a swinging orangutan in Borneo or a leaping lemur using alliterations here just for the fun of it Leaping lemurs in Madagascar.
Speaker 1:That's a lot of movement, a lot of motion, and if you shoot something at 1, 60th of a second, you're going to get that motion in the scene and because you're doing it intentionally, it falls into this bucket of an intentional motion blur. So the advice here is, of course, the first thing that comes to mind is the sort of quote, unquote, normal vision of freezing that motion, getting that animal and tack sharp focus. We love that Viewers love that. People that look and maybe even buy your photos are going to love that classic look. But a way to elevate your photography, especially in a creative direction, is to very quickly move on and go towards that slow shutter.
Speaker 1:And just to kind of recap, we're talking about slow shutters somewhere, let's just say, between one tenth and one eightieth of a second. That's kind of the range that's going to be a sweet spot here. Anything slower than that, there's no way you're going to handhold it, even on wide angle lenses with a lot of stabilization, and anything faster than that is probably going to just be a little bit too fast. So any sort of blur that does appear in the scene doesn't look intentional. You're really trying to get a lot of blur, wispy, smooth, ribbon-like motion of that animal, of that leaping lemur I'm just going to keep on saying leaping lemurs because that just sounds fun. Right, you can visualize that. But there's another kind of motion blur that I want to marry this idea with and you don't have to use this in concert with a moving animal, but you certainly can and that's actually blurring the entire scene.
Speaker 1:So I just kind of hampered on this idea of keeping the camera still, while the subject is moving, this next thing is actually moving the entire camera, and that can be bad in some cases and it can be really good in others. I think we get, I think we fall into this trap that everything has to be in tack sharp focus all the time. And if you listen to my recent episode on how to get tack sharp focus each and every time, you may be saying, corp, you are just very contradictory today, but that's the idea. That's the idea of injecting creative vision. So the process for creating intentional motion blur across the entire scene is being willing and intentional about moving your camera, and so one really great example you can try in your own backyard, you know, really right now, today, right after listening to this podcast, is take your camera out there, set it on a slow shutter of something like one half a second or one 10th of a second and as you press that shutter button down, move your camera, uh, move it from left to right, top to bottom.
Speaker 1:Sometimes I actually literally rotate my camera kind of like around a clock, like going clockwise, and it creates this swirly circular blur and this is really really compelling for certain scenes. I do find this can be married with the previous technique of tracking moving wildlife at a slow shutter. So not only is the wildlife extra blurred because it's moving, but your camera just panning left to right or right to left adds a little bit of a blur in the scene. This streaking of the, you know, imagine that cheetah on the savannas of Africa. Imagine if those grasses are streaking because your camera's moving left to right. And then the cheetah you can see the legs are kind of moving in a circular fashion. So they have this rotational blur and you get this really, really artistic, very creative photo. So that is intentional motion blur, really artistic, very creative photo. So that is intentional motion blur.
Speaker 1:You have two main categories where you're trying to keep the scene relatively still, but the subject moving, and then the other category is to actually blur the entire scene and that's all done by slow shutter. So if you haven't yet listened to my podcast or experiment with slow shutter speeds something you're going to have to do in order to take these shots that's something you can do on iPhones and point and shoots. It's a little bit more in the menu system, but if you have a bigger camera and you're used to shooting on shutter speed priority or the TV mode, shoot at those slow shutter speeds and again, if you're moving the entire scene, we're actually quite a bit slower than if we're just getting the movement from the animal. So we're in the realm of a half a second to like maybe one 15th of a second. But the real trick here is to go out and experiment with this, because it's obviously really, really hard to depict or explain or really understand if you haven't seen examples of this and it's something that I'm hearing more and more of from my pro photographer buddies of doing this and trying it out in the field, and because we're always trying to photograph things differently. As we see more and more of the same photos online on social media, this is a very, very creative way to inject some sort of new vision, new portrayal of things you might be photographing quite often. Or if you've already photographed something on a photo trip multiple times, like you've already photographed your 10th lion when you're on a safari in Botswana and you say, well, how can I do this differently? Well, intentional motion blur is that way.
Speaker 1:The third technique I'm going to talk about is a top-down perspective, and this is probably the least fancy, maybe most slightly obvious of all, and that it's simply just photographing things with a very top-down perspective, and what that means is putting your camera so you're pointing directly down at what you're photographing. This is especially easy on smartphones, especially easier on smaller point-and-shoots because they are smaller. You can point your camera over a barrel of blueberries or of spices in an Indian market. But just getting that top-down perspective is something that we, as viewers, are very unlikely to see. We usually are not on top of baskets of strawberries or on top of wildflowers with that very, very direct, top-down perspective. However, when you take a photo that way, it gives this unique view to anyone that is lucky enough to look at your photo, that is lucky enough to look at your photo. So the technique is very, very simple.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna start with smartphones, because I think that's actually one of the easiest and best ways to use this technique. I use this when I'm in markets a lot, so if I see amazing fruits and vegetables or even things like baskets of eggs or dried fish, wherever it might be, when I see patterns, like lots of patterns, when there's a lot of texture and there's good contrast, I'm just going to take my phone. I'm going to hold it where my thumb is actually on the volume down button and the camera. I'm going to be very, very deliberate about making sure my camera is completely flat, so everything in that barrel, everything on that display table, is equidistant from my lens. That way everything's in pretty good, crisp focus and because my thumb is on that volume down button, I can actually use that to take the photo. On the vast majority of smartphones these days, if you use the volume down button, that's like a mechanical or an actual shutter button on your phone. That way you can operate your camera with just one hand, reaching over that barrel or bushel or what have you of the contents that you're trying to get a top down photo of. This works really well for things like river rocks and streams, grasses, even tree saplings. It's a really unique perspective that I very much advocate for.
Speaker 1:So I wanted to start with smartphones because they are easier, but the technique is pretty much the same with your bigger, fancier cameras. Essentially, what I'm going to do is have some sort of wide angle lens on. Usually I'm not going to be able to see in the LCD screen. I'm not going to be real worried about my settings, other than making sure it's fast enough to prevent any sort of hand movement of the camera. We do want this style to be in focus and tack sharp, although, I should say honestly, combining these techniques makes for the ultimate creativity. So if you want to inject that camera motion at the same time, very, very cool.
Speaker 1:But since you're hovering over that subject again, we're just going to use this barrel of spices in an Indian market or this basket of strawberries you might see in Mexico. You can put it over, fill the frame with it and again, normal way would be to just take that photo. Don't worry too much about depth of field, it's going to be fine. Like an F5.6 or F8 is just fine. Smartphones and their automatic settings are great, but you're going to reach with that one hand and just take that photo, making sure. If there's anything you're really making sure about is that you're just perfectly over your subject and you're not at an angle. You're not askew because because then all of a sudden it's a different photo. You're trying to provide a perspective that people don't generally see. And again, bonus points, brownie points. If you combine that with some of these other techniques, then you're going to get an even more creative photograph. But yes, top down perspective is something I love to do, especially with cultural travel market photography. Try it your next time. Heck, you can even try it next time you go to the grocery store and you see that scene before you where there's a flat barrel, a flat bushel, a flat display table. Try that, and you're going to really like the results.
Speaker 1:The fourth creative technique is black and white photography, and this is something that I highly recommend you get into if you haven't done already. It's one of those things that are oftentimes afterthoughts, because in this world of digital photography, it's just so easy to take a color photograph and then say, oh yeah, that could be cool Black and white. I can do it later, I can desaturate on the computer, and that's fine, and if that's your technique, that's a okay, there's nothing wrong with that. But I do oftentimes especially with smartphones and point and shoot cameras is I will set it to black and white, to not only, you know basically cue my mind to remember that that scene is seemed to be pretty good for black and white, but it also takes one step out of the equation and it forces me to think in that black and white photography. So what's so lovely about this is not only is it a very different type, a very creative type of photography that we just don't see that much anymore. But it's also something that is going to really yield itself, lend itself to high contrast scenes.
Speaker 1:There are always times in any photo trip, in any photo journey, in any time that you're out taking photographs, where the light is a little bit too harsh. The bright tones are too bright, the dark shadows are too dark. With black and white photography, it's fantastic when you have high contrast, it really provides a very ominous, surreal, artistic look. So I do. I actually have a setting in my camera where I can just tap one button and instantly go to black and white photography. In fact it's. It's a special app with the Leica Lux app. It's a free app now in the app store that I'm just in love. With Leica, the famous wonderful camera brand Lux L-U-X, I can actually set what would be kind of like a desktop shortcut it's just like the home screen shortcut to go straight into black and white photography, and I even have it set on high contrast black and white photography and I'm just loving, loving the results. One thing to go further is, as you're editing those black and white photos on a computer, is you can even boost the contrast. You can darken the shadows, darken the black points, increase the whites and the brightnesses, and it's amazing what you can do to seemingly normal scenes to make them really moody, really dramatic, at various times a day. So can't recommend this highly enough to experiment with black and white photography on your next photo trip, on your next photo journey. Definitely try that out. Make it easier on yourself by maybe having your smartphone set on black and white for the day and then your bigger, fancier camera on normal photography or vice versa. That way, when you see that scene, when you're thinking a little bit creative, you can grab your camera and quickly take a black and white photo without fussing with the settings.
Speaker 1:The last thing I'm going to talk about goes back to camera angles. But this is not obviously the top down angle. I'm talking about the angle your camera is physically at, as if you're pointing it straight in front of you. Normally we have it where the horizon is quite level and I think people get lost in this idea that you should have every horizon and every flat horizontal line as flat as it can be, where we're constantly going into the computer afterwards and we're straightening and adjusting, but there's no rule that says you have to keep your camera exactly level.
Speaker 1:In fact, oftentimes, especially when I'm in forests or again in markets and travel scenes around temples and unique areas that have this unique energy and vibe I'm shooting with my camera on a 45 degree angle, such that my camera is truly making a 45 degree angle to horizon. And I do this not only to just inject a different angle but also to kind of match leading lines in the environment. So one of the most common times I do this is when I'm in big forests, especially forests where maybe, like a storm has gone through or I'm just seeing trees that are already kind of leaning one direction and I actually use that leaning tree to make a little bit of a frame around my shot. So I will turn my camera so the right side or left side of my frame is completely parallel to that tree, meaning everything else is at an angle. I'm probably shooting with my camera at a 45 degree angle because that tree's at a 45 degrees, so I'm making it look as if that tree is sort of like a normal upright tree, but then everything else is tilted and I can't begin to tell you how many cool effects and how many cool photos I've gotten from this technique.
Speaker 1:So when you think of creativity, you're thinking outside the box, you're thinking outside the lines. In this case, you're using other lines. You're just changing your perspective and changing your camera angle. There is no rule that says your camera needs to be flat and parallel to the horizon at all times, so changing your camera angle is a really, really great, creative technique. So those are five camera techniques, but I'm going to add a bonus one in here. It's one that I just thought of as I was sort of constructing and thinking about this podcast episode, and it is using spot metering, like forcing yourself to use spot metering.
Speaker 1:So, for those that don't know, spot metering is a way for your camera to basically figure out how much light to add in the scene. So most of us, including me, I'm shooting like 99% of the time on a full screen evaluative mode, meaning my camera is looking at all the lights and the darks in the screen and it's trying to figure out what an average lighting is, and that's what our eyes do, our eyes adjust and it's trying to figure out what an evenly lit scene might be, such that the whites aren't too bright, the darks aren't too dark, and it's something in the middle. This is like a normal photo, such that you are taking a photo very much like what you're seeing in the moment. However, spot metering what it does is it selects just the very, very dead middle of your scene as the only place that it meters, the only place that chooses light is when you're photographing wildlife that might be in thickets or in deep brush, like little birds in trees, or animals that might be backlit from the sky. Classic example where you can't quite figure out what the metering, what the light should be, because the light in the rest of the scene, besides the animal, is so harsh or so dramatic and so different that you say, oh gosh, all I really care about is the light on the animal. So spot metering is great.
Speaker 1:However, what I'm saying here is that's the sort of normal, typical way to use spot metering. In a pinch, I'm saying set your camera on spot metering for an entire day Now. Don't go botching the rest of your photos. If you're on some sort of epic wildlife safari and you're never going to be there again, but walking around town, walking around the city, especially with people photography, it's a really, really incredible way to take photos. It is going to really change the lighting of your photo. It's going to be very, very bright or very, very dark for a lot of the photos you take. In some cases it's going to be right on in a very again normal lighting scheme.
Speaker 1:But we're trying to inject a creative vision into your photography and so this spot metering means that only the thing in the middle of your frame is going to have that quote unquote perfect lighting. Everything else, if it's a really, really bright day out there, and the walls in the background, if the ground and the foreground is very sunlit and that subject is in the shadows, it's going to brighten everything a lot, because that subject in the shadows is going to be the thing your camera tries to get a properly exposed lighting on. It's the exact contrast. If you have your subject in bright sunlight and everything else is shadowy around it, it's going to darken that subject because it has so much light on it at the expense of everything else. So it's a really cool way. Again, the only way to understand and properly see this technique is to go out and experiment with it, but you will want to put your camera on spot metering and it's going to give you some really, really fascinating results.
Speaker 1:One quick caveat is you may have guessed this is that this is going to require you to put your subject in pretty much the dead middle of your frame each and every time. This is something that I usually don't advise. Usually we go to the rule of thirds or we go to exaggerated composition, which is my first tip in this episode, and we put them outside the middle of the frame. So if you don't want your ending photo to be some person or some animal in the smack dab middle and you want to go to one of those rules because, again, nine times out of 10, that is a better looking photo because of just general rules of aesthetics the way I compensate for this is I will shoot a little bit wider than you might want in your ending photo. So what that does? It allows me to take the photo with my subject in the middle with that really, really interesting lighting scheme, but then when I'm cropping on the computer, I can actually realign that subject to be in the right third, the left third and the bottom right intersecting point. So zooming out or shooting wider and then planning the crop is a way to compensate for that and it works very, very well, and there you go Five tips.
Speaker 1:Well, six tips, five tips and a bonus tip of how to inject creative vision into your photography. Again, the more you stack on your photos I'm not saying all these are appropriate for every photo out there Some photos you can combine a couple of these, some photos you should just shoot normal. But adding creative vision to your photography is what's going to really set you apart. At the end of the day, you need to like your photos best, but doing something different is a sure way to make sure you have a refreshed lens on your own photography. It's sure to attract more attention from those viewing your photos, whether you're sharing with friends or family, or on social media or on a website or on a blog. It's going to level up your game. It's gonna give you maybe, what I would even say a renewed vigor for photography, because photography as an art form is all about that creativity.
Speaker 1:If you enjoyed this episode, please do consider sending to a friend. The best way to get the word out there is telling others. I don't really market the podcast all that much, so if you want to forward this on to someone, I would be eternally grateful. You can also check out my YouTube channel at Court Whalen on YouTube and you can forward things on from there. You can also visit my website, where I have all my podcasts and also a lot of my own photography at courtwhalencom, court, whalen. All my podcasts and also a lot of my own photography at court whalencom, court whalen, c-o-u-r-t-w-h-e-l-a-n. You can also on my website. You can sign up for a blog that I write. Uh, what I'll do is I'll write, usually, uh once every couple weeks, about photography topics, travel topics, conservation topics, things that inspire me, and those will go to your email inbox, should you wish. So thank you so much for being a part of this podcast. Thank you so much for following along and I look forward to talking to you next time.
