LocalNavy433 Photography

Hello and how the hell are you?  If this is your first time here thanks for stopping by.  In this blog we are going to cover two tips that you need to improve your Landscape Photography or your photography in general.   It might come as a shock to you but as a photographer I once sucked really bad at taking photos.  I didn’t know how to compose a photo to save my life.  Hell I didn’t even know what that meant.  I was so lost that all I would do is pull up my camera and take a photo and thought that it was the best image in the world.  Man oh man I miss those days because it was so much fun just taking the photos with no worries about how good the image was.  

I mean for the longest time I was just about going out to shoot just to shoot a sunset or sunrise.  I was all about just capturing the skies with all the colors and thought that I was so good.  I was wrong in that thought process but in the end it helped me to learn what makes a great photo.  Over time we all start to realized there is more to photography than just putting the camera to our faces and taking the shot that looks cool.  Over time and lots of images we see that you need so many layers to a photo.  

There is two tips that I can give you to help your photography grow and help you see the world in a whole new light.  The first of those tips has to be time.  I know it seems so simple but over time you will see what makes a great photo by learning with every shot that you take.  You will also read articles like this just to try and grow your knowledge base to get better.  The fact is the more time that you take the better you will be.  You can only get better than you were the last time that you went out to shoot.  This measurement is the one and only thing that you can see happen with every image that you take.  

If you go back and look at when you first started you will see so much growth in your images.  Time after time you will look back at the body of work that you created and you will start to see the steps of growth.  I didn’t believe this for the first two years that I was shooting because during that time you see so much growth that you will wonder how to get better faster because you feel that is the pace that you need to grow. That is when I learned the second part to these tips. 

Practice is the second tip and that is because the more you work on photography the more you grow as a photographer.  “Practice makes perfect” and how many times have you heard that if you have a sports background.  There is there is merit in that quote due to the fact that you will learn what not to do.  When I was a welder I was told by an older Ironworker now that you are a certified welder you have a license to practice.  The same can be said about you and your camera.  NOW that you have your camera you have the license to practice.  

The only tool that you need is that camera and lens that you have.  The only other tool that you need is your brain because you need to build that muscle up to remember what works and what doesn’t.  You see all the great images on line but what you are not seeing is all the failed attempts at taking the same comp at different times trying to make it work.  The failure ratio is high and I mean high.  For example, I went out to shoot sunset the other night and took over 200 images and only one ended up being what I feel is good enough.  You see at the end of the day no matter how long you have been shooting you will still be practicing.  

I am not saying to go out and spray and pray and hope that you get a good image.  There was plenty of thought that went into to all the images and I worked the scene like no other and tried to time it just right to get the photo that I wanted but they never worked out.  The Irony was the best shot that I took that night was the first image that I took when I was reacting to the light and not trying to force an image like the other 199 images.  

I have learned when out practicing to listen to my gut for what to shoot.  The reason for that is I have been shooting for five years and I have trained my eye to see the shot right away.  I take that shot and then try to make a better image after I have that one in the bank.  Sometimes it works and sometime like the other night it fails and that is fine because sometimes you will not even get a usable image.  The fact is on sessions like that you learn what didn’t work and you know how to make it work next time.  

At the end of the day there is only two things that you need to be the best photographer that you can be and that is time and practice.  So stop reading this and get out there and take your time and practice your craft my friends.  The more that you do that the more you will grow and be able to get those images that you want.  Thanks for stopping by and enjoy from St Johns y’all