What Makes a Great Travel Photograph.

As a travel photographer we have to deal with things that are out of our control, the weather, different customs, extreme lighting, over crowding. However, there are two things that we can control, the amount of time spent on setting up a photograph and your level of skill.

A great Travel Photograph is one that conjure emotion, tells a story a and provokes thought and discussion.

Its a sad fact but many of the great Travel icons such as the Taj Mahal, the Eiffel Tower or Macchu Pichu have virtually passed into our collective subconscious. Even people who have never travelled are un-amazed by the photos of these iconic symbols. We have become overfamiliar with these beautiful images.
The Travel photographer may be blown away when seeing the Eiffel Tower for the first time but a common response to someone viewing their travel photos is slight boredom.

Not anymore! As Travel Photographers we need to capture that excitement and ore we felt the first time we set eyes on that wonder. We need to draw in the audience and to do this we need to use our most powerful tool as a photographer, our creativity.

Getting creative, experimenting and being skillful with photography means your photographs will go from dull to inspiring.

Photography can come across as complicated but in reality it can be as simple as you want. Its not about achieving technical perfection, start with knowing the basics of exposure and how to adjust the depth of field. If you feel out of your depth use a automatic setting to start with.

We have to use different skills and techniques in order to get a variety of shots and
in difficult and unfamiliar conditions, but with time and practice your skills will become second nature. You don’t have to know everything there is to know about the manual settings on your camera you just have to use a bit of imagination and creativity. Be original.

Here are 4 simple rules that will help you be more creative and turn a good shot into a Great shot.

• Pre Visualize.

Its important to stop and think. Obviously if your photographing something fast moving this doesn’t apply. Plan your shot and really think about how its going to look. Think about the composition.

• Learn and play with the depth of field.

A simple but highly effective technique is to control the depth of field. If your unsure how this works learn about it here. Using this technique will simply bring your photography to life.

• Lighting and mood.

Try to match the mood of your photograph with the lighting. For example, a monsoon shower at Angkor W will mean your photograph is dark and moody, embrace this with a slow shutter speed to give movement, capture the shades and subtle tones of grey. Brighton beach in the summer is awash with colorful people and beach hunts, use a large depth of field and even flash to capture the bright fun feelings.

• Shoot at a different angle.

It may feel strange but get down on the floor, stand on that wall, get right up close and shoot from a different angle. look for interesting perspectives and shoot. Capture that huge castle from ground level to distort its dimensions.

There are many creative techniques we can use to simply bring your photographs to life, for example, Capturing the clouds and using lens flare to add interest.

So what makes a great photograph? Creativity mixed with a basic amount of skill. Theres no better way to perfect your technique than to just shoot.
You can photograph any thing and everything, just as long as your photographing something , playing with your creativity and practicing you skills. Here are some ideas to help you practice around the house and ideas to help you take more photographs.

Have fun!

Abby