In today’s blog I thought I’d share th answer to a question I hear almost daily.  “What can I do to take better photographs?”  Well, here are my five tips for taking better photos (no matter what camera you have)

1 – When photographing landscapes take a minute or two to look through your viewfinder and study everything that will feature in your shot, starting in the middle and working out towards the corners.  You will be surprised how many times you find some unwanted object creeping into your shot.  To fix this, crop your shot tighter or try and change the angle you are shooting from.

2 – Another great tip to take better photos is to try and change the angle which you are taking the photo from.  Think about it, what is the angle people normally see the world from?  When they are standing upright, so get onto a balcony and take the photo from there or try and lie on your tummy and take the shot from really low down so that your composition goes from plain to interesting.

3 – My third tip for taking better photos if you are photographing people in midday, is to try and move them to a spot where most of their face is in the shade.  This will get rid of “squinting eyes”,  distracting highlights on the face and harsh shadows under the eyes and chin.

4 – At number four we have the age old piece of advice to “split your viewfinder” into thirds.  Use your imagination to divide your viewfinder into 9 equal sized blocks and when photographing a person try and position the subject at a space where two of these imaginary lines cross.  The same applies to landscapes, unless you have a perfectly calm river where you are capturing a clear reflection, try and place the horizon so that there is either two thirds of sky or two thirds of land.  This will make your shot more visually appealing.

5 – Never stop experimenting…  Learn the rules to break them properly   How else do you think any kind of progress will ever be made?  Enjoy!!!

Riani