Right now I am teaching a semi-private photography to six of the most fun and entertaining guys you could meet. The class has been a real treat for me as it has forced me to think back to the fundamentals of photography. It’s easy to get caught up in the excitement of new techniques, new gear, new ideas… as it should be.
But underlying it all is a basic foundation of photographic principles; light, exposure, composition. Nail those and you have winning photographs!
Last night’s class left the planned agenda a bit but it couldn’t have been a better session. One of the questions asked was, when you walk into a scene (going out in the field, etc.) what do you check first? Expecting an answer about setting my ISO or my aperture first, I thought for a moment and said “the picture”.
Learning to see the picture in your mind’s eye is a crucial and critical step in the image making process. If you can’t see it before you shoot it, you won’t see it after you shoot it. It really is that simple.
I went on to say that I approach my wedding and portraiture photography the same way. Long before I start thinking about the technical aspects of an image, I see the image first. Knowing what I want to create dictates the rest.
