Pictures that tell a story

This post is is a reminder to me to think, before I press the button, why I’m taking the picture.  For me it’s easy to get lost in the mechanics of photography, thinking about composition and camera settings, but not actually think enough about what I’m trying to achieve with the picture I’m taking.  

Sometimes you see something and think that’ll make a great picture and that in itself is a good enough reason to press the button.  I’ll give you an example, we recently had a holiday in Scotland on the North Aberdeenshire coast.  The scenery is very special, if you haven’t been I’d recommend adding it to your bucket list.  Obviously with that kind of scenery there are plenty of photo opportunities and sure enough driving back to Aberdeen as we went over the brow of a hill this was the view.

I had to stop the car and take the picture, it looked beautiful.   Sometimes capturing a landscape to make a good picture can be difficult but the composition in this case looked pretty good to me with it’s leading line (the road) leading your eyes into the picture.

I love the picture and think it would look pretty good enlarged and hanging on the wall as a canvas or acrylic print.  However I knew I would be creating a photo book of the holiday so wanted to take a second picture to add context, to tell a story.  So here’s the second picture that’s now on the front cover of the photo book ‘Our Scottish Odyssey’.

I’ve got a second example taken on the canal Broadwalk in Milton Keynes.  The tree lined path, with the right light, makes for a great picture.  At the right time of day the light is really interesting and it’s pretty easy to get a good composition (usually with more leading lines).  So here’s the picture, which is on a canvas and has been used as a calming background in a dentist surgery.

This particular day we were both taking pictures so I took a second one to add context, to tell a story.  This picture was used by Milton Keynes Parks Trust on their 2018 calendar, they wanted to tell a story of people enjoying the parks in Milton Keynes with a variety of activities.

There’s no wrong and right answer with this post, sometimes you just take a picture because it looks good, but sometimes you want it to tell a story, to add context.  Just worth thinking before you press the button what the picture’s for.  But, hey, whatever you decide remember it’s digital, so take loads!

More soon,

Vaughan