Practical Photography - UK (2019-09)

AboveThesetwoimages,takenat thesametimeof dayat thesamelocation,

demonstratehowtwophotographerscanhaveverydifferentshootingstyles.

romablack

There’snobetterwaytodemonstratethe

natureof photographicstylethanto let

twophotographersinterpretthesame

lo cation.PPst affersLouiseCareyand

Ri chardCollinsarrivedat PenmonPoint

in NorthWales– a favouredlocation

forla ndscapephotographers– at the

sa metimeon thesameday,andwere

pr esentedwithidenticalconditionsin

which to shoot.Bothphotographers

us edsimilarequipment– full-frame

DSLRs– andbothhadlimitedtimein

whichto work.Beyondthoseconstraints,

ea chphotographerwasfreeto interpret

th e scenein anywaytheypleased.

Ri chard’snaturalaffinityforthe

mi nimalistaestheticsawhimmakeuse

ofthesweeping,monochromaticnature

oftheforeshoreto leadtheeyetowards

thedistantlighthouse,whileLouisetook

advantageof thevariousrockpools

dottedaroundnearthelighthouse;

bygettingcloseto thefloor,shewas

able tocapturea partialreflection.

one location shot by two

di fferentphotographers

casestudy

shot1 richard

shot 2 louise

Find Your Style

PracticalPhotograPhy.com 35

leveller in the form of the camera. if two
people point a camera at the same subject,
under the same conditions, using the
same settings, they will produce
essentially identical images. But while
a camera may be a mute documenter of
the photo-realistic, with thought and
imagination, a photographer with their
own style can use it to produce images
that are unique to them.

Develop your individuality
it would be very unusual to demonstrate
a distinctive photographic style in the
first few shots you ever take. Style is
generally honed, sometimes through
years of practice, and sometimes via
a natural gift for visual intuition.
certainly, you need to have a decent
grounding in the technical aspects of
photography before you can think about
developing your own style, though it’s
not necessary to be a camera whiz who
knows all the settings by rote and only
ever shoots in full manual mode.
the process of developing a style
may require time and effort, and is
undoubtedly tricky to teach, but there
are some steps you can take to speed the
process along – and over the following
pages we aim to help you find your way...

Developing a style takes

time. Keep shooting until

it becomes second nature.