Biography | Livingstone Website
by Terry Livingstone |
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Don’t stop now We’ve all done it. We find ourselves in a great photo situation. And we do all the things it takes to get the shot – carefully composing, metering, focusing, etc. So far so good. But then after firing the shutter, we mentally pat ourselves on the back for a job well done, and just walk away. And that’s where we go wrong. Here’s the secret to getting better at nature photography: don’t stop after the first shot! Because where there’s one good picture, there are at least three good pictures. Okay, so maybe this isn’t much of a secret. But it is one of the things that separate productive photographers from disappointed ones. In any given situation, there is usually an obvious image that presents itself to us. The red sun poised above the horizon at sunset, the bright patch of autumn color on a hillside, the majestic waterfall pouring over a cliff. Whatever the subject, we respond to it immediately and intuitively. It’s a no-brainer. It’s an obvious photo opportunity. But I’ve noticed, in years of teaching photo workshops and shooting with groups of photographers, that not everyone sees the same way. What may be an obvious photo for one person goes unnoticed by another. And there’s an important lesson here: the first, most obvious photo we see is not the only one to be had – and not necessarily even the best one. In other words, wherever there is one good photo opportunity, there’s more than one. The trick is to see beyond the obvious shot. After you get that first photo, take a little time to look around. Explore the situation from different points of view. Try using different lenses, or various focal lengths on your zoom lens. If you used a telephoto lens for the first shot, see what you can do with a wide angle. And vice versa. Shoot both vertical and horizontal compositions of the same subject. Look for lines to incorporate into your images, or relationships between near and far elements that can be exaggerated with a wide angle perspective. Look for contrasts in colors. Look for small details of the scene, patterns or textures that can stand on their own, visually. The possibilities are truly endless. Here are a few examples, from a workshop on the Gulf coast of Florida’s Panhandle. |
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I took my workshop group to a deserted beach, where we waited, standing in the dark and shivering in the wind, for the sunrise. I was hoping we’d get a shot of the sun as it first appears over the horizon. The morning before, when scouting the location by myself, heavy clouds had hidden the eastern sky, and there was no sunrise to see. On this morning we were lucky. It was pretty darn close to perfect. |
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I started with the Tamron AF70-300mm lens, and then switched to a Tamron AF200-500mm, to make the sun bigger in the frame. |
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Then I noticed a tidal pool just a few feet from where I was standing. I pulled out one of my favorite lenses, the Tamron SP
AF28-75mm Di, and took a wider view, from a low vantage point. The wide angle let me emphasize the foreground, and create a diagonal line to lead the viewers’ eye toward the horizon. |
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Try to always shoot both vertical and horizontal versions of everything. Quite often the version that was an afterthought turns out to be the strongest image. |
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The same as the previous shot, but a slightly lower camera angle, to leave out the sun. |
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The wind ripples in the tidal pool at my feet caught my eye, and I couldn’t resist a few semi-abstract variations on that theme, again with the Tamron AF70-300mm. |
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Of course, I’m not saying we can always get lots of good pictures, every time we take out our camera. Sometimes if the light isn’t photogenic, or my perceptual skills just aren’t working like they should, I’ll walk around for hours, and not fire even a single frame. But in those places where there is a good photo, after you get the first one, assume that there are 3 or 4 more pictures nearby – just waiting for you to find them. |
If you make this a habit, you’ll soon start to sharpen your perception. You’ll learn to see better. And when that happens you’ll not only enjoy the process of photography more than ever before, you’ll become a better photographer as well. |
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