Jim's Top Ten Photography Tips

1. 

   Work the Reflections

   Reflections always add visual drama to pictures and can make an otherwise ordinary scene interesting. But reflections require calm waters so get out early in the morning before the winds kick up. Just a few minutes can make the difference between glassy calm and a freshening breeze that turns the waters choppy. Also, get lower and closer to the surface of the water to get more reflections. Even a small puddle of water can produce large reflections if you are right down to the surface.

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   Work the Reflections

2. 

   Work With Shapes

   The red sumac that I found out on the prairie was pretty, but what was really interesting was how the shape of the branch mimicked the shapes of the white clouds against the blue sky. Looking around to find graphic elements to use as building blocks for pictures is one way to turn a humdrum situation into something elegant. In this case I picked out just one branch to focus on and moved around, finally getting down low, to make it line up with the clouds.

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   Work With Shapes

3. 

   Keep an Eye Out for Shadows

   It doesn't happen everyday, but occasionally a great shadow will make a great picture. Looking around this churchyard in Kirkwall, Orkney, I found the scene nice enough, but not particularly exciting. Then I happened to see how the shadow of the craggy old tree lined up with the gravestones and I had my picture. Often you'll need to get up higher to see the shadows well, and you'll need to tune your eye to see how dark they can be and what sorts of interesting shapes they may form.

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   Keep an Eye Out for Shadows

4. 

   Collect the Details

   Detail pictures do wonders for a set of travel pictures. Not only do they offer a welcome variety in the scale of the images (pictures get dull quickly when they are all shot from the same distance and viewpoint). They can also reveal telling aspects of a place and its story. Such was the case when the Mayor of Dartmouth, England, came aboard the National Geographic Explorer festooned in her official regalia of office. Not only was it a telling detail, it was colorful as well.

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   Collect the Details

5. 

   Move Around to the Back

   Moving around and trying different viewpoints is always a good idea, but too often we don't go far enough. Going clear around to the backside of the action can make images that offer a fresh perspective. Too often we follow old habits and shoot everything from the front. Certainly when I was trying to photograph these guys playing boules in Brittany I was frustrated that I couldn't get all the action in one picture. That's when I went around behind the player. Suddenly I could see exactly what was going on.

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   Move Around to the Back

6. 

   Shoot Through the Flowers

   This is a simple trick that can utterly transform your flower pictures. Get in close with a telephoto and shoot thorough the clutter of flowers, focusing on a flower somewhat further away. You'll have to look for a wee opening amongst the blossoms to peek through, and you'll have to be much closer to the flowers in the foreground than you ever imagined. But when you pick up the trick you'll suddenly have a way of adding color and variety to the composition while keeping just one flower in sharp focus.

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   Shoot Through the Flowers

7. 

   Keep It Simple

   Clutter kills too many pictures. Simplicity is powerful. Usually that means cleaning up the background, leaving out extraneous, unnecessary detail. So watch your framing carefully, and especially watch the edges of the frame. For example, this Norwegian wooden boat had such simple, dramatic lines, it just begged to be made the total, uncontested center of interest of the picture. The mountain side in shade on the far side of the lake was the perfect background, but I had to very carefully leave out a house just to the left of the picture, and a shaft of light falling on trees to the right of the picture. By leaving them out I got a perfectly simple blue background.

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   Keep It Simple

8. 

   Welcome Weird Colors

   Look for great color and then fill the frame with it. This street in Arles, Provence, was an absolute riot of colors, at once strange, eerie, and exciting. With so many weird light sources there was no hope of capture "correct" color. But then, many photographers worry too much about getting the white balance right, when the odd colors of the real world are perfect material for great pictures.

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   Welcome Weird Colors

9. 

   Work Hard for Action

   Action pictures stand out from the crowd. The vast majority of pictures are static pictures, pictures where nothing is moving and very little is going on. Action pictures are much rarer, and they just shout for attention, even if they are not perfect. And you'll have a lot of pictures that aren't quite perfect when you go after action. Note that I never did get this distillery worker's face very sharp. That's OK. The power of a dynamic action picture can often make up for small failings. But when the magic happens, action pictures can be powerful.

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   Work hard for action

10. 

    Strong Patterns Make Strong Pictures

    Patterns work in pictures for the same reason they work in the real world. Our brain is hard-wired to recognize patterns and we love playing the mental games of figuring them out. So whenever you see a pattern (and if you travel to Morocco, like I did, you are going to see a lot of them) then go to work. The main mistake photographers make is going in too close and making the pattern too simple. In this picture there are myriad patterns played off each other, but the design is strong enough to maintain a sense of harmonious order. Finding that balance is the hard part of pattern pictures.

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    Strong Patterns Make Strong Pictures