Energizer Ultimate Photo Contest 2010

1. Top Ten Photo Tips

   #1 Wait It Out: Patience Pays

   

   'Twas a lovely day for watching life go by in Ireland. And I think I saw most of it as I sat there in Kilronan on the Aran Islands, waiting for this horse-drawn trap to come by. I waited and I waited and I waited some more. (Turns out it was their lunch break.) But finally I heard the familiar clip-clop coming and I was ready with my camera. In the end it paid off and I had my picture of the Celtic cross with Irish life all around. The photographic trick is to get everything all lined up and then be very patient and have faith that what you saw once will happen again.

    

2. Top Ten Photo Tips

   #2 Foreground Plus Background Equals Depth

   

   Everything was perfect that morning off the coast of Ireland. The sea of pink blooming flowers on the rocky shore, the sea like glass, the National Geographic Explorer waiting patiently while we explored. Each of them would have made a nice picture. Together they told a story. And by getting down low, very close to the flowers I was able to get it all in one picture. The big bonus was the way combining a close foreground with distant objects gave a great sense of depth to the picture.

    

3. Top Ten Photo Tips

   #3 Add a Splash of Color

   

   Adding color to a picture is a simple but valuable trick, even when you have a subject as wonderful as the Valhalla Ship's Figurehead Collection in the Scilly Isles. One such trick looks and sounds silly—until you try it. Here it is: frame your subject up with some leaves or flowers in the foreground, but get really, really close to them. The leaves adding this splash of green were no more that two inches in front of my lens. So poke around until you find just the right hole to look through and then play around until you get a pretty effect. It works. Honest!

    

4. Top Ten Photo Tips

   #4 The Fun Is in the Details

   

   Boring pictures often become interesting pictures when you start leaving stuff out. The official town crier of Dartmouth is actually a nice looking guy, but you'd never know it from my picture. I was more interested in making a picture that was all about the trappings of his position and duties, all the lace and brocade essential to proper decorum. Detail photographs let you mix things up once in a while, and that's often a welcome relief in the long parade of faces.

    

5. Top Ten Photo Tips

   #5 Framing Adds Focus

   

   Picture frames aren't all made out of wood, you know. I'm speaking now of using one thing to frame another within a photograph. The nice benefit of doing this is the artistic way you draw attention to something further away by surrounding it with something up close. Almost anything can serve the purpose. In this case I was up on the Basilica in the Piazza San Marco in Venus when I noticed how using one horse's hoof to frame another horse was kind interesting.

    

6. Top Ten Photo Tips

   #6 Watch Out for Patterns

   

   Give yourself a gold star every time you find a pattern to photograph. Our eyes never seem to tire of tracing the lines and figuring out the rhythms of life revealed by patterns. I found these in an artwork made entirely out of seashells at the Tresco Abbey Gardens. And if the graceful, repetitive curves weren't interesting enough, then the iridescent colors just put it over the top.

    

7. Top Ten Photo Tips

   #7 Wait Until Dark

   

   Night shots are often as beautiful as they are mysterious, but I'll let you in on a secret. Most really good "night" shots aren't taken at night. They are actually taken a dusk, before it actually gets dark out. Sometime after sundown there comes a magic moment, when the castle lights have been turned on and the sky is shading towards a deep rich blue and the whole scene just seems to glow. So set up your tripod and wait out the perfectly balanced moment.

    

8. Top Ten Photo Tips

   #8 Dare to Experiment

   

   There comes a moment in any trip when one great castle or cathedral begins to look like another. That's when the best pictures come from going a little wild. Sitting outside the Papal palace in Avignon I was at one of those moments, when I noticed how, if I were patient enough, the pigeons would land in front of me. Framing up the palace in my viewfinder I waited and then let out one great shout. Pigeons flew everywhere and I had my picture.

    

9. Top Ten Photo Tips

   #9 Not Everyone Has to Be Looking at the Camera

   

   Life is such a stream of people and places, moments and meaning. Our pictures get better when they capture that sense of serendipity combined with the precious and fleeting. So take a break and let some of your subjects look the other way. Let the picture be about their experience and what is happening to them. This lad in Wales is drinking in a world. Don't interrupt.

    

10. Top Ten Photo Tips

    #10 Be Ready!

    

    This is not what I expected to see from the deck of the National Geographic Explorer off the coast of Ireland. The Irish Coast Guard having a bit of practice landing crewmen on our deck. At those moments you don't have to be the greatest photographer in the world, but you do actually have to have a camera with you. The unexpected makes powerful pictures.

     

Jim's Top Ten Photography Tips

1. 1

   Wait It Out: Patience Pays

2. 2

   Foreground Plus Background Equals Depth

3. 3

   Add a Splash of Color

4. 4

   The Fun Is in the Details

5. 5

   Framing Adds Focus

6. 6

   Watch Out for Patterns

7. 7

   Wait Until Dark

8. 8

   Dare to Experiment

9. 9

   Not Everyone Has to Be Looking at the Camera

10. 10

    Be Ready!