06 Oct 4 Ways to Take More Fascinating Culture Photos

We live in a visual world these days. As digital cameras and cameras on phones have become the norm, it’s also become the norm to visually document everything. When you are writing a blog post, people don’t just want to read what you write, they want to see it, too.

You may be worried that since you don’t have a high quality camera, that you have to settle for mediocre images. The truth is, it’s not the gear that makes a photo great, it’s the eye that sees it, frames it and captures it.

Here are some tips to improve your photographic eye.

Look for Light

A monk is illuminated by butter lamps, or candles, in Boudhanath, Nepal. Rather than using a flash, which is distracting, I used the light from the candles to create a moodier picture.

Photography is all about light, so keep an eye on where your light sources are. Whether it’s the high-noon sun or buzzing fluorescent tubes or the glow of a fire, knowing what kind of light you are working with can help you look for interesting scenes to frame.

Using light and shadows in novel ways makes photos more interesting. An easy way to jazz up that sunset picture is to put someone in the frame; as long as you are still focusing on and exposing for the sky, they’ll turn out as a silhouette.

Using objects that cast shadows, like window blinds, can punch up photos taken indoors too. Don’t be afraid to move your positioning around to get better lighting for your framing.

Vary Your Vantage Points

The end of the first wash at a gold mine in Cameroon. By crouching down at the end of the wash, I was able to give a sense of importance to the machines being used here and get it all in my frame.

The vantage point from where your camera is when you take you picture can make all the difference. The easiest way to take a picture is to immediately put your camera up to the eye level you are seeing the scene at. However, that doesn’t always make for the most visually interesting images.

Shooting things from a low vantage point can make them seem bigger, and it imbues a sense of importance because the viewer is literally looking up at the subject. A high vantage point can make up for a fixed lens that doesn’t provide a wide angle view, and gives the viewer a sense of being above the subject. Even shooting from your waist can make the image more interesting, because it provides a new way of seeing things. Crouch down or find something to stand on to experiment with these framing techniques.

Do the Details

A shrine for protection on a bus in Thailand. These shrines are in almost every bus, and it’s a small detail that can set the scene for what bus travel is like.

Detail and scene setting images are just as interesting as action shots. While you may be used to seeing pots hanging on the wall above the indoor water cistern every day, those are the details that can be so interesting to your readers.

Look for small tableaus within the larger scene, like a single vendor and customer at a festival. If your equipment allows, focus just on the details and allow the background and foreground to blur or get close and crop everything else out.

If you are having trouble finding interesting details, look at what is grabbing the interest of children or ask them what they see. Kids see things that many adults overlook, simply because they are at a different eye level and they don’t always grasp the bigger picture.

Focus on Framing

Drummers at the Aboakyer festival in Ghana. Every part of the frame is filled, with the man in the foreground drumming and the man in the background. The main subject, the man in the foreground is cut off above the waist. However, the man in the background is rather awkwardly cut off at the knees.

Keep your frame in mind. Photography is inherently a selective activity because it only captures a framed portion of what is going on.

Think about every part of the frame and fill it. That may mean getting up close and in the middle of the action or it may mean stepping back to the edge of the crowd and getting everything, or somewhere in between.

Think about what those four edges are containing within them, and where they are cutting off. The natural places for people to be cut off at are the just below the shoulders, waist and full body; cutting people off at their legs looks really awkward. If something is in your framing that is distracting, either move it or move your body. You can also crop things out afterward.

Get experimental

Don’t be afraid to experiment. As long as you aren’t shooting on film, take a bunch of pictures. Try new angles, different settings, focusing on something unexpected, shooting through something like glass or fabric, using the self-timer or documenting something that seems mundane. This trial and error will give you plenty of practice to figure out how all of these techniques can make your images stronger. And you can always delete the ones that just didn’t work out.

This is a guest post by Christine Bedenis, a well-traveled twenty-something from the Midwest. She is a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer (Thailand), now living and working in Ghana. She was a winner of Peace Corps’s annual Blog It Home contest in 2014.

Ready to take your photography to the next level? We highly recommend the following online course, provided by CreativeLive: Travel Photography: The Complete Guide with Ben Willmore

The instructor, Ben, is a photographer who happens to travel, but he’s also a really skilled teacher. He has a great way of explaining things that is easy to follow and keeps you engaged. This course has 37 video lessons and a dozen downloads that will help you:

• choose the right camera and gear,
• strategize to get more compelling images,
• navigate the challenges of photography in foreign situations, and
• master editing techniques in Lightroom and Photoshop