Taking stunning photos with kit lens (18–55mm)
This is a post about how i found out that i can take amazing photos with the 18–55mm kit lens. Fx. the photo in the background is one of them.
I started playing around with my Canon T3I about start August 2015. Not a lot, just a little bit once a week if i felt like it. I have had my camera since 2011, but i NEVER used it, because i only had the kit lens, 18–55mm, and i couldn’t get any good shots out of it.
The time i had a 50mm prime lens
In August 2015 i borrowed my friend’s Canon 50mm f/1.4 Prime lens. And it seemed so much easier to get decent shots out of it. Therefore i suddenly found it fun to take photos, so i started doing it regularly.
But i’m still talking about maybe once a week or twice, not seriously practicing, just for fun.
I got some decent photos out of it, and i could feel that i really developed. My photos became better and better, and I became more aware of how i could get the best shots.
Back to basics
In mid September, me and my girlfriend had to go from Copenhagen to Stockholm, because we started our 4 months trip to Stockholm, Cuba, Mexico and USA. So of course i was very excited that i got the chance to take photos around these areas. Got a text from my friend “Hey dude, you are leaving soon, can I get my lens back before you go?”
So of course i had to give it back…
What the fuck was i gonna do now? I only had my 18–55mm “shit” lens that I even dropped once with its UV filter on, which broke and couldn’t get off, so i had to stand for an hour with a knife and cut out the UV filter from it’s metal ring.
Well, i decided that it wasn’t gonna hold me back from taking stunning photos from all these amazing places. Cause i’ve always said to people who just want the best and most expensive equipment, that it is not the equipment, but the person that takes to photos. Even if you got the most expensive lens in the world, you can take shitty photos — If you don’t know how to use it.
And it is about the settings, your stile, the surroundings (What you have in the frame) and the light that makes a good photo. And especially when you get it in to your computer and finish up the photos.
First day with 18–55mm lens
The first night in Stockholm, I decided to go down to the heart of the city, Slussen. I only stayed for an hour. I played around with the camera during golden hour. Felt like the photos were okay, but not very good (The photos will become better the next couple of days).
This was the first the that i actually went out and shot with the kit lens. This was actually also the first time i played around with the manual settings, because i wanted to have as much power over the frame as possible, since i was running around with my “shitty” kit lens.
Here are 4 of the photos from that night.
I wasn’t very excited about the photos that i took that night, but i got some good feedback, which gave me the courage and inspiration to go out and take more the next day.
Second day with 18–55mm lens
The second the, the weather wasn’t too god, so I didn’t go out during the day. We went to a bar, where they had som awesome light bulbs, so i snapped some photos of them.
But then the weather got better and I went in to the city center again, where i got the photos of the red/orange sky.
Again, i wasn’t too excited about these photos either, but bare in mind that this is my second day shooting with this lens. Still learning its strengths and weaknesses.
I lost some inspiration and didn’t feel so good about my photography skills, cause i felt like the lens was holding me down.
Third day with 18–55mm lens
We decided to go to my girlfriends parents summerhouse in Stockholm. I had been there before and knew that it is a very beautiful area. I didn’t feel so good about my skills from the other night — and i knew i was kind of blaming it on the lens.
“That fucking 18–55mm standard kit lens! Can’t get anything nice out of it”
Bla, bla, bla, bla.
I started taking photos of their cat during end of mid day, because the light was a little hard and gave some pretty nice shadows. I could feel that i really started to learn the lens and camera to know. I didn’t have to spend as much energy focusing on the settings, it came more natural how much i should “scroll” the shutter-ring to get the right amount of light ect.
I was almost all the time zoomed in at around 55mm, because i wanted the long focal length and the bacckground to be blurred. I wanted to emphazise that the cat is melted in with the nature — this is where it belongs.
A lot of the time it comes down to your focal length, that is pretty much what controls the emotions in the photo. I will go into focal length in a different post and when to use what.
I was pretty happy about those shots, so I wanted more. My girlfriend and I, went down to the beach. there it was one hour before sun down, so the light was REALLY sharp and intense, which was fun to play with, but also made everything much more deficult.
I could really feel that i was getting better with the 18–55mm lens, than i was with the 50mm prime lens. And this only took three days.
Fourth day with 18–55mm lens
This is the last day of this post, because i’m writing this on the fifth day.
I just went right outside the summerhouse, where there was a vas with flowers on a table. I started playing around with it. I wanted to take photos that i felt could be a desktop background.
I wanted simplicity, simple colors and depth. This is what i got.
Well that turned out awesome! I sent them to my friend which said:
“Haha, first i thought those flowers were photos from some kind of Windows background”
So that turned out perfect, just what i wanted. Very aesthetically beautiful and simple. The top left photo i shot with a lower focal length than the others to make them less blurry. But the other three I went straight for the long focal length.
Golden Hour
And the magic happened during the golden hour. We went down to the cliffs, so we got nature, water and sky.
Here you can really see the difference from when i use a short and long focal length. When my girlfriend is in the frame, I used a long focal length to make her stand out more and be clear. And the bottom right corner, I used a short focal length to get “everything” in the frame, to show how big and beautiful this place is.
This was not a very indepth blog, but more to give an example of what you can do with you kit lens, and that it is not the lens that creates amazing images. I will create blogs more indepth of how i do it, but more the techniches so you yourself can create your own amazing photos.
Cause i have tried before where people write, put the settings at this and get this, but that is just not how it works. That setting might only work for some shots. So i want to give the tools not the answers.
If you like my images, you can follow me on 500px where i post all my favorit photos: https://500px.com/luidupontbrandstrup
Follow me on Instagram to see my latest photos: https://www.instagram.com/lui_brandstrup/
Thanks for reading and i will see you next time.
