What Makes a Great Photo?
If different people photograph the same exact subject, why do some photos look “better” than the others? I often wondered if there was a “formula”, or key ingredients that make one photo ordinary and touristy, while making the other look “professional” or artsy.
See the two photos below of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge. They’re shot from a nearly identical location, but one is obviously better than the other.
After much thought, I came up with five ingredients that I think create a great photo. Here they are:
- Seeing it
- at the right time
- for the right composition
- with the right equipment
- applying the right amount of post-processing
While there may be others, I’ve found that these five are all required for a photo to be memorable, sellable or just better. Let me explain each of these ingredients in some detail.
Seeing it
There are beautiful subjects all around us worth photographing. Sometimes a subject is obvious (a famous bridge or landmark as in the examples above). Other times, it might be subtle, abstract or non-obvious (a leaf floating in a puddle). Before taking a photo, it helps to identify something unique or interesting about the subject. Something that may not be immediately obvious. In the “bad” photo above, the photographer simply focused on the most obvious subject — the Bridge. In the “good” photo, a wave is seen crashing against the rocks in the foreground. The picture is as much about the strong waves as it is about the Bridge in the distance. This gives it a different and unique meaning than yet another picture of The Golden Gate Bridge.
Some of the most interesting subjects are often in plain sight, yet most people don’t notice them. Being able to see the little patterns and details around us makes for more interesting photos.
The right time
Even if you identify an interesting subject, simply photographing it at an arbitrary time won’t necessarily produce a great photo. Depending on the time of day, it could be under harsh sunlight, covered in shadow or fog, backlit, obstructed by people or vehicles, or simply be too ordinary. A great photo is one in which light shows the subject in some extraordinary, unique or interesting way.
Some of the best photos you’ve seen probably required the photographer to revisit the place multiple times until the light was perfect. Many landscape photographers prefer to shoot during sunrise or sunset, also known as Golden Hour when the sky is most colorful. Arguably, the worst time for photography is in mid-afternoon. The sun is at its harshest, long shadows are everywhere because of the sun being directly overhead, and even clear skies are pale blue.
The “bad” photo above was shot when the mid-day light was flat and the sky was overcast. The “good” photo was shot during sunset when the sky was filled with vibrant colors.
Below is another example.
The right composition
Having a good subject and the right light aren’t enough if your photo looks boring or sloppy. Parts of the subject being cut off at the edges, margins being too narrow, lack of depth, distracting objects, all contribute to awkward or ordinary photos.
Simply holding a camera at eye level, pointing and shooting from the most obvious, “natural” position will get you the most obvious photos. Instead, if you try to include a strong foreground, obey classic composition rules, or get even a slightly different perspective, you get something much more original and unique.
One simple way to add depth to your photos is to balance the background with a strong foreground. For example, in the photo of the Pismo Beach Pier below, I didn’t simply shoot the pier. Instead, I composed it so that the seaweed and light reflections act as strong foreground elements against the pier in the background. This gives the photo an almost three-dimensional depth.
The right equipment
Having a great subject, perfect light and creative composition don’t matter if you lack the right gear to capture it with. A high quality lens with the appropriate focal length and aperture are essential to capture what your eyes are seeing.
Sometimes accessories like neutral density filters and polarizers are also needed to control the light. A simple point & shoot or your iPhone camera, while convenient, usually aren’t going to create the really stunning photos. Of course, fancy gear isn’t all that matters, or $4000 would make everyone an Ansel Adams. That is why gear is only one of my five ingredients.
The right amount of post-processing
Post-processing can make a good photo great. If you have everything else right, applying some exposure correction, a bump in saturation, cropping to improve composition, noise reduction, highlight recovery, spot removal, pattern cloning and other techniques can all drastically improve a photograph.
Often the difference between a flat or boring photo and one that looks “professional” is the work done on a computer instead of in camera. Contrary to what some may think, post-processing doesn’t simply mean “make the colors pop” using Photoshop.
Post-processing is often about fixing optical distortion caused due to lens characteristics, or removing elements to make the photo less distracting. The “bad” photo of The Golden Gate Bridge above is straight out of the camera. In the “good” photo, the beautiful sunset colors were boosted, and a whole surfer was erased (using pattern cloning) because he was a distracting element. In fact, the most expensive photo ever sold ($4.3 million), was also a product of post-processing. You can read about it here.
So, the next time you wonder why a photo isn’t as good or “artistic” as you’d like, the answer will likely be one or more of the above ingredients missing. Try to pay attention to these when you’re out shooting, and you will surely create better photos.
