How to Make Emotional Photographs Without Emotional People

It can be done

“Coastal Redwoods” (© Mark Ali)

From what I can tell (and by that, I mean: from what an AI search of the internet tells me), the most basic human emotions are: happiness, fear, sadness, anger, disgust, and surprise.

Don’t quote me on that — I’m not a psychologist (and neither is the AI that I used, I don’t think).

Impactful photographs can depict some of those emotions, even photos that are not portraits. In other words, you don’t always need to show a face to depict an emotion.

To me (really me this time), I think the first three emotions in the list above (happiness, sadness, and fear) are easily depicted in a photograph.

Let’s talk about how that’s done…

“Peeking Over the Horizon” (© Mark Ali)

Happiness

Happiness can be reflected in an image by imparting a sense of calm.

The image above is just your average sunrise photo. But when you think of the early morning hours, you think of calm.

And in this image of that time of day, you can also see still water — another sign of a calm environment. Plus, the image includes…