Picture: Wave breaking on coastal rocks at sunset near Stinson Beach, Marin County, California
This month I have the privilege of being an invited guest photography mentor for an online photographic community where I get to provide advice, critiques, and insights regarding the participant members’ photos. In the forum, a member asked what I think is probably one of the most important and preeminent questions that any beginning or developing photographer could ask. It far and away supersedes any basic query regarding composition, equipment, or technique. In short, the question is, “What is Personal Vision or Style, and how do you develop it?” I thought the question is so important that I feel a need to share and expand upon my reply for all to consume.
Personal Vision is something that is created through a natural progression and growth of your own photographic pursuits and activities. It is not something that can be learned over a weekend workshop. It can take years of repeated trips out into the field, followed by critical and honest reviews of your work with an eye towards continually refining how you visually and photographically interpret the world around you. It’s that sort of personal interpretation that defines your personal vision. How you shape and process that vision becomes your style.
Personal Vision can also be partly defined through a natural or innate photographic talent; it’s what we refer to when we say that somebody has a “good eye.” For those people, the path towards developing a strong personal vision can be shorter, but it is a path nonetheless. I recently had a chance to judge a photo contest with 300 entries from 7th graders from my local area and a sister school in Denmark. As with adult competitions and camera clubs, there was a wide variety of images ranging in quality from excellent to not-so-good. But unlike adults, the one thing I could be sure of was that none of these kids had decades of photographic experience under their belts. We were looking at their raw natural vision and talent, and how they expressed a 3-dimensional world in a 2-dimensional medium.
There are also those people who continually struggle trying to develop a personal vision, but primarily in part because they lack the connection and forethought of execution regarding their subject at the time they are taking the photo.
If you simply just lift the camera up to your face because you see something pretty, but don’t take the time to really think about what it is you’re shooting, why you’re shooting it, what you’re trying to say or show the viewer, and how you’re combining the elements within the frame, then your chance of developing a strong personal vision may be far-flung to futile at best.
Personal vision is all about how we as individuals see the world through our camera, and the skill with which we are able to present that vision to a viewer in such a way that they are able to see and feel our own connection to the subject and the story we are trying to express with our photo.
Remember: Photography is a form of communication. If all you’re doing is pointing your camera toward something pretty, all you’re likely to get in response is “Oh, that’s nice.” However, if you really take the time to show us exactly what you find pretty, why it’s pretty, and isolate that story, you’re much more likely to get a stronger response from the viewer. It’s how you dig into the meat of the story and construct the who, what, when, where and whys that form the foundation of developing your personal vision and style.
One of the ways so many photographers find their personal style begins with simply mimicking or copying the style of other photographers whose work they enjoy. This is absolutely the case with landscape photographers. It’s a natural course of evolution that isn’t necessarily bad. But sufficed to say that some people are able to move on from that stage where they are copying the work of others to the point where they develop their own style, while others merely adopt someone else’s style so thoroughly such that when you see their images, you immediately think of somebody else’s work instead. They becomes more of a clone than a copy. You can see this a lot in the genre of what has come to be called ‘Fantasy-scape’ landscapes where scenes are rendered with a nearly obscene level of perfection. The same phenomenon happens in all other genres as well. Influence and inspiration for developing your style is great and a natural course in the path to define your personal vision. Mere imitation for the sake of glorification or popularity is what should be avoided. Again, it’s OK to copy, to mimic, or to ‘get your own trophy shot’, but once you do, move on and try to find something that you can call uniquely your own. This is why I continue to espouse to all photographers to simply find and follow their own voice and muse so that you become known for your own personal take on the world. In the end, that’s all that should matter: Your Vision and Your Expression of that Vision.
Picture: Trees emerging from the clouds, Humboltd-Toiyabe National Forest, California
Only you can see and know what is driving you to lift the camera to your eye. Focus on that alone, and eventually your own personal style will begin to evolve in much the way a coarse family dinner can evolve into a gourmet meal. They both involve the same ingredients, but it’s how they are prepared, blended, with fine little finishing touches added, and how they are served that defines the difference. One meal you gobble down without much thought, while the other meal you savor. Your Personal Vision is what you like to eat, and your Style is how you like to cook and serve.
I hope that helps to explain it a little.
If you have thoughts to add, I’d love to hear your comments and opinions added here on the blog as well.
Cheers,
– Gary.
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Image ID#: ba2-2104 (Coastal Wave)
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Gary Crabbe is an award-winning commercial and editorial outdoor travel photographer and author based out of the San Francisco Bay Area, California. He has seven published books on California to his credit, including “Photographing California; v1-North”, which won the prestigious 2013 IBPA Benjamin Franklin Gold Medal award as Best Regional title. His client and publication credits include the National Geographic Society, the New York Times, Forbes Magazine, TIME, The North Face, Subaru, L.L. Bean, Victoria’s Secret, Sunset Magazine, The Nature Conservancy, and many more. Gary is also a photography instructor and consultant, offering both public and private photo workshops. He also works occasionally a professional freelance Photo Editor.
Great post Gary! I like the term, “fantasy-scape”. The photos look cool most of the time but rarely resembles nature.
looking at street photography just recently I have been thinking that most of the more impressive photos are repeating what had been established by some greats already quite a while ago. The same line plays, reflections, lights, strong contrast and vignettes asf. asf. Most look a bit forced, catching these ever repeating contents and seem little original, however impressive the images might look. I ask myself, is there any room for something new, original at all?
I do mostly travel photography, well, that also doesn’t well describe it, I have been around most places for years, though just for months at a time. Therefore I would like to think that many are different to the short time traveler as well of locals. I don’t look for the special, the striking, but for the every day and it’s subtleties and nuances. However it seems to me that these are not easily recognizable as such, not by other tourists for being to little ‘special’, nor by the locals for being too normal. I admit that I find it hard to stick to my ways, and feel tempted to attempt the same more striking images. It’s a struggle, but I hope that it make me learn
Well said, Gary.
Dan
First off, excellent pictures, both Crashing Wave and Trees in the Clouds. Really beautiful.
I am primarily trained as a wedding and portrait photographer.
In the most recent years I’ve gone through some extreme changes in my personal life and have been on the road between California and South Carolina since 2009. Back and forth every year or two. Because of this I’ve not photographed as many weddings as I would like. Circumstances being as they are; I’ve drifted toward Landscape, and developed a “new attitude”. I photograph the beauty as I see it unfolding in the real world. Watching a lot of sunsets lately and shorebirds, these have become my newest subjects. I am ever evolving as an artist and practicing daily. Even when it’s simply composing a photograph of my sister’s hyacinth blooms covered with dew drops.
““When one has reached maturity in the art, one will have a formless form. It is like ice dissolving in water. When one has no form, one can be all forms; when one has no style, he can fit in with any style.” – Bruce Lee
Great post Gary – the above is all I can think of contributing. 🙂
Well said and thorough, Gary. Artists in all mediums share, borrow and exchange ideas and have since the beginnings of art. We all learn and grow from observing what other photographers are doing, but the difference between mimicry and being inspired by another is an important one to keep in mind. With the rise of the internet, there has been such a strong trend toward everything looking similar that visual artists of various types have to put more effort than ever into being original. Borrow ideas, but make it different. This is the ultimate compliment to another artist, but copying shows lack of creativity, which sort of defeats the purpose of being an artist in the first place. If you’re going to rip people off, why not just go to a lab and have a color copy made or actually steal the image online and say it’s yours. It’s the same thing. As for style, along the lines of what you’ve said, allow it to develop organically. Practice patience and don’t try to push or jam yourself into a style prematurely. A person is not going to make it as a photographer without patience anyway. Style and personal vision come from being an interesting artist from the inside. They develop over time as you become clear in who you are as a photographer and discover what has the most meaning to you.
Developing style is just like polishing a rock till it shines. it takes time and effort.