On presets: photographic style cannot be “canned”

Conversations around photographic style have always felt a little odd to me for a few reasons. It’s something I get asked about a lot by my students, as they feel that without a style, a visual signature, then they will fid it very difficult to differentiate themselves from other working artists. So much of today’s communication is done through brands and visual identity that it’s a natural response for photographers to seek to find some way to make these things work for them, and as so much of the photographs themselves act as both product and advertisement many are looking to make their brand inherent to their images.  

Usually when I’m asked about developing a style I suggest that the solution is to shoot for five years and after that to look back and carefully curate. My view is that style is the result of many, many layers of decisions that involve everything from theme to colour to choice of subject. When reviewed from a birds eye view, of thousands of exposures, patterns and threads reveal themselves, and from these a style can be presented.  

This isn’t something people always enjoy hearing, I think one of the unfortunate byproducts of instant digital photography is that people seem to want to produce their entire life’s work in a few weeks, bypassing trial and error in favour of quick fixes. 

One of these supposed “quick fixes” represents a mindset that I find harder to deal with, and that’s canned colours – presets. It’s genuinely surprising to me the number of photographers I encounter both online and in person who feel that style can be achieved through colour alone; consistency, or a limited palette as the be-all-end-all of how they want to represent their style.  

I honestly don’t think there’s a lot that presets can actually do to bridge the gap between images that otherwise have no connection. I don’t think that a preset could be added to one of my images and that be enough to make it seem like someone else’s.  I also don’t think that it’s possible for someone to make an image look like one of mine just by shooting on the same film stock, or making something black and white. There’s more to an image than simple tonality – there’s the way the subject is presented, the perspective the image is shot from, the choice of lenses, shutter speeds, depth of field – essentially every other factor there can possibly be plays a roll in the eventual style that image possesses, and those factors echoing across other frames will result in a series or entire portfolio of consistent images.  

While colour does therefore play a role I would not say that it is the most significant factor at all – certainly not enough to warrant the number of digital artists selling presets and implying that that’ll be all it takes to make your images look like theirs. It may give a hint, but very superficially.

For me style comes from a series of preferences ad priorities. I’m always thinking about what aspects of the moment or character need to be overridden by the merit of a composition, and vice versa, but rarely actively making decisions according to some brand book or style guide. Artists who shoot with originality don’t tend to think in terms of their style – I don’t see a situation and think, “how would Simon King shoot this?” in the same way that Winnogrand didn’t leave the house thinking “I need to make pictures today that look like a Winnogrand” – instead it ought to be pretty much the same for everyone: “how am I going to use my tools, the light, and the scene in front of me to represent the story I want to tell?” It’s about doing the absolute best you can in every frame, reacting spontaneously and making any number of compromises to produce the right frame.  

To shoot an image in “my style” you would have to do more than shoot with the same film stocks – you would have to adopt aspects of my eye. You would have to take on a set of values that inform my understanding of form, shape, light, exposure, moment, theme, and emotional energy. Replicating these sensibilities would be a much more accurate way to achieve an image anything like the ones I tend to make. There is no one size fits all solution to composition, colour, or exposure; only values to balance, and compromise, and frame around.  

There is more to Fan Ho and Sebastião Salgado than just “black and white film” works otherwise the two would be indistinguishable. There is more to Steve McCurry than rich, dark tones, more to Matt Stuart than juxtaposed elements, and more to Josh K Jack than steamy windows. Anyone looking to emulate the style of these artists or any others would be best suited to asking about what mythic properties they themselves respect and seek to embody. What physical and mental spaces they want their audience to experience. By doing so you access the means to photograph beyond just composition around shape and colour but around real sociology, narrative structures, and soul. 

About the Author

Simon King is a London-based photographer and photojournalist, currently working on a number of long-term documentary and street photography projects. You can follow his work on Instagram and read more of his thoughts on photography on his personal blog. Simon also teaches a short course in Street Photography at UAL, which you can read about here.