“The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.”
Confucius
Starting out with street photography can be really tough at times…
It seems like you have to climb this gigantic mountain to become the best street photographer you could be. To be honest, this really intimidated me when I started out.
Of course, you want to shoot street photos that you love. But first, you have to close the gap between your street photography vision and your actual results.
Untitled by Vijce | Amsterdam, 2016
That’s why I want to show you a method that will help you climb that mountain step by step. In order to improve your street photos, 2 things are the most important:
* Going out to shoot as often as possible
* Knowing what you have to improve in your street photos.
Master street photography by focusing on one aspect at a time!
In order to improve, you need to know exactly what you need to improve. Otherwise, you simply shoot without working on your photos.
Try this today:
1) Grab a pen and a piece of paper
2) Draw a table with “love” on the one side and “hate” on the other side. You can also write down “like” or “dislike” or “good” and “bad”.
Like this:
3) Take a look at your 5-10 favorite street photos and write down what you love and hate about them on both sides.
Let me give you a few examples of things you could love or hate about your photos:
* Subjects (Do I love the people I capture?)
* Sceneries (Do I love the street scenes and background I shoot?)
* Light (Do I pick great light or do my photos look grey and dull?)
* Reflections (How well can I play with reflections?)
* Sharpness (Are my photo actually sharp or too blurry?)
* Lines (How well do I capture lines in my street photos?)
* Natural contrasts (Do my subjects pop out or go under?)
4) The goal here is to reflect your street photos as much as you can. Be 100% honest with yourself. That way, you will improve as much as possible. Even if you have a list of 50 aspects that you don’t like about your photos, it’s good. These are all goals you can tackle one after another! Perseverance is your key to greatness!
Snowflakes and Butterflies by Vijce | Thuine, 2014
5) For your next photo walk, you pick one aspect that you hate about your street photos and focus only on that. That whole photo walk of 10, 20 or 30 minutes is dedicated to that aspect only.
6) Take a look at the results of that photo walk and write down again what you love and hate to re-define your next goals.
“It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.”
Confucius
Shooting street photography for 10.000 hours doesn’t make you a master. Shooting 10.000 hours where you focus on mastering aspect by aspect of your street photography does!
Keep shooting, keep picking tiny battles and win these with all your eye, heart and soul. That way you will love more and more aspects of your street photography till one day you will say to yourself:
I love my street photography so much!
About the Author
Marius Vieth (aka Vijce) is an award-winning fine-art street photographer and coach based in Amsterdam. His label Eye, Heart & Soul (www.eyeheartandsoul.com) empowers uprising and established fine art street photographers worldwide. Make sure to check out his website, connect with EHS on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to level up your street photography game! This article was also published here and shared with permission.
