Making mistakes as a photographer

Mistakes are a fact of life and everyone makes them, including us photographers.

This blog post is about some of the photography mistakes I have made and how I learned from them.

Pay attention to backgrounds

When I was new in the business I focused on the people in my pictures, and that’s about it. I didn’t always look to see what was in the background. Now I look back at some of those photos and don’t understand how I could have made such simplistic photography  mistakes. For example, at one wedding I noticed the bride and her wedding party were posing for photos with a parking lot full of cars behind them. At this same wedding, I took several portraits of the bride in front of a wall vent grate – a fact she pointed out to me and asked if I could remove. I have learned to not only look at the subjects but where they are posing to make sure the background is clean and pleasing.

Include some ambient light

At my very first wedding I photographed the family in the church sanctuary. The people were lit but the background was very dark. That is because didn’t know how to make sure to include ambient lighting in the picture. The ambient light keeps the background in view and makes for a far more interesting photo. Including ambient light requires that photographers not just use a flash to light the subjects but change up equipment settings to make sure existing light is visible in the photo.

Don’t have people facing the sun

I took some photos of a family and in many of the shots they were looking into the sun. At the time I believed that the sun needed to shine on their faces to make sure they were well lit. The results I got were people squinting as their photos were being taken. It’s best to put the sun behind the subjects.

Make sure backup equipment is available

A good photographer will have more than one camera, more than one light and more than one lens. It’s bound to happen at some time that equipment will malfunction for various reasons. A photographer who doesn’t have backups will be in big trouble. I personally have not had problems with this, but I have heard stories about those who have. Make sure your photographer will have backup equipment.