Secret To Great Photography - Quality Over Quantity

Words by Scott Bourne - A Platypod Pro
Edited by Eryka Bagwell



I've spent 50 years making photographs and if there's one thing that helped me figure out when it was that I was moving from being a casual snap-shooter to a serious photographer, it was when I noticed that professionals took far fewer pictures than I did. I used to be a spray and pray kind of photographer, pointing my camera at anything that moved and then REACTING. I shot at 10 frames per second even when I didn't need to. That approach delivered plenty of quantity for me, but very little quality.

When I slowed everything down and became more deliberate and more contemplative, then I started making fewer - but better photographs.

So here's my advice. Aim for quality over quantity. Test yourself. Give yourself an assignment. What if you limited yourself to just one photograph a day for 10 days? Sure most of us are using cameras that can shoot in burst mode and we can take lots of pictures per second. It's free (once you buy the camera.) But what if - what if you couldn’t shoot more than one picture of one subject? What if you couldn’t shoot with more than one lens or in one location? If you did that, you’d be photographing to make a point – to tell a story.

The secret to great photography is making the RIGHT picture - not LOTS of pictures. How do you do that? Have a point of view. Know a lot about your subject. Be passionate about storytelling. Try to FEEL your next photograph. Limit yourself. Think about it. Plan it. Study. Work hard to research where and when you’ll make that image. Be very deliberate as opposed to just reacting. Be thoughtful. If you accept my challenge to make only one photo a day for 10 days that means you literally only get one shot. You want to make sure it counts.

This kind of approach will train your photographic mind to deliver great results. Give it a try. Let us know how it goes.

All of us on the Platypod team are rooting for you.

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