For as long as I can remember, there has always been a camera in my life. Whether it’s my parents taking photos or videos of milestones within my and my sister’s life, someone bringing a camera to take pictures on vacation, my dad taking online photography classes, my mom starting her side photography business, or me with the camera in my hands. I was brought up viewing the world in pictures, so now I know how to look at the world and see a photo. Through this blog, I hope to teach you some of my simple tricks that I use in my photography so you can also learn to take good photos.
- Frame the subject – When I say frame the subject, I don’t mean literally print out the photo and put it into a frame. I mean, find something that frames your subject naturally. This could be a doorway, a window, an archway, or some overgrown trees. Whatever it is, by framing your subject you’re drawing attention to what’s framed. Framing the subject is really helpful when you’re taking landscape photos or portraits.
Example of an “unnatural” frame 
Example of natural framing of the One World Trade Center - Put your subject off center – In photography, there’s something known as the rule of thirds. This is where you place the subject of your photo on an intersecting point within a grid that splits your photo up into thirds. An example of this grid is seen in the photo below. When you place your subject a little off-center, or on one of these intersecting points, it again draws attention to your subject, but in a different space. This also allows more of the surrounding environment to be seen. You don’t want this background to be too distracting though, rather you want it to add to your photo and your subject. This technique is helpful for really any type of photography.
Example of the rule of thirds - Crop – Do not be afraid to crop your photos. You may want to try and get as many items in your photo as possible, but sometimes cropping actually adds more to the photo than a ton of random items will. As shown in the photo below, which was a photo that I took while taking photos for the North Star at the final football game this past season, by cropping in on the two players I was able to show the emotion within the two subjects, and portray a intimate moment while standing yards away from them at the time. Cropping is really helpful when you’re taking close-up photos or portraits.
Example of Cropping - Zoom out – While I did just tell you to not be afraid to crop, also don’t be afraid to zoom out. While being zoomed in can capture the emotion of a subject, zooming out can capture the grandness of a moment. By zooming out you can emphasize the space of the picture. Zooming out is helpful when taking landscape photos to show the sheer size and space of the landscape around you.
Example of zooming out - Change your angle – Sometimes, if a picture seems boring being taken straight on, you can completely change the photo by changing your angle. Taking a photo from a lower or higher angle changes how you perceive a subject. When taking a photo from a high angle, you make a subject seem smaller and more abstract compared to what’s around them. When taking a photo from a low angle, you make a subject look larger and more significant.
Example of high-angle 
Example of low-angle - Find a new lighting source – When shooting photos on your phone, I’d typically advise you to take a photo with the light source in front of your subject, as having the lighting behind can sometimes cause a weird glare on the lens. But, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t switch up your lighting source every so often. By finding a new position for your light, whether it be side lighting, front lighting, or backlighting, you can drastically change an image. Changing the lighting can be used on practically any picture, even landscape because although you have no say in where the sun is when you take a photo, you can go and take pictures at different times in the day to utilize the different lighting from the sun.
Example of different colored light source 
Example of backlighting
A quick disclaimer to these tricks. Though many of these photos I’ve included as examples were taken on a DSLR, you don’t have to use a nice camera to take a good picture. For example, the picture I included in the natural framing of the One World Trade Center was taken on my phone, not a DSLR. Another example of a photo I have taken not on a DSLR that I really like would be the photo included below. I took this photo on a 2011 digital camera and yet still took a good picture. Basically what I’m saying, the camera doesn’t make the picture, you do.
Whether you’re taking Instagram pictures, photos on vacation, or just taking a walk through the forest preserve and seeing a pretty sunset and deciding to take a picture, implementing even just one of these tricks could take your picture from a 6/10 to a 10/10 photo. If you don’t use these tips, that doesn’t mean your photo is going to be bad, many photos I’ve taken followed zero of my own tricks said here and still turned out well. These simple tips are just a quick way to help you see the world through an artistic lens.
Hi Kayley, this was such an interesting post! First of all, I think it’s really cool how your entire family is passionate about photography, whether that be your mom’s side photography business or your own picture-taking endeavors. I also love photography – I think there’s something so great about capturing memories and scenes while having the creativity to make a piece of art. That being said, my skills can continue to be improved, and these tips were really great! I definitely agree with the rule of thirds – after working on applying this technique, I feel like my photos have improved tremendously. I think your lighting tips are quite interesting: I haven’t tried experimenting with light sources and positioning as much as I could, and your blog was quite thought-provoking. The photo with backlighting was really pretty! Additionally, I wanted to say that the dog you included (your dog perhaps, I’m assuming?) is so incredibly cute. Thanks for sharing!
Kayley,
Super fascinating read here. Wow. I’m really missing out. As I was reading, I have to be honest that I didn’t know there was that much to photography (hence why my pictures look so bad haha). I really liked your shot where you zoomed out from the sea – it really did add a lot of value to the picture and created a sense of solidarity. In addition, your pictures of the dog was pretty goofy and I liked it a lot. The rule of thirds is something that I’ve never thought about, but I’ll probably try to implement it in my other photos that I take along the way. We’ll see how that goes.
I think I’ll experiment with this around naperville downtown, since I’ve always found the architecture and scenergy there to be beautiful. Definitely will be using the rule of thirds, and I’ll try out the other things on my clunky old android camera.
Awesome post, keep at it dude!
-Kai
Hi Kayley, this was a super interesting read. The picture of that girl (I think it’s you?) standing on the peer looking out at the mountains is actually a masterpiece. When I saw that I knew I had to read your blog. In fact, scrolling through all the pictures, I would have believed that a good amount of these were professionally done. I loved reading about all the techniques that you use to make these pictures so beautiful. I think that I will have to try zooming out and backlighting. They wound simple enough, but the pictures that resulted from it look insane (in the best way). The different colored light source picture was also so cool, I love how the purple stands out in an unique and unnatural way. I have never been big into photography, but I have always been curious to pick up a camera. Hopefully I get around to it one day, especially now that I know some tricks.
The pictures are beautiful. Thank you sharing your work and your thoughts on a subject that is dear to you.
Hi Kayley,
Thanks for the advice! It’s great that your tips can be used with any type of camera, from the one on your phone to digital cameras and so many more. I’ve always loved looking through photographs- I think it’s fascinating how they not only preserve memories but they’re also an artform of themselves. I’d like to get into photography myself, so I will definitely take your advice in order to take pictures that my family and I will cherish for years to come. Even though the gridlines on my phone’s camera have always been turned on, I’ve never known how to take advantage of them until now. I’ll definitely keep the rule of thirds in mind from now on.
Your photos are beautiful! I especially love your examples of how lighting can affect the photograph, it really draws your eye to the subject. That’s definitely something that I’m going to experiment with in the future.
Great post 🙂
Anna-Maria
Hi Kayley! I loved reading your blog post on photography—not only learning about new tips and tricks, but also what photography means to you. My dad is a photography-enthusiast himself—he’s taken several courses in college and passionately documents all of our trips through photos (including making us smile and pose every time we stumble upon something “memorable”). There’s something about capturing a moment in time that is so fascinating—it is both permanent and fleeting. The photos you include in your post almost seem frozen in time, which I think is really powerful. I will definitely be implementing your tips on framing the subject and finding a new light source—it seems like even a subtle change can alter the entire piece. Thanks so much for sharing! This was a very helpful read ;).
Hi Kayley, considering that I haven’t actually sat down and learned specifically all of these photography tricks, it was interesting to see you describe them because I’ve been using them subconsciously my whole life. Through mainly using the rule of thirds in all of the nature photos I’ve taken on a 2007 Canon digital camera, your backlighting tip also seems very useful. When first given an electronic device in elementary school, I cherished it as if it was a phone and documented nearly every nature outing or fieldtrip. When I recently transferred them all into an SD card, half of them were rule of thirds with a tree or rock being the subject. Overall, I have not gotten a handle on how to take pictures properly but it is something I definitely aim to work on.