There’s little doubt that the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic disrupted some of our lifestyle habits, and also made a great number of people change their outlook and perception of life. Moments that in the past may have been taken for granted suddenly became much more valuable and precious. Many people chose to record their restricted and isolation experience in photo format, and to preserve the images in stylish photo albums.
If you’ve followed the photography trend, here are 6 cool post-lockdown ideas to inspire your next photo shoot…
- The A- Z Challenge
Motivate yourself to get out of your photography comfort zone by setting yourself an A- Z challenge. The idea is to take snaps of objects and subjects that are associated with each of the 26 letters of the alphabet. Look all around you to get the game started…
‘A’ could be the shiny green apples in the fruit bowl; ‘B’ may be the bumble bees that are busy collecting pollen in your garden; your cat would be an excellent subject to photograph for ‘C’, and so on…
Use your imagination to make the challenge creative and fun. Test your photographer’s eye by exploring everyday objects in unusual ways. Once you have 26 images, you can arrange them in personalised photo albums and invite your family and friends to browse the stunning results.
2. Create Deconstructed Images
If you’re looking for an interesting and original photography project, you can always try out a new technique to enhance your creative talents.
Explore a landscape in a fresh new way by creating a composite deconstructed image that features multiple fragments. Take a walk in a local beauty spot, in the countryside or on the beach, and snap away from a variety of different angles. Shoot anything that catches your eye, so that you have a good selection of images to chose and select for the finished result.
When you’re back home, use Photoshop to create a grid. You can then assemble your deconstructed photo selection using Layers.
3. Vintage Vibes
There’s something rather magical and romantic about timeless black and white photography, that makes it such a wonderful and appealing style of imagery to display in elegant and luxurious photo albums. In the absence of colours, light and shadow provide a wide scope for photos that boast a vintage vibe. When photographing in monochrome, it’s also a good idea to focus on elements like lines, textures, patterns and shapes.
If you have a spare lens filter you can also try the famous Hollywood trick of using a smear of Vaseline to give your portrait snaps an alluring soft glow appearance. To save your filter, you can alternatively apply Vaseline over stretched out cling film across the lens, held in place with an elastic band.
Keep the aperture wide for a shallow depth of field. For unique diffusion style, try the vintage visual effect when shooting a light source.
4. Through The Looking Glass
To capture images that are unique and beguiling, you can experiment by shooting through a crystal ball. Light is refracted as it passes through the glass camera lens to produce an inverted image. The same thing occurs when you snap scenery through a glass orb.
If you don’t have a crystal ball you can use a paperweight or marble that is clear and transparent. A wine glass filled with water also produces effective results.
Express your creativity by photographing portraits, land and cityscapes, or abstract items through the looking glass. To fill the entire frame with the sphere, use a macro lens. Snapping with a wide-angle lens will capture some of the scenery behind your focal point. You can also play around with editing software to rotate the images and alter perspectives.
5. Add A Pop Of Colour
Using cool colour techniques can make an object really stand out in your photos. You can pick a favourite colour for your post-lockdown photo shoot, and then look for it in your surroundings. Using clever composition techniques enables you to draw the eye to the pop of colour, without the need for it to fill the frame.
Search for household objects that you can creatively use as colour filters. Tissue paper, translucent sweet wrappers or ultra thin fabric, attached to the
lens with an elastic band, is a great way to instantly saturate and transform your images with colour.
6. Discover The Beauty All Around You
If your next post-lockdown photo shoot is outdoors, challenge yourself to experiment with your camera. Look for the beauty in subjects, surroundings and settings that may initially look rather simple, uninspiring or mundane. You can also practice by snapping images with your mobile phone camera.
For sharp and clear images, select a mid-range aperture. If you’re transfixed by a stunning landscape and you need a steady hand, use a tripod to capture the perfect breathtaking image.
Just because landscapes are horizontal, it doesn’t mean that you have to stick to the tried and tested format. Have fun playing around with an angled or vertical orientation. Each snap that you take should feature elements that dictate perspective, and also show off your techniques and skills as a photographer.
Once you have a good selection of striking images, pick out your favourite snaps and showcase them in your post-lockdown photo albums. Display your talents to great effect, by arranging the photos by subject matter, colour or theme.
