https://mastodon.social/@UP8/tagged/9mm
If your goal is to show people something they haven't seen before the G Master telephoto is the last thing you want. If anything out of his photos I like the wide shot from the mountaintop better because it's lively and has people in it. One of the boring things about the average social photo stream is that it is either (a) selfies or (b) bugs and flowers and landscape and empty cityscapes.
Agreed. And strongly related to your other comment about selfies/bugs/flowers/boring landscapes…
One of the best pieces of advice for leveling up from novice snapshots to compelling photographs is: take photos about things, not photos of things.
Purposefully including people in the frame goes a long way to make photos more interesting because it instantly attaches a narrative.
(1) good portraits
(2) photos that show players in opposition to each other
(3) photos that tell a story
Developing the habit to do (1) consistently is important because photos like that are still usable. If you just chase the action in most sports the ball is between you and a player and you get a lot of shots of people's behinds so looking for the places where people are open is foundational.
(3) is tough because a play involves a number of events that don't usually appear in one frame except for a few shots in a game like:
Then in the middle there is a train station(?) where the narrative is also absent or muddled. The people arrived by train to do what?
I would argue the tight shot of the mountain and house is the best capture, because it tells a story of a beautiful place where someone lives.
I think there likely are ways to effectively include the people, by getting to a angle where you can isolate a couple of them and include the mountain. I suspect you could also get a good shot with the wide angle by moving closer to the people, although this would emphasize the people more than the mountain.
I went through a phase of shooting everything at 10mm too. It’s a novelty that wears out fast if you’re not respecting rules of good composition.
Author is correct, the wide shot of the mountains cape is too busy and lacks a story. Despite lacking people, the tight shot is a stronger image.
I would agree with the author that telephoto makes it easier to get a clean composition... Walking around with a 35mm I end up taking almost no shots.