Serious photographers work hard to find their style. Searching for that certain something that says "this is the work of "x."" It can take years for a photographer to develop their own personal style. And some never do, happily content snapping away without ever committing to a particular style.
Style is borne out of many things. Visual styles are often first developed through studying other photographers’ and artists’ work. That process usually starts when we are very young children before we even have any interest in becoming an artist. And it continues and grows after we pursue photography as a craft. And that stylistic inspiration isn’t limited to just printed images and photography. Often as children we may see scenes in real life, in movies, or on television and some of those images get imprinted on our brains and end up influencing us for a lifetime. For me, some of my earliest visual influences came through many sources.
Things that influenced me greatly included my visits to parks (being out in a natural environment,) being out after dark in New York City (mesmerized by glowing lights in the darkness,) flipping through my mom’s album collection (the amazing covers,) some of the illustrated books of my childhood (most enchanted by forest scenes,) the circus (the spectacular of performance and action,) a religious prayer book illustrated with nature photos (peace through a connection with nature,) and television (especially the musical performances on variety shows where the performers were dressed in sparkly outfits that would sparkle and hypnotize me as a child.) Those things had a great influence on my visual tastes and still impact me today.
Take the time to think about it and you will find that you too have a list. Those early influences likely have had more of an affect that you realize. Making a list could help you on your way to discovering your personal style. Writing it down helps you sort it out better.
Other factors that can strongly influence your style are your subjects and available shooting situations. Your subject matter often dictates how it needs to be captured. If your preferred style is of, for example, light and airy high key imagery with no shadows but what you have to shoot are buildings and scenes under harsh high contrast lighting with strong shadows, then things are not going to work out for you at that particular time. You will need to either adapt your style or come back at another time or find another subject. But that is the thing about style, you’ll find that your subjects will influence your shooting style. If you live in a city surrounded by such high contrast scenes in daylight, you’ll find through practice how to make those scenes work photographically. And then suddenly that high contrast look becomes part of your style. Or you can find that you can’t work with it, and then opt to shoot only with artificial light or during overcast days.
But don’t forget that you don’t need to shoot everything the same way or under the same lighting conditions in order to have a personal style. I have a love of different lighting situations and subjects. I use whatever techniques necessary to capture the best possible image of whatever it is that I am shooting at the time. But everything still ends up coming together well as a collection in my body of work. And that’s the thing about style, some aspects of it are so subtle that you may not even notice it while you’re shooting. The way you compose a scene or frame your subject are a big part of your style, even if they may not be as obvious as some other stylistic aspects such as key, lighting, or color preferences.
Other strong factors contributing to your style are your photographic knowledge and gear. Your gear influences your style simply because of how certain cameras and lenses record a scene. For example, using a compact camera will render scenes with deep focus because of the smaller sensors in those cameras (do an internet search if you want to learn more about the physics that are the reason for this.) You will find creating images with shallow depth of field, an aspect of my own personal style, an impossibility with those types of cameras. If you shoot with a Holga or pinhole camera, you will find creating images with deep depth of field and high sharpness an impossibility. Is it the camera that influences a photographer’s style or is it the photographer that chooses to use particular gear to support his style? It can be either and sometimes even both. I think an SLR or mirrorless camera along with a two zoom lens basic kit is an ideal place for any photographer to start gear wise. As your experience grows and your style develops, you can add more lenses to your kit as needed. I myself bought lenses over the years to support my then current work and had often found that those tools made an impact on my style. Both by supporting my style and also by influencing it, which I will later explain in this post.
Here are some tips on how to develop your own personal photographic style:
