It is not necessary for you to be a professional photographer in order to take a good photo. What is a good photo? For me, it is an image that strikes my interest. In order for that to happen, it needs to be bold whether it is color, contrast, perspective, or scene. Play around with some of these ideas and see what you come up with.

• Colors – The colors should be bold or you could try photographing in black and white.
• Contrast – This is the light and dark tones in the photo that create highlights and shadows. There are different levels of contrast that can be used to create a mood.
• Light – The type of light (warm or cool), how much light used, and the angles from the light source all have different impacts on the image. A lot of photographers like to take photos during the golden hour, which is the hour after sunrise and the hour before sunset. Golden hour usually produces flattering images because of the soft warm light and the low direction from the sun.
• Perspective – Try taking shots from different angles to create some unique scenes.
• Scene – When creating a scene, be sure to use the rule of thirds. This is a guideline where you break the image into thirds both horizontally and vertically. This will create four intersections. The focus of your image should be placed on one of these intersections so that your eye naturally locates it.

Experimenting with the subjects above will be a learning experience of what works and what doesn’t. It is trial and error, but it will become second nature after a bit of practice. Try photographing different models too. A model doesn’t have to be a human. It could be an object, animal, or flowers for example.

Once you feel like you have some good snaps, play around with editing tools to enhance your photos. After you’ve mastered these skills, you can graduate to playing around with your camera settings to take some interesting photos. For instance, adjusting your shutter speed, ISO, and aperture will create different effects in your photos. Now, it is time for you to either set up scene at home or wander outside to see what type of shots you can create.