Finding a way to tell a story

[photoguy99]

Don't bother getting in to semantic chopping games. We're taking about pretty vague and very idiomatic language here. Fussing over what, exactly, 'tells a story' means according to the dictionary and the grammar text is to miss the point entirely in favor of counting coup.

 

[Scatterbrained]

Don't bother getting in to semantic chopping games. We're taking about pretty vague and very idiomatic language here. Fussing over what, exactly, 'tells a story' means according to the dictionary and the grammar text is to miss the point entirely in favor of counting coup.

It's not semantics at all. It gets to the heart of both what photography is and what it means to communicate. Here's a great example from the article I referenced earlier:

Recently, one of the most celebrated 'storytelling' images, Alfred Eisenstaedt's photograph of a sailor kissing a woman on V-J Day in Times Square, has seen a revised storyline that dramatically changes its connotation. The image depends on the audience sharing a similar cultural and historical point of view, but when people start asking who the woman is and questioning her role in the storyline it becomes possible for this photo to transform from an icon of joy to an emblem of sexual assault. Because the image provides no actual narrative, it supports both interpretations.

 

[Scatterbrained]

It's quite simple, when you tell a story you guide peoples experience; with a photograph you set the scene for them to create their own experience.

 

[Murray Bloom]

I'm working on a series of dying roses. I'm not sure if the narrative works as much (if at all) without the title, "Now I lay me down to sleep".

Flickr

 

[Murray Bloom]

It's quite simple, when you tell a story you guide peoples experience; with a photograph you set the scene for them to create their own experience.

That's why I often avoid short depth of field, which is often insistent on what the subject is. I prefer as much to be in focus as possible within my chosen composition so that the viewer is free to explore and discover.

 

[Gary A.]

I have a collection of old B&W's I took during the film-only days. Most tell very good stories ... a few are ... meh. Dunno if they help any ... but here they are:

Black & Whites - GaryAyala

Gary

 

[snerd]

OMG!! Aren't there LAWS against hanging children from ceiling fans?!?!!

 

[PaulWog]

I'm wondering how some of the folks on here frame a picture to tell a story? The way i understand it is: a picture can have too little or too much, the layers of the out of focus background can have a secondary role to frame your main subjects in. I am having a hard time processing all the elements in finding the right composition when i'm in the field, it just gets overwhelming. My question really is that: how do you sort out through the mess when you are in the middle of a shoot? Not when you have time to plan things out, but when you are shooting from the hip.

"I'm wondering how some of the folks on here frame a picture to tell a story?"
If you're creating a painting, composing a piece of music, or writing a book, there are rules to adhere to. Everyone practices their craft through mimicry, repetition, and identifying rules. Part of progression is making mistakes (not breaking the rules properly, or not understand the parameters of particular rules). But to your question: How do you tell a story with one photograph? You just have to see something, and capture it. It's a matter of seeing exactly what needs to be in the frame to ask your question, or tell the story, or convey the exact emotion you saw. You could say you are glozing about, editing what really happened... but no one sees what *actually* happened! They remember what they experience. EveryonA good photograph captures that, rather than what the sensor normally would capture on its own, which is just a frame. The reason why I think there's no straight answer to this comes right back to what I said about a book, or a good painting... you can know every rule, but if you haven't practiced applying those rules enough, you won't ever produce what you really want to. There is some universality to the rules of photography, but a story can be told in so many creative ways.

There's a few things that you can do to help yourself. The first is to not get too hung up on getting everything correct... just shoot. The second is to set goals... pick out rules that you want to apply to your photography, or challenge in your photography. The third is to view other peoples' photographs, and identify what rules they have used or broken.

I really like this video. It's a little different than other photography advice videos I've ever seen... he provides a lot of really solid, in-your-face, straight-to-the-point, easy-to-digest lessons. One of my favorites is his lesson about the horizon. You can apply it to more than just landscapes. It's essentially the rule of thirds, applied to the horizon. He indicates that there is a battle going on in the frame for dominance, between the land and the sky. To paraphrase, he says that everyone wants a winner... ties are boring. So, set your horizon at a 1/3 line, to either allow the sky to win, or the land. This can end up being at a 1/4 mark (top 1/4 or bottom 1/4 of the frame), but you get the idea. This can also shift depending on how maybe a skyscraper might add to what seems like the barrier of the horizon line. Here's the link to the YouTube video:

This simple one piece of advice can be furthered in your photography. Does something win out in the frame? Why does it win out? What is it winning against? Is there something your subject can be contrasted with, or complemented by? A competition, or maybe an alliance? I mean, we can just take post #19, which is a great example of something winning out in the frame. The dying rose has won the primary light source, it wins the concluding portion of the leading line (the stem), It wins the foreground of the picture (it's raised the highest). But the frame isn't filled with the dead rose... so what is the frame filled with? Well, it's filled with dead petals and leaves. They're sort of an empty space, and yet a filled space... random, but a bed for the dead rose. But then we can apply another rule to the same photograph... rule of thirds in framing... and again, it seems to adhere to that rule fairly well. The use of diagonals to provide a sense of change? Yep. Subject weight, in contrast with something else that is a slightly lower-tier subject? Yes, the dead stem seems to be a secondary subject that accents the primary subject (the dead rose head). I'm pretty bad with deciding what is at the barriers of the frame (serving to keep the frame a rectangle or box)... I can't speak much on that.

The point is that you can really go on forever looking at different rules and applying them to your photography. It's worth looking at different photographs and figuring out what makes them work, how they apply rules, how they break rules... just practice different things, and become fluent with new skills as you go. Identify what is interesting... force the viewer to feel something, or better yet, to be left wondering something, even if that something is so little (even a half-thought that no finger can be put on). Oh, and then there's the difference between taking one photograph, and creating a body of work... there's different types of photographs, some that stand on their own, some that only work with the body of work, and some that can do either. There's different genres of photographs too... stock photographs can be beautiful, yet clean like soap.

 

[photoguy99]

There are more things in heaven and earth, Scatterbrained, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

The article you keep citing does the same thing you are doing. It adopts a narrow view of what 'storytelling' might mean, and then uses that narrow definition to declare a bunch of things 'wrong'.

This is sheer pedantry.

I'm much more interested in trying to figure out what people might mean when they say a thing than I am in declaring them simply wrong. But then, I don't care to count coup.

Also, your article uses the word effect wrong.

 

[Designer]

But i do find that sometimes to understand an image, you do have to have the cultural and the educated mind to be able to enjoy something. I'm not talking about always, i'm just talking about my expierence.

I know the feeling well. Almost nobody understands why I take certain shots, but even if it is only for my own enjoyment, at least I've done it.

As for grabbing shots quickly while in the moment, you can do several things to be ready. Upon entering a street with short to moderately long views, switch over to the wide angle lens. Meter the light for an average scene, and get your settings to that average. If something happens, grab the shot first, then if there is more time, check the settings to make the second shot better. Learn to focus quickly if using a manual focus lens, and you will be prepared for almost any situation.

 

[sashbar]

I'm wondering how some of the folks on here frame a picture to tell a story? The way i understand it is: a picture can have too little or too much, the layers of the out of focus background can have a secondary role to frame your main subjects in. I am having a hard time processing all the elements in finding the right composition when i'm in the field, it just gets overwhelming. My question really is that: how do you sort out through the mess when you are in the middle of a shoot? Not when you have time to plan things out, but when you are shooting from the hip.

A technically "storytelling" image and an image with the content, that can trigger your imagination and give you a story, are two different things.
Technically storytelling pictures are pictures that are shot with a wide lense using deep DoF. They have forefront objects and exploit our typical lines of vision, but there may not be "a story" as such.

As for the stiory as a content, it is mostly intuition. Unless, of course there is something obvious happening, which is not really interesting, as anything that is obvious. This is a teritory of a documentary/reportage that I personally am not interested in the slightest.

Most of the time you look at the scene and see something that draws you in, whether it is emotion, composition, colors etc. Most often it is a combination of these factors. Often there is simply no time to think about it and you shoot relying on your vision. Looking at the image on your computer screen you know if there is indeed any story or not.

For me a single shot that carries a story and wakes up my imagination most of the time is a sign of a true artist. There are selected few whose images contain stories and trigger our imagination, even though they often do not see these stories themselves. But their creative vision and instinct are top notch. This is just the nature of art. One guy on this forum was Pascal Riben, who sadly decided to delete all his images here and left. But he was on a different planet altogether. I could see a story in his every second image. Then again, some people look at his images and see nothing. So it all in your imagination.