Moving up

[odway]

Hi
It's been a while since I've been here, the last was when I was buying my camera and you guys helped me out to make my choice (great advice by the way, absolutely love the D50!). I've been trying to get in as much practise as I can but I'm finding it hard to make the step up from kind of happy-snap type photos to photos that actually look a bit more serious. I'm so glad I went and bought an external hard drive because at the end of the day I still like to keep my snapshots (and there's tonnes of them!) but I'd really like to try and step things up a notch and I'm a bit lost with how to do that.

I'm still a real beginner, and I'm only now just getting off the auto mode. I've been taking photos of friends' horses so that I can get the experience shooting equines while they're being worked which is good because I've realised how hard it is to get a good shot (when ears aren't back etc!). And I've also found a lot has to do with the background, a horse can look lovely but it just wont cut it if the background is untidy. As I'm the one who travels to the location, not the horse, I feel like I can't really get around that one unfortunately.

I've put a few photos in below. How do I try to move things up a notch? Is it just a matter of practise? Sometimes I feel like I lack inspiration or motivation, I almost feel like I should enrol in some sort of class to get assignments to keep me going because I find it hard to make the time in between looking after my own horse and studying at uni. I don't want to be a pro photographer or anything, I'd just like to be able to use my camera the best I can. Any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks! (and sorry if this is in the wrong forum, I wasn't sure where to put it).

 

[imabigboy]

I love the first picture! What is that? Some kind of monkey?

 

[Alex_B]

wohaaa! if it wasn't for the eyes I would not be sure if that first one was a face or a behind!

sorry .. totally unqualified comment

yes, practise does it.

and look at your photos again and again and decide what you like least about them, and then try to figure out what you can do to improve it technically or composition wise.

and .. ask that is what a forum is good for

 

[canto_xii]

Look at lots of different photos by lots of different photographers, explore different techniques, don't be afraid to "waste" film (or kilobytes) on experimentation. Also, one of the things the photo fundamentals teachers at my college always said: "GET IN CLOSE AND BEND THOSE KNEES!"

 

[canto_xii]

Oh, and the first and third photos you posted are really not too bad!

 

[odway]

Thanks guys, just a little update... I followed your advice and went out to a horse show and photographed one ring for practise, and then came home and critiqued each shot. That helped HEAPS to figure out what needs fixing the most. I actually ended up selling quite a few of the shots (which wasn't the initial plan at all but people were requesting them) and that really recharged my inspiration and made me feel great! Canto your teacher's words really helped, in my opinion some of the best shots were taken from a lower angle than I would have normally taken them at. I guess I should try new things more often . So really, thankyou for giving me advice and helping me take the plunge and get out there a bit, it's really helped!

Oh and yes, I think that's a primate of some sort. Was taken at Singapore zoo, unfortunately I don't remember exactly what it was, but it did look rather interesting!

 

[WDodd]

Something I always do when i go out to shoot stuff is play with different settings. For instance your third photo the horse is definitely moving if I were you I would try and capture some of that movement with a slower shutter speed perhaps? Then when you go out and you are looking to achieve a certain effect you know exactly how to do it. =)

I like the first one a lot, really weird looking creature!