Essential to any photographer’s growth is the development of their own individual style or vision. It’s what makes people want to see your photographs instead of someone else’s. For those of you who seek to pursue a career in photography, your own personal vision and style is what will set you apart from your competitors and make you attractive to clients.

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If you don’t already have a style that you can call your own what can you do? There are probably as many different answers to that as there are photographers asking the question. Personal style comes over time. You can’t hope to develop it overnight; rather, by shooting what you love over and over again, you can discover and nurture your own style. View the work of other photographers, particularly those who shoot in the same genre as you. Choose a couple of images from your favorite photographer that best represent (to you) the essence of their vision. Now go out and copy that. Look at it. Study it. Compare your image with theirs. Even if all of the technical details are the same, the gear is the same and the subject is the same, the two photos will be different. Why? The simple answer is that one is shot with vision and style (theirs) and the other is trying to copy that (yours). Guess what. It doesn’t work. Your style is unique to you and it’s up to you to discover, nurture and express it.

Once you know and understand this, not in the intellectual sense but in the lightbulb over the head sense, go back out and shoot the same subject but shoot it differently. Try different times of day, different lenses, different processing techniques, move closer, move further away, shoot into the sun, shoot at night, wait for a stormy sky, change the angles and background. Anything you can think of and even things you can’t. Don’t worry if you think that a shot won’t work – take it anyway. Don’t think. Shoot from the place inside you that is your essence or heart. Shoot hundreds of frames of the same subject. Eventually you’ll find your own style. Maybe not on the first day or in the first month. But find it you will. When you do, treasure it. Your style is what will make you stand out from the crowd.

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