P#9 Q1: What Is The Single Biggest Travel Photography Mistake People Make?

Get Into The Picture

Brenda Tharp: It's hard to narrow it down to a single biggest travel photography mistake, but I would say that one of the most common problems is that there's a distance people put between themselves and their scene or their subject.

They just don't get close enough. It has nothing to do with the technical side of photography, but it's about actually "seeing".

When we travel to a foreign place, it's not uncommon to feel shy. We're strangers at that point. We want to see the life that's lived there and experience it.

The problem is, until we really get close, jump in, and get more involved in the scene, then all of our pictures are going to have a "by-stander look" to them.

You want to take a picture of something going on in the meadow, but rather than actually being in the meadow photographing the scene up close, you're on the sidewalk taking the picture. The result is that anybody who looks at your pictures doesn't really connect to the experience you had because you haven't shown it by really getting in closer and being involved.

Audri Lanford: That's really fascinating! I would love you to give a us some tips that can help us avoid doing that. How do you get into the scene and be there more?

Brenda Tharp: I think one of the leading contributors to this problem is zoom lenses.

Don't get me wrong. Zoom lenses are great for times when you physically cannot move any closer to your subject.

However, if you can move with your feet, whether it's a ship in a harbor that you're photographing or it's a person in a market, the closer you get, the more intimate the picture becomes.

I see a lot of people zooming their lenses out without physically moving. Yes, that pulls the subject in closer, but without any physical shift of perspective. You've given me a bigger picture of the subject, but you still haven't made me feel like I'm there.

Move in Closer

It's choosing to walk into the meadow the extra 25 feet, rather than staying on the sidewalk.

We've become a little lazy. The zoom makes it so easy for us. We don't have to get our feet wet in the grass. Or we're in a hurry because we're with friends traveling. They want to get to the Louvre. We want to make a picture. It's easier to just zoom.

Zoom does make a subject bigger, but it isn't necessarily the best perspective for it. It doesn't put me in the picture with you when you've taken the photograph.

We are photographing our experiences, whether we're experiencing a flower or we're experiencing someone selling cheese or fish in a market in Venice. If you're standing on the sidelines, your pictures are going to look like you stood on the sidelines.

If you're walking amongst those stalls in the fish market, you're smelling the fish, and you're getting the close-up views of all these different fish, then I'm going to feel that when I look at your picture -- like I was there.

In conclusion

So there you have it. Sidelines are not the place to be when taking travel photos.

For extraordinary travel photography, you need to live the experience, and take the close-ups that show you were there. Move your feet rather than simply zoom your lens, and you're travel photography will improve a great deal.