Guess what? This is my 50th blog post!! I can hardly believe it! That’s a whole lot of stuff about making travel photos, me, feelings, probably some France thrown in there…

So for this post, I thought I’d share with you the top 9 tips that I’ve picked up since starting my journey into making travel photos. Because it hasn’t exactly been the smoothest of journeys. I’ll give you a little recap…

When I first discovered travel and photography, I decided it was a match made in heaven. Until I saw my photos. They were not so good. Actually a lot of them sucked. Blurry, too dark, not sure what the subject even was...you get the picture (no pun intended). And so I put my camera down thinking “I’m not good at this”.

Fast forward a few (a lot) of years later and I’m on my 50th blog post on the subject! Because eventually I picked my camera back up and decided that I love making photos enough to figure it out.

Oh yeah, and then I convinced my husband to move to France for a year, and I REALLY wanted to make good photos while we were there.

Let’s dive into my top 9 tips. I think they’ll come in handy.

This is a vineyard in Tuscany. The only reason I’m including it in this blog post is because I was dreaming of Tuscany. So here you go…

Don’t expect perfection

Photos can be FABULOUS without being perfect. I am a recovering perfectionist, and I would look at my photos with such a critical eye that I ended up rejecting almost all of them. Now don’t get me wrong, it’s normal to take LOTS of photos and only end up with a few that are really good. But I used to reject so many or all of them, for things that were...well silly really.

If a photo makes you smile, reminds you of a warm or funny moment...then guess what? It’s a good photo. Now a really underexposed or off-focus photo won’t bring a smile or warm thought - it will only bring a cringe. So there do have to be a few things in place for it to pass. But if you consider the moment captured when evaluating if it passes or not...I think you’ll end up with a whole lot more that make the cut.

If this is something you struggle with and you want more about it, don’t worry there’s a blog post on that.

Perfect photo? No. But this is the Place du Capitole in Toulouse, where we lived for a year. It brings me right back to Toulouse, to the French cafe culture…ahh the memories.

How to not make blurry photos

OK, this is a little embarrassing. I thought my camera’s focus system wasn’t working for a long time. Uh...no my camera was working just fine. What was actually happening was that I shot in aperture priority mode, and would choose just the right aperture.

That means my camera would choose the shutter speed it needed to get enough light into the camera. Which often meant a really slow shutter speed based on my aperture number and the available lighting. Which meant I couldn’t hand-hold my camera steady enough. Hence the blurry photos.

Now at the time I didn’t really look at shutter speed, nor did I know about the whole “slow shutter speed causes blurry photos” phenomenon.

Now I do. So the tip here? If you don’t want blurry photos, pay attention to the shutter speed. And if you want to understand this concept better, head over to this blog post right here.

This photo was made overlooking a plaza in Saint-Émilion, France. It was an overcast day, so the light was fairly low which made it important to keep an eye on the shutter speed so it didn’t get too slow.

ISO can be your savior in low light

I like to travel light, which often means no tripod coming with me. So what do I do? I adjust my ISO up to give me the shutter speed that I need. I figure out which aperture I want, and then increase my ISO until I get an acceptable shutter speed (acceptable being fast enough as I mentioned above).

Sure that means a little more noise in my photos. But for me, that’s an acceptable exchange for not having to lug a tripod around. And if you ask my husband who usually carries said tripod, I bet he would agree.

Yep you guessed it, there’s also a blog post on ISO, in case you want more deets on that.

This photo was made inside of a museum in Toulouse, France. Since the light was pretty low, I bumped up my ISO to 1000 to get this shot in focus.

Creativity is in there, but you have to look for it

At one point in my life I learned that I am creative. It was kind of a revelation. I grew up in a place that didn’t really foster creativity, but rather conformity, and so I had never thought of myself as “creative”. But what I learned is that WE (yes even you) ARE ALL CREATIVE! We just have to figure out what that means for us, and how to find it.

I believe in this SO strongly that I have written a few blog posts dedicated to the topic. Here’s a good one to get you started.

In Toulouse during the holidays, I was playing around with slow shutter speed…just to see what happened.

Photos are more than pretty pictures to hang on your wall; they are memories

I used to have the mentality of “if this isn’t picture-worthy, then it’s not worth making”. So I would evaluate a situation, a scene, and decide if it’s something I would hang on my wall. If not? No photo.

But now I realize the more photos made the better. Because I LOVE going back through my photos and remembering the places, details, experiences, people. My mind can’t possibly keep all of that sorted. But photos can!

It’s important to figure out your why. Why do you make photos when you travel? It can be for memories, but also for wall art, photo books, sharing the experience, educating about a culture. When you figure out the why, it can help drive what you make photos of and how you do it.

By this point you probably see the pattern. Here’s an entire blog post devoted just to this topic right here.

This is the street where our Toulouse apartment was. Did I print this photo and hang it on the wall? No. But when I look at it, I go right back to the little market, and wine shop, the cafe right down the street…riding our bikes to the Canal du Midi. Yep I’m definitely glad I made this one.

Keeping your photos organized can bring peace and joy

For a while, I really didn’t even want to make photos anymore, because I couldn’t find the digital images that I already had. I was overwhelmed and didn’t want to add to the mess.

You can probably see that there were a few times I decided I wasn’t going to make photos anymore. I’m sure glad I didn’t stay in THAT place!

BUT I figured out a system and jumped in to fix the mess. And now? Now I have a system in place, and all photos have their own little happy place. Where I can find them when I want them.

Peace and joy. You can have it too. This blog post will help you get started.

This is the street we rode our bikes down every day for 2 weeks while we went to French language school. It’s a fond memory. Luckily I could find this photo which makes reminiscing soooo much easier!

Telling the story of your travel can inspire others

Not just making random photos, but rather mindfully thinking about the story you want to tell...now THAT can make for some fantastic photos! And not just individual photos, but those that together fill in the details, the context, the feeling you got when you were experiencing that particular moment. Or trip. Or adventure.

I love the thought of telling a story through my photos. A story that can inspire others to...create, to travel, to try something new. Now that’s a powerful impact of your photos! Want to know more about telling a story with your images? You’ll never guess...there’s a blog post (or 2) on the subject.

No this isn’t JUST a cat in France. This is a burglar. He would loiter just outside our apartment on the tile rooftops. Waiting for us to go to sleep, when he would sneak in through the open window (no air conditioning, must have cool air) and steal our saucisson that we had on our countertop. But yes we did move it after the first invasion.

Get your photos out of hiding and print them

I really hadn’t printed my photos much...really at all...for years. But in the past couple of years, I’ve printed. A lot. And I love seeing them on the walls, propped on shelves, in books. I love reliving the experiences I had by looking at the prints every single day.

The alternative? Leave them trapped on your hard drive where you have to actively pull them up (if you can find them, see the previous tip on organizing files) to enjoy them.

I know, it can be tricky to figure out how and where to print. But don’t worry, I will help you with that. But brace yourself...I don’t currently have a blog post on that.

I know, quel horreur! I’m in the process of researching just the right print labs to use so I can recommend the best options to you. So stay tuned! Not only will there be a blog post, but probably an entire workshop dedicated to the subject.

Yep. That’s how much I believe in printing.

This is one of my favorite photos, make in Albi, France. I finally printed and framed it…and it makes me so happy to see it every day.

Photos need help being fabulous, and that’s what editing is for

Photo editing, or post-processing, was pretty intimidating to me at first. It’s a whole new software, technology, terminology for goodness sake...who wouldn’t be intimidated! But once I started playing around with Lightroom™, I was hooked.

And what I found out was that my photos were pretty ordinary (as most photos straight out of camera are) until they got a little makeover in Lightroom™.

I also figured out that even with just a few little nudges, my photos could be pretty amazing. Now if they’re bad, they stay bad. But if they’re ok...well then they can become pretty freaking amazing. You still have to have good composition, decent exposure and lighting...but you can give those photos a little makeover and you’ll be amazed at the difference!

And oh yes, there is definitely a blog post on this one! And there will be some live training coming up soon...I’ll keep you posted on that one.