Bursa Photographer
The best part about being a beginner photographer is that you have the freedom to explore almost any style of photography. Fashion, photojournalism, sports, events – armed with a camera, you can try them all and improve your skills at the same time.
But as you gain more experience in photography, you will discover that it is difficult to stick to a specific style if you don’t stick to it. In fact, it can be the single biggest thing holding you back from succeeding in a particular field.
In this article, we will help you understand some of the most popular styles in photography, what they are like, and how you can succeed in each of them.
The Most Popular Types of Photography
Portrait Photography
Portrait is arguably the most explored niche or genre in photography. Today, everyone with a smartphone practices portrait photography, as it has become natural to point and aim the camera at a person.
The beauty of portrait photography, also known as candid photography, is in capturing a person’s personality, sometimes through the use of poses. Professional photographers in this niche typically photograph supermodels or celebrities on red carpets or in magazine shoots, but in some cases they also do graduation portraits, family portraits, and professional headgear for aspiring models and actors.
For a more appealing portrait, make sure you are close enough to capture the person’s facial expression clearly.
Still Life Photography As the name suggests, this popular photography niche primarily involves photographing objects. Product photography is used by advertising agencies to photograph items for catalogs, magazines, and even billboards. You can use just one main product or several products that follow a central theme.
One of the secrets to taking great photos is having great lighting, whether outdoors or indoors. In product photography, many photographers use a light box, which they place to illuminate the item from all angles with diffused light to eliminate harsh shadows.
Landscape Photography
Those who love to travel will of course take a lot of landscape photos. Contrary to popular belief, this type of photography is not limited to horizontal photography, as shooting vertically may be necessary when shooting tall trees, mountains, and anything else you might feel compelled to capture while exploring the outdoors.
Fortunately, this generation has also opened up more creative possibilities for us by making it much easier to shoot aerial drone shots for bird’s eye views, as opposed to just ground level. But for more striking shots, you’ll need to upgrade from your smartphone or compact digital camera, invest in a better camera, and use the right lenses for landscape photography.
Food Photography
If we were writing this article about a decade ago, the food photography niche would have been harder to break into. Fortunately, today’s generation of social media has influenced the way we take photos of our food, whether for entertainment or marketing purposes.
With today’s camera phone capabilities, it may not be necessary to use a professional standalone camera, as long as you have a pretty good camera phone and the right lighting to capture truly mouthwatering food shots.
Make sure the white balance is set correctly to get the right colors. You can also increase the saturation of your images (especially the reds and yellows) to make your food look even more appealing.
Sports Photography
Sports photography is a more professional niche that requires very fast shooting. Sports photographers are normally equipped with long, heavy lenses that can zoom in on where the action is and shoot at fast shutter speeds without ending up with underexposed images.
Sports venues are regularly packed with photographers, but a slot competition is still quite tough. If you want to try your hand at sports photography, crank up your ISO so you can use a fast shutter speed, experiment with angles, and always be ready to aim and click that shutter.
Wildlife Photography
Another rewarding and well-paying niche is wildlife photography. Because of the obvious difficulty of capturing good, clear images of wild animals without letting them into their natural habitat, a job in this field requires some significant improvements in camera equipment and many safety precautions, similar to sports photography.
Not everyone can be a wildlife photographer, which is why people pay good money for this type of photography. Wildlife photography often takes place in the most dangerous and remote parts of the world, in harsh conditions.
Macro Photography
Those who want to capture truly incredible images enjoy macro photography. Capturing objects to appear larger than they actually are is relatively easy, as long as you have the right equipment. You can equip your smartphone with a clip-on macro lens accessory, or use a macro lens on a DSLR or mirrorless camera for more ideal high-resolution results.
If you are looking for regular photography work, macro photography may not be the right niche for you. However, it is a great genre for those who want to capture artistic and highly appealing photos.
Event Photography
Event photography is a large and popular field that includes many types of special events, such as concerts, birthdays, corporate meetings, and even weddings. It often involves a mix of different photography techniques, as you photograph everything from people and candid moments to venues and food.
What makes a good portfolio for this genre is knowing how to tell a story with your images, rather than obscuring the event itself. Obviously, there will be a lot of practice in dealing with people and capturing a specific event. You will also need a variety of lenses to successfully pack each shot into your “shot list” and not miss any important moments.
Fashion Photography
When people consider a job in photography, most suggest fashion photography. Thanks to its demand for advertising and marketing, it has remained one of the most lucrative jobs for decades.
Fashion photography often features supermodels and celebrities in fashionable clothing, shoes, and accessories. Because of the need to showcase the outfits, this job usually involves a lot of full-body shots. However, it may also include some portraiture, so you may want to practice your portrait skills if you want to get into fashion photography.
Depending on the style of clothing, fashion can take you anywhere from studios to outdoor locations with full lighting setups and modeling runways.
Newborn Photography
Newborn, infant or baby photography is basically the same as portrait photography, but it’s its own niche because of the unique challenges that come with it. Newborns are usually very fragile, their eyes are sensitive to light, and it’s necessary to learn how to use the camera to make the most of the available light. Babies also have a hard time regulating their body temperature, so your studio should be cool or warm enough depending on what your precious guest is wearing.
Did we mention that bowel movements can be unpredictable? A newborn photo shoot can be the craziest, yet most rewarding, of your entire career.
Street Photography
For those who bring their cameras everywhere and enjoy exploring their artistic freedom, street photography is a particularly appealing genre. It’s a unique genre of photography that documents the human condition and captures unplanned events as they occur, often without a central theme or subject. The best part is that you can use different types of cameras for street photography.
Common subjects include street vendors, street food, children, graffiti, and sometimes lots of concrete in black and white. As long as they highlight or portray the reality of the outside world, they don’t necessarily have to be taken to the streets.
Fortunately for many street photographers, these types of photos are often featured in magazines, blogs, and newspapers. However, since street photographers typically shoot on their own time rather than on a project-by-project basis, there is no guarantee of a steady income.
Photojournalism
Not to be confused with street photography, photojournalism is a profession that typically covers specific scenes and stories for the news. It uses street photography to take objective photographs that are more historical in scope. And because they tend to be published in newspapers, professional photojournalists are paid well for their photographs, especially if they are affiliated with newspapers, magazines, book publishers, or specific organizations and institutions.
Photojournalism is another place where it is not necessarily about taking the perfect picture, but capturing candid moments that tell the story best.
Documentary Photography
Have you ever heard of war photographers? These brave men of the press are part of the documentary photography business, along with other photojournalists who cover much more historically significant social and political issues. Like street photography, they capture raw, intimate emotions and significant moments in time in real-life situations, but they are given more universal titles because they do not only cover local gatherings or other celebrities.
If you are looking to shoot timeless photos of world issues or presidents for some of the biggest magazines, documentary photography may be for you.
Stock Photography (Stock Photography)
Stock photography is another area that is growing among today’s new generation of professional photographers. Stock photographers provide and sell photos that will be licensed for specific uses. Although it has been around for centuries, the stock photography market has grown significantly due to the increasing demand on blogs, websites, and digital marketing purposes.
It’s not exactly one of the most popular, but it can be a good source of income. It allows you to work for yourself at your own convenience. You also get passive income from reselling, that is, if you don’t manage to take a lot of photos and really explore your artistic freedom.
Aerial Photography Aerial photography is basically outdoor photography that showcases different weather conditions (often harsh and extreme) such as hurricanes, blizzards, sandstorms, hailstorms. Many photographers around the world chase down life-threatening storms to capture the beauty of what is usually hidden and quick to escape.
Given the chance, this niche will pay you well and probably reward you with award-winning images, but whether it’s worth the risk to shoot and risk your life is a question of whether it’s worth it.
Architectural Photography
If you are looking for a niche that offers a constant flow of projects, you may want to look into architectural photography.
Photographing the exteriors and interiors of buildings and other structures can be very rewarding to designers, architects, leasing companies, and potential investors. It is a blend of artistic and technical skill, and can involve serious knowledge of the elements of art and proper composition. This work can sometimes be confused with real estate photography, which involves photographing structures (most often homes, apartments, or condominiums) and their interiors. You can technically switch between the two, as they both use the same equipment and have the same skills.
Long Exposure Photography
Long exposure photography uses the technical capabilities of your camera to hold the shutter open for longer periods of time, allowing you to capture surreal images that are invisible to the naked eye. This genre is moving into night photography and astrophotography, which can result in incredible streaks of light, starbursts, and dramatic gradients (at least) that would otherwise appear like a dull black sky in real life. It also includes using an ND filter during the day to capture velvety smooth lakes and sparkling rivers.
Given that long exposure photography requires the use of long shutter speeds, you definitely need to gear up with a tripod, remote shutter release, a camera with good low-light performance, and real skill in manual photography.