How to Actually Start in Photography (Advice I Wish I'd Had)

I get messages from young people around Terrace asking how to get into photography. It is the best kind of message to receive. So here is everything I would tell a fifteen-year-old, or a forty-year-old, who wants to start — stripped of the gear-shop nonsense.

Your Camera Does Not Make You Good

This is the most important thing, so it goes first. Your gear does not make you a good photographer. A top-of-the-line camera, when you are starting out, is a waste of money and actually makes learning harder — there are too many buttons and too many decisions. All you need is a camera with a kit lens or two, some batteries, a memory card, and a tripod. Honestly, the phone in your pocket is enough to learn composition, which is the part that matters most.

Spend your money on getting out and shooting, not on the next body. The best photographers I know would out-shoot a beginner using a ten-year-old camera.

Learn the Exposure Triangle, Then Get Off Auto

The single most useful technical thing you can learn is the exposure triangle: aperture, shutter speed, and ISO, and how they trade off against each other. Once you understand it, take the camera off full Auto. You will not learn anything while the camera makes every decision for you. Use aperture-priority or manual, get things wrong, and figure out why.

That is the whole loop: shoot, look at what failed, learn the one thing that fixes it, repeat. Do that a thousand times and you are a photographer.

Try Everything Before You Specialise

You might have picked up a camera to shoot landscapes, or sports, or your friends. Shoot all of it anyway. You never know what you will have a knack for, or what one genre teaches you that carries into another. Sports taught me to anticipate a moment; portraits taught me to put people at ease; landscapes taught me patience. They all feed each other.

Look at Great Work, Every Single Day

Make a habit of viewing a handful of strong photographs every day — on a photographer’s website, on a platform like 500px, wherever. Do not just scroll past. Sit with an image and ask why it works: where is the light coming from, where did they stand, what did they leave out. Studying images is how you train your eye, and your eye matters more than your shutter finger.

Canada has world-class photographers to learn from — I wrote a whole piece on five of them and exactly what they shoot. Start there.

Talk to Working Photographers

Most professionals do not mind a few respectful questions. We were all beginners, and we remember the people who helped us. Be polite, be specific, do not demand hours of someone’s time, and you will be surprised how generous the photography community is. If you are local and you see me out shooting, say hello.

Shoot Where You Are

You do not need to travel to make good photographs. The Skeena Valley, the trails around Terrace, the working port at Prince Rupert — this region is wildly under-photographed, which means it is full of images that have not been done a thousand times already. The best subject is the one you can get to after school or on a Saturday morning. Familiarity is an advantage: you can be there for the ten minutes when the light turns.

The Only Mistake Is Caring Too Much About the Wrong Thing

The trap that catches new photographers is getting hung up on gear, likes, and trying to go viral. None of that is the point. The point is being creative most days, meeting people, seeing your own place more clearly. Keep that at the centre and the rest sorts itself out.

If you are starting out and want to talk, or if you are looking for a photographer for something that matters, the door is open. Reach out anytime.