How to Find Inspiration Photographing Locations Near Home

A Post By: Leanne Cole

Everywhere you look there are thousands of images depicting beautiful places in the world. How many times have you thought to yourself, “I wish I could travel so I could take the same photographs?” The reality is that most of those photos were taken by people who live close to the locations, or have the ability to travel there multiple times.

It is a statement that you hear from many photographers. It may be true, but the truth is most of us live in wonderfully rich photographic areas. The problem is that you see it every day, so it no longer seems interesting.

Knowing that a storm is coming, then being able to get to a good location quickly, is an advantage when you photograph near where you live.

What would you recommend to a visitor:

If another photographer was coming to your area and wanted to know places to go, what would you recommend? Think about what someone else might be interested in, that is a way you can photograph it. Try to look at your area from another point of view.

Also read :Tips for Minimizing Reflections When Photographing Through Windows

How to find something to shoot:

There has to be something unique or different about where you are located. Look at the history of your town or area. See if you can find out about an event that happened where you can visit the place. Use the history as your motivation for photography. Google the area around you, and see what you can find.

Think about interesting buildings, ones that are abandoned or still in use. There may be some interesting landmarks that can help tell a story. Perhaps there was an industry there that no longer exists.

For example, suppose in your area the local hospital started as a home for incurables. Then the land was given to the city for a permanent hospital. How has that hospital shaped the town? Is the original hospital still there? Has the hospital gone, but now something else is in its place?

There is always the possibility that nothing has ever happened. Maybe your location is devoid of that, and in which case you could photograph the normality of it. What makes it boring? What does the main street look like? Is there anything interesting there at all? There will always be something.

An older part of the Austin Hospital in Heidelberg.

How far are you willing to travel?

Mark a circle on a map of where you would be willing to travel to in a day. For instance, you might be prepared to travel at least two hours to get somewhere. Perhaps time isn’t on your side, and you can only travel 15 minutes in any direction. That becomes your zone, and the area you are going to photograph.

My area is two hours, or around that. I will travel somewhere for the day and take photos. I will go back to the same areas. There is a lot that is within that area near where I live.

Find the story:

Perhaps instead of finding individual images of the place you might be better off trying to do a whole story on it. Find the story of the area. What makes it important to the people who live there? Why have they stayed? Why do you live there?

The answers to all these questions will help you find the story, and can inform your photography.

An old car left to rust in the Mallee.

Advantages:

When you photograph where you live, you have nothing but all the advantages:

1 : You can take photos at the best time of day:

One definite advantage you have over visitors to your area, is that you can work out when the best time to photograph that spot. Then, you can go back as many times as you need.

If it is very close, you can get up early and see if it is worthwhile going there for a sunrise. Perhaps in the afternoon you can see if there are clouds in the sky, which might make it a good opportunity to get a sunset. You will be able to look out the window and figure out when you want to go.

Most people have to hope that the one time they go, the conditions will be perfect for what they want to photograph. You know how often that happens.

Getting sunrises is easier when you can wake up and go down the road to capture it.

2 : Visiting the location multiple times:

How often have you gone somewhere, put your photos on the computer when you got home and thought, “I wish I had noticed that tree” or something else on the side of the image? Maybe you wished you could have taken it at a different angle.

If you live there, that will never be a problem for you again. You can visit that spot as many times as you like, to get exactly the photos that you want.

Old towns can have great buildings that have just been left, like an old shearing shed make from kerosene tins.

3 : Experiment with different techniques:

You can try a lot different techniques to take photos. You can go home and see what you have, then go back and experiment with other angles or conditions another time. You can try more experimental types of photography, that other people who only have one opportunity to go there, might not want to try.

Every time you go, try to shoot it that spot a different way.

Sunset over a salt pan in the Mallee. Being able to get back to the same spot to get the best photos is a bonus.

4 : Have access to local knowledge

Visiting any places where you might only go once, you have to be content with information from the internet, or with what you see when you get there. However, when you live in an area, you can talk to people you know, who may be able to introduce you to others. If they know you are interested in the local area and taking photos, then you might find people coming to you, to tell you about places that you didn’t know existed.

Disadvantages:

Are there really any disadvantages? Perhaps the fact that you aren’t going anywhere exotic to take photos, unless you already live somewhere like that.

When you decide to photograph the area you live in, you get all the advantages that so many others don’t have for that place. It is up to you to make the most of it. Some examples:

A Mallee Town of not much consequence:

Take a small town in North West Victoria (Australia) where my mother lives. I go up there to visit all the time. According to the locals there is nothing there. But when I drive around, I see shops that are now empty, or a train station that has closed, and stopped being used many years ago. There are things that give hints to a time past, that was industrious. The town had a past where it was bigger, where those stores were open for business.

It would be easy to agree with the locals that there is nothing there, but that would be a mistake. The story is there in those closed buildings and what is left of the town. As a photographer you can then show what is happening there.

Getting to know locals in towns can give you access to buildings, like this old church in a Mallee town.

Finding the history of where you live:

For many years I always travelled to other places, in the city, or in the state of Victoria, to take photos because I was convinced that what was around me was boring. Who would be interested in what’s here?

I started to realize that this area has a rich art history. Some famous Australian artists have painted this area, and perhaps that was where I needed to start looking. Once I started looking with different eyes, a lot of new places started to open up to me. This area has some great parks. It is quite old so there are ancient homes, hospitals, cemeteries. Now I photograph it all the time.

Knowing the local train station and timetable, can be great for getting to the station at a good time to take photos.:

When you photograph somewhere you live or a place you travel to often, you really get so many wonderful opportunities.

Many photographers dream of travelling to other places and photographing the world, but sometimes your best subject is right outside your door or within a stone’s throw of where you live. You just need to get out there and see what you can find.

What would you recommend to photograph in your area for someone who was visiting it for the first? Please share your local photography finds and your images in the comments below.

Tips for Minimizing Reflections When Photographing Through Windows

by Leanne Cole

Have you ever wanted to take a photo through a shop window, but couldn’t work out how to cut the reflections? Or been up on an observation deck, trapped behind glass that had so many stray lights shining into the glass, that you couldn’t get a good shot of what was on the other side?

It is hard to take photos through glass and not get lots of unwanted reflections.

Glass can be one of the hardest things to take photos through. It doesn’t seem to matter where you move, you will find more reflections. Then just when you think you have the perfect shot, you put it on the computer only to find that they are still there.

Shop Windows:

One of the most commons places to take photos, is through shop windows. But, they are often in well-lit places, and they are tough because you will be getting reflections from all directions. There are ways of minimizing the reflections, and things you can do to help prevent them.

Polarizering Filter:

A polarizer filter will help reduce the reflections. It may not remove them all, but it will help you to eliminate many of them. Take the images below, it has all the lights on the outside of the store reflected in the glass, and with a polarizing filter.

The reflections of the lights from outside the shop can be seen on the glass.

The reflections have been removed by the help of the polarizing filter.

A circular polarizing filter was put on the lens, and in order to remove the reflections, it was turned until they just disappeared. Take a look at the image above right, the filter has helped remove many of them.

It doesn’t always work, but it can help reduce reflections. In some cases, you are going to find that reducing them is better than having them ruin your images.

Using a Lens Hood:

If you can get your lens right up to the glass of the window so that it sits on it squarely, it can stop any unwanted reflections from getting in front of the lens. However, it means that you can only take photos of what is directly in front of the camera, what do you do if you want to take some at an angle? There is no doubt that once you move it on an angle you will start to see reflections.

You want to be able to create a seal around the end of the lens, and a rubber lens hood can do that. Look at the following photo, you can see one on the lens.

The rubber lens cap is on the lens, and pushed against the window.

The advantage is the flexibility, and how you can move it around and change the angle of your lens. The following two images show one with reflections, and one without. The latter is the one taken using the rubber lens hood.

Reflections on the glass are apparent here.

The rubber lens hood has eliminated the reflections.

They used to be very common and a lot of people would have the rubber hoods for their lenses, but slowly the hard plastic ones have taken over. It is good to see that if you hunt around on the internet, you can still find them. The one used for this demonstration was found on Ebay.

Trams, trains and cars:

There are numerous places you could use it, and on a recent trip to the mountains around Lake Tahoe, it would have been great in the tram up Squaw Valley. The glass in the tram had so many reflections it wasn’t worth trying to get any photos. It was the same on the tram that runs from Roosevelt Island to New York.

Trains and other moving vehicles have the same problems with windows and reflections. The rubber lens hood would help you to get an image free of any distracting reflections. However, there is one place in Melbourne where it wouldn’t help at all.

Eureka SKydeck:

In Melbourne there is an observation deck that is 88 floors up, Eureka Skydeck, that provides some stunning views of Melbourne. It is a great place to see the city, but a terrible place to take photos.

There is glass all around, and it reflects everything else in it. The one place where you can go outside has mesh across it and for most cameras the holes in it are not big enough to take photos through. At night there are lights on the floor that create their own effects on the windows.

If you go up to the glass to take photos, you will find that if you use the rubber lens hood method won’t work as there are two panes of glass. You might get rid of the reflections off the first pane, but there is not much you can do with the second.

Here are two images, the first was taken during the day and you can see the reflections. The second image was taken at night and you can see all the lights that are there reflected in the glass.

Taken during the day and you can see the reflections.

At night the lights inside reflect everywhere, and you can also get portraits shots, whether you want them or not.

Like everything in photography, there are always ways to get around problems.

To eliminate the reflections, you will need to put your camera on a tripod, or something similar, for the following image a GorillaPod was used. It was placed close to the ground, as you can see in the image. At the Eureka Skydeck they have lights in the floor, so you have to make sure that light isn’t coming from under the camera.

The camera on the gorillapod on the floor.

Set up your image and create a seal around the camera with fabric, you could use a piece of black cloth. It needs to be dark as a lighter colour will reflect as well. For these images a lightweight black jacket was held up against the window, to help prevent the reflections. You want to be able use the fabric or jacket to create a closed-in area around the camera, so you don’t get unwanted views in your image. Look at the following image.

The jacket is placed around the camera to stop reflections.

Of course no system is going to be foolproof, but, if you compare the following two images, you can see that it does make a big difference. The first image was done without any protection, and the jacket was used for the second one.

This image has had nothing done to stop the reflections.

This was taken using the above method with a jacket to block the reflections.

You have to judge each situation as you get to it. While one technique might work in one place, it may not work elsewhere. There is no doubt that glass and windows are one of the hardest objects to photograph through, a bit like photographing a mirror. Take care, and I hope the next time you are taking photos of a shop window, you get some great photos.

 This article already published in Digital photography school