When I am teaching one of the things I try to get through to my students is about intention, basically why are you taking the image.

Intention

At school now, when students write something they are asked to answer who is their audience? Who are they writing it for?

I don’t see any reason why the same can’t be asked when you take a photo.  So here are some questions to ask yourself:

• Why are you taking the image?
• What is in the scene that makes you want to photograph it?
• Who is the photo intended for?  It is only for you, your family, your blog, or maybe a photography competition.  It is good to have some idea of who the image is intended for.
• So you want the image to be a art image?  Are you intending to do lots of post processing.
• Is the shot just a record of what you saw?

I look at lots of photos on the internet and often I see photos of say a building where someone has just gone straight up to the building held the camera up to it and taken the photo.  There is nothing really wrong with that, if that is your intention, so if you do it, is it your intention, or would you like to do more.

When I see a building that I like and want to take photos.  I try to think of the images that most people would take, and then I think to myself, what else can I do?  How can I try and make my image different to what everyone else takes?  I then have to ask myself what is my intention here, and what sort of image do I want to take.

We all have to do this and if you want to do something different, then start asking yourself, what is your intention?

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