Across four decades working at the highest levels of professional photography – from photographing world leaders, royalty, and major global events for Reuters and The Australian, to long‑form commercial commissions across Europe, Asia, Australia, and the United States – including project managing the six‑year documentation of the £4 billion Heathrow Terminal 5 construction. – I learned how professionals create strong images every time while under pressure. Those years taught me the mindset, clarity, and decision‑making process that separate the confident photographers from those who rely on luck. – But with all that experience under my belt now, I look back, and it started very differently.

Has your mind ever gone blank, you don’t know what to shoot or can’t decide if what you’re looking at will make a good photo? – Have you looked at a scene and you know it’s a good picture, but you don’t know how to make it a good picture? – Now imagine that with your client standing next to you, asking, “What’s the first picture”?  A nightmare. I used to bury my head in my camera bag, pretending to find something just to take a moment to calm down and destress. – I realised very early on, as a working photographer, that I needed a fast, efficient, logical, and reliable system for creating good photographs every time. – “Subject, Context & Mood” is that system, and I’ve used it for over 40 years.

When I began working as a photographer, I thought my job was to shoot everything; so that my client or picture editor had a good selection of images to choose from. I was the photographer, they were the picture editor, and they chose the best image. This couldn’t be more wrong for two reasons. – First, you never had the luxury of time to shoot everything. Second, even if you did shoot everything but didn’t know why you were taking the picture, it didn’t matter how many shots you took – you still wouldn’t have one shot that summed up the “Story”. – You don’t have time to shoot everything, so you have to find a way to invest your time in shooting quality. – Learn to think more, and shoot less.

In the 1980’s, a Reuters job took me to a private hospital in London. I met a well-built Arabic-looking man in a suit who checked who I was but never said a word. He led me into the lift to a private floor, where more well-built security stood in silence. We entered the private room with yet more security and an old man in bed. As I entered, the man was lifted from his bed and placed in the chair next to it, a blanket placed over his legs. The bodyguard gestured to me to take a photo, which I did. The instant the flash went off, one exposure, I was instantly told to leave. The only words spoken so far, so I left. A seriously weird event, but I later found out that I had photographed Habib Bourguiba, the President of Tunisia. It was a “proof of life picture”. – A photograph that proves he was alive back in Tunisia, to prevent a coup in his medical absence.

I had to take the portrait of a militant trade union leader who was notorious for calling strikes that caused havoc. I took some pictures of him behind his desk, but they were boring; they said nothing about him, only showed what he looked like. Then I noticed his office had an ornate balcony. I suggested it would be a more creative photograph for me to stand in the street and take his portrait, looking up at him. He agreed, so I went down to the street and started shooting away. Then he went mad with anger and flew into a rage. He understood what I was doing. I was intentionally portraying him as the all-powerful dictator that he was. I portrayed him as Il Duce, the fascist Mussolini. He understood the power of the picture and visual communication, as did I. – My only problem was that I hadn’t planned on him knowing the power of pictures!

The photograph below is nothing special. It was taken in the Philippines. I had been covering the conflict between the government and rebel forces in the southern islands of Mindanao, living in the jungle for about six months, covering both sides. One story I wanted to cover was the rebel arms shipments that “island hopped” their way across the Sulu Sea to Mindanao. I tracked down the village where the arms arrived, but was told that I couldn’t photograph the shipment, the whole purpose of being there. After deliberation, I decided to go to the beach anyway and photograph as it ended. When the commander saw I’d disobeyed him, I was detained and held at gunpoint for 24 hours as they decided “what to do with me”. They didn’t want photographic evidence. People worldwide understand the power of pictures; the story they convey.

Photography may be for personal enjoyment and self-expression. However, if people don’t understand what you’re expressing, then it fails as “self-expression”. It fails as a photograph because photography is “visual communication”, and viewers failed to understand the idea you were trying to communicate. When someone else looks at your photograph, a fundamental change happens. Photography is no longer about your enjoyment of “the process”; the viewer only has “the picture”. They will judge your picture like any “product” because that’s the way our brain is hard-wired, and we cannot change it. This may sound very cold and clinical, but that’s reality, and it makes sense. – Let’s look at “Products”.

Think about any product you have ever bought: – A product is defined as one that provides a benefit to the end user and delivers a good user experience. The picture is our “product”, the “end user” is our viewer, and the viewer expects a “benefit”. Have you ever bought a product that had no purpose and gave no benefit? No, it would contradict basic common sense. The “purpose” of the picture is the story it communicates. The viewers’ “benefit” is the enjoyable mental stimulation your story triggers. A good “user experience” is the combination of visual efficiency and mental stimulation: “Minimum effort for maximum benefit”. Do you like looking at boring photographs that give you no enjoyment? – No.

If we create a “good product”, do we not create a good photograph? – This approach doesn’t take the “fun” out of photography; it makes self-expression successful because viewers will understand what you’re expressing. When you see photography only as self-enjoyment, it doesn’t force you to prioritise the picture or think about the viewer. – Equally, you gain more creative satisfaction because you create the images you want to create; it puts you in control of the image. – This tutorial is going to concentrate on the picture and the viewer, the two subjects that most tutors and workshops overlook, yet are the core ingredients. – We need to look beyond photography to understand photography first.

Good is dictated by how well it performs as visual communication. Like is dictated by personal bias and taste. You may not like a photograph, but it can still be a good photograph. – If the viewer understands the story you’re communicating and it evokes an emotional response, it’s a good photograph, even if they don’t like the story you depict or its aesthetics. Good is defined by principles. Like is defined by personal taste. If you’re a vegetarian, you don’t “like” eating steak. That doesn’t mean the steak isn’t “good”; it just means you don’t like it. – Good and like are different. – Don’t worry about being liked, worry about being good. – People respect good images, even if they don’t like them personally.

The photographer’s job is to visually communicate an idea or story to the viewer. Photography is a form of “Visual Communication” that has its own “Visual Language”. You must prioritise the picture and the viewer. – The story your picture communicates is both its purpose and its benefit to the viewer. The purpose is to make viewers “Think”. – We need to look beyond self-enjoyment to understand good photography.

Your job as the photographer is to tell the viewer “something”. – Would you read a book you gained nothing from? – If you just mechanically record “what you saw”, then it’s just a statement of fact, not a conversation. You make no comment for me to respond to; it’s like a one-way, dead-end conversation. You’re basically telling the viewer to do your job and find their own story, which is like being told to “cook your own meal” at a restaurant. That’s not the deal. Would you engage in a dull or confusing conversation with someone who has nothing worthwhile to say? No. – Pictures are no different. Photographs fail when viewers don’t understand “the story” or find “the story” dull and uninteresting.

In 2002, I was tasked with documenting the £4 billion Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 construction project in London for 6 years, which meant project management, planning, and photography. It was a wealth of little micro-stories. The story doesn’t need to be complicated. I love the picture below because of the construction worker’s body language, as if he’s saying, “Sorry mate, you can’t come through here, I’m working”, as if he had the power to decide the fate of a jumbo jet. The construction worker symbolises “construction”, the aircraft symbolises “airport”, and the interaction between the two is humorous. – A simple story creating a simple functional picture that implies a crazy scenario.

Don’t just show me “what you saw”; tell me something interesting about “what you saw”. Let’s say you photograph a waterfall. What’s special about your waterfall, what makes it unique from any other waterfall? Is it enormous with a powerful flow of water? Or is it very small, but in a beautiful location? Is it in a tranquil village or isolated in lonely mountains? – Your subject is the waterfall, your “Story” is to convey the feeling of “enormous”, “small”, “beautiful”, “tranquil”, “isolated” or “lonely” – the “feeling” you had when looking at the subject and taking the picture. It is your job to “make me feel what you felt”. The image isn’t about the waterfall, it’s about “how you felt about the waterfall”. – I’ll explain how.

Think of your composition as a theatrical play. Your subject is the lead actor. The context is the supporting cast and stage backdrop. The mood is the stage lighting. – We must create a “Visual Hierarchy”, order, structure and emphasis relative to the importance of each component. Your lead actor, the “hero”, is emphasised to make them instantly identifiable to the viewer. Build the entire photograph around the lead actor and what you want to say about them. Everything else is downgraded to a supporting role. The stage lighting creates your mood – how you wish viewers to feel. – The viewer creates “The Story” in their imagination. – Are your photographs just “Factual Statements” or “Theatrical Plays”?

“Order, Structure & Emphasis” refers to “Visual Efficency”. We also need “Mental Stimulation”. It’s only when you combine both that you create a great picture. – Photographers commonly make a massive mistake: they believe “good photography” requires overall, easy-to-read clarity. If you do this, you leave no work for the viewer to do; there’s nothing to engage the viewer and make them think. That’s why all “postcards” fail, yet so many images look like postcards. You must make the viewer “do some work”. Your photograph only supplies clues, not the answer. The viewer creates the answer in their imagination. Don’t give them the answer, don’t be literal. Be slightly ambiguous, create a feeling of mystery.

“The Story” may be about a static object. In my case, I love old architecture; in your case, it may be the natural landscape. “Time is life”. Without life, a picture feels dead, but inject time, and it comes alive. – If the story is about a static object, let life come to you; don’t chase it. Compose the main subject, the overall theatrical stage, then wait and let fleeting light or momentary person come to you, let them walk on stage. You must be patient, wait, it will happen. That momentary element changes the whole feel of your image. Equally, the story may be about having a “timeless” feeling of being there forever, in which case we want the opposite: the feeling of stillness and calm, “that nothing ever changes”.

The heart of your photograph is “The Story”. – Think of it as a conversation between you and the viewer. “Tell me something unique about the subject you show me”. – The story is very simple, and you create it in a logical way using – “Subject, Context and Mood”, or as a Theatrical play with a “Lead Actor, Supporting Cast, Backdrop and Stage Lighting”. – Write a very short caption before you shoot, summarise your story. Your photograph is then a simple illustration of your caption. – The critical point is you must know why you’re taking the photo before you take it.

How many times have you driven to work, but don’t recall doing so? – You have no memory of the journey details. Your eyes must have sent a constant flow of visual data to your brain of the entire journey, or you would have constantly crashed. – Our conscious level is reserved for problem-solving, planning, and investigation. Everything else, our brain prefers to handle at an automated subconscious level because doing so conserves resources. – However, we can’t “engage” with anything that’s subconscious. We have no “memory” of it; it’s like it never existed.

On a “routine journey”, nothing special happened worth investigating, so your driving was handled at an efficient subconscious level to save resources, which also means you have no memory of it. The visual data was “Deleted”. – To be factually correct, it is “Ignored” because it was never saved. Now, what about that day someone walked out in front of your car, you reacted instantly. – That visual data was filtered out as “important” and got instantly diverted to your conscious level to investigate the problem and plan a solution. – You became very “engaged”.

The event was not “what you predicted to see” on your journey to work. – Now, if your brain processed all the incoming visual data in detail, you would have hit the person because the data comes in faster than our brain can process it. If our brain ignored all the incoming data, you would have hit the person because you ignored the “useful” data. – This is our “Keep” or “Delete” filter in daily life. – Our photograph is “visual data” to be processed; therefore, it’s also subject to the “Keep” or “Delete” filter. – This has absolutely enormous photography implications.

You’re free to make your photograph however you want it, “there are no rules”. – BUT, if you want it to be successful, it must be in the format our brain can easily process; our brain only has one way to process images, and it will not change it for you. The brain dictates “rules”, whether the photographer likes it or not. – Our brain prefers “New and Different”, “Mood and Atmosphere”, “Life and People”, “Three-Dimensional Form and Spatial Depth”, “Order, Structure, Emphasis and Simplicity”. It likes “Visual Efficiency & Mental Stimulation”. Science, not personal opinion.

The brain’s primary function is survival: conserving time, effort, energy, and resources helps survival. – Conscious thinking requires enormous resources; subconscious processing doesn’t. Therefore, the brain prefers to automate everything subconsciously to conserve resources. This keeps the resource-intensive conscious level free for important problem-solving, planning, and investigation: “Thinking”. But, we can’t “Think” about a photograph if it’s subconscious. – Also, thinking about your image takes enormous resources, which contradicts the survival priority.

Second, when we’re born, we have no memories. Our memory is built as we gain new knowledge and experiences. To conserve resources, our brain has evolved a “predictive process”. – We constantly use our prior knowledge and experience to predict “what we will see”. – If “what we see” matches “what we predict to see”, we don’t investigate it. We don’t think about “what we already know” because it wastes our resources for no benefit. If your picture shows “what we have seen before”, we don’t engage or “think” about it. It’s a waste of resources for no benefit.

Third, our brain constructs and maintains a three-dimensional mental model of the world around us to make sense of the world and navigate within it to survive. – The brain, therefore, prioritises three-dimensional “real-world” visual information; it helps update our three-dimensional model, and de-prioritises flat two-dimensional “graphic” information because it adds little value to our three-dimensional model. Photographs are two-dimensional, low-priority “graphic” information, not high-priority “real world” information. – It’s low-value “useless” information.

Two equally important fundamental principles are in direct conflict. On one hand, we defined successful photography as: “it makes the viewer think”. Yet, on the other hand, our brain “prefers not to think” by default, especially since it’s a 2D photograph and “low value visual data”, and the brain dictates the rules. However, if we don’t make the viewer “think”, the photograph has no purpose, because it gives no benefit to the viewer. The “Catch-22 photographers must resolve is “How to make viewers think and engage with your photograph and go against the brain natural instinct not to want to do so”. – This is why literal, generic-looking images are rarely successful – they don’t make the viewer “think” or engage with them. – We must “add value”; add something to the photograph to trigger the brain into “thinking” and engaging with it.

If you want to create good photography, you must accept a brutal reality. – By default, the brain dictates that your viewer will not care about your photography; they will ignore it. – Our brain puts all the responsibility on you to give the viewer “a reason to care”; to stand out from the “background noise”. – The good news is that if you give the viewer “a reason to care”, they will care. They will notice your image above all the background noise, but this is very unlikely to happen on its own. – You need to learn “How Pictures Work”. Just “Taking Photos” isn’t enough.

I was running a workshop in Venice, standing on the Academia Bridge with my client. He is very sociable and talks to people standing around us. To my embarrassment, he’d ask if they would like to see my photography portfolio. – Not wanting to appear rude, they politely agreed, so he took out his mobile phone and showed them my work. The instant they saw my photographs, the conversation transformed from politely muted and reserved to energetic, enthusiastic and passionate. I suddenly realised that if all these bystanders had no photographic or artistic knowledge, but they all had the same response, then their response could not have been due to their knowledge of photography, but it had to come from something far more fundamental. I’d overlooked the obvious, which explains everything – Human nature and perception.

Not everyone takes pictures, but everyone processes images – it’s pre-programmed into our brains to make sense of the world around us and survive, and we all process images the same way: we gather information, process it, and then generate a response. Our photograph is nothing more than visual data that needs processing. If we reverse-engineer this intuitive process, learn how people process images, we can use that knowledge as guidelines to create successful photographs. If we learn the fundamentals, “How pictures work”, we create “Pictures that work”.

People judge photography based on intuition, NOT, on their knowledge of photography. That’s why people can recognise good photography but not explain why it’s good. – The only common denominator people share worldwide is human nature. Human nature defines how people perceive, process and respond to visual images. – Human perception defines visual language, which then defines how we “create successful photography”. Photography does NOT define the rules. Human nature and perception do. – Not understanding people is the biggest problem.

The human eye has 120 million rods to detect tone and 6 million cones for colour – a 20:1 ratio that makes tone our primary visual data. Tone is the “backbone” of vision, defining 3D form, spatial depth, separation, motion, and edges. Colour is only a secondary overlay used to enrich the underlying tonal information; it helps differentiate objects of identical tonal value, identifies surface cues, like the freshness of food, and sets the emotional mood. While colour attracts the eye, tone carries the essential structure of everything we see. – Using a building analogy: “tone constructs the building, colour is the coat of paint when it’s finished”. – The 20:1 Tonal System – Where science underpins art in photography.

Don’t create a colour image first, then strip out the colour to make a black-and-white image. – Create a black-and-white image first, then add colour to make a colour image. It’s a fundamentally different approach that complies with scientific logic. In a “literal sense”, we see the world in colour, but colour distracts us from clearly seeing the underlying structure. We must get “the building’s structure correct first, before giving it a coat of paint”, or “the coat of paint will hide the bad underlying structure”. The 20:1 ratio of rods to cones tells the overwhelming majority of our photograph depends on tonal values, not colour. – We must be very good at tonal control and quality; it underpins every photograph.

The Science of Perception: Mathematically, colour accounts for only 20.5% of this image. – That’s why tonal structure comes first.

We learn to “read visually” quickly from birth, but we don’t learn to “write visually”. – The ability to visually read the world around us is critical for our survival. The ability to create or write visually has little survival benefit, so we don’t learn it. Reading visually is a natural ability; creating visually is a learned skill. – That’s why “people can recognise good photography but not explain why it’s good” – they can’t explain it because they can only “read”, not “write”. The implication is that because you can recognise a “good picture”, you then assume you can create a “good picture”, which is totally false. Creating is a learned skill. – Many are geniuses as “End Users”. NOT so much when it comes to being “Creators”!

To Repeat: – An incredibly important concept photographers overlook. Photographers dictate “the story”. Our brain dictates how we “read it”. An analogy: If I want to write a book for people in Japan, it’s my job to write in Japanese; otherwise, they won’t be able to read it. The reader sets the rules, not the writer. The ability to “Visually Read” is pre-programmed into our brain’s operating system; we can’t control or change it. Our brain dictates “How we read pictures”. Photographers must create pictures using the same rules we use to read. The viewer dictates the rules: that’s why pictures fail. Photographers don’t care about the language they use to “write “; they assume viewers can “read” it: they can’t.

The reason why photographers go wrong and why most pictures fail is that photographers don’t appreciate one absolute, unchangeable, and basic fact. – We can’t control “How people process images”. We can only control “The pictures we give people to process”. – We must adapt our photograph to the viewer because the viewer cannot adapt their “reading process” to our pictures. – If viewers can’t process our pictures, our pictures have no purpose for viewers; they give no benefit. People dictate and can’t change their “reading process”. – Our images must be created in perfect harmony with people’s “reading process”. – You must learn the “Reading Rules” first so you can create good photography.

How can we create a “good product” if we don’t understand “our end user”? – Every company worldwide will understand the end user of their product first. They produce products that the end user finds beneficial, or they have no purpose. Finally, they learn the manufacturing process to produce their product. Why should understanding photography be any different? – It makes learning both very easy and fast. Social media promotes photography only as self-enjoyment. They don’t look at photography from the viewer’s perspective or prioritise “The Picture”. Good photography is within everyone’s reach, if you’re given the correct knowledge. – Photography isn’t magic; it has simple, provable principles.

As discussed, the majority of visual information is tonal values; very little is colour. When we take a photograph, the camera’s response curve radically alters the tones. The camera adds 45% more contrast to the highlights, darkens the mid-point by 2.5 stops and lowers the dark tones by 55%. The darkest shadow tones by 80%. The camera totally changed the photograph’s underlying structure in a negative way. – We need to retouch the image to repair the structural damage caused by the camera. We must “put back what the camera took out”, even if we don’t want a radical artistic transformation. – Tonal values are the “engine” of the image; we must get them correct so the photograph performs.

There’s also a fundamental problem that only post-production can resolve. As we reduce the scene’s dynamic range to fit within the range of a photograph, we reduce global contrast, but by default, this also reduces local contrast. It’s the local contrast that gives our pictures life. This is a structural problem with tone, not colour. Our ideal is low global contrast but with areas of high local contrast; otherwise, the picture feels dead. We must rebalance the tonal values. Highlights dictate the picture’s light, life and sparkle. The midtones dictate the 3D form and mood. The shadow tones dictate the picture’s structure. – This is why my workflow explains, “How to create a great Black and White image” first.

There is also a quality reason for creating a black-and-white image first. The camera will not have the subtlety of tone and the fine palette of rich, subtle greys that make both black-and-white and colour images look beautifully rich. The raw file simply doesn’t contain the tones; they are created in post-production: – A technique I call “Tonal-Painting”. Applying this technique creates the “Rembrandt Light”. The tones in “The Bodleian Library, Oxford”, shown next, do not come from the camera; they come from post-production. The same “Tonal-Painting” technique is used in all my colour images. My colour images are all created as black-and-white images first, but I just keep the colour “turned on”.

The camera raw file is a “low-quality signal”. – Image editing cleans and boosts the signal. Amplify the “useful data”, downplay and remove the “useless data”; the background noise. – But, editing also has a rule: “If you contradict the rules of nature, your photograph won’t be perceived as real”. If you have mountains that tonally recede into the background, they are perceived as real 3D data, but if you make them too black for “graphic effect”, they now contradict the “laws of science that govern how we perceive spatial distance”. The brain will instantly downgrade the original high-value 3D data to low-value 2D data because “you contradicted the laws of nature”. Post-production must be done carefully.

Successful photography is engaging; it requires a balancing act between turning up the “realism” element of the signal and turning down the “graphic” signature of photography, while retaining an element that triggers the viewer’s curiosity. – This is why post-production is so critical; it’s where we fine-tune this balancing act. The raw file out of the camera is too unrefined; the signal is too weak and polluted to be effective. Cameras record. People create. Who decided that what the camera records is “perfect”? – Photoshop is the creative opportunity, where you can overlay your “Artistic  Vision & Style” to be unique, not literal and generic looking. – It’s where you stamp your personality on the image.

Photographers often go to two extremes when editing. – They go for realism and create literal, generic-looking images that the brain ignores because they don’t trigger our curiosity, or they go for dramatically different, a totally “graphic feel”, and create images the brain then ignores because it labels them low-importance “2D graphic information”, not “real-world data”. Neither extreme creates maximum mental stimulation. Maximum mental stimulation is achieved only when there is a blend of both “realism” and “different”. Realism creates understanding. Different triggers curiosity and imagination. – Good photography is a psychological “mind game”; it’s also logical – but it’s NOT just “Push the Button”.

Everything written to date applies to pictures in general, across all genres, subjects, and in any style; indeed, any media. Photoshop, however, must respect the genre. – A news or documentary photograph cannot have anything added, removed, or transformed because we must trust its authenticity as an honest visual document of a person or event. Therefore, all the above picture qualities still apply, but must be created in the camera through composition and timing, not in Photoshop post-production.  – However, an obviously artistic photograph, with no intent to mislead or misrepresent, can undergo as much artistic transformation as feels right for the image and what it’s trying to communicate.

The camera records the image. Photoshop polishes the picture and refines the story so it communicates more effectively. Production begins at the camera and ends in Photoshop – it’s all one continual production process to produce the idea you had at the camera. It’s not a case of taking the photograph without an idea, then applying Photoshop techniques to create one. It’s one idea from camera to print. Photoshop is where you rebalance and fine-tune the picture to improve it. – The camera alone doesn’t allow any refinement; it just mechanically records everything it “sees” with cold impartiality. Photoshop allows fine-tuning in selective areas. – Photoshop for us is what a brush is to a painter.

The photograph doesn’t look like a literal, generic-looking image. It’s not a postcard picture. Based on “your prior knowledge and experience”, it’s not “what you predict to see” or “have seen before”. Yet it’s in the sweet spot between two extremes, realistic enough to serve as a point of reference for understanding the image, and different enough to spark your curiosity, imagination, thoughts, and feelings. – Because it’s an interpretation, not a literal depiction, being unnaturally clean, simple and polished, it’s worth investigating. – It triggers “Mental Stimulation”.

There are a number of subtle “disruptor” elements. – The fact that it’s black-and-white is the obvious one. The image is unrealistically clean of litter and everyday background objects we all “expect to see” in a street scene. There is only one figure. – Who is he? – Why is he there? – His body language looks like he is being crucified on the cross. – If the image were a literal depiction of a street scene, it shouldn’t contain these anomalies, the “disruptor elements”, so the brain is forced to investigate these discrepancies to resolve them, triggering “Mental Stimulation”.

The mood is soft and peaceful, with a beautiful palette of rich dark tones, the “Crucifixion” lit like a religious Rembrandt painting, which adds to the mystery of the picture and the story. I waited for the soft grey clouds to act as a low-contrast backdrop against the building’s brighter, high-contrast, and detailed facade. A contrast of textures. The light focuses the eye on the figure and links the figure to the building. The light emphasises the main actor, our “hero”, and downplays the supporting cast. The light mood, drama and atmosphere are “Mental stimulation”.

Without a figure, the image would feel dead and lifeless; the figure adds “biological relevancy”. However, it’s not just a case of “any figure will do”, I need one that adds to “The Story”. Oxford is a university town; the only way I can indicate this is by finding a student in university robes. We know from our “prior knowledge and experience” that these robes are associated with a university; we make the connection and “join the dots”. An ordinary pedestrian with shopping bags would offer no supporting evidence for the story’s theme. – Again, it’s “Mental Stimulation”.

The more “real” we make the image, the more we engage with it; our brain assigns higher value to the information. It thinks it’s analysing real-world 3D data, not flat “graphic” 2D data that doesn’t add value to our 3D mental model of the world. The way we make the image feel “real” is through three-dimensional form and spatial distance; the image has both. – The more we remove the “graphic signature of photography”, the more we deceive the brain. – Without three-dimensional form and spatial distance, the image is forgettable. – This is “Visual Efficiency”.

Can the image be reduced to a limited number of basic shapes? Yes. The photograph has a simple graphic design, without clutter, confusion or noise. The elements are: Library, figure, background buildings and sky – four components with clear emphasis on the figure first and library second. A clean structure and cohesion, which makes understanding the image and therefore “The Story” fast and efficient at a quick glance. “The journey is easy, and the destination interesting”: you can invest your time in “The Story”, not decoding it. – That’s “Visual Efficiency”.

“The Story” is simple, clear and easy to understand. A very simple story of “A student in front of a beautiful building”. You understand the story visually; I don’t need to add any supporting words to explain it. – If your picture needs any supporting words, it probably indicates a weakness in your image. – The viewer only needs to invest a minimum of effort to understand the photograph, but gains a maximum reward from doing so, which makes it a “good user experience”. – It’s “Visually Efficent & Mentally Stimulating”. – It “Stops, Captivates and Rewards the Viewer”.

Most photography workshops will focus on “how to take photos”, but don’t concentrate on pictures. – Those who teach you about pictures teach you how to “duplicate the tutor’s artistic vision and style”; replicate their photographs using their subjects. Both approaches don’t give the fundamental groundwork knowledge you need to create your own unique “Vision & Style”. – My knowledge doesn’t dictate your style; it teaches you the fundamentals of good photography. – It’s how you apply the principles that dictate your style. It’s knowledge that gives you the freedom to be unique. – Good photography is within everyone’s reach because what I teach applies to “pictures”, not a subject or style.

It’s all about “The Picture”, not the camera and equipment. – When you travel or go outdoors, time may be limited, and conditions may not be perfect. You may use a lightweight travel camera or even your mobile phone. Possibly a 20×16 film camera, or be a purist who likes the image in-camera rather than radically transformed in Photoshop. It doesn’t matter; the end product is always a picture, and the picture must always tell a story. How you create the photo is only a production method using different “tools”; the underlying visual principles of “picture-making” never change. The purpose is to give you professional “picture-making” knowledge so you take far fewer images, but of much higher quality.

Knowledge removes the guesswork; guesswork causes failure. Knowledge doesn’t remove the “joy of photography”; it removes the stress and frustration from not fully understanding “what you are doing”. It puts you in control of the image, which provides greater creative satisfaction. Knowledge removes the endless pain of slow trial-and-error self-learning. My personal one-to-one mentoring is focused on knowledge based on my 40 years of professional photography experience and years of personal research to fully understand “images”. This makes my workshop a cost-effective solution: you learn far more in less time, at your own pace and only what you need to know. – You only learn “what works”.