Symbolism – Relies on your prior knowledge of what a symbol represents to give the picture a meaning. Without this prior knowledge, the picture won’t work. – A cross represents Christian religion. The Eiffel Tower represents France. – The content is specifically chosen to be a trigger.

Connection – We assign meanings to objects, and when we see objects together, we have to work out what the connection is between them. If a picture shows a ripped-apart chair and a sleeping dog, we assume the dog ripped the chair. If we only show the dog, there’s no story.

Ambiguity – This is similar to ‘Connection,’ except we imply something, not show everything. If the picture showed the ripped-apart chair, but instead of showing a dog, there is an open door behind, we would ask, ‘What was it that came into the room and ripped the chair?’

Different – This contains a paradox. – We’re attracted to different because it’s not – ‘what we expect to see’. It offers the potential for greater benefits. However, ‘different’ also comes with greater risk. – We’re drawn to the benefits of different, but feel safer with the familiar.

Time – An expression caught in the ‘act of thought,’ or an event frozen in time, gives pictures life and energy. The fascination of being able to study in detail what’s too fast in real life. But, it’s also worth considering the quality of ‘timeless,’ the feeling of something never changing.

Memory – The above are universal properties; memory is personal because only you have this specific ‘prior knowledge.’ – A picture of where you grew up has meaning for you, but nobody else. Fine for personal pictures, not for wider audiences. – Viewers only have ‘what they see’.

Composition and Simple Design only help visual efficiency but are NOT mental stimulation.

Good Photography is visually stimulating. – The journey starts with what we show. A picture’s visual qualities have two functions: a practical function and a stimulation function. – Practical functions give the picture cohesive readability and efficiency by using visual order, structure, and emphasis. – They direct the viewer to the main subject of the image, the ‘hero,’ by giving our ‘hero’ visual emphasis. The stimulation function means ‘What we see visually, we respond to emotionally’. We push viewers’ emotional buttons by what we show them. – Light, mood, drama and atmosphere in our Photography stimulates an emotional response in the viewer.

Good Photography is in the sweet spot between two extremes. Literal Photography doesn’t benefit viewers because it shows them ‘what they expect to see’. Not showing anything new doesn’t ignite their curiosity. Photography people don’t understand, doesn’t benefit a viewer because they can’t engage with it. Engaging Photography uses light, three-dimensional form, and a feel of spatial distance to give the picture a foundation of realism; this gives a point of reference to understand the picture. – The artistic interpretation makes the picture different, stimulating the viewer’s mind and arousing their curiosity, thoughts, and feelings.

You can’t ‘create photographs that work’ unless you understand ‘how pictures work’. You can only create your own ‘Artistic Vision & Style’ after you first understand how people perceive, then respond to pictures. Otherwise, you have no logical basis for creating your own ‘Artistic Vision & Style’. – An artistic picture depends on ‘Artistic’ knowledge, because without artistic knowledge, you have little artistic style. If you have little artistic style, you have limited ability to make your pictures an interpretation. This keeps you a prisoner of only being able to make literal and generic-looking Photography – which provides little creative satisfaction, personal fulfilment or sense of achievement and self-esteem. – All of which are natural human desires.

Digital photographs don’t fail for technical quality reasons, but often fail for artistic or human nature reasons. If we know ‘how people respond to pictures,’ – we can use this knowledge to ‘create pictures people respond to’ using Artistic Knowledge. Photography alone only records the image. – Improving your Photography requires less attention on camera and Photography skills and more concentration on learning Human Perception and Artistic Knowledge. – If you understand what you are doing, you will accelerate your improvement at unparalleled speed and save many years of painful ‘trial and error’ failure. – Photography workshops today isolate Photography from the broader knowledge that’s critical to improving your Photography.

Everything centers around ‘Artistic Knowledge’, but ‘Artistic Knowledge’ is an ambiguous term. We can’t progress further unless we clarify what we mean by – ‘Artistic Knowledge’. – We can divide artistic knowledge into two – ‘How we perceive pictures’, and ‘How we create pictures’. For ‘How we perceive pictures’ – we have ‘The Principles of Human Perception. – For ‘How we create pictures’ – we have ‘The Artistic Principles’; all are based on science. – Combining these two sets of principles together form ‘Artistic Knowledge’. How well you apply the principles is called ‘Artistic Ability’, and the look that you make is called ‘Artistic Style’. – The last remaining component is the quality of your choices and decisions when applying these principles.

Developing your ‘Artistic Vision & Style’ requires a ‘System’. – However, a critical point: I teach you a universal system for making pictures that can be applied to any visual medium: Drawing, Painting, Photography, etc., or used in visual occupations like Graphic Design and Advertising, and can be applied to any subject. – Human nature dictates that all pictures must have certain qualities to be successful. – If you create a system based on those human qualities, then what that system produces, powerfully connects with people at the intuitive or human nature level. Photographers and artists create systems based on their style, but that system only works for their style. If you create a system that works at a fundamental human level or making pictures in general, then that system can be used in any medium for any style. – This is what I teach.

A system, or what we will call a ‘Workflow’ from here on, is important for many reasons. – First, it’s a checklist of every essential quality to make a successful picture. A checklist will force you to consider every quality and not overlook any. – Equally, this checklist will prioritize the order of importance of those qualities because you must create the most important quality first: the one which makes the most significant change to the picture. That change will then create the context for judging the next quality, and so on, down to the small details last. The order of the checklist is just as critical as what’s on the checklist. – From a broader perspective, a system or workflow creates efficiency and a structure that produces repeatable quality every time.

For the beginner, the most critical value of a workflow, is it creates your artistic style. Imagine the workflow as a series of questions. You fill in the answers, and the cumulative result makes a picture with a unique look. That look is your artistic style. As you get better at answering the questions, you improve at Photography and refine your style. – Your pictures become unique. It also means you can isolate a quality you are weak at, then improve that individual quality in isolation to improve the overall quality of your Photography. – As you improve the individual qualities, you improve your Photography at unprecedented speed. – It’s a systematic, logical and methodical approach to learning and improving at artistic Photography: It’s a ‘System’.

No matter how we find our subject, whether in person on location, or pre-planned from being inspired by an image we’ve seen, the aim is to create one beautiful, perfect picture. One great picture is worth a thousand second-rate pictures. To do this, we must be very calculating and plan. We visualize the subject overlaid with our artistic style, which emphasizes one particular quality we want to make our picture about, for example, the light. – Try to visualize your ideal picture. Imagine you saw it as a beautiful painting; what would it look like? If, like me, you’re a fan of Rembrandt, ask yourself: What would Rembrandt do? Imagine what someone else you admire would do. – Next, reduce this perfect picture you imagine down to component parts: the sky, ground, buildings, animals, etc. – Create the picture in your mind before shooting.

The next step is to consider how to capture the highest-quality components. – Plan what day the weather is best to create the mood and atmosphere for the picture you imagine and what time the light will be at the ideal angle to make the three-dimensional quality. – The more you plan, the more chance of success you have. – What we don’t want to do is shoot hundreds of different angles that get deleted later. We want to invest all our time in one composition and blend the best components together to make one perfect picture. The picture is the product of Photoshop, not the camera. The camera only records the components for Photoshop. – It’s in Photoshop that we apply each of ‘The Artistic Principles’ and turn the picture we visualized into an artistic reality from the literal and generic-looking components that we recorded.

In essence, my workshops could be defined as – ‘Artistic Knowledge Applied To Photography’. I teach you the principles and a structured workflow to give you a framework to create artistic pictures. – Each ‘Artistic Principle’ controls a particular picture quality, creating the light, mood, drama, and atmosphere people intuitively respond to. – Your decisions will give your picture a unique look because your artistic decisions are unique to you; this is your artistic style. As your artistic style develops, it becomes easier for you to imagine your artistic style being applied to a subject before you shoot; this is your artistic vision. This gives you the creative confidence to be different and enormous artistic satisfaction. – Photography and Photoshop can be learned anywhere, but my artistic knowledge, workflow and approach are unique and innovative.

We wouldn’t design an airplane without considering gravity, and we wouldn’t produce a boat without thinking it must float, but we do Photography without considering our human nature. Yet, human nature, or to be specific, our brain, dictates how people perceive and respond to pictures. Digital Photography makes it easy to ignore human nature, but by not knowing how human nature works, you are unknowingly making photographs that may not work.

The ‘Red Signal’ is the common approach to Photography ignoring human nature and art, but the ‘Green Signal’ starts with people’s human nature. Art is a human pursuit. Therefore, artistic knowledge is the next subject in our ‘Signal.’ – Within art, our speciality is Photography, which makes the picture. – These pictures appeal to a viewer’s human nature because they consider human nature and artistic principles when they’re created. The result is engaging pictures.

If we do not factor in human nature and artistic principles when we create photographs, we’re expecting the viewer’s human nature to adapt to our confused pictures or lack of knowledge. That’s unrealistic; it won’t happen. Human nature will not adapt to our pictures; we must adapt our pictures to comply with human nature, and improvement begins by learning about human nature and perception first. – We can’t ignore human nature and create good Photography.

What happens if the brain receives a visual input? – The ‘Neocortex’ gathers and processes the information and passes it to the ‘Mammalian’ brain for understanding. – The ‘Mammalian’ brain creates a three-dimensional model and breaks that model down into geometric shapes called ‘Geons’. It then searches its hard drive ‘database’ for each shape to find a match and associate a meaning to the shape; to understand what it represents, sending the result back to us as an intuitive response or an emotional ‘feeling’. It can also associate a memory or belief. We have no control over the processing; we only have control over the input data: the information we supply to be processed, our pictures, and they’re processed the same way everything else is.

The brain applies two processes simultaneously, a ‘Feedback Loop,’ to efficiently process the ‘Geons,’ the geometric shapes of the three-dimensional model – ‘Bottom-Up’ and ‘Top-Down’ processing. – Bottom-Up is factual data from our eyes. Top-Down is stored information in our subconscious database, our prior knowledge, memories, beliefs, etc. – Bottom-Up first creates the shape in its most minimalist form. – Top-Down searches our ‘database’ to find a match for the shape to give it meaning. If a meaning is found, the process stops. – If meaning isn’t found, Bottom-Up processing will generate a higher level of complexity and detail, and the process is constantly repeated until Top-Down finds a meaning. The details our brain hasn’t analyzed are then filled in with a ‘Prediction’ based on prior knowledge and could be an interpretation. We only analyze enough detail to understand the object; no more. – This conserves resources.

The fundamental principle of our brain is to conserve resources through efficiency. – Thinking uses the highest amount of effort and energy, the brain’s resources. Therefore, the brain hates ‘Thinking’. – The brain always prefers a fast intuitive decision, not an extended investigation; in Neuroscience, it’s called being a ‘Cognitive Miser’. – In picture terms, our brain likes simple and obvious pictures. Generic or literal pictures ‘that we have seen before’ will move smoothly and efficiently through the ‘Neocortex’ to the subconscious ‘Mammalian’ brain and are understood without requiring conscious ‘thinking about’. – This conserves the brain’s resources and leaves the conscious resource-intensive ‘Neocortex’ free to think about and solve other problems.

Geons (geometric ions). Irving Biederman (1939 – 2022) was a Neuroscientist and Professor of Psychology at the State University of New York. – Biederman’s Recognition-by-Components: A Theory of Human Image Understanding, 1987, proposed that simple forms such as cylinders, bricks, wedges, cones, circles and rectangles, called Geons, serve as building blocks for object recognition in the brain. For example, the ice cream cone could be broken down into a sphere shape above a cone shape. – An enormous number of objects can be simplified down using a few Geons: 24 Geons can be recombined to make over 10 million different two-Geon objects.

The concept of ‘Geons’ – breaking something down to its simplest structure and adding layers of complexity isn’t new; it’s only relatively new to Psychology, but it makes common sense. It’s a basic concept used in art and design every day for hundreds of years. We just never hear the word used and certainly don’t think about it in Photography; we just ‘click the shutter’. – Apart from composition, it can’t really be applied, but in post-production, it certainly can. Not doing so is probably the photographer’s greatest weakness that lets their Photography down. – The camera provides very inefficient pictures from the brain’s perspective. – Enhancing the ‘Geons’ in post-production will greatly increase the readability and efficiency of your Photography.

Let’s summarize the dilemma from a Photography perspective. On one side, the viewer’s brain wants visually efficient Photography that doesn’t require thinking about. But if we don’t think about anything, we don’t feel stimulated, so Photography gives no benefit to the viewers. On the other hand, cameras are unforgiving: they blindly record everything in front of them – but what they record isn’t necessarily efficient for our brain to process. Artistic knowledge bridges the gap between pictures and people. – Art allows us to translate the signal to be efficient for human consumption. – It’s like cooking: ‘We buy raw chicken, but we don’t eat raw chicken’.

Think of post-production, the artistic stage, as going out for a meal. A restaurant doesn’t serve you the raw ingredients on a plate. The chef cooks the ingredients to create an enjoyable and tasty meal. What the chef does with the ingredients dictates the meal’s success or failure, but the ingredients don’t change. – Similarly, if you speak to me in Russian I won’t understand you. However, if you speak to me through a Russian interpreter who then translates what you say into English, I will understand you. Post-production is our ‘translator’. Artistic knowledge tells us how to correctly ‘translate’ raw files into fast and effective Photography for viewers.

To make matters worse, our brain is trying to make a 3D model of the world, but Photography is two-dimensional. An inefficient discrepancy that takes time to resolve. – On top of this, the camera records unrealistic tones – cameras darken the grey midpoint by two and a half stops. The lighter tones gain 45% more contrast, while the darks lose 55% contrast, rising to 80% in the darkest tones. The camera compresses global contrast, which makes the depiction of 3D form and spatial distance even more unrealistic. – The more the signal deviates away from a perception of reality, the more the brain has to invest resources in resolving the discrepancy.

Photography creates detail. – Analyzing detail is resource-intensive and, therefore, inefficient. However, exploring detail also means discovering new content unseen at first glance; this can be mentally stimulating, captivating, and rewarding in its own right. – Detail isn’t a negative by default. What is negative by default is if a picture lacks an overall, simple, and cohesive design. The design makes an efficient initial scan because it’s the primary quality to be processed first; detail is always secondary. Therefore, Cohesion, including composition, balance and design, is the primary artistic principle that governs Photography. – Emphasis has been covered already.

Light – The primary quality of Photography responsible for everything from creating 3D form to spatial distance. – The light, mood, drama and atmosphere in pictures appeal to the senses, a powerful way to make Photography appeal to people. – Photography is stories about ‘Light’.

Form & Distance – These give Photography a point of reference and a sense of realism, which help the viewer understand what they’re looking at. We try to recreate the signals of a three-dimensional world our brain will ‘believe’. A ‘fake’ signal to fool the brain, an ‘Optical Illusion’.

Contrast – This is not limited to tonal contrast. Contrast means contrasting one quality against its opposite, such as warm against cold, detail areas against flat tone, or big against small. This adds ‘Visual Energy,’ interest, power and emphasis. The primary means to ‘Focus The Eye’.

Variation – Areas that are flat and don’t change are visually boring because they don’t trigger any visual stimulation; think of a flat blue sky. Every area of the photograph must contribute to the overall interest of the picture, even if it’s only a small and subtle tonal variation.

Today, photographs aren’t the product of the camera but software. The camera only records the ‘assets’ for Photoshop, where I create the photograph. – The more assets I take, the more creative choices I have to make my picture. Photography is ‘data collection’. – The assets are:

The Base Exposure – My mindset is to get the complete photograph in a single exposure and take additional ‘corrective’ exposures to improve that photograph. I ask myself one question: If I were a painter – What would I paint to make this my perfect picture? – I try to shoot the additional ‘assets’ I need to make my perfect picture. – Those ‘assets’ are in three categories:

Technical Exposures – Improve the technical and tonal quality of my Photography. These are primarily bracketed images to control global contrast and create rich shadow detail. Freezing moving objects, removing unwanted objects, and exposures that provide a better separation between objects. – I shoot at f11 and never use any filters except a 10-stop ND very rarely.

Artistic Exposures – These are artistic improvements to the content of the picture. – People, animals and vehicles that give the picture life. When the sunlight falls on various parts of the landscape at different times, but isn’t captured in the main base image. I will only shoot one composition, but I will shoot a lot of artistic ‘assets’. Volume gives me more creative choices.

Sky & Cloud Exposures – Very rarely is the sky my ideal choice when photographing. – Most often, it doesn’t have the correct mood for the picture that I imagine. The sky and clouds are the picture’s ‘silent heroes,’ but their importance is vastly overlooked. Sky and clouds dictate the mood and drama. – I will replace the sky if needed and can photograph a sky anywhere.

Our brain is 3% of our body weight but uses 20% of our daily calories. 40% of the brain is used to process visual information, while 90% of what the brain processes is visual information. We process visual information 60,000 times faster than text and remember 80% of what we see, compared to 20% of what we read or 10% of what we hear. We understand a picture 5 times faster than we blink our eyes and extract meaningful information from a picture in as little as 13 milliseconds. – This emphasizes just how visual people are and how fast perception works.

You enjoy the travel, holidays, and memories Photography creates. You enjoy the process. But don’t confuse the process with ‘Good Photography.’ If your Photography is on show in Tokyo, Japan, viewers only know and see your Photography – the ‘Product’, not the ‘Process’. – Weak Photography only appeals to the photographer. Good Photography appeals to everyone. Ask yourself: Does your Photography communicate to people who don’t speak your language and know nothing about you? Make pictures for others, and you make better pictures for yourself.

You exhibit at a gallery with other photographers. But, this gallery has a weird entry regulation for visitors: ‘If visitors look at a picture for 20 seconds, they must buy it’. As photographers, our first job is to grab the visitor’s attention. – The next is captivate their attention for 20 seconds, and we earn money. The worldwide average time for people looking at a painting in a national gallery is 17 seconds. If we don’t ‘Stop, Captivate and Reward’ instantly, visitors leave. – If your survival relied on selling Photography, would you look at your picture quality differently?

Think of color and tone in Photography, like constructing a building. – The main construction is done with tonal values and relationships. Color is essentially the cosmetic exterior paint when finished, but it plays little role in the structure, only the mood. Blacks give the picture strength, structure and a solid foundation. – The mid-grays give the picture three-dimensional form and distance and set the overall mood. The lights give it life and sparkle. – Think of a second-hand car. – There’s no point in looking pretty on the outside, if it’s an ‘old banger’ on the inside.

Our brain has another trait. – They don’t like unresolved problems. We have to solve problems; it’s survival. When we solve a problem, our brain releases Dopamine; we get a chemical ‘high.’  It’s what’s called the ‘aha’ moment. Why do people inflict the pain of doing crossword puzzles on themselves? Getting the word correct isn’t the purpose; they want the Dopamine hit from the ‘aha’ moment. When they get the word correct – they do another word to get another hit. We can play this game with Photography, create a problem to solve or details to discover.

Imagine you’re the pilot of a Jumbo jet approaching New York’s JFK Airport at night. – You’re looking out the cockpit window into the blackness of the night. There’s only one thing in life you want right then – to see the beautiful golden lights of the runway. Nothing else matters but getting your plane on the ground, then you can relax. – Photography is no different. It is very stressful searching around for an area of importance to lock onto. Once we lock onto it, we relax. – Not having anything emphasized is like having the runway lights off. – Stressful.