This is something I have quite a lot of people asking me with my feed: What camera do you use? How do you edit your pictures? How do you have such a nice feed? Personally I think there’s a lot better feeds out there but I appreciate the comments. The first thing you need to know that it's the photographer not the gear, a good eye will be far more beneficial than spending a load of money on new gear. You can achieve a lot more on a phone than an expensive camera if you follow some of these steps. Also I have another point to get across before I begin. It’s going to get its own paragraph.
People follower you for different reasons. Informative, accurate and positive content is far far far more important than a pretty picture in my opinion when it comes to fitness accounts.
Right on with the blog now.
How to take a nice picture & feed
The first thing you need to think about is the consistency, it's a balance because if you can only take a certain type of picture occasionally it might be the case you might not be able to post as frequently as you like. This can effect engagement and overall process. Or what you might have to do is take as many pictures as you can in that certain ‘scenario’ so you have enough pictures to post throughout the year. This might be lighting, style, type etc. For me in the house I have three areas I can rotate around to make sure I stay consistent with the feed and create a similar dark style, these are: the garage, my bedroom and a flat lay set up. The consistency you create in your photos means it’ll have a bigger impact when people view your feed, remember when I talk about consistency I mean a similar colour tone for each of the photos. However it is difficult to maintain this, if you take a super nice picture but it doesn’t fit the grid then it doesn’t get posted. I could create an entire new account based on the photos I haven’t used.
Next tip is to think about your composition of your image (where your focal point is, making sure your audience is drawn to exactly what you want). They're a few tricks like rule of thirds (google it if you want to learn more) or putting things in odd numbers to draw more attention. That’s my first two tips on how to improve your game.
My photography and editing process
So I use a Sony alpha 6300 (mirrorless camera), 16mm sigma lens and 18-104mm Sony lens. I also use a gorilla pod & another tripod, that’s my main bits of equipment.
My first step is to search through inspiration on Pinterest, Behance & Instagram. This will give me a few ideas what what I want from my photoshoot. After this I set up in the location and use the Sony app to connect my phone to the camera (if I’m going to be the subject), this allows me to control the camera settings and see how the photo will look from my phone. I will take into account the settings such as shutter speed, aperture, iso etc. All these factors effect the image quality, style and exposure. This is all super nerdy and very specific which a lot of you may not even need to think about. If you are wanting to understand more I recommend just watching some YouTube videos to understand what I’m talking about. Lighting is key when taking a photo no matter what camera or settings or you’re using. Remember that. For people using a camera always shoot in RAW as it gives you more scope when editing your picture afterwards (some camera apps shoot in RAW as well so it’s worth checking out).
After the shoot I import the pictures into Adobe Lightroom to edit my images, if there are any blemishes I will import them into Adobe Photoshop to take them out. Editing will be different for everyone and takes a lot of practise. Everyone has their own style so don’t so chasing a certain influencers trying to replicate their page because it won’t make you stand out. This blog would go onto another two pages if I went into editing so I’m going to leave that for another blog, if people found this one interesting.
You maybe thinking, I don’t want to invest heavily into editing I just want to improve what I do at the moment for Free. Well good news for you, download VSCO & Snapseed for your phone. These are what I used before Adobe came into my life. Edit in VSCO and then import into Snapseed to remove blemishes, or whatever you find best suits you. Easy peasy and for free who can complain.
Afterwards I export the image, remember Instagram actually downgrades your photos if you export at 100% which can effect the quality. Export it at 70% so it doesn’t get compressed and ruin all your hard work.
Hopefully you found this beneficial, and a bit different from my usual content. If you have any further questions please let me know on Instagram @cmcg.fitness
Enjoy the rest of you day
Cameron
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