Haarlem photo club

Now the good weather has arrived, it is time to go outside again! Haarlem and surroundings has some beautiful spots where you can take great pictures, think of the canals, Elswout and the Dunes. Here are some tips for improving your photography. We would love to see the result in our Spring Photo Competition!  

1.) Make use of colours

Be aware of the colours you use and make colours the subject of the photo. The use of colours will have an impact on the atmosphere of your picture. Colours of the same tone will create a harmony where as colours opposite of each other will increase the contrast in a photo a lot more. Look out for colour accents that will make something stand out in a picture and put more emphasise on it. It will draw the eye to that particular accent.  

2.) Overexpose

After a dark winter, spring is about light, light and more light! If you take pictures in automatic stand, your camera will average out the light intake and white will become slightly greyish. If your camera allows it, move from automatic to a manual stand and overexpose your photo’s with one stop. This will literally let more light into the picture and give a fresher feeling. Watch out you don’t overexpose too much or you will end up with too much white empty space in your picture, it is about finding the right balance.

3.) Change your perspective

Use different perspectives when you are taking photos. Lie on the ground for a frog perspective, hold your camera high for a bird perspective. Also realise that you don’t always need to look at your screen to take a picture. You will literally widen your working area if you don’t always look at the screen but hold the camera away from your as far as you can. For example; set your camera, use auto focus and hold your camera really high and press the button, the picture will be from a perspective that you won’t even be able to see yourself.  

4.) Find a theme

Find a theme and make a series. One picture might not tell much but if you put several together a story will emerge. Photographing for example a field of flowers different times of the season will tell the story of the life of the flowers. The series below shows tourists at the Haarlem Bloemencorso.

5.) Make the best use of early morning light 

Early morning light and early evening light is perfect when you are photographing landscapes or cityscapes. To catch the morning light, you need to get up before the sun rises and capture how the sun flows over the landscape or the buildings and, in cityscapes, how the artificial light mixes with the daylight. Plan your sunrise shoot well, check what time the sun rises and check the weather to ensure it is not too cloudy. Also know where you want to photograph, the time frame for capturing the best light is very short and if you don’t plan ahead, you will find yourself searching for the best spot instead of photographing.  Take a tripod to use longer exposure times.  

Arianna Ardia-Wenink

Arianna studied Literature and Arts at the University of Amsterdam, where she specialised a.o. in "museology" and "organisation & marketing of blockbuster exhibitions". After working for 6 years as market researcher & marketing analyst at Zoom.nl, now she focuses her photography love and enthusiasm on the Haarlem Photo Club.