How Familiarity Breeds Stunning Photos

How Familiarity Breeds Stunning Photos

In this article, I share one of the most important things you can do to take better landscape and cityscape photos.

A few months ago, I visited Donegal for the second time. My last visit had been more than ten years ago. Donegal County lies in the north of Ireland and is famous for its harsh mountain landscapes and stunning coastline. It's full of spectacular photo locations, yet during my first visit, I couldn't capitalize on this. It had just been part of a one-week road trip, including Northern Ireland. I packed as many locations as possible into the few days I had. As a result, I ended up in many unfamiliar places.

This is the most prominent view of Fanad Lighthouse. It's located just 20 meters from the parking lot. However, it's not the best because the meadow on the left creates an imbalance in the frame.

For example, I took the photo of Fanad Lighthouse from the main viewpoint. Because I had just one day in the area, I didn't have time for extensive scouting and settled for the obvious composition. Thanks to the conditions that morning, the photo looks good. But as I discovered afterward, there is much better subject matter available.

My Second Visit

When I returned to Ireland this year, I decided to spend the two weeks I had allocated for the trip in Donegal. Some people will drive around the whole island in two weeks. I did the same 16 years ago during my first visit to Ireland. It was a rush; it was great for sightseeing but unsuited for photography.

I split this year's trip into three parts to familiarize myself with a few photo locations. During the second week, I focused on the Fanad Peninsula. We had rented a little house just a 20-minute drive from Fanad Lighthouse, and I went there nearly every day.

When I started with photography, I would never have done that. There's so much to see and explore in Ireland's north, and I would have tried to photograph two different locations every day—one for sunrise and one for sunset.

But over the years, I learned that to get the best photos, you need time to familiarize yourself with the places you visit. It's why local photographers usually have an edge. They know their photography backyard, understand the light at different times of day, are familiar with seasonal changes and weather patterns, and can respond quickly.

The entrance to the beach from which I took this photo is a bit hidden. But I had allocated enough time to find it.

And that's what I did this year. I took the photo above on a stormy morning with an incoming tide—ideal for this beach near Fanad Lighthouse. I decided to head there the same morning when looking out the window and checking the weather forecast. I had also scouted this beach two days earlier for compositions, knew where to park my car, and how to get there. It's not an easy place to find in the dark, and only my familiarity with it allowed me to capture the photo.

The same familiarity brought me to the vantage point from which I captured the image below. By then, I had visited Fanad Lighthouse several times, knew my way around the cliffs, and had seen how different tides and swells changed the scene's look. Here, a low tide with a large swell provided the best conditions. Again, I decided to head there on the same morning.

If the tide is too high, the rocks in the foreground are submerged, and the photo loses a lot of interesting features. The day I visited to photograph this view featured a low tide and a spectacular swell.

Getting Familiar With a Place

In my portfolio, you'll find many examples of how my familiarity with a place led to my best photos. Acquiring it means photographing fewer locations. But it's a trade-off you should be willing to make. Coming back to a great photo location multiple times is never a wasted effort.

Fanad Lighthouse, for example, felt different during each visit, and I never got bored of it. The key is to select suitable locations to focus on. It requires research, planning, and sometimes multiple trips. From my first whirlwind trip through Donegal, I knew what the Fanad Peninsula had to offer and that it would be the perfect home base for photographing not only Fanad Lighthouse but also places like the Great Pollet Arch, Murder Hole Beach, or Mount Errigal.

I had already photographed this composition the day before, but this morning, the light and movement of the clouds allowed me to get an even better result.

But, besides the Fanad Peninsula, I stayed in two more locations during the first week of my trip. Although Donegal is relatively small, driving to more remote photo locations can still take much time. The apartments I selected were always within one hour of my photo locations. Since the days were already getting shorter in September, this requirement also gave me time to relax between scouting and photography. With a single home base, this would not have been possible.

I follow this one-hour rule on most of my trips. It might not be required if you travel alone. But if you travel with your better half, you need some balance, and too much time spent in the car driving to and from photo locations disrupts that.

However, visiting a location multiple times and spending longer in an area does not automatically create the familiarity you need to take great photos. You must be more deliberate and scout. In this article, I share several tips on how to get to know a place. It involves venturing into the unknown and not stopping at the famous views. Become an explorer and reap the rewards.

Conclusion

In the last 15 years, I could have easily visited twice as many places. However, I chose to return to many locations. For example, I visited Morocco four times, Cornwall and Portugal three times, and even more remote places like the Seychelles, Vietnam, and New Zealand twice. And I never regretted coming back. Often, I took my best photos during the last visit because I knew exactly where I had to be and in which conditions.

You should do the same, at least from time to time. Mix it with the exploration of new places to strike a good balance. Your portfolio will get better and better that way.

Michael Breitung's picture

Michael Breitung is a freelance landscape and travel photographer from Germany. In the past 10 years he visited close to 30 countries to build his high quality portfolio and hone his skills as a photographer. He also has a growing Youtube channel, in which he shares the behind the scenes of his travels as well as his knowledge about photo editing.

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