How get a better photographer (small guide)

Well, here I am. Writing my first post on Steemit, laying on a bed in Hawaii, trying to do useful stuff. 

It came across my mind that I could explain and give tips on how to evolve as a photographer and on how to make better pictures. Now some might say: "Simple! Get a camera, point it in any direction and release the beast in you. Easy!". Let me get this straight: No. It's not even close to that. Some guys out there might be blessed and get exhibited in an art gallery after taking one picture. But that doesn't help the average photo-newcomer to get better. 

So, let's start this small guide with a short description of myself:

I am a 19 year old student from Germany who loves taking photos in his free-time. I am no pro-photographer. I have no gallery, I sold no pictures. And still I think I can tell you on how to get from taking average holiday pictures to taking great shots. Why? Because over the years I went through exact this process and I will try to pass on the knowledge I gained over time.

Here is a short list on what you need to do in order to make better pictures; I will tell something about each step  below

1. Be patient

2. Take more pictures

3. Take your camera everywhere

4. Learn Photoshop (or a similar program)

5. Buy a decent camera

(6. Get online)

Be patient: Don't think that the process of becoming a better photograph is easy and fast. It needs time and you need to work hard on yourself. Get started by thinking of a photography project that you always wanted to do (start simple), grab your camera and start doing it. When I was 12 years old I started my "photographer-career" by taking a glass of water, letting ink-drops drip into it and taking pictures of it. The result was disappointing, as my 12 year old mind was thinking of something like this: 

but all I got was:

Not quite what I hoped for.  Well, after this disappointment it took me some time to find the fun in photographing again and it took me longer to improve myself. Lesson: Even if you first shoot disappoints you, keep going! Don't hesitate! Maybe look up some photography tutorials on youtube (there are literally billions out there just waiting to be discovered!) or just ask google what you can make better. Fun fact: Years after I took this photo it finally found its use on a card, so the effort taking it was at least not for nothing.

Take more pictures: Some years ago I always tried to make THE one and only perfect picture. I had to realize that I often failed, and even worse, that the opportunity to retake the image was gone. Today, I take as much photos as possible,  each of them with slightly different settings. The average ratio of a perfect photo is about 1:200. Everything else is incredible lucky. What I am trying to tell you is: The more photos you take, the greater the chance to have a good one. Don't take just one photo: there is often something wrong with a setting and you normally realize too late.

Take your camera everywhere: Most photo opportunities come unexpected.

Learn Photoshop (or a similar program): Some people think unedited photos are the best. This might be true for some of them, but photoshop (or affinity photo) can do magic stuff to some of your pictures that you didn't even consider good. Here is an example (before and after):

Note how the saturation changed and the trace of the plane got erased. That is the work of 2 minutes photoshop (and you can do much more). If you have a crazy idea just go to youtube and you will most likely find a photoshop tutorial for it. Advice: Take small steps, photoshop is quite complex. Start using some filters so you can do stuff as shown above.

Buy a decent camera: If you already did some photo shootings of some scenes you found interesting you might notice that you cannot do everything with a camera that costs 400$. Now, what is a decent camera? This heavily depends on the stuff you want to do with it. For me, auto-focus speed, size, image quality and images per second are important. Before you buy one, go into a professional photo store and try out several cameras. Ask yourself the question: Do I need a DSLR or not? Often it is enough to buy something like the Sony a6000 (can't think of another camera right now; this shall be no advertising): Cheaper (around 700$), smaller, faster auto focus and nearly the same settings as a DSLR. AFTER YO BOUGHT A CAMERA: TRY. EVERY. SETTING. ;)

What a camera MUST have in order to be decent: exchangeable objectives!

Get online: Whatever you do: Get information. There are so many tutorials out there waiting for you!

With all this I basically want to say: Believe in yourself! Get going and take the pictures you like! It is normal to edit pictures in (e.g.) photoshop! Take many pictures and sort them out on the computer! In the end and after some time you will probably see an evolution in your pictures like you can see on my website or my eyeem account (do you see the differences between the most recent and the older uploads?): https://www.eyeem.com/u/l_fiedler; www.lukasfiedler.wix.com/lfph

Note: My most recent picture is unedited. Taken with a Sony a6000 with a raynox 250 on a 210mm telephoto lens.

PS: Feel free to comment my post. Improvement suggestions are appreciated (especially for my English...had no time to read through all this again). Lets have a discussion here & Hope you enjoyed!