Photography

 

How to write content about your photographs

Photographers (as any other creatives) genuinely care about their work. The things they create talk about who they are and what they stand for. When asked to write content about their photographs and share processes, they become vulnerable. Let’s learn how you can build on that and turn it into an advantage.

By Oana in Storytell your website

October 25, 2019

Reading time 11 – 16 minutes

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No matter if we do that through photography or painting on a grain of rice, we live in a world where we need stories to complement what we’re doing.

Writing has never been more powerful than today: every day, we read, write, post, send, enjoy, dislike, share, like a steady stream of written text. Thus, learning how to present your work (also) in writing has become indispensable. 

This article walks you through a specific list of actions that you can make to write authentic content with ease about your photos. 

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Three tips to write content about your photographs

Three good practices to give your writing effort the best chances

My aim is to bring the best knowledge I’ve been acquiring in the past 10 years of digital communication and help you present your work in a way that resonates with your inner-why, and stands out. 

I deliver some specific tips about how you can write meaningful content around your photos. 

Before I jump into the subject, I feel the need to mention that photographers, like many other creative souls out there, have their anxieties, dilemmas, and fears of all kinds. 

Showing up and talking about their work is hard, very hard, especially when a strong emotional attachment is at play.

The next time you see a cliche from a wedding photographer or a not-so-coherent message published on the social media channels, stop judging and start thinking what makes it so hard for them.

Ready to find out how you can start writing content on your terms, without falling into derisory? 

3 tips to write content about your photographs

The Internet is brimming with recipes and how-to guides to walk you through everything you need to make it work. My goal is not to duplicate what’s already there, but to share valuable insights gathered both from my hands-on communication experience and from talking with professional photographers.

To be honest, nothing beats the added value I get when I talk to people who encounter these problems on a daily basis.

Here’s the thing: nobody can make it for you. Nobody can find shortcuts and get you to the final lap faster. Nobody can live in your shoes, not fully. Nobody can speed up your process and evolution. You need to invest whatever it takes to make sure you give yourself the best chance to shine out there.

The most important step you can take is to be as candid as possible regarding who you are as a person in the first place (then as a photographer), and what makes you, you.

Tip 1 — Write down notes while you take photos of your clients

As a photographer, you deal with quite a lot of different individuals every year. It is hard to keep track of everyone you work with since each customer has a different story, a different background – so the best way to be up to date is by taking notes during your photo sessions. Think of them as emotional snapshots of your inner self, in that specific context.

For the sake of more clarity, let’s assume you’re a wedding photographer and have around 20 contracts annually.

A simple way to develop long-term narrative memories of the couples you work with is by writing down all kinds of pop-up thoughts when spending time with them.

Just put on paper whatever words come to mind: how the weather is, what you observed, how they dressed, where they went, how they behaved, the color of their socks, the gestures they made, etc.

All these so-called random observations will be super helpful when you connect the dots to publish a text next to the photos on your website or social media accounts.

You will no longer feel stuck because you don’t know what to say, nor will you be afraid of sounding foolish or repetitive. The truth is that what you captured in that particular scenario, with those specific people places you in a unique, authentic mood and words start to flow naturally.

We rely way too much on our memory, our brain, our ability to remember, and we often get lost, and we dilute various important details. My recommendation is to write down as much as you can because it gives you plenty of ideas when you craft content around your photos, your clients, no matter where you will use them — on your blog, on Facebook, on Instagram, on e-mail.

Your clients will, most probably, feel honored that you took the time and the energy to pay much attention and that the final result truly represents who they are, in a raw, simple yet powerful way. The extra benefit is that you set aside from the rest by manifesting care and kindness.

Tip 2 — Put the storyteller hat on and ask open questions

For the sake of being consistent, I keep the example of the wedding photographer. I know for a fact that there’s much pressure to differentiate each story since most of the weddings look the same. I can relate to that, but the funny thing is that the events, per se, may look quite similar, but the people involved are surely not.

In the end, we all have something special, something that defines us, quirks that makes us different, but it’s the photographer’s job to see these aspects and showcase them elegantly, both through photos per se and content.

A simple yet powerful way to capture the uniqueness of the people you work for is to engage with them and facilitate meaningful dialogue. Don’t just snap the shutter, take stunning photos, grab the money, and move on to the next project. Create reliable liaisons through honest and vulnerable conversations. 

Learn how to ask genuine questions to help people share their narratives, and you will no longer face struggles when you write about your photographs.

Here are a few examples of questions that you can try asking:

How did you meet in the first place?

What are your favorite desserts?

What do you love most about each other?

Where did you travel together for the first time?

What are your biggest fears?

How do you make it up after a fight?

What kind of music do you guys love?

As long as you refer to your clients as people who are unique in their way, who have a life full of ups and downs – as we all have, you can start putting the pieces together. Automatically, you also make the most out of your photographs, your content, and your relationship.

The lovely thing is that once you succeed in narrowing the gap, you start matching your photos with their story, and that’s basically the best thing you can do.

Tip 3 — Let you clients contribute to your writing process

I often hear that photographers don’t know how to highlight the specificity of each client because, from a certain point, they are so zoomed in that they are no longer able to see the nuances.

This challenge is common for most folks who work in creative industries since we are so bound to what we are doing that we can’t see the big picture anymore. But it doesn’t mean that we can’t get out of there.

For a wedding photographer, a witty solution is to involve your clients and ask them to generate content ideas to complement the photos you take for them. Ask how do they imagine the description of their photo album on Facebook, how they would write a message about their photo session, which words are the most appropriate to define the emotions revealed during the session, and so on.