Stop Trying to Find Your Photography Style
One of the questions that comes up again and again with photographers is:
“How do I find my style?”
It's something I hear from newer photographers in particular. They look at photographers they admire and see these beautifully cohesive portfolios where everything seems to belong together. The colours feel consistent. The lighting is recognisable. The images have a certain mood.
And then they look at their own work and think…
Mine is all over the place.
Here's the thing.
I don't think you need to find your photography style.
I think you build it.
And quite often, you're building it long before you realise it's happening.
Your style isn't hiding from you
We sometimes talk about photographic style as though it's this mysterious thing we're supposed to discover.
Once you find it, congratulations, you're officially a photographer!
I don't think creativity works that way.
Your style develops through shooting, experimenting, making mistakes, changing your mind, trying things that don't work and discovering things you absolutely love.
And yes, sometimes you'll create something you love and then spend the next three hours trying to remember exactly what you did. We've all been there.
The more you shoot, the more patterns start appearing.
Maybe you constantly gravitate towards darker, moodier images.
Maybe you love soft, beautiful light.
Perhaps you're drawn to movement.
Maybe colour plays a huge role in your photographs.
Perhaps you love theatrical characters and storytelling.
Maybe you keep coming back to simple, quiet images.
Those decisions gradually become part of your photographic voice.
Look backwards, not forwards
Here's an exercise I mentioned during the first Picture It Differently LIVE.
Instead of asking yourself:
“What should my photography style be?”
Try looking at what you've already created.
Choose around 20 photographs you've made that you genuinely love.
Not the ones that got the most likes.
Not necessarily the award winners.
Not the ones somebody else told you were fabulous.
Choose the photographs YOU love.
Put them together and look at them as a collection.
Then start asking questions.
What kind of light keeps appearing?
Are they bright or dark?
Are the colours bold, muted, warm, cool?
Are your compositions clean or busy?
Do you photograph people looking at the camera, or do you prefer moments that feel more candid?
Are your images polished and beautiful, or slightly strange and imperfect?
Do they tell stories?
Do they feel romantic? Cinematic? Whimsical? Quiet? Dark? Joyful?
What subjects keep appearing?
What do you repeatedly do in your editing?
You might be surprised by how many connections are already there.
Try the three-word exercise
Now take it one step further.
Think about the photographs you want to create.
Describe them in just three words.
Maybe it's:
Moody. Cinematic. Mysterious.
Or:
Soft. Romantic. Dreamlike.
Perhaps:
Bold. Colourful. Playful.
There's no correct answer.
But those three words can become surprisingly useful when you're planning a photograph.
If you want an image to feel moody, cinematic and mysterious, suddenly you can start making decisions.
Does bright, flat front lighting support those words?
Probably not.
Would side lighting and deeper shadows help?
Perhaps.
What about the background?
The wardrobe?
Colour palette?
Pose?
Lens?
Editing?
You're no longer trying to copy a “style”. You're making a series of choices based on how you want the photograph to feel.
That's a very different thing.
Inspiration isn't imitation
There's nothing wrong with looking at other photographers.
We all do it.
But instead of looking at someone's photograph and thinking:
“I want to make that.”
Ask:
“What is it about that photograph that I love?”
Maybe it's actually the light.
Or the colours.
Perhaps it's the styling.
Maybe it's the storytelling.
Perhaps it's the sense of movement.
Take that little piece of inspiration and mix it with everything else that influences you, movies, music, paintings, fashion, locations, books, people, experiences and your own slightly odd ideas.
That's when inspiration starts becoming yours.
Your editing isn't your style
This is another trap.
A preset isn't a photographic style.
Neither is a Photoshop technique.
Editing can certainly become part of your visual language, but style is much bigger than that.
It's the decisions you make before you even pick up the camera, as well as the ones you make afterwards.
What you choose to photograph.
How you light it.
Where you place your subject.
What you leave out.
What you exaggerate.
What you want someone to feel when they look at the finished image.
That's where your voice starts appearing.
And your style is allowed to change
This might be the most important part.
You don't have to choose a style and spend the rest of your photographic life protecting it.
Where's the fun in that?
Look at photographs you were making five or ten years ago and compare them with what you're creating now.
Hopefully you've changed.
You've learned things.
You've experimented.
You've become interested in different things.
You've probably abandoned techniques you once loved and discovered new ones.
That's not a lack of consistency.
That's growth.
So perhaps we need to stop worrying quite so much about finding our photography style.
Shoot things you find interesting.
Experiment.
Pay attention to what excites you.
Notice what you keep coming back to.
And most importantly, make lots of photographs.
Your style may already be there.
You just haven't recognised it yet.
A little challenge
Choose 20 photographs you love from your own portfolio.
Put them together.
Then ask yourself:
What keeps showing up?
Finally, write down the three words you'd most like someone to use when describing your photography.
Don't worry about whether your current work completely fits those words.
Use them as a direction, not a set of rules.
Then go make something.
Get creative. Shoot more. Picture it differently.
You can watch a replay of the PODCAST here
