Welcome to Week 29 of 2025!
In today's e-mail, you'll get:
TIP OF THE WEEK: A visual lesson in great group shots
PHOTO OF THE WEEK: The wild rabbit that eats weeds in my backyard
RESOURCES YOU MIGHT LIKE: Are newer iPhone cameras better than old ones?
TIP OF THE WEEK
Tricks For Nailing Group Shots
When I was 11, I took art lessons from a local artist whose other day job was sketching for court cases. I thought he was the coolest.
I learned a lot from him, and to my surprise, a lot of the drawing instruction he gave me now applies to photography. I had no idea at the time of being in his classes that I would have a career in photography.
But decades later, here I am - using his tricks to take better photos.
I remember one day we were tasked with drawing a still life he placed in front of us. I had my little pencil and I was gingerly drawing from sight on my sketch paper.
He came around to look at my drawing and told me I was too timid. My drawing was too small! He told me I needed to draw bigger, bolder. To not be afraid to fill the page and to go right to the edges.
He could see I was hesitating, so he went to the back and got me a huge piece of white paper and the biggest sharpie marker I had ever seen.
I was now fist-holding what felt like a big baton that I could barely wrap my fingers around.
He told me "Now, draw big."
To this day I remember this instruction. To not be afraid to fill the frame. To take up space. To be bold.
This past weekend I was taking group shots with my iPhone, and at one point I handed over my iPhone to my daughter so that I could jump into the group photo too.
After reviewing her photos compared to mine, I was reminded of this common mistake we all make. We don't fill the frame enough!
Here are some quick tips on how to fill the frame and not be timid about making our subjects "fill the page" as my art teacher would encourage.
Instead of standing far away and leaving lots of empty space around the group, get closer and fill the frame:
When looking at photos of people, we want to see and recognize faces! If we have to squint to see who's in the photo, the photo was taken too far away.
Fill. Your. Frame.
To take it a step further, let's talk about head placement. With groups, you want to bring the faces together (I call this a bouquet of faces!) - rather than keeping faces in a long row.
The point is to fill the frame with faces, rather than having them spread out too far:
Don't be timid. Get everyone in close and make sure we see those faces filling the frame!
PHOTO OF THE WEEK
When Black & White Doesn't Work
I have a rabbit that comes to visit my yard every evening and eats my weeds. It's kind of nice, and super cute. It's become less scared of us, which means it's been getting easier to take close up photos.
I took this photo and edited it as a black and white, but found that the rabbit blended in too much with the grass. Sometimes photos don't work as black and white images!
So back to colour it goes:
RESOURCES YOU MIGHT LIKE
Are Newer iPhone Cameras Better?
I did iPhone camera comparisons to see if newer iPhones have a better quality camera, and if so, by how much. The results are here: