How can we shoot better monochrome pictures?

(Pictures shot on film Leica MP + 35mm f/2 lens, on Kodak Tri-X 400 pushed to 1600, with yellow filter):

1. Surrealism

What is real or fake?

I first saw this advertisement in the background with this woman’s face in East London. I waited for someone to enter the frame. I crouched down low, shot looking up, and with a flash. Note how I got lucky with the timing — I put the old lady woman’s face over one of the eyes of the advertisement:

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2. Cutoff head (decapitation technique)

When taking a picture — you can cut off the head of your subject, to make the picture look more surreal.

What I did was ask this woman to make her portrait. I liked her tattoos in her forearms, so I asked her to stand against a simple background, and to just stick out her arms:

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3. Eyes

“Eyes are the windows to the soul.”

Note how the original picture, the eyes are off-center. This is what it would look if together:

Note the off-center eyes:

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4. Minimalism

“Less is more.”

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5. Leading Lines

Leading lines composition: When photographing your subjects, look at the background, and use the lines in the background to point in the ‘vanishing point’ of the leading lines:

Note another version — slightly less visual impact, because no leading lines to Cindy:

6. Social critique/commentary

Let us read the text in this picture:

“HEY! SPEND THAT TAX RETURN WITH US.”

Also note that there is a Mercedes-Benz SUV in the picture, which is a symbol of affluence.

So the question is this:

What is the social commentary or critique in this picture?

For myself:

A critique on American consumerism — using our tax returns to buy stuff we don’t need (chocolate/candy).

If we feed the picture to the Google Vision API, here is what shows up:

Take a look at how Google sees the text:

Related reading: How Can AI (Artificial Intelligence) Help You Analyze Your Photos? >

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7. Hand gestures

Hand gestures have more soul.

Note this picture with Cindy’s fun hand gesture, which allows you to focus on her eyes:

Lesson: Ask your subject to do a fun hand gesture!

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8. Dynamic movement

Ask your subject to do a fun hand gesture. Note the dynamic lines in the left of the frame… adding a dynamic curve to the photo.

Tip: Don’t center your subject.

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9. Honor thy selfie

Shoot selfies of yourself, in the mirror, and cover an eye, and try using flash.

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10. Fibonacci spiral

Look for spirals, and shoot looking up or down (staircases are good):

11. Bookend technique

Note Cindy on the far left (I’m shooting over her shoulder) which is the “bookend”. Then I focused on her in the mirror:

12. Simple geometric shapes and lines