Taking a Closer Look

One of the things I love about photography is how it's changed the way I look at the world. Because of photography, I'm always looking at light, color and backgrounds, thinking about how I might use them in a photo. It's also made me more observant and more aware.

If you've ever read a book on photography or attended a photo class, you've probably heard the phrase, "If it's not good enough, you're not close enough." A common mistake many people make in their photography is that they stand too far away, or they don't zoom in on the subject. Let's talk about taking that idea to the extreme.

Close-up photography is just what it says it is: you're getting close to something and shooting a picture. Close-up means being able to achieve as large as a one-to-one subject-to-image ratio. Macro photography means going closer than that; and then there's photography done with microscopes. Here, we're going to stay with close-ups.

When I was getting started in photography as a teenager, all I could afford for close-up photography was a set of close-up filters for my 50mm lens. They worked okay, but in time I was able to buy a used lens made especially for close-ups, and that made it much easier for me to make dramatic close-up photos. Today most lenses for digital SLRs are capable of focusing fairly close, and almost all point-and-shoot cameras, due to their design, can focus to as close as an inch or two, making them perfect little close-up cameras.

Why Shoot Close-Ups?
When I don't have a specific assignment, I approach photography from a wide view, looking at everything around me. If there's nothing that catches my eye, I'll start looking at the small parts of the scene. That sometimes results in me crawling around on my hands and knees, looking for things that other people wouldn't even notice. That's what makes close-ups so much fun. Most folks see things from a standing position and at a distance, but if your goal is to show people something different, to catch their eye, there's no better way to do that than by making a picture that makes them ask, "What's that?" Close-up photography's a great way to do just that.

When you start looking for the details around you, you'll be surprised what's there: water droplets on a flower; veins in a leaf; your daughter's patriotic toenails; ice crystals on a lake in winter; or just a frog. Even mundane things like doorknobs can take on new life when shot up close.

Explore, discover, create. It takes nothing more than a motivated imagination to picture beauty from an inch or two away.