If you haven’t read the others, please do check out: Slowing down with Ami Vitale, Being there with Ami Vitale and The science and art of photography with Ami Vitale. I have tried to keep the feedback pertinent to anyone interested in photography, rather than a personal soapbox for my meager talents!

This last post is the advice I received about how to make my images – predominately travel reportage – more compelling, by recognizing my strengths and using them to differentiate my work. I am going to jump right in and share two final images that Ami and I discussed during the review and use them to illustrate the advice she gave me.

The first is the Man in the Barbershop. If you have read the 3 previous posts then this image was one of the rare occasions where I had managed to combine these 3 concepts – albeit unknowingly! But the result is pleasing. Of all the images, this was the one that Ami got really excited about, because she immediately saw a story being told. As a picture it was well composed, well lit, but the subject matter is unusual and also lighthearted so grabs your attention. It is a compelling image because it has highlighted the unusual in the usual. It has presented a different side to Cairo than seen by most tourists. It has also played to my strengths (Ami’s perspective, not mine!) of looking for light and strong composition, getting in close, forming a relationship with the subject all of which allows a more personal dimension to be shown in the final image.

It is not unique a situation – you will find other barber shops in other parts of the world where a similar story can be told. But it works because it has the marriage of the science and art of photography. It works because there is a mixture of observation and communication and lastly it  is an image that stands alone, but also could be part of a wider story and encourages you to find out about more of that story.

In fact we talked about this image quite a lot in the review, and ended up agreeing that I should look at the whole subject of how traditional barber shops play a role in Egyptian community life as a photo essay project. Oddly for a culture so masculine and traditional, there is an interesting bridge to the more “metro-sexual” western world where this sort of male grooming is seen as a modern phenomenon, yet here we have proof that it is part of a traditional culture.

This success in creating this compelling image is in contrast to the second image – Shepherd in Sakara. This was – is – one of my favorite images because it represents Egyptian daily life to me and the combination of light, subject matter and composition give it an almost biblical quality. I had deliberately shot these shepherds heading home at the end of the day, knowing that the sun would be low, the dust cloud prominent and by shooting the subjects going away from me, I though this re-enforced the story of the end of the day.

Ami’s perspective was different, and surprised me a little. Whilst she acknowledged the great light, and understood the composition, she felt the image could have been better. As a travel image it was not iconic because it was not complete – it didn’t provide the viewer with a complete story. You are left with questions, rather than insight. Travel photography she reminded me is not about the location, but in seeing whichever location you are in with fresh eyes. It is about being intimate with the culture, the people and the environment. It is about seeing beyond the surface to the real story underneath. Travel photography is as much about humanity as it is about location.

Of course she was viewing this image with objective and fresh eyes, and not perhaps the blind conviction and attachment that I had formed around it. As she talked my perception of the “quality” of the image began to unravel! Perhaps  if I had included less of the green bush, or waited for the concrete slab in the bottom centre to be out of shot, then this would have made that particular composition more compelling. But Ami suggested also that to really tell this story, to really capture the location, the humanity and the environment,  that perhaps I should be taking an entirely different image.

If the story was about the unchanged tradition of the shepherd in Egypt, or the return home after a long day out with the sheep, or the “biblical” aspect of daily life, then this image only told part of the story. Perhaps, she offered, a shot of them coming towards me might suggest more of a welcome home after a long day or even to take a shot in the morning when they are going out. Whilst the image is good, there is an opportunity to tell a more complete story and create a more compelling image. Ami’s ability to immerse herself in her subject’s environment, to find the unusual in the usual, to tell the story with compassion and insight is what marks her out as one of the truly great modern photographers. Her suggestion then to return to the same place, perhaps with a translator, and getting introduced to the shepherds, spending a day with them, has to be taken seriously. As soon as she said it my mind raced with ideas and concepts, of opportunities and potential stories. So simple an idea, but potentially so profound and impact.

What this review process has done for me is open my eyes to how I approach photography and what I look for. Ami has helped me see past the perceived barriers of technique or experience; she has motivated me to get out there, experiment, have fun and to relax. Bu she has also really inspired me to think about what the story is I want to tell and to go and create photo essays that really tell those stories.

Everyone that I have talked to about Ami has the same opinion. She is the real deal. A compassionate big-hearted individual, with a capacity to relate to people and their lives. As a photojournalist and now multimedia journalist she is the master of her craft. The very high regard that photo editors, fellow professional humanitarian,freelance photographers, as well as her clients and students, hold her in is a reflection of who she is and how she goes about creating compelling and memorable images. Without trying to be overly sycophantic, It has been a true and rare privilege to have such dedicated feedback from someone whom I hold in very high regard and who has truly inspired me.

If you want to undergo a similar experience to me, then Ami still has some vacancies for personal one on one reviews available through The Compelling Image Website. I suspect though that the vacancies won’t be there for long!

Put simply, the advice was: Have a reason to be there. Tell their story.

Although Ami’s advice  was simple it still needs a little further explanation, so let me expand a little. The first thing that we need to do is to pick a subject and then tell the story of that subject. It doesn’t matter what the subject is, but in the act of creating a subject we create a focus for our images and the expectation that there is a story to be told. Maybe you don’t know the whole story yet, maybe the images are part of the journey. Maybe you have an idea, maybe a feeling or maybe an emotion that you are trying to share. But one thing is for sure is that the image that will really tell the story – the image that really connects with people – will come because you were acutely aware of the context. The story could be a single image or it could be a photo-essay – if it is the latter each image needs to stand on its own. But either way you can’t tell a story without a context. You can’t have the context without knowing what you are there to capture.

You are not just some accidental tourist, hoping to be in the right place at the right time to shoot the next iteration of Steve McCurry’s Afghan girl. This I suggest is missing the point. I am sure we have all done it. Day 1 of a workshop or holiday in a new country, over-run by potentially iconic shots and furiously snapping away as we tick off National Geographic’s next cover image in our mind. The reality though is that this scatter gun approach seldom yields result – it is akin to “being jack of all trades and master of none”.

And when we are out of synch with our environment then we are not really able to see where the real stories are. We haven’t tuned into the people around us and our part in their story.  As a result the images don’t quite hit the mark. They might be technically good, you might be a master of your craft but they still look like Marco Ryan images, not Ami Vitale images right?

For example let’s look at my picture of the “Egyptian man in the coffee shop” (left). A nice portrait, well executed and there is clearly a connection between us. Ami’s critique about the picture itself (good connection, great light, simple clean background, nice composition) were all positive and helpful, but, she suggested, had I shown him drinking coffee, or puffing on a sheesha pipe or a cigarette, the image would have had more impact. As submitted, you would never know where this man was sitting or what his story was – at least not from the picture. In fact, as Ami gently reminded me, the title tells you more than the picture – lovely though the light and tonal range might be! You’d never guess from this that he was a retired guide for the Pyramids would you? If I had slowed down, chosen my composition better, I could have given you a hint of  that story –  the tip of the great Pyramid was just visible through the window (out of shot) to the right. Why didn’t I include it? For once it was not because I was in a rush (see my last post about slowing down) – quite the opposite. I was probably just fixated on getting a good catchlight or the right tones or demonstrating my perceived mastery of the rule of thirds. The truth is I can’t remember. And that says it all doesn’t it? In effect I was in super-tourist mode (albeit a slightly over-camera’d tourist in this case!) and because I lacked a reason to be there – because I lacked a framework or context for the story – the picture became anonymous.

One of the ingredients that differentiates Ami’s images from, say, mine is that everything she shoots is contextual. Her images are compelling because they are a result of observation, communication, understanding and seeing the subject in the context of the story. She ALWAYS has a reason for being there. She always knows her story, her angle. And my images? Well if  I am brutally honest, they are probably still opportunistic. I kid myself that I am there for a reason – for example maybe I wanted to create a “Blurb” book as a Christmas present on “The Artisans of Old Cairo” –  but the reality is I am doing tick-box photo-journalism. In fact not even that.Tick box photo-tourism. It is not that the images are bad, it’s just that they are not great and they fail to really connect because I am not clear about what story I am trying to tell.

Because the real story is theirs, not mine. The real reason to be there is to capture some aspect of humanity, to tell their story. Travel photography is, Ami suggested, not about the location, but about being intimate with a place or a subject; seeing beyond the simple, and seeing things that create complexity in your images. You can only do that by knowing why you are there and what it is that you are trying to convey with your images.

Ami used my image of the father and son working on their lathe in their workshop (left) as dusk approaches, to amplify her point. As it stands it is a nice image. Good use of light, not bad composition, with some context provided by the use of contrast (both figurative contrast with the people’s difference in age and literal contrast with the use of light and shade) and with a a couple of things you might change (the red and blue bag behind the boy’s head for example). Overall then a pretty decent image. Yet it could be so much more. It is, Ami suggested, an image with potential. And here is is why.

It has the potential to tell an amazing story, but it loses impact because  it is unclear what  that story is. Is it about struggle? Is it about working conditions? Child labour? What does this image tell you? It loses impact because I haven’t provided the context and as a result it is unclear what story it is that I am trying to tell.

Lets pretend for a second that I had delivered an iconic image about manual labour. That starts to suggest a story. Manual labour, Ami suggested running with the example, is a powerful symbol of man’s toil for survival. It gives us a glimpse into the past, and a single portrait like this is like a single quotation: Interesting in its own right, perhaps even memorable, but when seen in context as part of a story, it can be so much more. In the (non existent) iconic version of the  image we are expressing the humanity of man’s struggle for survival. We have context. We have a reason to be there. Yet in my  actual version (left), because I lacked that reason, that context, so the story is unclear and the impact of the image is diluted.

Ami’s questions challenged my assumptions, yet inspired me to think differently. “What is the story then?”, she asked. It is simply not clear. Is it their suffering that they had no other work option or is this a joyous image of a father and son free to run their own family business? Is it the sheer daily graft that leaves them exhausted at the end of the day covered in oil? What were they making? What detail could we have shown that would have made this image more compelling? If I had spent all day there, would I have different images to show for it? What story would I be able to tell? Does my image express the humanity of the situation?

For example, Cairo is the second most densely populated city in the world, after Mexico City, with a population of about 26 million people. Yet this image doesn’t begin to convey that or to provide that context. Perhaps it was not meant to, but if you now view this image in that context, suddenly things change. It now becomes perhaps about their own private space, their room to breath amongst the suffocating urban sprawl. Perhaps the  toil and the light are symbolic of other small tradesmen struggling to eek an existence against the poverty that Cairo’s scale has made such an unhappy bedfellow? The message then is that the context and story are inextricably linked.

Of course I had seen this so differently before talking with Ami. Ami made me realise that having a reason to be there – having clarity about the story that you are telling – makes it relevant not just for me, but for them. Perhaps if I had gone there with a translator or learnt a phrase that explained why I was there, they might have posed or allowed me to spend the afternoon with them observing their life. Having the reason to be there then – that understanding of what story it is that you are there to tell – allows us to find the common ground, to be able to create the environment in which their story can emerge, rather than just being an observer with a lens.We become facilitators of them expressing their story not authors of how they fit into our story. Go back, she said. Go back to the same place time and time again with a story in mind. Spend time understanding the context, and then use that insight to create a compelling image, because in the case of the father and son above, the potential is there.

In my last post, I shared Ami’s advice on the need to slow down and immerse yourself in the environment. Each of the themes she raised with me  are strong enough to stand alone. Each one when applied independently will raise your game and improve your images. The real impact though happens when these themes get combined. Then we begin to see where the potential to improve really lies.

The next post will cover how to step-change our technical ability and craft, as well as overcoming technical issues and frustrations – again using a couple of images form the review set to illustrate Ami’s insight and advice. I count myself blessed to have been given such great mentoring. I would love it if, having read and enjoyed this, you felt motivated to share this with others. Please tweet, post on facebook, digg or whatever your social network preference is.

If Ami’s portfolio is what you are after then visit her website, www.amivitale.com. It would be inappropriate let alone presumptuous for someone of my meager photographic talents to comment on Ami’s photographs. Many far more qualified than I have earmarked her as one of the truly outstanding photographic talents of her generation and I suspect the world is a better place for having someone of Ami’s skill, compassion and empathy using their visual story telling capabilities to help others.

So I am going to tackle this in two parts – the first part is this post about my experience and the process of having 10 of my recent images reviewed by Ami. The second part  - a series of 3-4 shorter posts – will each cover one of the key themes and detailed feedback, together with the ideas and suggestions that Ami gave me – which I think that others on similar “journeys” of photographic discovery may find helpful, re-assuring or even encouraging.

Booking the time with Ami was something that I orchestrated through the website, The Compelling Image for a cost of $160 – which I think is incredible value and, dare I say it given the time I had with Ami and the benefits I gained, is too cheap! For those of you wanting to take an online course in photography, then do look at “The Compelling Image” – they have some truly outstanding professionals providing you with individual tuition, assignments and critiques for a very reasonable price. You can find out more about all of their courses, including the option to have Ami Vitale review your work, at www.thecompellingimage.com.

Anyway back to the review. I have to say it felt pretty nerve racking. Like many photographers I have that weird mix of wanting to share my images so that people can see them, but also nagging self-doubt that they are really good enough. You can imagine therefore my angst at having to submit 10 images to be formally critiqued by someone of Ami’s standard, even though I knew by her reputation that Ami, of all people, would provide incredible objective insight, advice and encouragement.

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The first challenge was selecting which 10 images to submit. Now that sounds very arrogant – I don’t mean that I had so many great images to chose from that I struggled to sort the “chaff from the wheat”. Far from it. In my case I have so much chaff, that I struggled to find the wheat!  But obviously you want to show both your potential and also perhaps examples of where you are seeking guidance – the aim after all of such a review is to learn from somebody that you respect and whose work you acknowledge as being the type of quality that you aspire to achieve at some stage on your own photographic journey. I was conscious too that the images I selected would of course shape the discussion. Obvious when said like that, but I can’t tell you how long I spent wondering which ones to select – even taking advice from a couple of photography buddies to help me be objective about it! You can see the 10 images that I selected for review in the slideshow above and if you want to browse my other images then you can review those in my gallery.

The mechanics of the review are very straightforward. You select on the “The Compelling Image” website from a range of pre-ordained dates, when you want the review to happen; you pay your money, and on that day, the “course” is enabled for you. Once enabled you upload your images via the TCI website where you also have the opportunity to attach a commentary about each picture – why you had taken it, what you were trying to achieve, what you thought worked and what you thought didn’t etc.

Within hours of enrolling on the course – even though the course was still a few days off – Ami had been in touch by email. She wanted to know my background, my motivations my interests and then she wanted to arrange to have a chat with me via Skype on the day of the course (it is technically a one day course).

Ami could not have been more gracious or delightful. Full of ideas, full of encouragement and full of support, she began by seeking understanding about each image – Why had I chosen to submit this image? What did it mean for me? Why had I composed it that way? What other angles/viewpoints had I considered and why?  How many frames had I shot? How longed had I spent thinking about the image before shooting it? She had clearly prepared thoroughly for our call because as we discussed each image, Ami delivered real insight and the benefit of her extensive experience in identifying what is was that she liked or where there were areas she wanted clarification over.

Some images that I thought were my strongest, she liked, but usually Ami felt that they were missing something, or could have been better! Other images which I just liked, she loved – and for quite different reasons from me. As we went through each of the images, we kept returning to a number of dominant themes, but I am going to save those details and the specific critique for my next post. But at no stage was this dispiriting. Gavin Gough shared with me that “critiquing somebody’s photographs is only slightly less hazardous than offering thoughts on the perceived beauty of their children in my experience. It’s easy to offer praise alone and that’s often what reviewers resort to – or they go to the other end of the scale and pick things apart without offering encouragement”.

I can’t amplify sufficiently how productive, enjoyable and without being too over the top, humbling the whole review process with Ami was. It was just terrific fun. But of course it was also much more than that. It was incredibly focused, balanced between praise and constructive criticism, positive, helpful and motivating. Ami’s great skill is in simplifying things – helping the complex seem straightforward, removing the mental barriers that are blocking your ability to advance, and leaving you more reflective, upbeat and ready to go.  She makes you see things is an uncluttered and objective way, that as soon as she says them just seem so obvious that you kick yourself for making everything that went before so complicated. In just one hour I came away already thinking differently, motivated to just go and try new things and inspired by the opportunities that were now in front of me, yet also aware of what I should not repeat or get frustrated by.

Mentoring at its best, then. In terms of developing my photography I suspect I shall look back on this process as one of those seminal moments where I felt I had made a step change.

Like many who have met or know Ami – even virtually as I did – you realize that you have just spent time with someone very special.  There is an inner calm, a compassion and a genuine warmth in the interest she displays in you and your photographs that is all too rare these days. I too have joined the rapidly increasing Ami Vitale fan base!

Ami has kindly allowed me to share with you her comments and feedback. My next post will cover one of the key themes we discussed, using one of the images together with the comments I made as part of the submission process, and more interestingly, the critique that I received from Ami.

Please help and spread the word by clicking on the share button below, retweeting, facebook updates etc. And if you haven’t already done so, lose yourself for a few hours and get inspired by visiting Ami’s portfolio.