Give Your Photos Energy

Our world is always in motion, but photographs are completely static and are incapable of showing real motion. As a photographer, your job is to create the illusion of motion and energy in your photos. If you do this well, you can greatly enhance the viewer experience. The key is to create dynamic compositions that imply motion. I’ll teach you how to achieve this in the video below.

If you have any trouble watching the video above, you can also watch it here.

Here's an example of what I mean. In the photo below, it seems like the clouds are moving. I often get asked if this is a long exposure photo, but it’s not. My shutter speed was relatively fast. The reason it looks like the clouds are moving is that they create a dynamic shape that creates the illusion of motion.

So, how do you create the illusion of motion in your photos? Here are a few strategies that I like to use.

Incorporate Dynamic Shapes Into Your Visual Designs

Look for strong diagonal lines, S-curves, and zigzags. Create visual opposition by utilising different kinds of shapes in your composition. This can be objects pointing in different directions, multiple objects competing for the viewer's attention, and so on. This will encourage the viewer to explore different parts of the composition. Whenever you get the viewer’s eye moving, you get them visually engaged. The movement of their eyes will give the photo they are looking at a sense of energy and motion. For example, with the photo above, the cloud shapes are all leaning diagonally at different angles, giving the image a dynamic quality.

Move Your Subject Away From the Center

The eye natually goes to the center of the image frame to find the main subject. If the subject isn't in the expected spot, the viewer's eye will move around in unexpected ways. Don't get me wrong, I'm a strong advocate of centered compositions (when done right), but off-center placement is often an easy way to add more visual energy into your photos.

For wildlife and people, consider putting your subject on the opposite side of the direction they are moving or looking into; with the polar bear photo above, since the bear was looking and moving right, I put the bear on the left side of the image.

Capture The Expectation of Movement

I often photograph wildlife in motion: bears running in water, elephants giving themselves dust baths, lions yawning, and so on. Using a fast shutter speed (1/500th of a second or higher) to freeze a moving subject can create the illusion of motion through the expectation of movement. For example, in the photo above, capturing the moment that the elephant tosses dust in the air to give itself a dust bath implies movement because the viewer expects the suspended dust to fall to the ground. That expectation creates visual energy.

Use a Long Exposure

A short exposure freezes action, while a long exposure records the accumulation of movement over time. Recording motion over time can be an effective way to give your photos energy. However, keep in mind that long exposures will only create visual energy if the blur of motion creates a dynamic compositional shape. For example, with the photo above, a shutter speed of 3.2 seconds blurs the fast-moving water flowing over the boulder in the stream, creating a dynamic radial shape consisting of multiple diverging diagonal lines. The shapes resulting from the long exposure give the photo a feeling of motion, not the long exposure itself.

Incorporate Bold Colors Into Your Composition

Bold colors create visual energy, which can enhance the illusion of motion in your photos. Opposite colors, like orange and blue, can give your photos energetic vibrance that the viewer will instantly notice and appreciate. I took the photo above on Lake Superior during a brilliant sunset. The bold colors of sunset, and a half-second exposure to capture a dynamic motion-blurred shape of the wave crashing on the shore, both work together to draw the viewer deeper into the composition and imply energetic movement.

Conclusion

These are just some of the ways that you can give your photos the energy they deserve. Everything requires practice and patience, so be curious, explore new perspectives, and look for shapes and colors that will enhance your compositions and help you tell a story.

How do you give your photos visual energy? Let me know in the comments.