Camera Position 138 : Telling a Story with Pictures

Photography excels at storytelling. While a single image can tell a story, we can tell much more complex stories with sets or series of images.

If we set out to create those images with a story idea in mind, it’s much easier to have our stories make sense. This episode presents the essential elements of storytelling with images.

We’ve all known great storytellers and we know that what they are able to do is tap into both the personal and the universal when they tell a story. They also understand that a story has to have a beginning, a middle and an end.

Typically, a good story has most, if not all of these elements, each of which is explained in the podcast:

Introduction
Situation
Main Character
Detail
Setting The Hook
Tension
Consequence
Conclusion

I’ve found that photographers have a much easier time with storytelling if they photograph with story in mind. If you start thinking about the story that you’ll tell before you start to photograph, you’ll have an easier time of making a story work than if you try to impose story on photographs you’ve already made.