Sign up for the seven-day email series.

7 days of creative ideas

In this email series, you will receive an email with a creative idea every morning for the next seven days!

Here is an example from Email 1:

Let's start at the very beginning. Yes, today is a new beginning. Today is the first day of your seven-day email series, and I want you to see the world with new eyes.

The theme is:

STRAIGHT

This is an exercise for both your camera and your smartphone. No specific camera settings are required.

If you aren’t doing so already, paying attention to vertical lines and ensuring they are perfectly straight will instantly transform your photos from mediocre to professional-looking.

Look at the examples below. The first photo was taken without considering the lines, and the second has perfectly straight lines.

You can use the sides of the camera’s viewfinder as a guideline - or if you like, you can turn on your camera’s grid setting (you may need to refer to your camera’s manual to find them. It looks easy, but you’ll need to practice. If you aren’t succeeding, it’s probably due to one or two things (or both):

You’re tilting the camera (without noticing)

You’re stood to one side

You can practice on a bookshelf, a building, windows or doors, or anything with vertical lines. If your scene/subjects include vertical AND horizontal lines, focus on the vertical ones.

The suggestions above are quite obvious choices, but look at any account on Instagram with many followers, and you’ll notice that the photographers always pay attention to the lines. Both professional photographers and film makers pay attention to straight vertical lines. I know it’s one more thing to think about, but it will make all the difference to your photos.