Social media has weaved an immensely interconnected web around everyone and everything and has brought it front and centre into our lives. If we look at it practically, social media has become our source of research, business promotion, personal and professional networking and even a livelihood for many people. The key element that makes social media so appealing and useful for all these purposes is social media photography and pictures.
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What Is Social Media Photography?
All the photographs that you see on social media today, be it a selfie of your friend or a professional portrait of a fashion model, all are a part of this growing and commercial genre of photography. The essence of the type of photography is all about creating an aesthetically beautiful and visually pleasing or interactive image of whatever the subject may be.
It is important to note it is an umbrella term and there are a lot of different types of photography that come under this genre.
Photographs created for social media are usually used on websites and on socials such as TikTok, Facebook and Instagram.
Types of social media photography
As wide as social media is, of course, we have thousands of social media photography types. You cannot just master one and become a social media photographer. Let’s take a look at some of the major types of related photography that we continually see on our screens.
Fashion photography
One of the most popular and widely seen types of social media photography is fashion photography. Now all the different shoots including high fashion, commercial and aesthetic, come under this genre as long as those pictures are being posted on any of the social media platforms.
Food photography
Even all the sponsored advertisements you get while you scroll through your social feeds about popular food chains and everything else to do with food are also considered social media photography. A lot of food bloggers and vloggers generate content specifically for social media and get paid for it too.
Product photography
Another widely used type of social media photography is product photography, which again has multiple branches to it. Specifically used for advertisement and brand awareness purposes, product photography involves photographing interesting images of any kind of product that is to be sold through the medium of social media. This can include photographs of products for social influencers.
Equipment for social media photography
Unless you plan on adopting this as a full-time job or as a professional, you need not have any expensive equipment for social media photography. At a basic level, you can easily begin taking pictures with your iPhone or any other phone that has a good quality camera, or any basic DSLR. Positioning subjects in natural light can also get you to cut down on the cost of lighting equipment.
For an advanced social media photographer, you will require all the basic photography kit equipment such as tripods, multiple lenses, a good quality DSLR and a 3–4-point light setup.
How to complete social media photography
If you are going to give it a try for the first time, here’s how to enhance your social media photography game!
Implementing basic skills
The first thing to do is learn basic photography skills. The rule of thirds, image composition and colour coordination will make an image appear more appealing. Adjusting the importance of the foreground and background according to the subject, experimenting with angles and lighting come into the picture when you start learning basic photography skills. Once you get that right, you can move on to the creative steps.
Get creative
You need to get in touch with your creative side and embrace out-of-the-box ideas to make your images stand out amongst a sea of other social photographers and influencers. For example, if your subject is a water bottle, merely photographing it on a plain background is not going to make it look appealing.
Add some props or elements to the picture like adding some movement with a splash of water on the bottle, putting ice cubes in the frame, adding glasses, or things that relate to the brand image. Customizing ideas to your subjects will make your social media photography stand out from the others.
Leave an intriguing element
If you are one who is also going to post your images on social media, you need to add an element of intrigue that can get better social reach for your photos. For example, if you are trying to promote a famous food place, only posting about the delicacies there without adding the location will generate more comments from people who will be interested in knowing about it. Similarly, adding captions such as ‘tag a friend who…’, ‘rate from 1-10’, ‘type ___ in comments’, etc also helps in generating more audience interaction.
Tips for social media photography
If you are interested in trying your hand at social media photography, here are some of our favourite tips to help you improve!
Personal interaction
People will respond more to a face than to a product. So, remember to give your audience the personal interaction that’s required. Be it through Instagram stories or by just a selfie!
#whatstrending
There’s a reason trends exist! Following a trend guarantees you more audience interaction if you follow it at the right time and use the right hashtags. It is guaranteed to boost your social media presence if you keep following trends. However, remember to personalize these trends and relate them to your brand or subject!
BTS
Behind The Scenes! Another way to humanize your social media account for your audience other than personal interactions, is behind-the-scenes photos and videos. Not only do they showcase your efforts behind taking the perfect shot, but it also acts as a good way of attaining greater audience engagement when coupled with trending music or voiceovers.
Capacity of social media photography
Social media photography is a huge term which carries a lot of potential and capacity for great numbers of followers. With everything going digital, social media photography is in trend, and seems it will remain so for a long time. If you truly wish to, now would be an ideal time to kick start your social media photography journey!
Have fun with socail media photography!
Always be on top of the game in social media photography be keeping up with current social trends.