Creating a story-telling photo (Photo story / essay)

Many people can write, but few can make up, many people can take pictures, but rarely can make a story telling. Photography is one of the media to tell a very good story. Often, good photography can arouse feelings compared to writing alone. Being able to create a story telling story is a good thing to get a job in the field of photography, especially photojournalism.

In using photography to tell a story, usually the photographer uses some photos. Because rarely one photo can tell a whole story. After the selected photo, we can arrange it so that viewers can see the core and details of the story in full.

To create a good photo story series, we not only need the knowledge of how to make good photos, but also the skills to tell stories. We need ideas / topics, planning. In addition we need cooperation between the brain, eyes and heart. With the cooperation between the three well, we can know when and where the right time to make photos.

Often, the series of photos are not only made in one day, but many days in different places. If the story involves people, then the relationship between the photographer and the subject of the image should also be good. Bad attitude or wrong words can prevent us from getting good photos.

Although it consists of several photographs, but a series of photo stories have a red thread that associates between one photo with another. Linking photos can be through the same photo subject, photo style or color, composition, place and the same topic.

There are two terms that often confuse the term photo essay and photo story / picture story

The short difference is:

Photo Essay - tells a story, and usually aims at something like reminding viewers of the dangers of drugs, telling about the importance of environmental conservation and others. Photos can be made on the spot and with different subject images but still the same topic.
Photo story / picture story - Telling about a person, place or situation, there is a beginning, middle and end. For example the story of a farmer's life, doctor, etc.
Although the photos are actually free, but for beginners or photographers who love the structure, there are several types of photos that usually exist in a series of photo stories / essays:

Establishing shot: Usually describes the place / setting of the scene, usually using a wide angle lens to give a three-dimensional impression, but sometimes, the telephoto lens is also used.
Detail shot: Detailed photo of an object or part of an important person, such as a wedding ring or close-up of a person's tears / lips, usually macro or telephoto lenses are used.
Interaction shot: Contains interactions of two or more people
Climax: A photo depicting the peak of an event
Closer / Clincher: The photo closes the story. It usually leaves an impression, message, inspiration or motivation
Five steps to make a photo story / essay:
Define topics such as a person's one-day story, or an essay on a polluted environment
Research - Find information on the selected topic
Plan the photos to take (landscape, character / portrait, art and culture, etc.)
Make photos in the planned location and time. Usually this step is the most time consuming
Editing and photo selection
Preferred photo layout / layout. The more important the picture is, the larger the relative size with the other photos