Storytelling
Writing a column, caption, or blog post is not rocket science. To write something interesting, you don't have to wait hours for inspiration or take long walks. If you really have to struggle to come up with your story, then it may not be worth the effort. As a photographer, you write with images, regardless of whether you're an interior photographer or a portrait photographer. It's not just documentary or press photographers who document a story. We all do.
Whether you prefer that one tree on a heather-covered hill or capturing someone's character in a high-contrast black-and-white portrait, you are writing a story. Your unique visual narrative should invite people to read your story and buy your photo book. I recently bought Images à la Sauvette (One Decisive Moment) by Henri Cartier-Bresson because I love the story so much. It's like a fairy tale about street photography, taking you back to a time of bowler hats and long coats, highways without traffic jams, and children looking at the camera in wonder. All over the world.
You can write down the story behind the photo, or let the viewer make it up and pass it on. It's like the fairy tales of old, ancient folk tales passed down to new generations around the fireplace. We read a photo and search for its origins: what kind of camera was used, how did he or she come to take that photo?
Yet I often see and talk to photographers who struggle with text. That was already the case when I was still working at my previous company, Yoast, the plugin company, advising people on website optimization (SEO). "Write an accompanying text," I would say to a photographer. And after considerable hesitation, the wedding photographer would write a dazzling story about the beautiful day. The story had already been written, just not on paper yet. If you can talk for hours during dinner about everything you've experienced, then you can tell stories and translate them into columns, captions, and blog posts. I'm not saying you have to, by the way. Not at all.
I write intuitively, always. At six in the morning, the alarm goes off and I open Instagram on my iPad. I carefully choose today's photo and start writing. The first sentence refers to the photo. The rest comes as it comes, and I usually fill the caption with the maximum number of characters. Over the past few months, a diary has emerged, a modern fairy tale of someone who is venturing further and further into the swamp that is photography. I don't write about the witches I encounter, but about the breadcrumbs that can no longer be found. The next step, the final adventure. There is no map, but there are hidden treasures. Tomorrow, a new story will emerge as I rub the sleep from my eyes.
Photography is a subject that lends itself to modern fairy tales. You get lost, and every place has its own stories. My king is called Stephan Vanfleteren, my fairy is Valérie Jardin. I regularly go out with the other six dwarfs, and only in a city do I feel like Nello, wandering around with Patrasche and seeking refuge in a church or museum. Now take a look at your latest photo. What story did you want to tell? Did you do that, or did you leave everything up to the viewer? I'm curious. Go fill up your fairy tale book!
This article previously appeared in Focus Magazine (the best photography magazine in the Netherlands), for which I was asked to write a column for every issue in 2023 and 2024.
