19 Awesome Photo Essay Examples and Ideas You Should Try
Photo essays are a great way to push your creative skills and become a better photographer. By taking just one photo essay example from this article and trying it for yourself, you’ll learn how to tell stories will your camera.
Whether you want to be a photojournalist, event photographer, or fantasy photographer, shooting photo essays will help you hone your skills.
We start the article by looking at photo essay examples from the professionals. These examples with fire up your inspiration and show you what’s possible with photo essays. We then move on to photo essay ideas anyone can try. These are the perfect starting point for anyone interested in narrative photography.
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What is a Photo Essay?
I’m sure we all know what an essay is. It’s a concise piece of writing that studies one particular subject, exploring different details and aspects of that subject to inform and educate the reader. A photo essay is the same thing, only it uses photographs instead of words.
A photo essay can be about practically anything. We’ll explore specific photo essay ideas in detail later, but the subject could be anything from a local sports team to climate breakdown.
But the key to a good photo essay is to stay focused. We don’t just mean staying focused with your camera and lens. We mean staying focused on your subject. Don’t lose sight of the subject or the story. Avoid distractions and make sure the subject is clear in your images.
That doesn’t mean you can’t explore different aspects of your chosen subject. Looking at something from different angles or following threads and theories can make for a very stimulating photo essay. But don’t lose focus completely. Make sure all the photos add to the overall theme of the essay.
You can use many different types of photography within a photo essay. You can use candid street or documentary style photography. Portrait photography always brings a personal touch to a photo essay. You can also use more staged and considered styles of photography to explore your subject.
Professional Photo Essay Examples
We’ll now look at some photo essay examples from professional photographers. Seeing how the pros use photos to tell stories or explore topics will show you what can be achieved with a strong photo essay.
Women of the Cossack Resurgence
Anastasia Taylor-Lind is one of the finest photojournalists working today . And her Women of the Cossack Resurgent is the perfect photo essay example for anyone interested in photojournalism or documentary photography.
Taylor-Lind’s extraordinary essay looks at young Cossack women as they pass through an education system that’s rediscovered its nationalist verve. It’s clear from the photos, this schooling is more radical than we are accustomed to in the West. A militant edge runs straight all the way through it.
She uses a documentary photography approach with candid shots. But there’s no sense that this is an exposé with hidden cameras. The viewer gets an inside glimpse into an otherwise mysterious world without feeling like an intruder
See the full photo essay on Taylor-Lind’s website: Women of the Cossack Resurgence
Bachelorette
Dina Litovsky ‘s photo essay titled Bachelorette explores the growing culture of the bachelorette party. Her garish collection of documentary photos shines a lights on a western sub-culture that, for many around the world, remains mysterious, scary, or completely unknown.
Gender norms are always changing, sometimes for the better, sometimes not. And while many see the bachelorette party as a debauched, sleazy affair, it still marks a step in the right direction for women’s equality in western culture.
Sex plays a big part in bachelorette events. It might seem lewd or crude to many, it shows that in the 21st century, women are losing just as much sexual freedom when getting married. This is a truly modern phenomenon.
See the full photo essay on Litovsky’s website: Bachelorette
The Knife and Gun Club
This uncompromising photo essay from Eugene Richards gives an unflinching view of the realities of a hospital emergency room in the USA. Published in 1989, the essay still packs a punch today. The equipment and clothes are dated, but the images have lost none of their visceral power.
Richard’s hard-hitting images offer a true reflection of life in an A&E ward. The stress, energy, and raw emotion all come through loud and clear in every photo within the essay.
Focused and concise while being informative and powerful, the Knife and Gun Club is one of the finest photo essay examples.
See more of this photo essay on Eugene Richard’s website: The Knife and Gun Club
Sierra Leone – War Reparations
Like many countries in sub-Saharan Africa, Sierra Leone has had more than its fair share of strife. A neo-colonialist world leaves few unscathed, and Nick Danziger ‘s photo essay brings those victims into sharp focus. He shows the viewer how profit accumulation in the Global North reaps violence and suffering in the Global South.
While Danziger’s subjects are victims of violence, his images show a people with dignity and pride. There’s sympathy within the images but he doesn’t drown them in pity. His images are brutal and honest, but also warm and intimate.
We’ve chosen Sierra Leone as a photo essay example, but we could have chosen any number of Danziger’s essays. His humanitarian photography is the best in the business. But he has covered a wide range of subjects from Tony Blair to the All Blacks rugby team.
See the full photo essay on Nick Danziger’s website: Sierra Leone – War Reparations
Anya Anti is the name of the artist rather than the name of a specific photo essay. Anti works in a different way to the previous photographers. Rather than have separate collections of photo essays, her wider collection focuses on a collection of interconnecting themes. You can take any of her images and group them together to create a coherent photo essay.
Another major difference is her style. She’s a fantasy photographer who uses surreal elements to tell her stories. Anti’s images are vivid and alive with metaphor and symbolism.
Nature plays a big role in her photography. She explores our relationship to nature, how we are one and the same and how fragile nature can be.
Anti demonstrates how photographers can use a wide range of styles and techniques to create engaging photo essays.
See more work from Anya Anti on her website. Or, if you really like her work, you can check out the incredible ebook she made in collaboration with Expert Photography; Creative Portrait Concepts
The Rift: Fracking in the UK
Rhiannon Adam is a portrait and documentary photographer from Ireland. Jumping across the Irish sea, this essay looks at fracking in the United Kingdom.
She uses portraits to illustrate her essay, focusing on the players of an ongoing drama. But this is no trivial drama. Her powerful images show the dedication of those fighting against big business for the sake of their communities. And Adam doesn’t shy away from the effects that fight is having on them.
The essay offers a unique glimpse into modern life in the UK. It shows a culture under threat, barely holding on against exploitation and declining living standards. Yet her images are not bleak or sorrowful. Although not always cheery, her portraits lift the spirits and harden the resolve.
See more from this photo essay example on Rhiannon Adam’s website: The Rift: Fracking in the UK
The Stateless
Statelessness is something few of us have ever contemplated. To be stateless is to be without an identity, at least in legal terms. Many stateless people have never left the land where they and their ancestors were born, yet they have no official residence.
That’s the subject of William Daniels ‘ eye-opening photo essay. It’s a documentary photography essay that’s global in scope. He doesn’t only focus on one group of people. He documents stateless people all over the world.
Daniels’ images are bright and energetic, but the pain and sorrow cuts through each photo. This photo essay example isn’t the easiest to digest. But it’s essential viewing for anyone interested in creating hard-hitting photo essays on political or humanitarian topics.
See William Daniel’s full photo essay here: The Stateless
Professional climber, adventure, and photographer, Savannah Cummins has no fear when it comes to venturing into the unknown. She thrives when pushed to the limit, and that’s easy to see in this fantastic photo essay example.
Cummins’ essay explores the perils of live in the polar arctic, with her images a clear indication of how hard it is just to survive 109º F below.
This photo essay is the perfect example of how photographers need to get involved with their subjects to tell the best stories. There’s no sitting on the sidelines when you’re in freezing conditions. The cold affects you just as much as it does your subjects. But it’s about incorporating that into the essay, which Cummins does perfectly here.
See the full photo essay on Savannah Cummins’ website: 109º Below
Photo Essay Ideas
We’ve seen some incredible photo essay examples in the section above. But you don’t have to travel to war zones or the arctic circle to create interesting photo essays. You can start small, focusing on your community, finding local stories that effect those close to you.
In this section, we look at photo essay ideas anyone can try. You don’t need fancy equipment or specialist skills. All you need is a camera and an interesting subject to capture.
Study a Family Member
When we say “start close to home,” we mean it. Every family has an interesting character or two. And many might have far more interesting lives than you are even aware of.
Grandparents are a good place to start. Their advanced years mean they’ve lived longer than others. They might have lived through and experienced some major events from modern history, such as protests, war, or economic depressions.
You don’t have to limit your focus to the elderly. Do a little digging, and you might find a family member who is currently living a life worth documenting.
You can take a series of portraits to capture the character. You can also create a more candid photo essay, capturing them at work or living their daily lives.
Step Out Your Front Door
Your neighbourhood, town, or village makes a great subject for a photo essay. You might be sick of where you live and not think it worth documenting. But it might be interesting to others.
Also, if you’ve lived there a long time, you’ll have an intimate knowledge of the area. Look for landmarks that hold a personal significance or places important to the local community.
The community could even be the focus on the photo essay. You could capture the people as well as the landscapes and spaces. After all, it’s how spaces and people interact that makes them significant.
Take a Journey
Journeys are always interesting, even if they’re short. That’s why they make great subjects for photo essays.
You don’t have to travel far in order to make a great essay. You can go to a nearby town or leave your town for the journey. And you can travel however you see fit.
Driving gives you the freedom to go practically anywhere. But using public transport is another option, and can be more rewarding from a narrative point of view. There’s no mystery, with chance encounters and random occurrences. These bring your photo essay to life.
You don’t always need a specific destination. You can take each turn as it comes, deciding on the fly which way to go. Viewers will have a greater sense of adventure when looking at your images.
Photograph the Same Place
You don’t need to travel to crate an interesting visual essay. In fact, you can find one spot you find interesting and take several photographs of it over time.
The time frame is up to you. You can photograph that spot many time in one day. Or you can take one picture a day or one picture a week for several weeks.
The trick with this type of essay is that you need people to know it’s the same place in each photo. That means you have to take the picture from the exact same spot each time. Remember where you’re standing and work from there.
Alternatively, you can photograph the same place from multiple angles. That makes you’re photo essay a study of one particular space.
Watch Things Change
Similar to the photo essay idea above, you can focus on one thing over a period of time. That thing could be a place, but it could also be a person, plant, or inanimate objects. The only requirement is that this thing changes as time passes.
Photographing one place over time is a great idea if you live in a temperate climate. You can take pictures of that place as it changes over the course of the year, documenting the effects of the seasons.
Flowers and plants are a great choice for this type of photo essay. Some flowers have a short blooming period, so you can take a picture once a day for a week or so to monitor its growth and decline. Trees and other plants will need longer time periods.
The simplest version of this is to take a self-portrait every day. You might not thing there’s much difference between today’s self and tomorrow’s self, but when you view all the images in sequence the transformation can be incredible.
You can also put these images together to create a time-lapse video .
Follow a Protest
Protests often make excellent subjects for photo essays. They are full of interesting characters as well as colorful signs and placards. But they are also springs of emotion and tension. Most protests are peaceful, but more and more police in the West are cracking down on protesters, even if they are peaceful.
You don’t have to agree with the protesters or their cause. You might be staunchly opposed, but having some kind of emotional connection to the event will make your images more engaging for the viewer.
And don’t merely observe from the sidelines. Get involved for a more immersive essay. Speak to people involved, look for colorful characters. Keep your eyes peeled for counter-protesters or police. Look for signs of tension and focus in on those areas. Or, use your essay to show how peaceful protests can be.
Document a Local Event
Events are another great subject for your photo essay. Whether it’s a community bake sale or a local music festival, you can capture the event with your camera.
As with protests, it helps to get involved as much as possible. Speak to organizers and volunteers and make yourself known to the people there. This will help you get better access to the event. It will also allow event-goers to relax with the camera around, helping you capture more candid images.
Explore Abandoned Places
Urban exploration, or Urbex, is where photographers explore abandoned places. It can be dangerous, so be careful and take the correct gear. But it can also be rewarding, allowing you to see forgotten places.
For a photography essay, you need to tell the story of these dilapidated buildings. Look for clues from the building’s past life. Find out what the building was and what it was used for in its heyday. Through this, you’ll learn about a wider history of the area.
Entering abandoned places is often illegal as it’s considered trespassing, so get permission to enter if you can. If not, be careful.
Tackle Big Subjects
Topics like climate breakdown, capitalism, or political corruption might seem out of reach for an amateur photographer. And while capturing melting ice caps or gaining access to the White House might be tricky, that does not mean these topics are out of bounds.
The trick is to look at how these big stories manifest in your local area. Is your town experiencing excessive drought or flooding due to climate Breakdown? Or is there a community center being closed down due to governmental budget cuts?
Stories like these make for powerful and engaging photo essays. They show how big, almost abstract subjects affect us on a personal level. They show that everyone is in the firing line, especially those at the community level.
Appreciate Skill and Craft
This photo essay idea involved finding a skilled person to document. They can be anything from a carpenter or stone mason to a ballerina or cellist. All you need is someone with talent and skill. Then use your camera to create a photo essay about that person and what they do.
Make sure you have the person’s permission before you start taking pictures. Try to arrange some one-on-one time, so you can capture intimate pictures of them at their craft.
Take your time. Allow the other person to relax so they work in the way they would if the camera wasn’t there. Capture a mixture of shots including environmental portraits and closeups of them at work.
Look Behind the Scenes
Whether it’s a photoshoot, concert, or film set, people are always intrigued by what goes on behind the scenes. That’s why pulling back the curtain makes for such fun and interesting photo essays.
The tricky part is gaining access to the set or backstage area. You will have to reach out to the artists, managers, or directors beforehand. You can’t show up on the day and expect a backstage pass.
But once you’re in, it’s time to start snapping. There’s always a big cast of characters on any set. You have technicians, producers, and stylists. They all have interesting jobs, so try to capture them at work.
The key is to get involved without getting in the way. Learn to move with the crew and blend in as much as possible.
The photo essay is a brilliant and creative way to share stories and explore issues. A good photo essay should always say something. It isn’t just a collection of loosely linked photos. It’s a collection of connected photos that tell the story of someone, something, or a group of people or things.
Each photo essay example featured in the first section demonstrates how the pros construct their visual narrative. Those examples also show the wide range of topics photographers can explore with the photo essay format.
We explored the possible topics in the latter section on photo essay ideas. These ideas are accessible to anyone with a camera. You don’t need fancy equipment or a big budget. All you need is a camera and a photo essay idea that matches your interests.
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How to Create an Engaging Photo Essay (with Examples)
Photo essays tell a story in pictures. They're a great way to improve at photography and story-telling skills at once. Learn how to do create a great one.
Learn | Photography Guides | By Ana Mireles
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Photography is a medium used to tell stories – sometimes they are told in one picture, sometimes you need a whole series. Those series can be photo essays.
If you’ve never done a photo essay before, or you’re simply struggling to find your next project, this article will be of help. I’ll be showing you what a photo essay is and how to go about doing one.
You’ll also find plenty of photo essay ideas and some famous photo essay examples from recent times that will serve you as inspiration.
If you’re ready to get started, let’s jump right in!
Table of Contents
What is a Photo Essay?
A photo essay is a series of images that share an overarching theme as well as a visual and technical coherence to tell a story. Some people refer to a photo essay as a photo series or a photo story – this often happens in photography competitions.
Photographic history is full of famous photo essays. Think about The Great Depression by Dorothea Lange, Like Brother Like Sister by Wolfgang Tillmans, Gandhi’s funeral by Henri Cartier Bresson, amongst others.
What are the types of photo essay?
Despite popular belief, the type of photo essay doesn’t depend on the type of photography that you do – in other words, journalism, documentary, fine art, or any other photographic genre is not a type of photo essay.
Instead, there are two main types of photo essays: narrative and thematic .
As you have probably already guessed, the thematic one presents images pulled together by a topic – for example, global warming. The images can be about animals and nature as well as natural disasters devastating cities. They can happen all over the world or in the same location, and they can be captured in different moments in time – there’s a lot of flexibility.
A narrative photo essa y, on the other hand, tells the story of a character (human or not), portraying a place or an event. For example, a narrative photo essay on coffee would document the process from the planting and harvesting – to the roasting and grinding until it reaches your morning cup.
What are some of the key elements of a photo essay?
- Tell a unique story – A unique story doesn’t mean that you have to photograph something that nobody has done before – that would be almost impossible! It means that you should consider what you’re bringing to the table on a particular topic.
- Put yourself into the work – One of the best ways to make a compelling photo essay is by adding your point of view, which can only be done with your life experiences and the way you see the world.
- Add depth to the concept – The best photo essays are the ones that go past the obvious and dig deeper in the story, going behind the scenes, or examining a day in the life of the subject matter – that’s what pulls in the spectator.
- Nail the technique – Even if the concept and the story are the most important part of a photo essay, it won’t have the same success if it’s poorly executed.
- Build a structure – A photo essay is about telling a thought-provoking story – so, think about it in a narrative way. Which images are going to introduce the topic? Which ones represent a climax? How is it going to end – how do you want the viewer to feel after seeing your photo series?
- Make strong choices – If you really want to convey an emotion and a unique point of view, you’re going to need to make some hard decisions. Which light are you using? Which lens? How many images will there be in the series? etc., and most importantly for a great photo essay is the why behind those choices.
9 Tips for Creating a Photo Essay
Credit: Laura James
1. Choose something you know
To make a good photo essay, you don’t need to travel to an exotic location or document a civil war – I mean, it’s great if you can, but you can start close to home.
Depending on the type of photography you do and the topic you’re looking for in your photographic essay, you can photograph a local event or visit an abandoned building outside your town.
It will be much easier for you to find a unique perspective and tell a better story if you’re already familiar with the subject. Also, consider that you might have to return a few times to the same location to get all the photos you need.
2. Follow your passion
Most photo essays take dedication and passion. If you choose a subject that might be easy, but you’re not really into it – the results won’t be as exciting. Taking photos will always be easier and more fun if you’re covering something you’re passionate about.
3. Take your time
A great photo essay is not done in a few hours. You need to put in the time to research it, conceptualizing it, editing, etc. That’s why I previously recommended following your passion because it takes a lot of dedication, and if you’re not passionate about it – it’s difficult to push through.
4. Write a summary or statement
Photo essays are always accompanied by some text. You can do this in the form of an introduction, write captions for each photo or write it as a conclusion. That’s up to you and how you want to present the work.
5. Learn from the masters
Making a photographic essay takes a lot of practice and knowledge. A great way to become a better photographer and improve your storytelling skills is by studying the work of others. You can go to art shows, review books and magazines and look at the winners in photo contests – most of the time, there’s a category for photo series.
6. Get a wide variety of photos
Think about a story – a literary one. It usually tells you where the story is happening, who is the main character, and it gives you a few details to make you engage with it, right?
The same thing happens with a visual story in a photo essay – you can do some wide-angle shots to establish the scenes and some close-ups to show the details. Make a shot list to ensure you cover all the different angles.
Some of your pictures should guide the viewer in, while others are more climatic and regard the experience they are taking out of your photos.
7. Follow a consistent look
Both in style and aesthetics, all the images in your series need to be coherent. You can achieve this in different ways, from the choice of lighting, the mood, the post-processing, etc.
8. Be self-critical
Once you have all the photos, make sure you edit them with a good dose of self-criticism. Not all the pictures that you took belong in the photo essay. Choose only the best ones and make sure they tell the full story.
9. Ask for constructive feedback
Often, when we’re working on a photo essay project for a long time, everything makes perfect sense in our heads. However, someone outside the project might not be getting the idea. It’s important that you get honest and constructive criticism to improve your photography.
How to Create a Photo Essay in 5 Steps
Credit: Quang Nguyen Vinh
1. Choose your topic
This is the first step that you need to take to decide if your photo essay is going to be narrative or thematic. Then, choose what is it going to be about?
Ideally, it should be something that you’re interested in, that you have something to say about it, and it can connect with other people.
2. Research your topic
To tell a good story about something, you need to be familiar with that something. This is especially true when you want to go deeper and make a compelling photo essay. Day in the life photo essays are a popular choice, since often, these can be performed with friends and family, whom you already should know well.
3. Plan your photoshoot
Depending on what you’re photographing, this step can be very different from one project to the next. For a fine art project, you might need to find a location, props, models, a shot list, etc., while a documentary photo essay is about planning the best time to do the photos, what gear to bring with you, finding a local guide, etc.
Every photo essay will need different planning, so before taking pictures, put in the required time to get things right.
4. Experiment
It’s one thing to plan your photo shoot and having a shot list that you have to get, or else the photo essay won’t be complete. It’s another thing to miss out on some amazing photo opportunities that you couldn’t foresee.
So, be prepared but also stay open-minded and experiment with different settings, different perspectives, etc.
5. Make a final selection
Editing your work can be one of the hardest parts of doing a photo essay. Sometimes we can be overly critical, and others, we get attached to bad photos because we put a lot of effort into them or we had a great time doing them.
Try to be as objective as possible, don’t be afraid to ask for opinions and make various revisions before settling down on a final cut.
7 Photo Essay Topics, Ideas & Examples
Credit: Michelle Leman
- Architectural photo essay
Using architecture as your main subject, there are tons of photo essay ideas that you can do. For some inspiration, you can check out the work of Francisco Marin – who was trained as an architect and then turned to photography to “explore a different way to perceive things”.
You can also lookup Luisa Lambri. Amongst her series, you’ll find many photo essay examples in which architecture is the subject she uses to explore the relationship between photography and space.
- Process and transformation photo essay
This is one of the best photo essay topics for beginners because the story tells itself. Pick something that has a beginning and an end, for example, pregnancy, the metamorphosis of a butterfly, the life-cycle of a plant, etc.
Keep in mind that these topics are linear and give you an easy way into the narrative flow – however, it might be difficult to find an interesting perspective and a unique point of view.
- A day in the life of ‘X’ photo essay
There are tons of interesting photo essay ideas in this category – you can follow around a celebrity, a worker, your child, etc. You don’t even have to do it about a human subject – think about doing a photo essay about a day in the life of a racing horse, for example – find something that’s interesting for you.
- Time passing by photo essay
It can be a natural site or a landmark photo essay – whatever is close to you will work best as you’ll need to come back multiple times to capture time passing by. For example, how this place changes throughout the seasons or maybe even over the years.
A fun option if you live with family is to document a birthday party each year, seeing how the subject changes over time. This can be combined with a transformation essay or sorts, documenting the changes in interpersonal relationships over time.
- Travel photo essay
Do you want to make the jump from tourist snapshots into a travel photo essay? Research the place you’re going to be travelling to. Then, choose a topic.
If you’re having trouble with how to do this, check out any travel magazine – National Geographic, for example. They won’t do a generic article about Texas – they do an article about the beach life on the Texas Gulf Coast and another one about the diverse flavors of Texas.
The more specific you get, the deeper you can go with the story.
- Socio-political issues photo essay
This is one of the most popular photo essay examples – it falls under the category of photojournalism or documental photography. They are usually thematic, although it’s also possible to do a narrative one.
Depending on your topic of interest, you can choose topics that involve nature – for example, document the effects of global warming. Another idea is to photograph protests or make an education photo essay.
It doesn’t have to be a big global issue; you can choose something specific to your community – are there too many stray dogs? Make a photo essay about a local animal shelter. The topics are endless.
- Behind the scenes photo essay
A behind-the-scenes always make for a good photo story – people are curious to know what happens and how everything comes together before a show.
Depending on your own interests, this can be a photo essay about a fashion show, a theatre play, a concert, and so on. You’ll probably need to get some permissions, though, not only to shoot but also to showcase or publish those images.
4 Best Photo Essays in Recent times
Now that you know all the techniques about it, it might be helpful to look at some photo essay examples to see how you can put the concept into practice. Here are some famous photo essays from recent times to give you some inspiration.
Habibi by Antonio Faccilongo
This photo essay wan the World Press Photo Story of the Year in 2021. Faccilongo explores a very big conflict from a very specific and intimate point of view – how the Israeli-Palestinian war affects the families.
He chose to use a square format because it allows him to give order to things and eliminate unnecessary elements in his pictures.
With this long-term photo essay, he wanted to highlight the sense of absence and melancholy women and families feel towards their husbands away at war.
The project then became a book edited by Sarah Leen and the graphics of Ramon Pez.
Picture This: New Orleans by Mary Ellen Mark
The last assignment before her passing, Mary Ellen Mark travelled to New Orleans to register the city after a decade after Hurricane Katrina.
The images of the project “bring to life the rebirth and resilience of the people at the heart of this tale”, – says CNNMoney, commissioner of the work.
Each survivor of the hurricane has a story, and Mary Ellen Mark was there to record it. Some of them have heartbreaking stories about everything they had to leave behind.
Others have a story of hope – like Sam and Ben, two eight-year-olds born from frozen embryos kept in a hospital that lost power supply during the hurricane, yet they managed to survive.
Selfie by Cindy Sherman
Cindy Sherman is an American photographer whose work is mainly done through self-portraits. With them, she explores the concept of identity, gender stereotypes, as well as visual and cultural codes.
One of her latest photo essays was a collaboration with W Magazine entitled Selfie. In it, the author explores the concept of planned candid photos (‘plandid’).
The work was made for Instagram, as the platform is well known for the conflict between the ‘real self’ and the one people present online. Sherman started using Facetune, Perfect365 and YouCam to alter her appearance on selfies – in Photoshop, you can modify everything, but these apps were designed specifically to “make things prettier”- she says, and that’s what she wants to explore in this photo essay.
Tokyo Compression by Michael Wolf
Michael Wolf has an interest in the broad-gauge topic Life in Cities. From there, many photo essays have been derived – amongst them – Tokyo Compression .
He was horrified by the way people in Tokyo are forced to move to the suburbs because of the high prices of the city. Therefore, they are required to make long commutes facing 1,5 hours of train to start their 8+ hour workday followed by another 1,5 hours to get back home.
To portray this way of life, he photographed the people inside the train pressed against the windows looking exhausted, angry or simply absent due to this way of life.
You can visit his website to see other photo essays that revolve around the topic of life in megacities.
Final Words
It’s not easy to make photo essays, so don’t expect to be great at it right from your first project.
Start off small by choosing a specific subject that’s interesting to you – that will come from an honest place, and it will be a great practice for some bigger projects along the line.
Whether you like to shoot still life or you’re a travel photographer, I hope these photo essay tips and photo essay examples can help you get started and grow in your photography.
Let us know which topics you are working on right now – we’ll love to hear from you!
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Ana Mireles is a Mexican researcher that specializes in photography and communications for the arts and culture sector.
Penelope G. To Ana Mireles Such a well written and helpful article for an writer who wants to inclue photo essay in her memoir. Thank you. I will get to work on this new skill. Penelope G.
Herman Krieger Photo essays in black and white
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