Shoot with options in mind
Take 3 or 4 photos of the same thing so you can have a square crop for Instagram, a long thin shot for Pinterest, a landscape aspect for your featured image and maybe something with negative space for text overlay.
Plan your photos around your editorial calendar
You’ve got an idea of your next 3-6 months’ blog posts, right? So you know what kind of photos you’ll be needing. Batch your photos ahead of time so you are not scrabbling around on publication day trying to find a good featured image. Don’t let your blog rule your life though – remember to have some days when you are just taking photos, for yourself, not your blog or for Instagram.
Your personal stock portfolio
You are always on lookout for general photos that can be used for featured images, or overlaid with quotes for Instagram. You keyword these photos or save them to a separate folder so you can find them when you need them
Optimise your images
You know the pixel width of your blog, and the best dimensions for all your social media channels. You know how to resize your photos to these dimensions. You always rename your images from the numbers title that comes out of your camera to something meaningful, like “paris-eiffel-tower-1.jpg”. You add an SEO optimised alt-tag to your image when you include it in a blog post.
Camera housekeeping
Your battery is always recharged after a day’s shooting. Your memory cards always emptied, backed up and formatted so they are ready to use. Your camera reset after use – exposure compensation put back to zero, manual focus put back to auto focus, settings left on preferred mode (aperture priority/manual/shutter priority/program).
Digital workflow
Your digital workflow is sorted, including backups. You import your images into organised folders, and add copyright information and keywords at this stage. You immediately edit your shoot for keepers (deleting photos you’ll never use), and then edit for processing when you have time (exposure, contrast, saturation, crop). You always backup to 2 places including one offsite.
Free downloads
All those freebies you have downloaded (stock photos from Death to Stock or Unsplash, design elements giveaways and eBooks that will change your life) – you save them to folders where you will be able to find them when you want them.
No spam. Just a photography lesson by email every Thursday.
While you're waiting for your first lesson (it will come on Thursday, look out for it), why not have a go at my 30 Day Photo Challenge (with a twist)?