I find the difference between a good photograph and a great photograph stands on a very fine line. I have spent a lifetime being around photographers and studying photographs. Often the making of a great photograph comes by pure accident. Many well known photographers, artists, musicians and even writers will admit that their greatest work came by some unforeseen accident.

I had a friend who was in the middle of a shoot when they were studying the models and trying to decide which shot they wanted to set up next, when they took a miss step and knocked over the tripod, upon development of the film there was the perfect photograph; a triple exposure of their models. This accident created for them an award winning cover photo.

As photographers we can easily become obsessed with details but if we allow ourselves to randomly shoot images, thinking less about perfect settings, conditions, lighting, etc; we may be amazed to find that our photographs move from the sublime to the extraordinary. Inside this newly created freedom that we are allowing ourselves the stories we are trying to tell will also have a much more personal feel to them. Margret Burke White is the best example of a great photographer who was able to be unrestrained in her work and as we can see in her effort there is not only a story being told but a very personal one. Her photos of Gandhi are some of the most revealing of this great man and of his quiet soul.

Another important aspect to great photography is what seems to be the obvious but in actuality it isn’t as obvious as it seems. This aspect is known as perspective. In the movie Dead Poets Society the boys were encouraged to stand up on the desk in an effort to gain a different perspective. This same concept holds true for photography as well. If we look at our subject from a different perspective than our originally intended perspective we again open our photo up to endless possibilities. Sylvia Plachy demonstrated this with her photo of Don King. This was a photo inspired by a different perspective; she was in a room with Don King and some other photographers as she waited for her turn to photograph him she simply walked behind him and there was a new perspective presented to her and her photo of Don King was taken from behind creating an amazing and much more creative photograph.

I guess the answer here is three components are necessary to move from a good photograph to a great one accidents, freedom, and perspective. Remember, let the photograph come to you whenever you can and see what story your frame wants to tell.

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