Uncovering my Strengths to Build a Brand in Photography

Do I need to have a recognisable style to be taken seriously as a photographer? This is a question I have pondered and struggled with for a long time. Should I focus on building a brand and a style that is widely recognisable or should I give in to my natural instincts to dabble in a little bit of everything? Many of the professional photographers who have inspired me are known for their work in a specific genre such as nature and landscape or portraiture.

Putting my thoughts down on paper has helped me understand that my brand in photography is not necessarily a particular genre but rather my love for story-telling. The process that led me to this realization is interesting, and I'd like to share it with you.

Curating your images for a competition is a daunting process but one which forces you to examine your images with a critical eye. I ask myself, in a world where we are drowning in images, have I captured or created something that will help me stand out from the crowd?

Entering competitions are definitely one way to find out if your work stacks up with the best and is current. If you are developing a brand, and you do well, it is also one way to promote your work.

The Australian Photography Magazine runs a competition each year to determine the best amateur photographers in the Australasia region. The magazine says the Australian Photographer of the Year Competition (APOTY) is the largest of its kind in this region. This year there were more than 2,800 entries from around Australia and New Zealand. It is a competition that challenges photographers in the major categories—Aerial, Animal, Landscape, People,  Black & White and Travel—to share 4 images that work together cohesively. In addition to the portfolio challenges, there are also two single image categories in Creative and Single Shot.

This year, I decided to enter four different genres, Creative & People, as well as the ones I usually enter, Landscape and Aerials.

I love the story-telling aspect of the portfolio challenge. Choosing four images that work together cohesively to convey a narrative resonates with my style of photography. I consider myself a documentary photographer who is drawn to story-telling, not just with the images I am sharing but the stories I am writing about them.

It is easier to tell a story with four images than with one, so perhaps that is why this competition appeals to me. When constructing a portfolio, I start with about double the amount of images required and play with different sequences till I find the ones that together convey a greater narrative than they do individually. It is important that the set of four have a flow, with a beginning, a middle and an end.

My photography journey has evolved since I learnt how to use my camera in manual settings fourteen years ago. In 2010, while on a sabbatical from my day job, I volunteered in a Conservation and Photography project in South Africa. There I learnt that the first aspect to creativity came from mastering the technical, which appealed to my left brain. My creative journey began as I learnt the rules then had the courage to know when to break them.

When someone asks me what I photograph, aerials are what I speak about first. But portraiture was my first love. I loved sitting down with the ladies in the markets in South Africa and chatting to them. When I felt they were at ease, I would take out my camera and start shooting. Building connections like this came naturally to me and knowing the story behind the face added an extra element to my images.

I find that there is a lot of overlap between the skills in each genre and learning the different settings can only advance your ability as a photographer. But you may find that some genres speak to you more than others. When this is the case, don’t fret about letting some genres go.

As I start to unwrap what my photography is about, I realise that there is one element that connects everything I do. It is the desire to convey connection. Connection to the land that is now being impacted by climate change. Connection to the people who have just shared their stories with me. Connection to the natural environment both its flora and fauna with whom we share a common home.

Good images evoke emotion. They have strong narrative. I have always called myself a documentary photographer. I am beginning to understand why. My brand if I were to have one is that of being a story-teller. Conveying story through my images has always been paramount to my image making.

After four years of entering this competition I had the most success this year, achieving a Runner-up result in the People category. I also achieved a result of Top 10 in Aerial, Top 20 in Creative and a Highly Commended in Landscape. I could not be more pleased.

But how did I come to choose these images?

At a time when everyone is suspicious of a person with a camera, taking images of people in public places isn’t as easy as it used to be in big cities like Sydney. So I was grateful that this year I had the opportunity to engage in a skill swap at Callubri Station—a sheep station in Western NSW, Australia. The station is run by Mike Armstrong—a fourth generation farmer— and his wife Angie. The deal was that I would document the shearing activities through my images and stories about life on the farm and in exchange I would be granted access to the shearing shed, the amenities on site and have access to camp on their property in our motorhome.

It was an absolute privilege to get an insight into life on a farm and to be granted permission to photograph the shearing this winter. I spent my time building connections with the shearers, listening to their stories and appreciating their nomadic way of life. I noticed an easy camaraderie and a wonderful working relationship between the team and I wanted to capture those emotions.   

To be awarded the Runner Up prize is absolute honour in such a highly contested competition. It is also a testament to how having the time and freedom to respectfully mingle and build relationships in a busy work environment helps you capture authentic images of the Australian Outback.

The judges comment that “Nilmini De Silva has done a beautiful job of capturing some of the characters who work in these sheds and the close-up personal nature of these photos helps us learn a little about these characters and the work they do”, was a wonderful reward and I could not be more grateful. Some of the comments I got from my social media posts was about the fact that this was a wonderful story-telling set of images.

All the images in this series were captured with my Canon EOS R6 and my RF 24-105mm lens and my RF 70-200mm lens. Turning the images into monochrome was another element of removing distractions and highlighting the emotions and story. It was also part of using a consistent editing process. The four images show different aspects of a day in the life of a shearer, from the shearing, to the cleaning of the blades, the break referred to as a’smoko’ and one of the men posing with the final product, a bale of wool. Four images that tell a story with a beginning, a middle and an end.

But if portraiture was my first love, then aerials are my life partner! The composition and content of these images are closely tied to what comes naturally to me—’Symmetry’ and ‘Water in the Landscape’ even if abstract imagery were a foreign concept to me for most of my life. Aerial abstracts utilise the design elements of colour, texture, tone and form as part of its narrative. But there is another aspect called ‘pareidolia’ that I only learnt about when I became an aerial photographer. Pareidolia is our perception of a meaningful pattern where none exists. One of the images used in this series has a clearly discernible face. There is also consistency in the colours and tones which speak to the parched and dry nature of the Australian Outback. There is also consistency in how they were shot using my DJI Mini3 Pro drone.

It is fairly recently that I fell in love with drone photography. I learnt to use a drone in-between Covid lockdowns in Sydney. After trying my hand at capturing some abstract images at a salt lake in Victoria, I was hooked.

The story I am trying to convey in this set of images is that of resilience and the struggle to survive in a harsh land. This landscape has been shaped by wind, water and rain with the salt, algae and various minerals contributing to the colours. I love the colours of the Australian landscape and am inspired by how indigenous Australians depicted it in their  paintings. Their art was earthy and often used the various hues of yellow, red and black. As I travel this continent in search of aerial abstract patterns, this is what I am drawn to capture in my own work.

Connection to Country for the Aboriginal people meant an intimate knowledge of the landscape, which helped them traverse the songlines that connected waterholes. These particular images were captured at a lesser known clay pan in Victoria while on an artist residency earlier this year. Indigenous Australians often shared such waterholes with the animals that came here to drink. Sometimes, these animals were also hunted for dinner. If you look closely at these images, you will also notice the animal footprints. The Australian Aborigines treated waterholes as sacred and understood that water was life for the survival of all the species that depended on it.

A social media follower recently said “I adore your Aerial entries. They have such a spiritual connection with the landscape.” I was very grateful that she saw my intent. 

There are some genres that we decide early in our journey are not for us. For me the genre of ‘Creative’ was one of them. I have not gone out of my way to construct creative images. They always seemed to start with having a concept or an idea that you constructed by compositing elements of images together to form a cohesive image. It is definitely full of story-telling elements yet that kind of photography just didn’t come naturally to me.

Earlier this year, one of the set subjects at our camera club annual photo rally was movement. The photo rally is a special annual month-long competition with trophies that honour two of the club’s original founders, both now deceased. The topics for the rally are put together by a member of the committee and only divulged on the day the shoot commences with the destination being announced the night before! We start the competition with a social day, where we all go out shooting together. We are restricted to a specific area but the chance to go back during the month gave me time to experiment. During our day out, we had practised panning but I wasn’t happy with what I created. So I went back to one place that i know is always buzzing at the weekend.

People come from all over the city to hang out and shop at the Carriageway Markets in the heart of Sydney. It is a historic building, full of atmosphere and a hint of stories from the past, when carriages for Sydney's expanding rail network were built and maintained here. I went to the markets in Sydney with the couscous intent of creating a story about the chaos of being here on a weekend. I knew that I could only do that by taking several images of the thronging crowd and blending them to create an image of multiple scenes.

It isn’t usual for me to have a concept in my head before I went out to shoot but this time I knew exactly what I wanted to create for the set subject of ‘movement’. The image was partly constructed in camera (using the multiple exposure feature) and partly in photoshop. When you use the multiple exposure function in the Canon R6, you get both a blended multiple exposure image as well as the independent images that were used to create the blend. I used all of these images to create a second blend in photoshop, bringing them as layers and combining them at different values of opacity. I chose one of the images to mask in the figure of a woman who stood out bravely in the chaos of the movement in the market.

I used the colour balance adjustment layer to add another layer of story telling, creating some separation between the cooler shadows and warm highlights. I was extremely pleased with the final image that resulted in this creative process of crafting an image.

Buoyed by the fact this image won one of the trophies at the club photo rally, I entered it in the APOTY competition mostly to see how it stacked up with the best. Creative image making is quite new to me, so to finish in the Top 20 at number 14 is something I am immensely proud of.

The Landscape genre is very popular in Australia as it is around the world. Doing well in this genre is difficult. Along with portraiture, it is one of the first genres photographers learn. Many fall in love with it and become specialist landscape photographers. Of all the genres of photography, Landscape is perhaps the most laid back. You stand there, with your settings ready and your camera on the tripod, waiting for that perfect moment when the light and the sky changes colour. If your settings are not working out, there is often time to fine tune them. I am proud of these images and happy with the result in a field that is highly competitive.

Landscape photography also resonates well with the other passions I share with my partner—travel and discovery. Long road trips in our motorhome where we camp at beautiful remote locations is something we do for both work and play. One such location was Pamamaroo Lake, in Western NSW where these images were taken from before the sun set to long after the stars had started to shine showcasing how this ecosystem shuts down for the night.

Story-telling in landscape photography is often enhanced by the colour of the light, by storm clouds and by features such as mist and fog. I have used long exposure techniques here to convey the story of tranquility. The series titled ‘Pamamaroo Peace’ it is also about what photography has contributed to my life and what I wish for the planet we share as we stand on the cusp of a New Year dawning.

Putting my thoughts down on paper has helped me understand that my brand in photography is not necessarily a particular genre but rather my love for story-telling. I truly am a documentary photographer, constantly learning new stories, about people, the land and the wildlife that inhabit it. I am always looking for new perspectives that reflects my approach to life which is about pushing the boundaries of my comfort zone as I evolve and grow as an artist. At the end of each year, my reflections are always about what I might learn and try in the year that awaits me.

If you have read ‘Outliers’ you are familiar with Malcolm Gladwell’s 10,000 hour theory, which states that the key to achieving true expertise in any skill is simply a matter of practicing. But this theory has been debunked by many who claim that it isn’t repetition, but deliberate, dedicated time spent focusing on improvement that helps you excel.

I believe this to be true. 

Pushing the boundaries is certainly how I have evolved as a creative. Understanding my gear and the software that is needed to process the digital imagery have both helped enormously in the on-going quest to perfecting my craft.

One of my favourite authors Paulo Coelho is reputed to have said that to realise one’s destiny is a person’s only real obligation. He has also said that when you want something badly, the Universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.

So, on reflection I would say, dance outside your comfort zone. Be brave. Take a few risks. Try a genre of photography that is outside your box. You never know where it might take you and you might even win a few accolades along the way and discover your brand!