The power of great photography

Visual media, such as photography, video and animation, are digital alternatives to experiencing life and new interactions elsewhere. Using photography in web design is not a simple case of prettying up your interface, It's your way of narrating your story, supplementing unique selling points and providing an emotional experience your visitors will never forget.

Our experience's and emotional responses are largely defined by our sense of sight and how we interpret what we see, especially when using the web. What we take in visually results in a reaction and ultimately an action!

Visual media, such as photography, video and animation, are digital alternatives to experiencing life and new interactions elsewhere. Using photography in web design is not a simple case of prettying up your interface, It's your way of narrating your story, supplementing unique selling points and providing an emotional experience your visitors will never forget.

We should not forget the scientific fact that our brain processes images 60,000 times faster than reading text.


Substance
There is the old saying that "A picture paints a thousand words", that’s great but if you choose the wrong image you could be saying the wrong thing! The photography needs to be relevant to It's context; if you are a restaurant owner, logically you would want to use photography of food and surrounding premises to entice customers.

If you are selling services rather than physical products you can be more abstract with the photography, using strong symbolism that ties in with your offering.


Quality
The difference between booking a professional photography session vs your mate and their Sony cyber-shot are worlds apart in terms of quality. Hiring a professional photographer will not only get you great looking imagery but they will help you organise the shoot and give advice on how to get the best shot. If your budget simply wont stretch then you need to decide if a photographic route is really the way to go?


Stock Photography
The other route you can take is to visit stock photography websites but proceed with caution! Stock websites have been around for years and mostly all offer the same or similar images as each other; these images are rarely great to look at. Stock sites have primarily focused on quantity over quality.

Avoid people looking directly into the camera, whilst smiling like a sycophant because they love their job so much! These images will do nothing for your image. There are a few sites that are spending the time and money to get quality photography in their portfolios, Stocksy which was founded by Bruce Livingstone, a Canadian artist and entreprenur whio founded iStockphoto, is doing just that.


Draw attention
Well thought out imagery can also highlight content you want visitors to focus their time on, as well as help them identify which content is relevant to their needs; remember that everyone skims blocks of text for keywords so supporting imagery that can do that job for them will always be an advantage. You can use imagery to set the mood of a page or post on, as well as break up a page layout with a lot of text.


Impact
Over all, your end goal with any visual media is to envoke an emotional response so don’t settle for anything less than a great photo that looks and feels organic.