Sep 03, 2025

Stepping Into September: Photography Tips & Inspiration

September is a fantastic month to get outside with your camera. The air turns a little crisper, the light shifts, and the landscapes begin their slow, colourful tilt towards autumn. It’s also the perfect time to explore a few new creative themes – so here are this month’s ideas…

Focus of the Month: Lanes, Ginnels & Alleyways

1/1000 f8 ISO 400

I’ll be honest, I’d never heard the word ginnel until moving to Yorkshire nearly 15 years ago. It sounds far more charming than “alleyway”, I think?

Whether it’s a winding passage linking independent shops and historic pubs in York, or an overgrown cut-through that doubles as a wildlife highway, ginnels are a gift for photographers. Their strong leading lines pull the viewer’s eye straight into the frame. Making brilliant backdrops for portraits, street scenes, or even an impromptu wildlife shoot.

Look closely and the stories begin to reveal themselves: flowers spilling from back gardens, a kitchen worker sneaking out for a quick break, or, in my case, a sparrowhawk taking down a pigeon one year — a year later that same passageway produced an active wasps’ nest which I couldn’t resist photographing (via a remote shutter). These spaces are stage sets waiting for a story.

Come September, I always make a point of visiting our local ginnels. The ivy-clad fences, nettles, and garden overspill create sheltered tunnels that attract the last of the season’s winged insects searching for the rapidly diminishing nectar supplies. It’s not just people who enjoy shortcuts!

Needless to say, only explore the passageways you feel safe and confident in. It might be a ginnel, a driveway, or even just the gap between two houses — anywhere that offers a frame within a frame and a story to tell.

Creature of the Month: Dragonflies

1/3200 f5.6 ISO 2000

The ultimate hunter, dragonfly larvae can spend up to 5 years terrorising creatures below the surface of your local pond. Their comparatively short life in the air is no less dramatic and September is prime time for dragonflies. They’re fast, mesmerising, and sometimes frustrating to photograph, but when you nail the shot it's extremely satisfying!

Beginner tip: Find a sunny pond or slow-moving river (but search the nearby hedges and grasses too). Dragonflies often return to the same perch, so patience is your friend – Dragonflies also take some time warm up, so mornings offer easier opportunities, if you can locate their roost the evening before, even better!

For more experienced photographers: Try capturing them in flight. Use a fast shutter speed (1/2000s - 1/4000) with the fastest burst possible. Try pre-focussing on an area they keep circling and fire in short bursts. It’s tricky, but super rewarding when you freeze those shimmering wings mid-hover.

Photography Tip of the Month: Back Lighting

1/000 f6.3 ISO 160

As September rolls in, the sun sits lower in the sky, making it a great time to experiment with back lighting. People, wildlife or objects, position your subject between you and the sun, and you’ll create glowing outlines, soft halos, and dreamy atmosphere.

Try this with portraits, leaves, or even cobwebs glistening with dew and experiment with the exposure (brighter or darker) for different effects.

Inspiration of the Month: Lee Miller

This month’s inspiration comes from Lee Miller – a fearless photographer who moved effortlessly from high fashion to the front lines of World War II. Miller’s work is bold, brave, and uncompromising, yet full of humanity. Miller had an eye for the unexpected, and September is the perfect month to channel some of that curiosity.

In addition to delving into the fascinating Lee Miller Archives, two recent films 'Lee' and the fictional film 'Civil War' both pay homage to Miller albeit in different ways, style and tone but equally compelling.

Walk of the month: Astro Photography

Review of the Month

"I bought my first camera and was a little bit reluctant to book on because I thought youtube and books could teach you everything. I'm eager to learn, though, so I booked onto a 1:1 and I can honestly say I'm so glad I did. There's things that nothing a youtube video or book can teach you over actual experience. It had only been a week but I knew a bit but Rich adapted the lesson to suit. I was given feedback on photos in the lesson and what I'd already taken. Techniques I wasn't aware of were shown to me. I came out of the lesson feeling more confident and felt more ready to explore the world of photography. Highly recommend the 1:1 lesson." - S M - Google Review.