PRO GUIDE TO CITYSCAPES

Discover how to capture incredible images of urban vistas with essential advice from the masters

Cities represent some of the most energetic, exciting, dynamic and varied environments for photography. When captured well, cityscapes have a unique ability to hold our attention and spark an insatiable wanderlust. Whether it’s brightly coloured buildings, stunning architectural feats, mesmerising neon signage, or the motion of traffic and the people who inhabit the city, urban images possess so much potential subject matter that it can be difficult to know where to begin.

It’s this array of possibilities that forms the greatest challenge for the cityscape photographer. It’s the job of image-makers to find the perfect subject in a chaotic world, reducing a scene down to its fundamental elements, and constructing a narrative from those that remain. In a busy location it can be somewhat overwhelming, with hundreds of potential frames surrounding you in continuous flux, and for beginners this is where most of the mistakes are made; their images will often contain too much information, with no real substance or focal point.

In order to capture your best shots you have to be able to simultaneously identify the dominant colour balance, exposure challenges and ideal framing approach. We spoke to two of the leading photographers in the industry to put together this guide to creative thinking in the cityscape arena. Ultra popular online photographic educator Serge Ramelli and cityscape expert Anton Alymov team up to take you on a shoot, and provide insider advice.

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