An important part of becoming a better photographer is critiquing our own work. Lets be honest no one wants to see 1000 + photos of your holiday or photoshoot or even 100 of them even if you are an exceptional photographer. Here are a few tips I have learned along the way that have helped me in making a better photo selection.

First things first, go through and do a quick elimination process of ones that are not in focus, least favourite duplicates and ones with obvious problems.  After that you will start looking more carefully at each picture with the following points in mind

• Don’t pick the picture based on an emotional attachment you have with the situation but rather the emotional impact it gives
• Watch out for distractions that you might not have seen when you took the photo.  This can include things in the foreground or back ground, colours or clutter
• Make sure the most important part is in focus – if your subject is people the eyes should be in focus, is the depth of field right for the image
• Pick the best one, not lots of similar ones of the same subject
• Is it telling the story that you want it to and does that add to the rest of your selection
• Keep in mind who the selection is for and choose accordingly – are you showing a client, friends and family or entering a competition.  If you choosing for family you might be more interested in the story it tells than the standard of the photo.

Just remember refining the photos you share doesn’t mean you have to delete the other ones, but just that you are being more selective in the ones that you share.

After you have gone through this process you should find that you have a manageable group of photos to go through and pick from for what ever medium you will use for your final presentation of your photos.

As the old adage goes focus on “quality not quantity”

Here is a screenshot of some photos I took in Syria.  I had hundreds of photos from my trip but at the end of the day I chose just 5 or so as the main ones I show to people.