Experiencing Salisbury Cathedral with your photos

Top Tips

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• 1. Slow down

  Try walking around the Cathedral without taking any snaps and then sit down for a short while and allow yourself to remember what really drew your attention and stood out for you. Then go back to those places and take your photos. The chances are that, by slowing down your picture-taking, you will have noticed things you wouldn’t otherwise have seen. As Thomas Merton, a great spiritual writer, once put it: ‘Stop looking, and begin seeing’.

• 2. Use reflections

  Try taking another look at the reflections in the font, from different angles and with your smartphone higher or lower (but not too near the water!). ‘Reflection’ is an intriguing word – it literally means ‘to bend back’, not just light but also your thinking, when you choose to look back and weigh up what you’ve achieved or missed, and the people and things that have influenced you. Maybe you’d like to do some of that kind of reflection in the Cathedral or when you review your pictures?

• 3. Use framing

  Try consciously composing some of your photos with elements at the edges that will help frame your subject and draw your viewers’ attention. For instance, photos looking through an arch out in the cloisters or taken through the vast gothic arches inside the Cathedral or framed by two pillars can be very effective – providing viewers can see at least part of what’s enclosing the image. The arches in the Cloisters can also be a great place to take photos of people or pets you have come with, especially if they sit or stand at an angle so there is enough light falling on their face.

• 4. Notice anything missing

  Try paying special attention to what you can see on your smartphone screen (or ordinary camera viewfinder). Are you cutting off something that should be in the picture? It’s true that the Cathedral is too vast to include in one picture, so what are you choosing to include and exclude? Do you want people in your picture, for instance, to give a sense of scale, or do you just want uninterrupted views of the architecture? Only press the shutter release when you’re happy with what’s in the frame. By the way, if you spend a lot of time looking at social media on your smartphone, it might be worth asking yourself what and who is excluded from that frame – and what might offer a fuller, truer picture.

• 5. Look up… look down

  Try pointing your smartphone upwards or downwards, rather than straight ahead. Capture some of the beauty of the Cathedral above you, such as the ceiling at the ‘Crossing’ or the Chapter House ceiling. Or capture what’s at your feet, such as the geometric tiles in the Chapter House or light projected from the windows (at certain times of day). What new things do you notice when you purposely look up or down? How might your gaze be expanded in other ways today – could the Cathedral lift your spirits, raise your aspirations and deepen your experience in some way? Could your picture-taking put you more in touch with a fuller, richer and more worthwhile spiritual side to your life?

• 6. Stay in the moment

  Try simply immersing yourself in taking pictures. Don’t worry about the time or anything else on your mind. Just focus on enjoying finding pictures. You don’t need to take brilliant photos, just pictures that will help you replay the moment later or share where you’ve been with others. Photography is a great way of immersing yourself in the present moment and letting the past and future take care of themselves. That’s why it can be so good for people’s mental health.

• 7. Rotate your screen

  Try turning your smartphone 90 degrees from the way you normally take photos. If you usually take vertical pictures, try ‘landscape’ orientation ↔️. This will, for instance, affect pictures you take looking centrally down the length of the cathedral and tend to accentuate its symmetry – that can offer a sense of stability and harmony to your photo. By contrast, if you usually hold your smartphone horizontally to take pictures, try turning it vertically ↕️. That will accentuate the height of the Cathedral and offer a sense of transcendence, strength and awesomeness in your photo.

• 8. Take a long view

  Try deliberately photographing long views along the centre of the Cathedral or side aisles. Notice how small the other end of the Cathedral looks and how straight horizontal lines in the Cathedral architecture appear to converge and give a strong sense of perspective. When you review your picture later, you’ll be able to notice people and things in the far distance, middle distance and nearby. Maybe you have things on your mind at the moment that are worrying you. Your picture could help you find a sense of perspective. Try imagining leaving your worries at different places – the urgent, most pressing ones nearby and the less urgent, least pressing ones further away. That could help your worries feel less overwhelming and help put them in perspective.

• 9. Celebrate Symmetry

  Try looking for some pictures that are symmetrical, with the right hand side mirroring the left hand side. If you are photographing the length of the Cathedral, the trick is to make sure you’re dead centre and then your smartphone will pick up the beautiful symmetry. Another place to explore symmetry is the Cloisters – try standing at precisely one of the corners, looking at the lines of arches receding to left and right. Symmetrical pictures can be especially calming and people often associate symmetry with beauty. We’re hoping you’re finding the cathedral beautiful, though there is also another deeper form of beauty represented here: that of lives well-lived and persistent self-giving, especially by Jesus on the Cross.

• 10. Tell the story

  Try photographing some memorial plaques on the wall of the Cathedral, some effigies and tombs, and some stained glass windows. You may be able to discover some of the stories associated with the memorials and the biblical stories told in the stained glass. Try to capture some of the most compelling stories. You might also like to think about your own life story: how might this be represented in your photos? Who are the people, for instance, who matter most to you and appear in your photos? What do you most take photos of? Does this give a clue about what is most important to you? Might you want to change the story of your life in some way in future? If so, what photo would best picture this?

• 11. Appreciate the finer details

  Try focusing in on smaller details in the Cathedral, as well as the majestic sweep of the architecture. Home in on some of the finer details, such as the frieze in the Chapter House or the statuary outside on the West Front or the texture of textiles or stone. It’s easy to overlook the smaller details, unless you consciously slow down and let your gaze linger. Enjoy finding the little details that others may not be noticing. Though try not to lose sight of the bigger picture – photographing the Cathedral as a whole! Sometimes people get fixated by little things in their lives and lose sight of the big picture. Balance between noticing the small and the large in your photography might potentially be a useful carry-over for your life in general.

• 12. See in a different light

  Try returning to the Cathedral on another day, time of day, or time of year, if you have the chance – to see how different it looks as the light changes during the seasons or in the course of a single day. The word, photography, literally means ‘drawing with light’, but photos have only been around for fewer than two hundred years of the Cathedral’s long history. Unlike, say, your great-great-great-grandparents, you have the chance to record single moments on your smartphone or conventional camera, and capture the Cathedral in maybe a wonderful, unique, unrepeatable light. But that might be for another day! Today it might be worth just taking time to look at yourself in another light, especially if, for any reason, you’ve surrounded yourself with negativity. The Cathedral is here because of the belief that Jesus is the Light of the World, who loves every human being totally and unconditionally. Exploring that truth could put everything in a much more positive light.

• 13. Get some distance

  Try walking further away from the Cathedral if you are taking exterior shots. Smartphones often have very wide angle lenses that tend to distort large buildings. If you are having to point your device upwards to include everything in the picture, you could end up with an unnatural looking Cathedral with extremely convergent vertical lines. The further back you are, the better will be your picture. But if you simply can’t get any further back from, say, the West Front, you might like to consider afterwards putting a free app on your smartphone, called Snapseed, and then adjusting the picture using the ‘Perspective’ tool to look more natural.