The boom in photography has no doubt followed the trends of the rise in social media platforms, and to stand out on what’s now become a very saturated way of delivering your message, you have to up your game so to speak, especially from those who’s jobs it is to be the faces of the various angling brands and keeping up with the ever-changing trends.

In angling, one of the most commonly asked question is ‘how do I get sponsored, what do I need to do to be on the team’ etc. First and foremost is always the catching element of your fishing, as well as your image on social media in terms of how you conduct yourself. The next thing in the modern scene is your photography and social media following (as much as it pains a lot of anglers to admit) Capture shots can make a good carp, a great one, and can put venues and fish on a lot of anglers’ radars when incredible shots are taken, and the exposure it gains through social media.

In terms of taking your photography to the next level, you have to put the effort into it to get the rewards back. Over the years, I’ve taken thousands of photos for both other anglers and general shots in angling situations and I’ve only got to this job role by taking a boatload of shots!

YouTube is a hub for information and learning, and over time I have taught myself everything I know to this day with photography. I was the guy who’d be scrolling and watching tutorials to soak up every snippet of info you can find on evenings, just so I could learn new techniques and achieve the look I desired. Some may not be as useful as others, but there’s always information to help whatever your subject may be, no matter how specific it is! One thing that really is important though is putting in the time and effort to practice, just like anything in life! The more you focus on what you want to achieve, along with putting in the effort and willingness to learn, the more you’ll get back from it and improve. It’s also a very rewarding hobby to have alongside angling, especially if you can take some lovely shots for your friends and fellow anglers on the lake. The buzz that you get from seeing their reaction to some high-quality shots is just as rewarding as being in the captors’ shoes for me, and over time the more I’ve had the pleasure of photographing fish for others and getting ‘the call’, the feeling never fades.

"The more you focus on what you want to achieve, along with putting in the effort and willingness to learn, the more you’ll get back from it and improve."

Without diving too deep into the past, many anglers who were once at the forefront of angling over the past decade or so have vanished to some extent in many people’s eyes, and that’s because the trends and boom in high quality imagery and video has surpassed their era, making them fall behind and almost get lost in this instant, high quality image which Instagram had bred since its creation. I was listening to a recent podcast where the very talented and knowledgeable Rich Stewart referenced how Jimmy Armstrong’s roll in media was almost the first of its kind in the industry all those years ago, and now you look at the larger companies in this day and age within angling, and you have teams of staff documenting and capturing the moments of their anglers within both video and photo format to be used mainly on social media. So much emphasis has been focused on imagery, and a great shot can paint a very clear story of what the person wants to portray.

Last but by no means least though, you have to enjoy it. If you’re wanting to take it up to further yourself just to eye up future sponsorships, you’re in it for the wrong reasons. Photography is an art form; the enjoyment is endless and it’s purely down to the organic being (yourself) to make the shots happen. No matter how expensive your camera/lenses are, it’ll always be about your composition and looking at what you want to capture from the moment. With so many incredible photographers now working in the industry, you have to be different to stand out and push the boundaries. I’ll always be very critical of myself as no photo is perfect, there’s always some sort of improvement that can be made from all shots, despite many looking at them thinking they’re great, and that keeps me motivated with each opportunity arises as at the end of the day, you only get one crack of the whip to capture the moment.