The Leica M Photographer

6. Making Mistakes

The Benefits and Drawbacks of Rules

Do textbooks and rules make sense in a photographic context? If you want to do arithmetic accurately, you have to stick to the rules. If you want to take great photos, you have to know the rules too, but you can ignore them if you want. Many photography textbooks aim to help us avoid making common mistakes and talk about the “right” composition, “correct” exposure and “ideal” shutter speeds.

I think terms like “right” and “wrong” simply don’t apply when it comes to taking photos. Photography is a creative pursuit. Anyone involved in creating photographs for anything other than purely documentary purposes doesn’t need to enslave themselves to rules and should instead concentrate on packing ...