Urban Exploration Photography: A guide to creating and editing images of abandoned places

Three. What to Shoot

Now that we’ve covered how to compose and shoot your photos, let’s chat about what to put in those photos. Urban exploration is a unique genre because it involves static scenes that, as a photographer, you have to make interesting. You’re not shooting amazing landscapes like the Golden Gate Bridge at sunset, where the scene speaks for itself.

Your job is to capture beauty in unforgiving photographic circumstances. My experience with UrbEx has taught me that combinations of organic and synthetic elements create our scenes. It’s up to you to decide how to capture these elements.

This mysterious hatch was shot in the early ...