Day 03: The Beauty of Paying Attention
Day 3 of Project.30 came with a simple prompt: share your favorite photography tip.
Not aperture. Not ISO. Not camera brand.
Emotion.
For me, photography begins with understanding the subject. If you’ve ever shot with me, you know I ask questions that have nothing to do with the lens. I’ll ask what makes you laugh. What makes you smile. I might even bring up your ex, not for drama, but for data.
Because I’m not looking for a performance. I’m looking for a reaction.
There’s a visible difference between “pretend you’re laughing” and someone actually remembering something ridiculous. The first gives you symmetry. The second gives you life. One is technically correct. The other is true.
Psychology backs this up. Research by Paul Ekman on microexpressions shows that genuine emotions activate subtle, involuntary facial muscles that are extremely difficult to fake. A real smile, the Duchenne smile, engages muscles around the eyes, not just the mouth. Audiences may not consciously analyze this, but they feel it. Authenticity registers at a visceral level before cognition even catches up.
So instead of instructing someone to “look natural,” I understand what triggers their natural state. That’s the difference between directing and observing. One imposes. The other reveals.
If I’m shooting and I want a genuine frown, I’ll ask, “Hey, do you still talk to so and so?” And you’ll give me that look. That exact look. Not performed. Not rehearsed. Just real. Or maybe it’s simpler than that. A smirk. A raised eyebrow. There are things you can mention and a person will react instinctively, and if you’re paying attention, you catch it. That’s the moment. That’s the frame.
You can tell when it’s pretence. Fellow photographers, video people, you know. You can see it in the eyes, in the tension around the mouth, in the posture. Genuine emotion has weight. Manufactured emotion has hesitation.
So be genuine with your people. But also, understand that this principle doesn’t stop with humans.
Even if your subject isn’t a person, attention still matters.
My favorite photographer for street work is Badru Katumba. When you see his frames, you wonder, was this guy waiting for the moment? Did he predict that a boda rider was about to lean into that shaft of light, that a pedestrian was about to pause at exactly the right angle, that chaos was about to resolve into geometry?
That’s not luck. That’s presence.
I think it’s because he’s present. He’s paid attention to his craft, to his subject, which is the streets. He knows he can watch a scene and sense when something is about to happen. A boda is about to slide. A gesture is about to break through the frame. And he doesn’t interfere with nature. He waits. And then he captures the moment exactly as it unfolds.
Cognitive science calls this pattern recognition. The more time you spend immersed in a visual environment, the more your brain builds predictive models. Over time, you don’t just react to moments, you anticipate them. Street photographers seem impossibly fast, but what they really are is attentive. Attention becomes muscle memory.
The same applies to still life, to products, to architecture. Patterns, textures, repetition, negative space. When you train your eye to notice relationships between objects, you begin to see compositions before they fully form. You stop arranging randomly. You start composing intentionally.
So how do you apply this practically, beyond theory?
Slow down. Observe your subject before you lift the camera. Watch body language. Notice nervous habits. Listen to tone shifts. Give yourself time to understand what you’re actually looking at instead of what you think you’re supposed to capture.
Ask better questions. Instead of directing expressions, trigger them. Conversation is a creative tool. Use it. Invest in getting to know your subjects. That’s what makes lifestyle photography feel alive instead of staged.
Detach from control. Not emotionally detached from people, but detached from forcing moments. Let reality unfold. Capture what emerges. You won’t find me doing a lot of staged moments. I try to let the moment play out as it is, then we create the work from what’s real.
Study patterns. If you shoot streets, watch pedestrian flow. If you shoot portraits, watch microexpressions. If you shoot products, study how light interacts with surfaces at different angles. The more you observe, the more you’ll see before it happens.
Be present in the moment. Not just physically there, but mentally engaged. Not scrolling between shots. Not distracted by settings you already know. Present. Watching. Ready.
Photography is not just about capturing light. It’s about noticing life.
The camera does not create meaning. Attention does.
The most powerful images are rarely staged perfectly. They are witnessed carefully. They are the result of someone who understood their subject well enough to know when to wait and when to press the shutter.
Day 3 reminder: before you click, ask yourself if you truly understand what you’re looking at. If you don’t, keep watching. The image will come.
Day 3: we’re done. See you tomorrow on Day 4.
twinomugisha | 2026
