21 Photography Clichés That Should Just Go Away

We’ve all seen photography subjects or techniques get recycled, repurposed and endlessly reappear like an uninvited houseguest. We asked some of the photo industry’s greatest, a collection of famous shooters, photo editors and creative directors, what photography clichés, subjects, styles and techniques, they really don’t want to see anymore.

This is what they said in no particular order and very anonymously:

1. Faux Polaroid looking images. Bring back the real Polaroids!

2. Photographing little [uninteresting] towns that nobody’s ever heard of.

3. Mad Men influenced photos. Please find a new look to rip-off.

4. Tilt shift.

5. Smiling children from poor countries.

6. Fisheye lens.

7. Referencing old paintings, usually by a Dutch master.

8. People with dependency issues.

9. Anything shot with an iPhone.

10. Environmental portraits of family members looking sad.

11. Passing off nudes as progressive or edgy, when we all know that they’re easy
crowd pleasers (Yes, I’m looking at you Ryan McGinley.)

12. Pictures of random objects in your daily life, you’re not William Eggleston.

13. Actresses or models as 20s flappers.

14. Lazy on-flash photos trying to pass themselves off  as Terry Richardson or Juergen Teller style Katy Baggott.

15. Pictures of Cuba, until after there is a new regime (please!)

16. Pregnant partners – always photographed in black and white.

17. Coney Island.

18. Children’s beauty pageant contestants.

19. Surfers.

20. Cyan filters, it didn’t look great in the 1990s, so what’s changed?

21. Unmade beds.

This list is by no means exhaustive, so please – to use a cliché - feel free to put in your own two cents/

Tagged as: 1920s, 1960s, Cliches, Coney Island, Cuba, Cyan filters, humor, Influence, Iphone, Juergen Teller, lists, Mad Men, photo, Polaroids, Portraits, Ryan McGinley, Style, Technique, Terriy Richardson, Tilt shift, William Eggleston