Finding Your Visual Style as a Photographer

A visual style isn’t something you consciously decide on. It’s something that emerges over time as you experiment, refine, and repeatedly gravitate toward what feels natural. It’s the sum of your creative instincts, your influences, and the choices you make without even thinking. For many photographers, including myself, it develops gradually, quietly, often without you noticing until someone else points it out.

One of the first steps toward finding your style is to study the work you admire. I spent many nights scrolling through the portfolios of Scandinavian photographers, design studios, and editorial magazines—absorbing everything from colour palettes to how they used negative space. Not to copy them, but to understand what I was naturally drawn to. I discovered that I loved clean lines, bold colour, and cinematic lighting. That combination became the foundation of my visual identity.

The second step is repetition. When you shoot a wide range of subjects, patterns naturally appear. Maybe you always frame people slightly off-centre. Maybe you’re obsessed with yellow tones. Maybe you love capturing quiet moments instead of dramatic ones. Repetition reveals these habits, and once you notice them, you can intentionally refine them into stylistic signatures.

Over time, I noticed that my best images shared a sense of clarity and calm. They were simple but intentional. I wasn’t drawn to chaotic scenes or heavy editing. I preferred natural expressions, soft gradients of colour, and strong shapes. That discovery allowed me to evolve from “taking pictures” to “crafting images.”

But here’s the important part: style is not a cage. You’re not meant to lock yourself into one look forever. Your style will grow as you evolve as an artist. New influences, new environments, new equipment, new experiences—they all shape you. The goal isn’t stagnation. The goal is coherence without limiting yourself.

One of the most useful exercises I recommend is creating a private moodboard of images that feel like your work, even if you didn’t shoot them. Add anything that resonates: movie stills, design posters, artworks, paintings, screenshots from Instagram. Don’t worry about categories. Just build a visual library of your sensibilities. Over time, themes will emerge.

Once you’ve identified your aesthetic direction, you can push your work further by being intentional. If you love bold colour, start planning shoots around it. If you enjoy minimalism, reduce your compositions even more. Style comes from consistently making choices that align with your artistic instincts.

In the end, your visual style is your voice. It’s what makes someone look at a photo and think, “This feels like Sebastian.” And that recognition is one of the most rewarding experiences a photographer can have.

Finding your style is not the beginning or the end—it’s an ongoing journey. And the more you shoot, the clearer your voice becomes.