I’ve been a photographer for countless years now. My job has taken me to incredible places, from the red carpet in Hollywood to photographing His Holiness the Dalai Lama in India.

Over the course of seven years, these are the small things that I’ve learned or realized from my experience that I feel contribute to one’s success as a budding photographer, both in quality and style of photos.

1. Straighten your horizons and your lines

The first thing I always do when editing a photo: check the horizon and lines. It’s often a very simple thing to overlook (I used to never even realize it!), but straightening the lines in your photo can make a huge difference. A beautiful photo of the ocean can be perfected by simply aligning the horizon to be level and straight.

If your model is standing in front of a striped wall, make sure the stripes are aligned straight and not leaning off to the side. Having crooked lines throws off the balance of the photos. Think about it, you wouldn’t want to hang a photo on your wall that was crooked, would you?

2. Get the heck off auto-mode

When I first started with photography, I left my camera in “auto” for every situation. Moving the switch to the "M" button was daunting, terrifying, and complicated for me. This left me with overexposed, blurry photos nearly every time. Finally, I took a risk and started exploring more settings of my camera and haven't looked back since. Every last setting in your camera influences how your final image will look.

Do you want a beautiful portrait with nice depth of field? Keep your Aperture wide open! Want to take beautiful photos of the stars in the night sky? You’ll want to use a long shutter speed for that. Oh, but not too long or it’ll be blurry. Also don’t turn your ISO too high or you’ll get grain.

See what I mean? There are so many factors that influence your image, so it’s important to select the right settings based on your vision for the shot.

Once you start using manual mode and practice with it, it becomes second nature and you can start predicting what settings you’d use anywhere you go. It really is an art!

3. Sharpen and focus!

Are your photos all turning out blurry or not as crisp as you’d like them? There’s a reason for that. The wider you open up your aperture, the more depth of field you’ll have. This is wonderful for creating dreamy portraits, but definitely not ideal for landscape photos where you actually want everything to be in focus.

If you want sharper photos, stay away from the small numbers. Lean more towards f/8 or above, you’ll get more detail. Additionally, don’t let your camera’s auto-focus control you! Learn how to choose focus points, as well as pick up back-button focusing. It’s a game changer.

If it's late at night or you're shooting at a dark location, use a tripod! This will help you hold your camera steadier and prevent blur in your photos when you need to use a slower shutter speed. If I'm shooting one single scene, landmark, or object that doesn't require me to move a lot, I'll always use a tripod. Even if it isn't dark where I am.

If you fall in love with a shot but it’s out of focus, don’t crank up the contrast and sharpness while editing to try and "put it in focus." It won’t work that well, trust me.

4. Get out of the zoo

Okay, that caption probably made no sense. Let me explain.

“Chimping” is a term known in the photography community as checking every single photo on your LCD screen after taking it. It’s mostly a problem if you’re shooting an event or out on the street. It’s time-consuming, drains your battery life, and it can interrupt your flow and cause you to miss important moments.

Obviously, it’s okay to make sure your photos are turning out the way you’d like them every once in a while, but it’s important to just trust your talent and never miss a moment.

Additionally, don’t overshoot. Spend more time composing your shot instead of just rapid-firing and hoping one of them turned out good. Having a billion photos to sort through while editing can be a real pain in the rear.

5. Be confident and have fun!

Photography is fun! It’s an amazing outlet to connect with new friends and it opens up new doors to communities and opportunities everywhere. Whatever you shoot, own it.It’s always easy to criticize your own work and feel nervous to put yourself out there. I get that.

If you do what you love and love what you do, everything will fall into place. Don’t assume that your photos have to look a certain way. The best photographers have their own method and style that are unique to them and make their work desirable and beautiful.

One of my favorite things about photography is that it’s ever-changing. There’s always more to learn and new things to discover. By experimenting with your camera, meeting like-minded people, and exploring the capacity of your creativity, you can do amazing things!

Check out my photography website and Instagram if you’d like to see some of my work!