Guest Speaker 14- Francis Augusto

Francis Augusto is a visual storyteller and freelance photographer. He told us his story from coming into the UK as an asylum seeker and how he worked his way up to photography.

He told us how on a website, first impressions are important, you have five seconds to ‘hook’ the viewer to your work and what you’re about, curating your images on a website is key. This made me consider the images I was including on my website’s homepage and the layout of the images.

He is interested in human interaction through portrait, documentary and travel photography, and talked about the importance of relationships between the subjects you’re shooting and the way you interact with them. For example, if you are talking to them and complimenting them while taking their photo it makes them feel more comfortable and it will show in the images. I thought that this was an important piece of advice as communication between model and photographer is important, especially in a professional, industry-standard workflow or studio environment, which I learnt from my placement year.

The other things Francis talked about were his agency and the importance of mental health in the creative industry especially. I found it refreshing how open he was about mental health and his personal experience with it, as there are stigma and pressure of having to be creative and productive constantly. Good mental health increases creative processes, and his travel photography helps relax his mind.

Francis’s website: https://www.francisaugusto.co.uk

Screenshot from Francis’s website- homepage.