Light first, everything else after

I've stopped starting with objects. Where the light comes from, how strong it is and what colour it is decides nearly everything else — so it may as well be the first decision rather than the last.

Once the light is fixed, a lot of questions answer themselves. Where the eye goes. Which shapes are allowed to be complicated and which have to stay simple. What time of day it feels like, and therefore what the picture is about.

A useful test

Squint at it. If the thing you want people to look at isn't the brightest or the darkest shape in the frame, it isn't going to work, and no amount of detail will rescue it.

The detail is the easy part. It's the last five percent, and it only ever helps a picture that already reads.