A Better Way To Scroll Social Media

Dec 13

We have all been there. It is 11:00 PM, you are lying in bed, and your thumb is mindlessly flicking upward on a glass screen. You are looking at photography, but are you actually seeing anything?

This is the Doom Scroll. It is a high speed collision of visual noise. A colorful sunset, a brunch plate, a political meme, and a masterpiece by a Magnum photographer, all blurred into a three second window.

For a photographer, this habit is poison. It trains your brain to value the instant hit over the deep study. If we want to improve our craft, we have to change the way we consume. We need to move from Passive Scrolling to Active Deconstruction.

The Problem: The Three Second Trap

The algorithm is designed to keep you moving. It rewards images that pop. That means high saturation, high contrast, and immediate legibility. But great monochrome photography often requires a slower burn. If you spend only three seconds on an image, you are only seeing the surface. You are missing the bones.

The Solution: The 60 Second Study

Here is a better way to scroll. It is a simple mental framework to try this week. Instead of looking at 100 images in five minutes, look at five images for one minute each.

When you find a monochrome image that makes you pause, stop the scroll and ask these four questions:

1. Where is the Primary Light Source? Do not just look at the subject. Look at the shadows. Where do they start? Is the light hard or soft? By identifying the light source, you are learning how to recreate that mood in your own work.

2. What is the Tonal Anchor? Every great black and white image has an anchor. A true black or a brilliant white that holds the composition together. Find it. Why did the photographer choose that specific area to be the highest point of contrast?

3. What was Subtracted? This is the most important question for us. Look at the frame and imagine it in color. What noise did the photographer remove by choosing monochrome? Would a red car in the background have ruined this shot? By seeing what is not there, you learn the power of the Signal.

4. The Edge Check Run your eyes around the very edges of the frame. How did the photographer handle the corners? Is there a light leak or a distracting element that leads your eye out of the image, or is the composition a closed loop?

The Digital Fast

If you want to truly level up, try this: Curate your feed ruthlessly.

Unfollow the accounts that provide visual sugar. The over processed, cliché, and loud images that do not challenge you. Follow the archives of the masters, the contemporary documentary photographers, and the artists who make you feel uncomfortable.

If your feed is a cacophony of color noise, you will never hear the silence of a great monochrome moment.