When it comes to my Instagram account, one of the most common questions I get is, “how do you find all of these cool places and colorful walls?” Here are the five main ways that I find murals and other great photo locations in my city.
1. Follow Influencers In Your Area
On my business profile, I typically only follow people who are in my niche. However, I do make an exception with local bloggers and photographers. I encourage you to follow other creatives in your city and pay attention to the places they are shooting and where they spend their time. I’ve also found that it is especially helpful to follow fashion bloggers and photographers for finding photogenic spots in your city.
If you don’t know already, I’m based in North Texas. I will regularly search the locations “Fort Worth” and “Dallas” in Instagram. This allows me to see TONS of content being created right here in my city. While this will require you to sort through a lot of low quality images, every now and then you will find a great location that will make it all worth it!
2. Take Different Routes
Take different routes when driving around town and get to know your city better. You never know what random gems you might stumble upon! So many of my favorite photo spots are ones that I found just driving around town. Constantly being aware of your surroundings and always looking for photo locations on the go will get you a long way!
3. Get Creative and Have an Open Mind
If you saw most of my photo locations in real life, they probably wouldn’t be what you were expecting. Just this last weekend I took photos at that gorgeous rainbow painted house in my header, but the ground was covered with old tires (didn’t get in any cute shoe shots on that shoot). However, we still got some killer images! Be creative and strategic when framing your photos and be mindful of ways you can edit the image to make it work. A lot of murals are in parking lots and sketchy parts of town, but no one will ever know if you frame an image correctly!
4. Research on Pinterest
I’ve learned over time that typing “great photo locations in [CITY]” into Google only provides me with the top senior and family photo locations in town. These places are usually overly crowded, photographed by everyone, and are usually places that I’m already familiar with anyways. I cannot emphasize what a great resource Pinterest is! Sometimes we forget that Pinterest is more than our go-to resource for a dinner recipe or DIY project, it is an awesome search engine that can help you find things in your own city! Try searching terms like “[CITY] mural guide” or “The best things to do in [CITY]”. Once you find what you’re looking for, don’t forget to also look at the related pins or other pins by that pinner for some more great ideas!
5. Follow Mural Accounts and Hashtags
There are TONS of great mural accounts and hashtags. I keep up with all of the major accounts and occasionally one will repost a photo featuring a North Texas location that I didn’t know about. If you’re ever traveling to a large city, I also recommend doing this kind of research to find the best murals in that city.
Here are a few of my favorite mural accounts and hashtags you should check out…
- Wall Charades (#wallcharades)
- Wall Traveled (#walltraveled)
- Woof and Walls (#woofandwalls)
- Rosie Clayton
- Jennifer Lake
- #Studiodiywallcrawl
- #ihavethisthingwithwalls
- #abmlovesmurals
- #colorhunters
I hope these tips is helpful! For all my fellow Instagram fanatics and mural hunters out there!
I’d love to hear your tips on how you find your great locations, please leave a comment below! <3
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