Discussion of composition in general

[bleirer]

Spencer Cox at Photography Life has been updating their series of articles on composition. Seems like a good chance to see what you all think is important. Do you follow 'rules' if so what are the rules. Do you go for 'principles of design' if so what principles are most important to you? Are you an 'elements of composition' person. What elements?

Composition in Photography: A Guide to Composing Better Photos

How do you actually improve your compositions in a concrete way? This guide, Composition in Photography, aims to help.

photographylife.com

 

[bleirer]

One thing he linked is a scientific study of how the eye moves through different famous works of art such as a Rembrandt. Very interesting.

How Do We See Art: An Eye-Tracker Study

We describe the pattern of fixations of subjects looking at figurative and abstract paintings from different artists (Molina, Mondrian, Rembrandt, della Francesca) and at modified versions in which different aspects of these art pieces were altered with ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

 

[txstone]

I would highly recommend this video by Brad Hill. In the context of his advice for capturing wildlife images, Brad includes a list of Basic Compositional Guidelines that really caught my attention.

CSTV Live: Six Easy Steps to Capturing Great Wildlife Images
Streamed live on Nov 4, 2021

 

[FB101]

I would highly recommend this video by Brad Hill. In the context of his advice for capturing wildlife images, Brad includes a list of Basic Compositional Guidelines that really caught my attention.

CSTV Live: Six Easy Steps to Capturing Great Wildlife Images
Streamed live on Nov 4, 2021

Same here, I try to get the basics right in the shot and I can always fine tune afterwards, but I try to have a powerful composition from the start as it opens the door to more options. When the composition doesn't feel quite "right" I love to toggle the various guides in Lightroom to see if a different crop and composition might actually be more impactful.

 

[bleirer]

I would highly recommend this video by Brad Hill. In the context of his advice for capturing wildlife images, Brad includes a list of Basic Compositional Guidelines that really caught my attention.

CSTV Live: Six Easy Steps to Capturing Great Wildlife Images
Streamed live on Nov 4, 2021

Thank you. Which one did you think is most important?

 

[brachypelma44]

The only compositional guideline I actively think about when I'm out in the field is this: Is the sky more interesting, or is the scene more interesting? Place your horizon accordingly.

Aside from that, I don't worry about the crop/composition at all until I'm in the editing phase. I'm sure that some purists who did photography on film for a long time will hate to hear that, but in my opinion cropping is an incredibly powerful tool, and with advances in tech (digital and high MP sensors) there isn't a compelling reason not to do it at this point, especially if it results in a stronger final image in a size that will still print reasonably well if one wishes to do so.

 

[NorthernFocus]

I tend to be a non-conformist in general. But the basic rules of composition exist for a reason. Rule of thirds, clean BG, if it doesn't add it detracts, motion/vision into the frame, etc, are things that were established with common sense observations of what observers do/don't like. Now we understand more of the psychology/science behind those principles. There are times to break the rules but we should be aware of why it feels right to do so on a given image.

One of the hardest things as a photographer is realizing that we see with our minds not with our eyes. This is demonstrated every time we download images and look at them on our monitors. Not what you remembered? The camera simply records the light that fell on the sensor. Our memories are the processed images produced in our minds.

 

[Viathelens]

I can't image taking a shot without thinking about, although it's so ingrained in my mind I don't realize it, composition. Knowing about all the compositional elements, which are generally based on how we view images as said in other posts, allows me to quickly take a decent photograph in any situation. I do minimal cropping but will use the Transform tool in LrC to upsize and move subjects as needed. And, bleirer, thanks for posting something that is not related to equipment or equipment problems, my eyes glaze over anymore with that type of question or issue. I think people spend way too much time on equipment and not nearly enough time on the art of the craft.

 

[Palouse]

It is far easier for me to see and photograph good compositions. But I find it next to impossible to create good compositions—as in still-life, table top, food photography; that is an art!

 

[bleirer]

In the field I think there are composition choices we do make. The setting is there in front of us, yes, but we also actively engage with it, choosing what time of day to shoot and waiting for the right light, choosing the focal length, the position of the camera, the creative controls of f stop and shutter speed. In post we choose cropping and aspect ratio, rotate the crop box, decide what to clone out, what to emphasize with contrast, color enhancement, blur tools, sharpening, etc.

While some of this might not seem like composition, it all impacts the compositional elements of color, contrast, value, line, shape, form, and so on.

 

[NorthernFocus]

... thanks for posting something that is not related to equipment or equipment problems, my eyes glaze over anymore with that type of question or issue. I think people spend way too much time on equipment and not nearly enough time on the art of the craft.

I totally agree. Add to that the brand promoting/bashing that this site seems to have taken and it really is getting a bit too much. So much so that I just recently decided to place a personal moratorium on equipment related discussion other than technical questions related to technique.

It is far easier for me to see and photograph good compositions. But I find it next to impossible to create good compositions—as in still-life, table top, food photography; that is an art!

Same here. I can't even take a decent image of equipment that I want to list for sale. Don't even try any more. I just take a snap with the cell phone. I say all the time that the reason I do wildlife photography is because it's easy. People think I'm joking but it's true. We are not in control. Sure we can influence the outcome but in the end the animals control the shoot.

In the field I think there are composition choices we do make. The setting is there in front of us, yes, but we also actively engage with it, choosing what time of day to shoot and waiting for the right light, choosing the focal length, the position of the camera, the creative controls of f stop and shutter speed. In post we choose cropping and aspect ratio, rotate the crop box, decide what to clone out, what to emphasize with contrast, color enhancement, blur tools, sharpening, etc.

While some of this might not seem like composition, it all impacts the compositional elements of color, contrast, value, line, shape, form, and so on.

For wildlife shooting I'd say yes for sure we make compositional decisions and influence composition. We can do things to set up lighting angles, BG selection, angle of view, FOV(in camera or in post), etc. We can even control content to some degree. Say you're shooting a bear that is molting and is simply not attractive. So you compose and shoot portraits rather than full body shots. So yes we certainly make a lot of decisions in the field.

 

[Stephen Berger]

When applicable (as in when not filling the frame with a subject) I'm always thinking about things like negative space, angles and motion (the feeling of motion). Of course in a sudden encounter or with a super long lens it can be tricky to get it all going.

 

[Turberticus]

Before I even raise the viewfinder to my eye I will look at the scene in front of me and will see if it will make a pleasing photo. If there are too many distracting elements, the subject is poorly lit, too high, obscured by sticks/etc, against the sky (I hate sky backgrounds), or too far away, I won't take the shot. If the subject is well lit, unobscured, at eye level, and in front of a distant or interesting background I will spend time to compose the shot in camera and move around slightly to optimize the background or angle of the subject. I try my best to compose for the rule of thirds in camera by moving the focus point around, otherwise I will crop in post to allow for space for the subject to look in to, such as ensuring there's room on the left side of the image if the subject is looking in that direction, etc. If the subject is looking directly at me I tend to leave it in the center of the frame. I will sometimes do square or portrait crops depending on the scene. Of course there are moments where the subject is only there for a few seconds or there's a rare subject in front of me I've never seen before, then all those rules go out the window

 

[bleirer]

When applicable (as in when not filling the frame with a subject) I'm always thinking about things like negative space, angles and motion (the feeling of motion). Of course in a sudden encounter or with a super long lens it can be tricky to get it all going.

Here in Cleveland the public square downtown has the oldest and one of the tallest buildings, Terminal Tower. Whenever there is a super moon it rises past the top of the tower if you find the right angle to observe it. The photographers get their really long glass out, 500 mm or more and get far away, because they are composing the shot to make the moon appear larger. The moon being in space doesn't change size in the viewfinder, but as they get farther and farther from the tower, the tower gets smaller and smaller in the frame, making the moon seem larger and larger. So you see the newspaper shots of the 'huge' super moon, which to the naked eye isn't any bigger than any other moon.

So I guess the point is composition the sense of relative size, distance, and 3 dimensional space are choices we can make by our choice of focal length and our distance from the subject, moving left or right up or down to give some distance or breathing room to each important part of the image or what lines or shapes draw our eyes to or away from the subject.

 

[bleirer]

Before I even raise the viewfinder to my eye I will look at the scene in front of me and will see if it will make a pleasing photo. If there are too many distracting elements, the subject is poorly lit, too high, obscured by sticks/etc, against the sky (I hate sky backgrounds), or too far away, I won't take the shot. If the subject is well lit, unobscured, at eye level, and in front of a distant or interesting background I will spend time to compose the shot in camera and move around slightly to optimize the background or angle of the subject. I try my best to compose for the rule of thirds in camera by moving the focus point around, otherwise I will crop in post to allow for space for the subject to look in to, such as ensuring there's room on the left side of the image if the subject is looking in that direction, etc. If the subject is looking directly at me I tend to leave it in the center of the frame. I will sometimes do square or portrait crops depending on the scene. Of course there are moments where the subject is only there for a few seconds or there's a rare subject in front of me I've never seen before, then all those rules go out the window

I find I have to force myself to concentrate on composition when I'm worried about camera settings and getting the shot. It's almost a different state of mind to be in composition mode after other decisions are made.

 

[Turberticus]

I find I have to force myself to concentrate on composition when I'm worried about camera settings and getting the shot. It's almost a different state of mind to be in composition mode after other decisions are made.

I shoot in manual with auto ISO so the only adjustments I'll make are shutter speed (dependent upon available light) or exposure compensation, especially for bright or dark subjects, aka a Great Egret vs a Raven. Sometimes I'll make those adjustments ahead of time, especially if I have a target subject. I'm also more 'focused' on composition than my camera settings at this point because I've become very familiar with how my camera works. Of course there are times where I'll forget to readjust the exposure compensation lol

 

[tclune]

My main problem with articles or guidelines on composition is that my sensibility doesn't really fit with the spare, pared down compositions that arre generally raised up as the ideal. I'm more of a "Where's Waldo" kind of guy. The photos that I like most are something like tableaux, filled with small "eclairs," to use a favorite term of a professor I admired greatly. I can recognize real value in clean and spare photos composed according to classical principles of composition -- and I can back-fill such principles in some of the photos that I am most pleased with. But I just don't find the principles to be useful guidance to get me where I want to go with a photograph.

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

 

[Turberticus]

I shoot in manual with auto ISO so the only adjustments I'll make are shutter speed (dependent upon available light) or exposure compensation, especially for bright or dark subjects, aka a Great Egret vs a Raven. Sometimes I'll make those adjustments ahead of time, especially if I have a target subject. I'm also more 'focused' on composition than my camera settings at this point because I've become very familiar with how my camera works. Of course there are times where I'll forget to readjust the exposure compensation lol

I just happened to see this newsletter from Jared Lloyd from the Journal of Wildlife Photography covering what I was talking about in my last post.


Over the last couple of months, I have tried to spell out a simplified approached to thinking about how we set our exposures in the field.

If you have to “think” about it, if you are “experimenting” to get it right, if you do not have a quick and easy means of setting your exposure and nailing a proper histogram on the fly, then you are always going to struggle with wildlife photography.

As I explained in one of the first parts of this series of articles, wildlife photography is different than other types of photography. We are not always afforded the time and luxury to suss out all the details of exposure like we can with landscape photography.

This isn’t to say that all wildlife photography is “run and gun,” as the saying goes.

By no means.

Often, there is extraordinary amounts of sitting and waiting. Patience happens to be another important trait to master in this game. And in these situations, we may have time to think through technical minutiae.

But as any working photographer or cinematographer will tell you, the action, the thing you have been waiting for, always seems to occur in that moment when you are distracted, when you are looking at the back of your camera, checking your histogram, fiddling with something, tweaking settings, or as seems to typically be the case for me, taking a sip of coffee from a thermos.

So, even then, even when we seemingly have all the time in the world to think through the technical settings in great detail, we often don’t.

At the heart of this series is the simple fact that no amount of technical perfection is ever going to create a compelling photograph.

Being able to “nail” your exposure or decide on the right autofocus area mode for the situation simply means you are now capable of stepping up to the starting line.

That’s it. Nothing more.

It’s the equivalent of knowing how to hit a G chord on a guitar, or knowing how to make a brush stroke on a canvas.

And yet, in today’s world of photography, we often find our community obsessing over these rudimentary and somewhat arbitrary concepts.

Honestly, I think this is the fault of photo instructors in general. Teaching the technical side of photography is the easy stuff. It can be a bit like math. 1 + 1 = 2. It doesn’t take effort to discuss ISO settings and dynamic range and autofocus systems. Sure, these things are important to know. But given that these things are the low-hanging fruit when it comes to teaching this stuff, I think this has created a fetish with technical perfection at the expense of creative expression.

This is why I wrote this series about changing the way we “see” and think about exposure.

The only things that are more rudimentary in photography are attaching a lens, inserting a memory card, and turning on the camera.

If you want to progress with wildlife photography, the first thing you need to do is simplify the concept of exposure down to the point where you don’t even need to think about it. Only then can we devote ourselves to the real task at hand: creating compelling visual art that captures the imagination of our viewer.

 

[Turberticus]

My main problem with articles or guidelines on composition is that my sensibility doesn't really fit with the spare, pared down compositions that arre generally raised up as the ideal. I'm more of a "Where's Waldo" kind of guy. The photos that I like most are something like tableaux, filled with small "eclairs," to use a favorite term of a professor I admired greatly. I can recognize real value in clean and spare photos composed according to classical principles of composition -- and I can back-fill such principles in some of the photos that I am most pleased with. But I just don't find the principles to be useful guidance to get me where I want to go with a photograph.View attachment 27328

Agreed! Action shots are definitely an exception to the classic rules of composition.

 

[bleirer]

My main problem with articles or guidelines on composition is that my sensibility doesn't really fit with the spare, pared down compositions that arre generally raised up as the ideal. I'm more of a "Where's Waldo" kind of guy. The photos that I like most are something like tableaux, filled with small "eclairs," to use a favorite term of a professor I admired greatly. I can recognize real value in clean and spare photos composed according to classical principles of composition -- and I can back-fill such principles in some of the photos that I am most pleased with. But I just don't find the principles to be useful guidance to get me where I want to go with a photograph.View attachment 27328

One thing the article I cited mentions is simplicity, saying that simplicity is another word for clarity. It says a blank wall is simple, but uninteresting, but an image with a clear message can be helped by simplicity. On the other hand he mentions some of Ansel Adams famous works which are complex when you look deeply, but have overarching simple areas of light and dark, shapes and patterns. So I can see both sides. A simple message with an area of emphasis that you want the viewer to focus on, but also something more to see by going deeper into the details.

 

[bleirer]

I just happened to see this newsletter from Jared Lloyd from the Journal of Wildlife Photography covering what I was talking about in my last post.


Over the last couple of months, I have tried to spell out a simplified approached to thinking about how we set our exposures in the field.

If you have to “think” about it, if you are “experimenting” to get it right, if you do not have a quick and easy means of setting your exposure and nailing a proper histogram on the fly, then you are always going to struggle with wildlife photography.

As I explained in one of the first parts of this series of articles, wildlife photography is different than other types of photography. We are not always afforded the time and luxury to suss out all the details of exposure like we can with landscape photography.

This isn’t to say that all wildlife photography is “run and gun,” as the saying goes.

By no means.

Often, there is extraordinary amounts of sitting and waiting. Patience happens to be another important trait to master in this game. And in these situations, we may have time to think through technical minutiae.

But as any working photographer or cinematographer will tell you, the action, the thing you have been waiting for, always seems to occur in that moment when you are distracted, when you are looking at the back of your camera, checking your histogram, fiddling with something, tweaking settings, or as seems to typically be the case for me, taking a sip of coffee from a thermos.

So, even then, even when we seemingly have all the time in the world to think through the technical settings in great detail, we often don’t.

At the heart of this series is the simple fact that no amount of technical perfection is ever going to create a compelling photograph.

Being able to “nail” your exposure or decide on the right autofocus area mode for the situation simply means you are now capable of stepping up to the starting line.

That’s it. Nothing more.

It’s the equivalent of knowing how to hit a G chord on a guitar, or knowing how to make a brush stroke on a canvas.

And yet, in today’s world of photography, we often find our community obsessing over these rudimentary and somewhat arbitrary concepts.

Honestly, I think this is the fault of photo instructors in general. Teaching the technical side of photography is the easy stuff. It can be a bit like math. 1 + 1 = 2. It doesn’t take effort to discuss ISO settings and dynamic range and autofocus systems. Sure, these things are important to know. But given that these things are the low-hanging fruit when it comes to teaching this stuff, I think this has created a fetish with technical perfection at the expense of creative expression.

This is why I wrote this series about changing the way we “see” and think about exposure.

The only things that are more rudimentary in photography are attaching a lens, inserting a memory card, and turning on the camera.

If you want to progress with wildlife photography, the first thing you need to do is simplify the concept of exposure down to the point where you don’t even need to think about it. Only then can we devote ourselves to the real task at hand: creating compelling visual art that captures the imagination of our viewer.

Interesting quotation. Would you have a link for the article? The last section of the article I cited sort of boiled down the takeaways from the series. No mention of rule of thirds or any other rule. More like have a message, have a vision of the image before shooting, be concious of the decisions you make to capture the visualized image, and a lot more, worth reading even for us experienced folks.

15 Composition Tips for Powerful Photography

photographylife.com

 

[Roy]

Spencer Cox at Photography Life has been updating their series of articles on composition. Seems like a good chance to see what you all think is important. Do you follow 'rules' if so what are the rules. Do you go for 'principles of design' if so what principles are most important to you? Are you an 'elements of composition' person. What elements?

Composition in Photography: A Guide to Composing Better Photos

How do you actually improve your compositions in a concrete way? This guide, Composition in Photography, aims to help.

photographylife.com

Rules like the thirds rule are good.
You only need to know them so you know when to break them.
With experience seeing the way a camera sees becomes second nature.

 

[Whiskeyman]

Steve's lessons on the use of Auto-ISO and manual exposure are great lessons on how to simplify your camera's settings so you can spend less time thinking about exposure and more time thinking about and executing the composition side of your shooting

I just happened to see this newsletter from Jared Lloyd from the Journal of Wildlife Photography covering what I was talking about in my last post....

Are you a subscriber to this Journal? If so, how do you like it? I'm interested, but not enough to purchase a subscription without seeing a sample.

 

[Roy]

I'm not a subscriber but I know from others Steve's journal is really helpful to photographers starting out or even starting to become enthusiasts...

 

[abbymain]

I just happened to see this newsletter from Jared Lloyd from the Journal of Wildlife Photography covering what I was talking about in my last post.


Over the last couple of months, I have tried to spell out a simplified approached to thinking about how we set our exposures in the field.

If you have to “think” about it, if you are “experimenting” to get it right, if you do not have a quick and easy means of setting your exposure and nailing a proper histogram on the fly, then you are always going to struggle with wildlife photography.

As I explained in one of the first parts of this series of articles, wildlife photography is different than other types of photography. We are not always afforded the time and luxury to suss out all the details of exposure like we can with landscape photography.

This isn’t to say that all wildlife photography is “run and gun,” as the saying goes.

By no means.

Often, there is extraordinary amounts of sitting and waiting. Patience happens to be another important trait to master in this game. And in these situations, we may have time to think through technical minutiae.

But as any working photographer or cinematographer will tell you, the action, the thing you have been waiting for, always seems to occur in that moment when you are distracted, when you are looking at the back of your camera, checking your histogram, fiddling with something, tweaking settings, or as seems to typically be the case for me, taking a sip of coffee from a thermos.

So, even then, even when we seemingly have all the time in the world to think through the technical settings in great detail, we often don’t.

At the heart of this series is the simple fact that no amount of technical perfection is ever going to create a compelling photograph.

Being able to “nail” your exposure or decide on the right autofocus area mode for the situation simply means you are now capable of stepping up to the starting line.

That’s it. Nothing more.

It’s the equivalent of knowing how to hit a G chord on a guitar, or knowing how to make a brush stroke on a canvas.

And yet, in today’s world of photography, we often find our community obsessing over these rudimentary and somewhat arbitrary concepts.

Honestly, I think this is the fault of photo instructors in general. Teaching the technical side of photography is the easy stuff. It can be a bit like math. 1 + 1 = 2. It doesn’t take effort to discuss ISO settings and dynamic range and autofocus systems. Sure, these things are important to know. But given that these things are the low-hanging fruit when it comes to teaching this stuff, I think this has created a fetish with technical perfection at the expense of creative expression.

This is why I wrote this series about changing the way we “see” and think about exposure.

The only things that are more rudimentary in photography are attaching a lens, inserting a memory card, and turning on the camera.

If you want to progress with wildlife photography, the first thing you need to do is simplify the concept of exposure down to the point where you don’t even need to think about it. Only then can we devote ourselves to the real task at hand: creating compelling visual art that captures the imagination of our viewer.

I totally agree with this view. I tend to shoot small birds (5-8 cms) which are restless by nature. Once I spot them the only thing my mind can focus on is keeping the AF points on them and hoping that the timing of the burst coincides with the bird flight or unique portrait shots.
With Steve’s books on wildlife and bird , the idea of looking for eye-level shots, bird position, shadow on face, background, especially white spots, and light direction does stay in the unconscious mind. But these things don’t happen deliberately for me in the field. Maybe intutively with practice like driving a car. But to be honest I wouldn’t be able to claim a very methodical approach for small birds. And I am only an amateur photographer.