Better Photography: Lesson 5

Photography lesson 5 focused on picture composition. While a lot of artistic composition is innate, there are some simple rules that you can follow to improve the composition of your photos. I ran out of time to take pictures for all of the rules, so for this lesson I used both new pictures and scavenged through old pictures (some I took, some others took) to demonstrate each lesson.

Rule #1: Keep it simple. Avoid Background Distractions.

My parents in Rome.

It is hard to concentrate on my parents in the first picture because of all the background distractions. Meanwhile, the interesting but non-distracting background in the second picture, makes for an aesthetically pleasing photo.

Rule *2: Follow the rule of thirds. This rule states that your eyes are naturally drawn to 1/3 up or over in a photo.

Monster Matteo :)

This is one of my favorite pictures of Matteo. Because it follows the rule of thirds (Mattteo and Guinness being place 1/3 of the way up the frame), your eyes are first drawn to Matteo and his facial expression. Then, at second glance, you catch the mess that he has managed to make.

Rule #3: Keep an eye on the horizon. Position the horizon 2/3 up the photo if you want to focus on the foreground and 1/3 up if you want to focus on the background (ex. a nice sunset).

A Windy Afternoon @ Fort Lauderdale Beach

Rule #4: Frame your subject.

In these two pictures, I used patterned backgrounds to frame Matteo. If you think about it, this is what photo studios do when you go to get your picture taken.

In contrast to the other two pictures, I used the foreground to frame Matteo in this picture.

Rule #5: Fill the frame.

Evelyn's 1st B-Day

Filling the frame made all the difference in this picture.

Rule #6: Try a new perspective. Ex: Turn your camera the other way.

Southern Chile

By turning the camera vertical, I was able to capture the dramatic background.