Composition

What is composition?

Composition is the placement of objects and elements in a certain piece of work. This is one of the key aspects to taking a good photograph as having too few elements and objects in your photograph means it lacks detail and a correct interpretation wont be able to be made. And the same can happen vice versa, too many visual elements makes your photograph distracting and unclear of what you're trying to focus and emphasis on. 

A good photograph makes sure all the elements that are present, are necessary as well as pass on the idea or story you're trying to tell.

The Rule of Thirds - 

The rule of thirds was something i was taught in GCSE Photography and can be applied into my own work on this unit as well. Basically what the rule of thirds is, is a 3x3 grid in which 2/3 of your image should be the key focus of your photograph and the rest should be background and something the viewer wont be focusing on. 

Using the Rule of thirds, you can create well balanced images which allow the viewer to interact with the image more naturally. Studies show that when viewing images that people's eyes usually go to one of the intersection points the most naturally rather than the centre. What this does is creates a more interesting and captivating image for your viewer as well as balance all your elements in a way that the story or subject focus of what you're taking a picture of is clear and recognisable.

Diagonal lines and Geometric shapes - 

Diagonal and geometric shapes in photographs have been proven to both help people view images in a more natural way. Diagonals help the viewer to view the image from left to right as so if a diagonal line starting from the bottom left and leads towards the top right of image, the image feels natural and easier to follow.

These red lines help prove what i mean by diagonal lines in your image, though they're actually invisible. They are the lines that your eyes would follow when looking at the image.

Geometric shapes help create a balanced composition and emphasise on the most important aspects of the photograph. A triangle shape between objects in a photograph is the easiest way to do this as this makes the shape in between (the triangle) more central.

The red shape here shows how the shape; a triangle, fits into the image because of what has been taken. This becomes the first thing noticable about the photograph when looked at and helps viewing pleasure by making the whole scene and photograph look a lot more natural.