Positioning the Horizon

Before doing this exercise, my only thoughts on positioning the horizon were to consider whether you wanted to show more land or more sky. On days such as the one shown here, I might have included more sky in the shot than on days where it held less interest. For me in this set, the clouds hold as much interest as the corn so for now; the level of interest can be ignored in search of other effects.

Starting with the horizon very low in shot 1, the result is that of a shallow and very wide looking field with the sky above appearing less wide, yet showing much more depth. In shot 2 with the horizon slightly higher, the extra depth to the field makes it look less wide than in the previous shot, whereas the sky now looks wider.

I find the third shot the most interesting. As a result of the horizon being along the centre of the shot, both the width and depth of the land and sky are equal. The effect of this balance is that the eye is drawn to the horizon and in this particular set; I feel that more depth is created in the picture as a whole.

As we move through the subsequent shots, the higher the horizon gets, the deeper and narrower the field looks and the wider and shallower the sky looks.

Although the height of the horizon has a significant effect on the depth of different elements of the shot, there is another contributing factor: in the latter shots, more foreground interest is shown, drawing the eye to the front of the scene. I have noticed that the cottage in shot 6 looks bigger and closer than in shot 1. Logically, I would have thought that with the extra appearance of depth to the field, the cottage would have looked further away. Checking through the mid-range shots, I have found that as the field gets deeper, the cottage does seem further away and it is only the introduction of foreground interest that brings the cottage closer.

Having discovered these effects, I feel a need to explore my findings further by repeating the exercise with different landscapes. I would also like to explore the effect of the horizon in the same place but with and without foreground interest.

Balance

The following images have been chosen from my collection in order to show how the balance works in each photo. If two objects are of different sizes, they can be balanced by placing the larger object closer to the centre and the smaller object closer to the edge on the other side of the scale.

In this photo the boy and the thick tree are close to the middle of the shot. With the girl being further back, she looks smaller so the balance works as she and the thinner, therefore lighter tree are placed closer to the edge of the shot.

The lady and the bin in this shot balance each other well as they are similar in both size and distance from the centre. Although the pier is a single object, I feel that it can be split in two to show balance. The section at the end of the pier where the rides and buildings are taller sits close to the middle of the shot. This is balanced out by the smaller section of the pier which reaches right to the left hand edge.

The boy on the right of this shot takes up more space than the girl and doors to the left; however the slither of door to the far left makes up the difference. I feel that the fact that the subjects to the left are darker also makes them seem heavier.

This photo shows an example of a large object just left of centre being balanced by a smaller object to the far right. I feel that the balanced is also helped by the right hand object being half way up the shot which helps to weigh this side down.

The girl in this shot is just slightly to the right of centre. In order to maintain balance, the man who appears much smaller has been placed midway between the centre and the left edge.

The skater lagging behind sits to the far right of this shot balancing out the much larger group just left of centre.

Focal Lengths and Different Viewpoints

My subject for the focal lengths and different viewpoints exercise was a gateway leading to a public footpath. I used this subject as I knew that I would be able to use the edges of the gateway as the limits of the photo in order to compare the content.

Using the lens at the longest zoom of 55mm, I composed the photo using the gateway edges as a guide. The resulting shot showed the river leading away from the gate leading to the power station in the background.

I then set the lens to its widest setting of 18mm, moved closer to the gateway  and repeated. Although the edges of the gateway were still set to the edges of the photo, in this shot the power station looked considerably further away. The gate itself, being closer to the camera also seems wider in this shot.

I think that the reason for this is in the angle of view. When standing back with the zoom at its longest, the angle of what is shown is much narrower, leading to less width at an extreme distance. As a result of this, less of the power station fits in the shot so it seems larger and therefore closer. By the same token, at the wider angle, more of the landscape in the distance fits in the shot, making the power station look smaller and further away.

I have noticed this point in the past but was quite surprised at how extreme the difference was in this particular situation. It is definitely an aspect which I will pay more attention to in future projects.

Focal Lengths

On a walk on holiday, I noticed our cottage in the distance. With the wheat fields flowing and a bit of foreground interest, I thought it an ideal opportunity to complete my Focal Lengths exercise. In the first photo taken at 18mm, the cottage is only just noticeable in the distance.



 

 

Zooming in to the maximum zoom of 55mm, the cottage now seems much closer. Although the distance between myself and the scene have changed, distances between different elements of the scene appear pretty much the same.

 

 

It is clear to see from this crop of the first photo that to zoom in from the same viewpoint has the same effect on proportions as cropping. It is important to remember however, that cropping and zooming have very different effects on other elements of the photo, such as depth of field and exposure.

 

 



 

 

 

A Sequence of Composition

On a trip to town with my son, I noticed that the street was full of Army stalls. As I had my camera, I thought this might be a good opportunity to try the Sequence of Composition exercise.

My first shot was the first thing I noticed, the Army recruitment stall (1), probably showing the reason for the entire set up. I kept the ‘Caffe Nero’ sign in shot as I liked the contrast of it as a backdrop to the reality of harsh Army life.

My next two shots (2 and 3) are of a newspaper photographer taking shots of people. I noticed her confidence in asking people to pose for her and thought a candid, un-posed shot of a posed situation might work.  I quite like the shot but although the background is simple, I still find it very distracting.

As I moved along the street, I noticed that the tank was attracting a lot of attention. It must have been my lucky day as there seemed to be lots of red clothing around to contrast with the Army green (4 and 5). I noticed a boy in the tank, so got a quick photo (6) and moved around to see what else was going on.

Coming round the side of the tank, I caught a soldier’s reflection in the mirror (7).  This photo worked much better in my head than in reality. I thought that I might be able to make something of the three faces; reflection, poster and person but the scene is broken up by the fact that the real soldier is interacting with the couple and facing out of the scene.

To my left, the soldier from the reflection was leaning on the tank so I snapped him. I quite like this photo (8) as for me it’s one of contrasts; the contrasting colours of red and green and the child’s balloon against the Army equipment. The sharp focus on the tank shows the harshness of the machine’s role while the soft focus puts the soldier more at ease, reflecting his relaxed mood on what must be an easy day for him. I also think that the soldier and balloon both being soft brings them together and separates them both from the hard tank. For me it says, ‘tomorrow I may go to war but for today, I’m a children’s entertainer’.

Shots 9, 10 and 11 were taken as I caught the other soldier in a fairly good pose and started to notice equipment on and around the tank. A bit of depth of field play was used for shot 11 as I focused on the end of the gun and kept the tank soft.

My attention was diverted as the young boy started to move around the tank again (12). The soldier put a helmet on the boys head but with the windscreen in the way, what could have been a good shot kind of flopped (13). I tried to move around the front of the tank to get a better angle but there were people in the way also taking photos. As I knew the angle wasn’t quite right and I only had a moment to get the shot, I quickly made the decision to recreate the depth of field idea from shot 11. At this moment, the photographer appeared and asked the soldiers to sit on the front of the tank with the boy. As posed photos were not what I was looking for, I left the scene.

On leaving, I thought that shot 14 would be my final ‘this is what I was working up to’ shot but on reflection, I now prefer shot 8. Shot 14 had potential but the wrong angle led to a confused image. As we can’t see that it is a young boy in the photo, it is unclear what the scene is all about. There are similarities in the two photos. Both show sharply focused war equipment against a softly focused soldier. Both would have also shown a childlike element, also softly focused to connect with the soldier. Shot 8 achieved where shot 14 just missed the mark so I will have to put shot 8 as my most successful photo from the session.

An object in different positions

For my objects in different positions exercise, I chose to photograph an ornamental lizard on my living room wall. To keep the shots simple and focus all attention on the lizard and its position, I used a flat, desaturated wall.

I took one shot with the lizard in the centre and two with him on the third lines, one right one left. Although many successful images are created using the rule of thirds, I found all of these shots quite boring. Granted, I was taking photos of an ornament in a sea of grey but I felt more could be achieved.

Luckily, in my opinion anyway, I was right. My next four shots showed the lizard in the four corners of the screen. This effect seemed to breathe life into him and I could quite easily imagine him skitting across the wall. Shot five, where the lizard is far into the top right corner is definitely my favourite. The top right position gives no room for manouvre and the extreme nature of him being tight into the corner accentuates this. The shot goes against rules of giving the subject space to look or move into but I think in this case, it works.

I think that where the first three shots bring up images of someone taking a photo of a lizard, shot five and to a lesser extent the other corner shots tell more of a story. When I look at shot five, two stories spring to mind; one of a photographer, trying to take a photo of a lizard who nearly escaped from shot, the other trying to photograph a wall when a lizard scurried into view. The former story could also apply to shot four and the latter, to shots six and seven.  I feel that it is the stories evoked from the position of the lizard that make these shots more successful.

Fitting the frame to the subject

I spotted this freshly split log whilst on a walk and the reds really stood out to me against the other more muted colours in the surrounding wood. My first task was to take a simple shot with not too much thought about composition. I like the photo but I think it would have looked much better had the focus been on the left hand end of the wood, rather than the right. This would have shown off the detail in the fibres at the split end of the log.

My second shot for which I had to fit the subject into the frame as tightly as possible was focused much better. Had the grain not been a point of interest in this shot, I feel it would have been quite boring; without anything in the background, the log has no context.

I enjoyed the third challenge of getting closer to the subject so that no edges could be seen. I was surprised to see so many colours and was really pleased with the contrast of the moist fibres where the log was split with the drier grain at the base of the knot. I also like the way this photo is split, with the darkness across the bottom half and much lighter shades at the top. I feel the focus could have been better but I was working with fairly slow shutter speeds as a result of the low forest light. I avoided using flash as I felt it would have burnt out some of the shadows which are essential to the shot.

 

My final shot shows what first attracted me to the log, the vivid reds against the greens and more the muted tones of the trees. I quite like the balance of this shot; the log and also the large tree close to the centre are balanced by my son in the distance, smaller and closer to the edge. His red hair, although hardly noticeable is a subtle reflection of the reds in the log. I have slightly de-saturated the forest to promote the reds and show how I saw the scene at the time.