Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I. Composition & Shape Crop in the camera - 14 slides Copyright © Kenji Tachibana

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition & Shape: Crop in the camera C omposition: Do it early 1.Pre-visualize the image in your mind’s eye if possible. 2.If not, try making a simple pencil drawing of your story. a.Make sure to draw in a 4:3 shaped frame. b.The standard notebook paper is a 4:3 shape. Fold it vertically and horizontally creating 4 correctly shaped rectangles. Then use both sides to make 8 correctly shaped frames. c.Keep your pencil lines simple but try for correct shape, relative size, and perspective

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition & Shape: Crop in the camera T ransfer the composition to the LCD: 3.The camera LCD is your 4:3 shape canvas, compose your story fully within that frame. a.Do your best to transfer your mental or pencil sketch on to the 4:3 shape LCD screen/viewfinder. b.Some student may find it helpful to draw the 1/3 grid on the sketch and map the image on the LCD with its 1/3 grid turned on. c.Transfer accuracy is important but don’t shoot by- the-numbers. Be open to compositional opportunities offered by real-world situation. DSLR users will have a more complicated image transfer process… explain later…

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition & Shape: Crop in the camera C omposition: More thoughts 4.Make your layout using a light pencil line. 5.Keep it simple, and use the whole (corner to corner) frame. 6.Erase and make changes as needed. 7.The paper sketch and the real world live in different realms. Draw using real scale, shapes, and perspective. 8.Trace over the dominant lines using a dark pencil line. 9.Be prepared to ‘flip’ your layout idea based on real world lighting and practical needs.

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition & Shape: Crop in the camera P hotoshop: ‘cropFrame’ 5.Cropping tight with the camera is a must. Although, it is also important to shoot with an additional 10% safe-image margin 6.That additional 10% image will prove important to you in the future for multiple reasons. And you will be to apply the ‘cropFrame’ Layer in the Photoshop ‘lab work’ phase. 7.You are not allowed to apply a ‘true-crop’ to your assignment image. ‘cropFrame’ is only a Layer mask which can easily be turned off to show all of the camera original image.

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition & Shape: Crop in the camera G arbage In, Garbage Out: Students often say ‘I’ll fix it later in Photoshop’, which is a self defeating idea. Don’t load yourself up with bad habits. Habits are learned through repetition. Once something is learned by the mind and body, they become hard to overcome. Please practice good technique, lighting, and design. And use Photoshop for ‘making the image’ instead of ‘fixing mistakes’.

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition & Shape: Crop in the camera S hape, Ratio, & Proportion: Compact images have a 4:3 ratio (shape). And that means 4 parts wide to 3 parts tall. DSLR images have a 3:2 ratio, a much wider shape. It means 3 parts wide to 2 parts tall. Ratio is the technical term. But both shape and proportion means similar things… DSLR 3:2 shape 3:2 shape 3 parts 2 parts Compact Digital 4:3 shape 4:3 shape 4 parts 3 parts

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition & Shape: Crop in the camera 35 mm Film Size/Shape: Reference Both the Compact & DSLR image sizes are much smaller than the 35mm film. Compact image size is about 85% smaller and DSLR is about 40% smaller than the 35mm frame size. That translates to both advantages and disadvantages. And we will be getting into that topic area discussion later in the quarter…

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition & Shape: Crop in the camera I mage Shape & Frame: Whether compact (4:3) or DSLR wide (3:2) shapes, the magic needs to happen within a rectangular shape. And creating composition is about working or not working within that rectangular frame.

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition & Shape: Crop in the camera C omposition 101: Introduction Many digitals have the 1/3-grid built in as one of the Display options. And it can be used as a crude form of organizing a composition based on A, B, C, or D focal-point placement. Or, there is also the Optical Center focal point placement idea where ‘X’ marks the optical center. Both are valid forms of constructing an image. But they are somewhat crude forms. ABABCDCDABABCDCD X

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition and Shape: Crop in the camera M ore Advanced: 115 Start by accepting the rectangular border as your canvas. Then take advantage of the shape. Use shapes within the canvas to create movement. Example - Use a triangle, an often used compositional motif in the classical pieta (Virgin and Child) paintings.

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition and Shape: Crop in the camera V ariations: Shift, flip, and rotate Shift the triangle off center to either side. Simply flip it for a completely different look. Rotate it fully within or partially out of the canvas frame.

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition and Shape: Crop in the camera V ariations: Abstract to real Pretend for a moment that the triangle represents a cat’s face. Hopefully with the addition of the small triangles, it won’t be that hard to imagine. When you’re shooting, do this imagining in reverse. Squint viewing will help to start the abstraction process automatically. Look around you right now for a possible shot and squint-view it. Notice how the scene is slightly blurry which helps to turn the scene into a collection of abstract shapes.

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I Composition and Shape: Crop in the camera S ummary: Compose your image early. Preferably, it should be done before you look through the viewfinder. Leaving only the fine tuning adjustment within the camera frame. See the light quality, direction, and dynamic tonal range of the scene. And determine the subject shape which may be simple like the cat face or complex. Sometimes it’s easier to see the subject shape by looking at the negative space, the background. Play with the subject and negative space shapes until they live together in both harmony and movement.

Teacher: Kenji Tachibana Digital Photography I x End