1. composition

2. WHAT IS COMPOSITION? A pleasing arrangement of visual elements in an image A way to draw the viewer’s eye to the elements of an image that are of most importance.

3. Composition The key is to remember that in the same way as a chef rarely uses all of the ingredients at their disposal in any dish – that a photographer rarely uses all of the ingredients if composition in the making of an image.’ They are not rules…just things to consider when setting up a shot.

4. Composition What do you choose to include in an image, and what do you leave out? What you choose to include should in some way add meaning to the image. If an element does not add any meaning to an image, or is distracting, then you should find a way to compose the image so as to eliminate in from the image.

5. Simplicity Keeping photos simple is a great way of making sure that the viewer will know what your photo is about. cosmic rough riders:to be someone by Lali Masriera Untitled by sympathy

6. Simplicity Look for uncomplicated backgrounds and try to focus on keeping objects out of the picture that may draw attention away from your subject. Tres son multitud... by Miguel Angel

7. Avoid Busy Backgrounds

8. Using the natural frame – Simplifying in Camera

10. Fill the Frame Filling the frame makes it a lot more appealing and clearly shows what you are trying to display.

11. Depth of Field is a Part of Composition

12. Depth of Field Depth of Field can be as a tool in your composition. It can be used to eliminate a busy background and draw attention to the subject.

13. LINES Lines help lead the viewer to the subject of your photo by drawing the eye through the picture.

14. Line Ansel Adams, Road, Nevada Desert

15. Line Tom Grill

16. Line Lines can be a subject all by themselves

17. Line Including pathways, roads, bends, and doors The viewer will have a natural curiosity for their eye to travel through the photograph.

18. Where are the lines?

19. SHAPE City Shapes, Heather McFarland

20. Shape Edward Weston…what do you see?

21. Shape

24. TEXTURE

25. Texture Comes mostly with close-up photography, organic or urban.

26. Texture

28. Add interest by mixing textures

29. Texture

31. Nick Brandt Textural Photographer, involved in MJ videos, takes photographs of wildlife in Africa. Photos are taken in the wild but look like they were shot in a studio. Observe the textures.

36. REPETITION

40. Repetition: Chris Jordan Photographs capture American Mass Consumerism? (Everything we throw away!) Repetition enforces this concept

41. Phones

42. Circuit boards

43. Bullet casings

44. Oil drums

45. cars

46. CONTRAST – the arrangement of opposite elements to grab the viewers attention. using color and value

47. contrast

52. Contrast in visual relationship Rosamond Purcell Elephant bird and broad-tailed humming bird eggs

53. contrast

54. Contrast in subject matter Simon Norfolk Former Teahouse at the Afghan Exhibition of Economic and Social Achievements, 2001 Balloons were banned during the Taliban reign

55. FRAMING AND SUBJECT PLACEMENT How you choose to divide your frame and where you choose to place your subject can have and impact on not only the strength of your composition, but also on the meaning of your photograph. Equal distribution of visual weight creates balance symmetrically or asymmetrically.

56. Symmetry Depending upon the scene, symmetry can lead to a striking image with a good point of interest…without it, it can be a bit predictable.

57. Asymmetry

58. Rule of thirds We tend to put our subject in the center of the frame, but it is not always the most interesting composition. If we put our subject off center, we can include other elements in our photo, and made the image more interesting. Where should I put my subject? Imagine that there is a tic tac toe board on your image. The most interesting places to put your subject are on the places where the lines intersect.

62. Rule of thirds

64. Subject at edge of frame As opposed to filling the frame…

65. Photos by Arnold Newman

66. Subject at edge of frame

67. Achieving balance with Geometry

68. Achieving balance with geometry By positioning key aspects of your image on points of a geometric shape you can help create a balanced composition. Perhaps the most common and easiest way to do this is to use a triangle shape…

71. FRAME WITHIN A FRAME Do NOT take this so literally!

76. Informative Internal Framing Choosing what you frame your subject with can impart meaning into your photograph.

77. Informative internal framing In this image, the family is internally framed by the door of the car. This serves not only as a visual compositional element, but also serves to provide emotional impact.

78. What do we know about this person?

80. Lewis Hine, building skyscrapers in NYC

82. REFLECTIONS

89. CAMERA ANGLE Make people look at things in a way they are not used to…

90. Look up instead of down

92. Looking down allows you to learn more about the subject in this photo…

95. Forced perspective Playing with scale to create an optical illusion

108. What elements of composition are used in this photograph?

109. HOW DO I ACHIEVE GOOD COMPOSITION? Work the same object multiple different ways. Look for line, shape, texture, angle, framing, etc in the same object. If 50 people photographed the same object, you would have 50 different photos, because everyone sees the world differently.