Composition: Isolating "the Good Stuff"

My uncle Fran Leigh was a commercial photographer in Trenton, New Jersey. His clients were AT&T, Lenox China, and Lawrenceville School, among others. I wish I'd paid more attention to his work as I was growing up, but I just wasn't interested in photography then. When I "discovered" photography in the late 1970s, I remember him saying, "there isn't a photograph that can't be improved by cropping." This was a rather broad statement, and one could argue the point, but it hit home.

I interpret his cropping comment by thinking about what's in the frame. What am I including in the shot, and why? And then, what doesn't need to be there?

Here's an example. I show you my original image of the fluorescent orange fender (bumper) hanging off the side of a complementary blue fishing boat, the fender reflected in the water. I composed the image as a vertical so that I could include the reflection and so the fender would have "drooping room." I purposely didn't include the area above the fender because it was busy and didn't have anything to do with my subject.

However, I think the bottom third of the photo is rather empty (no color, no fender reflection, just ripples) and so maybe if I squarified the image it would be tighter and bolder. I would be filling my frame with just the "good stuff," the side of the boat, the fender, and the immediate reflection. You can see how I've marked up the picture to show you what I think is the "good stuff." And then you see the resulting image.

But what about the dark bit of rust at the far right? What does that have to do with my concept of blue boat, orange fender, and reflection? Nothing! So I cropped even more (still keeping the image a square), and now the photo is more concise and more about what I initially liked about the scene.

What about your own photos? When you take another look at them, ask yourself, "where's the good stuff?" and then see what you can crop out, what you can remove, to focus our attention on exactly what caught your eye to begin with. By analyzing the photos you've already taken, you'll find yourself being more careful about cropping in the viewfinder before you click the shutter, automatically making you a better photographer.

©Carol Leigh, who misses the clever wit and charm, generosity, and photographic skill of her Uncle Fran.

2011 Projects for 2012: Journal

What I Saw/What I Made: Rock Abstract

There are certain beaches here with large bluffs rising above them where, at certain times, under certain light, the rocks glow a beautiful, warm orange color. In these two photos I show you what I saw and then what I made.

The first photo is an overview of the bluff face, rising up from the sand. See the big swath of orange? Moving in closer, I focused on just a little section of that rock face. The bluff is maybe 30 feet high and the orange rock area is around eye level.

My talent — and my downfall — is that I rarely see the "big picture," but I'm good at finding little things to zoom in on. This is an instance where I forced myself to take more of an overview so that you could see what I was seeing. Click the images to see them larger.

©Carol Leigh, who is now trying, for the purpose of this blog and subsequent eBooks, to take overviews

Concrete Texture

I show you here a composition that I don't know if I like or not. I've tried analyzing it this way and that, and I still don't know. Let me talk it out and see what you think.

Chris and I were wandering around a little town in Washington called Concrete. There were some buildings that seemed semi-abandoned, lots of weathering on them, lots of interesting architectural elements. I spotted this door, the downspouts, the remnants of downspouts, and was immediately drawn to it.

What I liked were the colors. There's something about that clear, Santa Fe-ish blue that just sucks me in, as well as the faded, weathered salmon color of the door. I also liked all the abstract lines and angles I was seeing. And then there was the overall texture. So, I knew what I was drawn to, now, how to fill my frame with just that?

Here's where I wish I had an overview of the entire scene to show you, but no, I have just this one composition.

I knew I wanted the downspout on the right. And I knew I wanted to incorporate some of the door. Looking at my resulting photo, I see how I balanced the dark element of the downspout with the dark element on the door. Those two dark "things" echo one another and create eye movement as your attention flickers back and forth between them.

I also liked the repeating forms of the horizontal lines running across the frame, from the horizontal blue element to the blue/salmon lines on the door. Good repetition there. Same with the vertical elements.

In fact, the entire photo is fraught with vertical and horizontal lines, which are broken up by the strong diagonal line of the downspout and the less-strong diagonal line of the door mechanism. Good repetition there.

So, bottom line, what have I created? It's an abstract image of strong, repeating, straight lines. Adding a bit of interest are the two areas of diagonality. I love the lines, I love the colors, I love the movement. I just don't think there's enough content, however, for this love affair to last. Like a few old boyfriends I've had, the attraction is immediate and exciting, but long-term? It's just not a solid, lasting relationship.

©Carol Leigh, wishing you a few fun-but-fleeting connections with your pictures, but even more longer-term, solid relationships

It's a New Day . . .

Summer Light and Shadow

Right now, here in the northern hemisphere it's full-blown summer, which usually means lots of sunshine, lots of light, and lots of shadows. Got shutters? Got mini-blinds? Look at how early morning or late afternoon light pours in through the windows, the blinds/shutters creating dramatic shadows. When you see that light, those shadows, find SOMEthing, ANYthing to put in that light.

Your light may be fleeting, so you'll have to act fast. Here you see two photos I took in my kitchen a couple of years ago. I quickly hung a straw hat on a cabinet knob to create a summer-esque photo. And then opened another cupboard just to see what was there that I could use as a subject in the sunlight. A bag of coffee and a canister in the back was what I could find and shoot before the sun dipped behind the offshore fogbank and was gone.

If I could paint, the subject matter of a straw hat and bright, stripey light/shadow would be a wonderful composition to attempt.

Ordinary subjects in extraordinary light. That's what we're looking for!

©Carol Leigh, always happy to see light here on the Oregon coast

The Right Stuff . . .