
How to Pre-Visualize in the Field for Better Landscape Compositions
I create my landscape photography with film and digital technical cameras and received a request to share how I compose in the landscape with the gear I use.
I create my landscape photography with film and digital technical cameras and received a request to share how I compose in the landscape with the gear I use.
What do you think are the two least used, and probably most important, pieces of your photography gear? I’ll give you a hint: you can’t buy them at a camera store.
One of the most effective ways to fill a frame with information, particularly in street photography, is to layer elements of your composition, either in two dimensions along the X and Y axis or in three with the Z axis.
After shooting cities all around the globe for the past 15 years, I managed to publish seven coffee table books featuring cities like Paris, Venice, Los Angeles, and New York. I learned the hard way when was the best time to shoot and want to save you the time and effort so you can make the best photos of cityscapes possible.
I can't begin to tell you how many times I've lost a shot because I didn't think through the basics well enough. I would of course have my composition and exposure settings dialed in and with that determined, you would think that I have what I needed to get the shot. But, in some cases, that just isn’t enough.
Negative space in photography, design, sculpture, or any other creative pursuit is equally as important as is positive space in overall composition.
Square format simplifies shooting because you never have to rotate the camera. You can edit the image to any format you like.
I recently discussed the rule of thirds and leading lines in photography. In this article, I'll cover symmetry and include some of my own symmetry photography examples to illustrate this.
Learn photography rules, learn to apply them, learn their advantages and limitations. Finally, learn to bend them, break them and explore beyond them.
Leading lines in photography are existing lines within the frame of a photograph which the photographer has deliberately aligned/arranged (prior to taking the photo) by adjusting their composition either shifting their body or camera. It should result in lines which “lead” to the subject, increasing the focus of the viewer, allowing for a more enjoyable viewing experience.
Photography has been with me for as long as I can remember. In my childhood, my father had an old Zorki camera, the Russian Leica II clone, and he had a habit of developing films from our trips in the darkroom. That place with unfamiliar smells and substances had a unique charm for me.
Now and then, it just so happens that I find a show or movie that visually amazes me. I was blown away by the colors of Grand Hotel Budapest and by the cinematography of Birdman. The hit Netflix series The Queen's Gambit is one of those surprises that I have discovered recently.
Successful landscape photographers usually mix interesting skies and compelling foregrounds. But what if the sky is totally clear and the sun is harsh and unflattering? In this 13-minute video, Michael Shainblum shows how he makes the best of this kind of situation.
Photographer and YouTuber Mark Denny has created an on-location landscape workflow that allows him to repeatedly create the best images when shooting. In this 14-minute video, he breaks down his five easy-to-remember steps that you can replicate.
If you're interested in photographing landscapes, you should know there are multiple ways to make your images more interesting – some that only require a bit of imagination. In this 26-minute video, Canadian film photographer Kyle McDougall covers four techniques he uses to make his landscape images better.
Photographer Skander Khlif traveled to the North African country of Tunisia this past summer and spent days traveling along the coast. Along the way, he turned his lens on the joy of kids there growing up next to the sea and playing in the water as a way of life.
If you're just getting started in photography and want to build upon a solid foundation, here's a helpful 9-minute video by the popular YouTube channel Mango Street that covers 5 basic photography techniques for beginners.
Photographers can learn a lot about composition and color theory from great cinematography. Case in point: in this video, filmmaker Sareesh Sudhakaran of Wolfcrow explains how great movies will often use the 'Three Color Rule' to capture and keep a viewer's attention.
The winners of the 2nd annual Minimalist Photography Awards were announced just last week, and if you're looking for proof that "less is more" when it comes to photography... you've come to the right place. Many of the winners are masterful examples of simplicity in composition.
What makes a great landscape photo, great? Some appreciate an image for its technical prowess or adhering to certain rules. It might be focused correctly and sharp throughout the scene. It could be well-exposed, offering wide dynamic range. Some like to see leading lines or the rule of thirds.
Cinematography and photo nerds rejoice: One Perfect Shot—the popular Twitter account that distills movies down into a single 'perfect' frame—is being adapted into a docuseries for the streaming service HBO Max that promises to be something pretty special.
Landscape photographer and YouTuber Mads Peter Iversen is back with a short list of helpful tips that can help you break the mold and improve your landscape photography. These tips will be particularly helpful for beginners who feel their work is already growing stale.
If you have been shooting streets for some time or have been following the genre, you might have already thought about some of the things that I am going to talk about below. Street photography is a very volatile genre by virtue of the volatility of the decisive moments.
I don't normally rant, but this has been bothering me for quite some time. I try not to worry about what gets written on the Internet because I believe everyone is entitled to their own opinions and it's healthy to have many different opinions for others to pick and choose what works for them. Let's face it, there is no hard and fast rule that photographers must abide by.
It’s very easy to get stuck in grooves in photography, to find something that makes sense or comes from a position of authority; once habits are formed around ideas about genre, style, or technique, it can be very difficult to break out of those constraints.
When it comes to landscape photography, what's most important: light or composition? This question has been making the rounds in some online communities recently, so Australian photographer Andrew Marr decided to tackle the subject and share his take on how to best balance these two key elements.
Composition doesn't make a candid, but a good composition can enhance it. It can amplify what you feel about the subject matter or invoke a reaction all on its own. Today I’m going to share with you 5 tips on composition to enhance your candids.
There is a wealth of information on the internet about composition—endless blog posts about visual rules, geometric concepts, and photos with all kinds of lines and shapes drawn over them to the prove the point. But all of this information focuses on the "what" of composition rather than the "why." A photographer must stop and ask themselves: "why even bother following visual rules?"
In this 12.5-minute video and article, I'll share 7 of the composition tricks that I use in the field all the time. First of all, let me say that composition is difficult. It is, without a doubt, the hardest part of photography. But there are some things that you can be doing in the field that can help.
One of the most unintentionally useful influences on my photography has turned out to be the time I’ve spent playing computer games. Some photographers use cinema as a learning tool to observe the way cinematographers and DOP’s use their cameras to capture a scene. This can be a great source of inspiration, but I think it can lead to some photographers heading out and seeking to recreate shots or aesthetic styles (color palette, depth of field, grain, etc) rather than capturing anything unique for them.