Assignment 8 – Composition

[Justine]

‘Message in a bottle’

I always imagined finding a message in a bottle and wanted to compose a photograph that showed this vision. I have two photographs of this as I could not decide between them. On the one hand I wanted to show my personal favourite of the photographs I took. I changed the colours to black and white to try and portray so kind of ‘old-look’ scenario. The other photograph I wanted to show that I was trying to allow a little chaos into my photographs by not just focussing on the macro elements. I realise that it is not quite organising chaos as it is still rather close up but it is still allowing more of the environment into the photograph…

Hope you like it, thanks

Justine

[Duncan Rawlinson]

Both of these photographs are very beautiful. You’ve done a great job with the composition of both shots. You mentioned that you didn’t “organize chaos”, however I think you have especially with your further back photograph. You have at least 30 feet of depth in that shot. And while it’s not a wide shot, it still shows your ability to simplify and arrange a photographic scene.

Let me begin by pointing out of the highlights of the photographs. For starters, in the color photograph you’ve managed to do to a great job of controlling the color pallet of the shot. You’ve only let us various shades of brown and some white highlights. This has a simplifying effect on the shot and makes it easy to look at and have our eyes wander around.

On a similar point, your black and white photograph has used a great tonal range which is necessary to help make black and white photographs appear less flat and more vibrant and alive.

Secondly, you have used very good objects in your shots and you’ve seemed to naturally organize the shot in a way that your secondary elements (the sand, the water etc) add to the scene of your photograph but your primary object (the bottle) is the obvious main element of the photograph. This is important because the eye is drawn towards the bottle because of the leading lines in the photograph. This gives the eye and are to rest. However, your secondary objects are also worth exploring because they are filled with texture and small details. For example, the sand seems as through it turns into more of a mud in the background. This helps keep the image interesting because your secondary elements are connected visually and stylistically and they also change without making the image look cluttered.

Great work.

[Author]

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