Photo Composition

[100219]

I spend a lot of time at the beach with my young daughter and while we were there this weekend she was enjoying herself as normal and i noticed her footprint had impacted in the sand right next to one of mine. While this isn’t neccessarily staged, the representation is is very real. Not only does this photo represent our relationship but also our combined love and passion for the beach.

Hope you like it.

[Duncan Rawlinson]

Hi Paul,

Honestly this is not exactly what this assignment is about. I think you should re-shoot this assignment and put more energy into it. This photograph is certainly not your best…

Here are some examples of other student’s work on this assignment recently that you can use for inspiration.

Example 1

Example 2

Remember the assignment reads like this:

This lesson is about finding a way to reproduce something you imagine in your mind onto your camera’s film or CCD chip. It could be a scene from a day dream or just something you think up on the spot. Try to use your imagination to ensure it’s as dramatic as possible. You have complete creative control of this photograph. You’re not waiting for a decisive moment, and you can place anyone or anything in any position you wish. Use your imagination and have fun. Think about costumes, dramatic lighting, contradicting items, dark gloomy themes, bright, overexposed themes.

If you want me to critique this particular photo I will but I’d really like it if you stepped it up a notch for this assignment.

Thanks and hopefully you understand the goal is to make you a better photographer not to make you do work for the sake of it!

Thanks!

[100219]

Having read this assignment again, you are right and I certainly didn’t put enough thought into the shot.
I have resubmitted with another idea in mind and hope this does meet the criteria. It was a decision made on the spot but hopefully the level of creativity is sufficient.

[Duncan Rawlinson]

Hey Paul!

Yeah this is more like it!!! I like the idea.

It reminded me of this:

[attachment=1:28z8z6zl]evolution.jpg[/attachment:28z8z6zl]

Here are some ways to improve this image:

[attachment=0:28z8z6zl]evolution-of-family.jpg[/attachment:28z8z6zl]

1: Faces
Faces are critical! If you can, never block people’s faces in a photograph. They are often the most critical element of a photo. Never have things blocking critical elements in your frame unless you’re doing so for a creative reason. Like intentionally hiding something like this:

Hide-and-go-seek by AForestFrolic, on Flickr

2: Exposure
Your camera is trying to expose for the entire frame. Give the dark darks and the white hot highlights it did a pretty decent job. Beware of shooting in situations like this. It’s impossible to expose properly when there is a very large dynamic range like this. (darks are very dark and highlights are very bright)

3. Time of Day
I didn’t put a 3 on the photo because I’m referring to the time of day and it goes hand in hand with 2. If you chose a different time of day to shoot this your photo would look nicer. Such as realitvely early in the morning or late in the day. This is the golden hour and you should really try to shoot then!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_hour_%28photography%29

4: Alignment
In a fun photograph like this sometimes the alignment of your elements (in this case people) can get a little off. Try to space things out so there is a nice flow to the image. Meaning, make sure there are even spacing. Otherwise it feels a bit disjointed.

Finally, I’m not sure what the playground environment adds to the frame. It may have be cleaner if this was done against a simple backdrop or just in a grassy field. Check out the images below for a cleaner looking version of this idea…

Overall this is a much better image and I hope you had fun with this.

To take this kind of photograph to the next level you need to have a freakish attention to detail. Your images will stand apart when you do that. For example take a look at these incredible works of art:
http://irinawerning.com/back-to-the-fut/back-to-the-future/

It’s the attention to detail that makes them!

Here are a couple other examples of this idea. Note there is nothing blocking the main elements in the frame and there is nothing distracting from the main idea of the shot.

Evolution of Readers by jblyberg, on Flickr

25 Years of Apple Mouse Evolution by raneko, on Flickr

See you on the next assignment Paul.

Don’t forget, to take it to the next level, attention to detail is key!

Good work.

[Author]

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