Do you go in for square comps?

[jtk]

I guess thats why they call horizontal Landscape, you are generally following the lines of the horizon, unless your doing a tree, stream, waterfall, building etc.where you can utilize vertical. Vertical landscape is tricky, you need to brake it up so the horizon is less important, even tricker if the horizon is flat. I often try but seldom succeed. Do you have any examples, that dont follow up and down lines?
A Holga shot, but kinda illustrates what I mean.
View attachment 216968

Awty, many of my photos are shot vertical format rather than horizontal. In fact, shooting 35 and digital I think I usually first view the situation with camera held vertically. You're right about "tricky"... I find the horizons in landscape photos tiresome because they so often offer little more than clouds. In general it's situations where the foreground and middle field that first catch my eye, tho I do make plenty of horizontal photos. My Media includes examples of both.

 

[jtk]

http://lenscratch.com/2019/02/barbara-levine-people-kissing-a-century-of-photographs/

 

[awty]

Awty, many of my photos are shot vertical format rather than horizontal. In fact, shooting 35 and digital I think I usually first view the situation with camera held vertically. You're right about "tricky"... I find the horizons in landscape photos tiresome because they so often offer little more than clouds. In general it's situations where the foreground and middle field that first catch my eye, tho I do make plenty of horizontal photos. My Media includes examples of both.

Thanks, always intrigued by composition and what you can do with it beyond the basics, seems to be too "subjective" for most people I talk with. I personally like different view points and to be challenged. 35mm I do the least amount of vertical. Large format I do about 60/40. As for square format I love the way F. Woodman worked it as well as a few others, difficult medium.

 

[jtk]

Out of curiosity, do we think Photrio's Media provides an answer to the OT or do we just see the results of group habits?

 

[ME Super]

My parents shot most of the photos they have of my childhood with a Kodak Instamatic camera. Square pictures definitely have a nostalgia feel to them for me, personally. So I was super ecstatic to get a 6x6 camera to have square pictures again! Not that I couldn't have cropped 35mm photos to square, I absolutely could have.

The Stereo Realist shoots stereo pairs of images, in which each image is almost square too - something like 23mm wide by 24mm high.

So, why square? For some, like me, it's pure nostalgia!

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

We shoot more horizontally because the eye see more that way than vertically. Having said that, some pictures lend themselves to vertical format. Like Paul said, trees, waterfalls, people, etc. Also, pros who shoot for magazines often shoot the same scene both horizontally and vertically. If they want to sell a cover shot, it's got to be vertical.

 

[jtk]

'"]We shoot more horizontally because the eye see more that way than vertically. Having said that....[/QUOTE]

That is an amusingly false truism. Our eyes don't see that way. They aren't mere lenses, fixed in camera-like faces. They always scan. Our immediate field of vision is tremendous, both up and down, even when we're peering through a camera. We are not physically capable of seeing in any particular format.
.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

'"]We shoot more horizontally because the eye see more that way than vertically. Having said that....

That is an amusingly false truism. Our eyes don't see that way. They aren't mere lenses, fixed in camera-like faces. They always scan. Our immediate field of vision is tremendous, both up and down, even when we're peering through a camera. We are not physically capable of seeing in any particular format.
.[/QUOTE]
Ask a child to draw a picture of the landscape and it probably will be in horizontal format. Our brains "see" more from left to right then top to bottom. While it's true our eyes scan, the brain composes and sees more horizontally then vertically. Artists, TV manufacturers and Hollywood figured that out years ago.

 

[jtk]

That is an amusingly false truism. Our eyes don't see that way. They aren't mere lenses, fixed in camera-like faces. They always scan. Our immediate field of vision is tremendous, both up and down, even when we're peering through a camera. We are not physically capable of seeing in any particular format.
.

Ask a child to draw a picture of the landscape and it probably will be in horizontal format. Our brains "see" more from left to right then top to bottom. While it's true our eyes scan, the brain composes and sees more horizontally then vertically. Artists, TV manufacturers and Hollywood figured that out years ago.[/QUOTE]

Habit. Lockstep. Boring. Those examples have little relation to photo, which is it's own creature. Ignorance of physiology and perception itself calls for education.

Why preach horizontal as if it's a virtue?

 

[bunip]

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Field_of_view.svg#/media/File:Field_of_view.svg

 

[jtk]

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Field_of_view.svg#/media/File:Field_of_view.svg

The absurdity of that is stunning. It ignores the fact that heads turn, something well known to people who (unlike me) burden themselves with "no-line" bifocals, which require that head-turning just to observe the world straight ahead down the road.

 

[Pieter12]

The absurdity of that is stunning. It ignores the fact that heads turn, something well known to people who (unlike me) burden themselves with "no-line" bifocals, which require that head-turning just to observe the world straight ahead down the road.

Eyes are lined up horizontally, the shape of the eyelids is horizontal, heads tend to move more horizontally than vertically.

 

[Paul Ozzello]

Eyes are lined up horizontally, the shape of the eyelids is horizontal, heads tend to move more horizontally than vertically.

Stop feeding the troll...

 

[Pieter12]

Sorry, I'm bored.

 

[jtk]

Eyes are lined up horizontally, the shape of the eyelids is horizontal, heads tend to move more horizontally than vertically.

Eyelid shape and belief that heads "tend" to move one way or the other have nothing to do with the HABIT of shooting horizontally. Eyes look up and down as easily as they look right and left.

 

[Paul Manuell]

Anyway, hopefully getting this thread back on track, here's a square crop from a 645 original but shot with the square version in mind...

 

[Paul Ozzello]

"How can something so round be so square?"

 

[Sirius Glass]

Anyway, hopefully getting this thread back on track, here's a square crop from a 645 original but shot with the square version in mind...
View attachment 217833

Well the format may be square but I am not seeing anything but curves. Do I need my eyes checked?

 

[Arklatexian]

Good idea.

We have not got into much detail about printing yet, something I have not done since the early 1970s. When I said fill up the paper, I did not mean borderless, but rather enlargong the image enough to leave an equal size border on all 4 sides of the 8"x10" print vs. the unequal border on two sides that results when printing the square image on 8"x10" paper.

Here is a question for the square community: Where are the square photographic papers?

As a retiree-on-a-fixed-income, I was somewhat shocked by the price of paper. I would love to have the option to print bigger on 9"x9" paper, rather than paying for 8"x10" where my image size is limited to 7.5"x7.5"

A paper size of 9x9 has about the same square-inch size as 8x10. Leaving a 1/4" border on all four edges of 9x9 paper yields an image size of 8.5x8.5, or 72 sq.inches, compared to 56 sq.in. at 7.5x7.5 on 8x10 paper. When printing square on 8"x10" paper, I am paying for 20 square inches of paper more than I need.

Years ago when I went into a camera store in Germany to buy a frame for an 8x10 print, I learned that 8" x 10" was not a "normal" size paper in Germany at that time. Nor were other "standard" North American paper sizes. Our paper sizes were chosen by our photo paper manufacturers. When I entered into photography we had additional paper sizes which are no longer being made. Have you ever used 14"x 17" paper? Mounted on a 16 x 20 board and framed , it was great. Sooo, if your print looks better cropped to a "non-standard" size, go for it. After all it is the final print that is important, not the camera format, unless, of course, you let the camera and the paper manufacturer tell you what to do and that smacks of regimentation which I thought was frowned upon in photography......Regards!

 

[Arklatexian]

It's always puzzled me why most photographers are locked into horizontal format. Especially strange for landscape photographers who, I would have thought, looked up and down as readily as sideways.

But most of the "how-to-do-it" books say "vertical" is "portrait" and "horizontal" is "scene" and if I don't adhere to those "rules" someone, looking over my shoulder, might think I don't know how to take pictures. That is why my camera makes square negatives. I make the P or H decision in the darkroom and usually work alone.........Regard!

 

[Rob MacKillop]

Those of us who grew up with LP covers are used to viewing square formats. CDs too (remember them?!). Vinyl is back in in a big way in Europe, with more sales than CDs. So, 12" square format is popular again. I often view square format shots as potential LP covers.

 

[jtk]

Just bought a couple of 11X17 clip frames (Michael's) for some 7X12 horizontal format images, cropped from the top on 13X19 paper, leaving large rebate at top and bottom.

Hung a 12X12 (with 1/2" rebate) that was cropped from 13X19, my standard paper for prints hung at home. 100% cotton Hahnemeule papers branded by Canon.

 

[Black Dog]

You can buy Ilford MGIV RC paper in 10 x 10” in the UK. Not sure if any of their other paper is sold in that size though. Even satin RC isn’t available in that size, only the gloss as far as I know.

Maybe buy a roll and then trim the paper to the size you want? That should work out quite good value for money as well.

 

[awty]

Is square better to compose with 1 eye?

I've mostly used waste level view finders for 6x6, but recently been playing with a 6x6 eye level finder. Generally I work from the outside in and am finding it easier and quicker with one eye. Usually with wider format you need move your eye a little to check your corners, but with square its straight on. Wonder if I should use my left or right eye, should experiment to see which is better.

 

[Pieter12]

Is square better to compose with 1 eye?

I've mostly used waste level view finders for 6x6, but recently been playing with a 6x6 eye level finder. Generally I work from the outside in and am finding it easier and quicker with one eye. Usually with wider format you need move your eye a little to check your corners, but with square its straight on. Wonder if I should use my left or right eye, should experiment to see which is better.

Most people use their dominant eye---usually the right eye for right-handed people, either left or right for left-handed. There is a simple test to determine which eye it is. Cut a small hole in a sheet of paper and hold it at arm's length. Using both eyes, center something in that hole--a picture on a wall, for example. The without moving anything close one eye at a time. Whichever eye sees the object as you centered it with both eyes is the dominant eye.