Suggestions for a Composition primer

Michel Hardy-Vallée

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I second Poore's work, "Composition in Art" is a composition primer, available cheaply from Dover pubs. Sometimes I find the explanations rather obscure, but his book gives you the ability to analyze composition. He doesn't really take the "composition rules" road, rather he shows you how painters organize their work according to ideas like balance, line, color, shadow/light, etc. Once you can analyze a scene according to such tools (or similar ones, every artist have their own way of decomposing a scene), then you have a much stronger power in your hand.

Once you pored through Poore, go pick up a few painting books and a few photography books and try to see if you can reverse-engineer the way in which they are composed. You will be surprised to find geometrical regularities, equal areas of shadows and light, and so on.

The epiphanic moment about composition for me was when I realized that the pictorial space and the picture plane can be understood distinctively, so that you can build relationships between the two. For example, a vague shadow pattern that is happening in depth in a photo (3D), actually creates a perfectly geometrical manner on the picture plane (2D).

For me, it happened when I looked at the Polaroids series of Walker Evans. I was able to "get" seemingly banal pictures by understanding their composition. Eggleston does that to me too.
 

timbo10ca

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You might find "Image: Designing Effective Pictures" by Michael Freeman useful. I got it on recomendation by somebody a while back, and am just starting it now. It's from the Amphoto workshop series, and has a number of projects throughout it. I just finished "Learning To See Creatively" by Bryan Peterson. Also basic, but helps to stimulate thought on composition- some good ideas. As others have said (as do these books), painters are good people to look to.

Tim
 

Videbaek

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Finally, a thread that tackles one of the most important things! All academic theories of photographic composition come directly, with a few elaborations, from theories of painterly composition. Forget about photography when learning about composition, it is a very recently invented tool. Go to the painters and draughtsmen who have been working since man first began to walk upright. For an understanding of picture-making in general it is wise to start with the greatest -- da Vinci's treatise on painting, unfortunately scattered through his writings and cluttered with his inimitable asides, but giving a unique understanding of seeing and perceiving from the hand of the greatest draughtsman who ever lived. Many of his insights cannot be understood until you have achieved a certain "serenity of seeing" that is very much at odds with modern life. One always falls well short when one deals with da Vinci.

Study the paintings of the Masters in all their glory, absorb their theories when they expressed them (they often did), there is nothing that a reasonably well-educated person cannot understand. Art history is largely irrelevant in this pursuit, since it deals primarily with tracking content -- inspiration and influences from the historical perspective -- with very little to say about how pictures were made, the materials and techniques involved.

Above all, become at least an adequate draughtsman as someone has already expressed. Forget photography. Spend a year in a life drawing class with a good teacher and pleasant fellow students. Expose yourself to the human figure and a large, empty sheet of paper. Start seeing in earnest. It is no coincidence that many of the greatest photographers knew how to draw rather well.
 

Morca007

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What coincidence! I was just reading through this thread, when I noticed the Portland Art Museum is having a show focusing on Rembrandt and the Dutch masters!
I'm going to go in tomorrow.
 

timparkin

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I learnt a lot about composition by looking at photographs I didn't like and working out why.. It's not only targetting the positives, it's avoiding the negatives
 

wayne naughton

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amen to the both of you..... i am a great fan of the 'new objective' art movement where painting and photography met pretty much on equal terms for a brief period...spend some time with the paintings of Dix, Schlicter, Grosz et al, and i promise you, your photography will never be the same. associated photographers include the immortal August Sander, Karl Blossfeldt and Albert Renger-Patzsch.

wayne
 

jeroldharter

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I think that John Shaw's photographs in his photo books are useful to look at. Donald Miller's photos on the gallery are instructive. Inernet galleries of famous photographers are helpful. I like all the Ansel Adams books. Also, zipping through the APUG galleries allows you to quickly see what catches your eye and what does not. Then slow down and study why that is so.

Of course, some of this just depends on what you like. For example some people seem really excited about muddy platinum prints or random pinhole camera shots. Likewise ULF contact prints with minimal depth of field and bokeh. To each his own but if you study what you don't like you can learn also.
 

PhotoHistorian

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Any rules of composition no matter where one finds them (books, museums, workshops etc.) are made to be broken. My mentors in photography all instructed me to just "really" look at the world around me. If it looks good to one's eye, it is worth recording on film. Save your money on books and workshops and just shoot a lot. Your compositional "eye" will develop its own style.

Walker
 
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Les McLean

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I'm with PhotoHistorian on this subject. Composition is a very subjective issue, look at the number of difference suggestions and recommendations from this short thread. In my early days I was given similar advice to what PhotoHistorian received and I have used it ever since. When I'm asked about composition when I teach workshops I simply tell photographers to go out and make photographs and arrange the elements where they feel comfortable with them and regardless of where they are placed make the exposure.

I also suggest that we should look at the use of light and how it affects the subject we are photographing. In this respect I have looked at many photographers and painters work, my favorites are Rhembrandt and the impressionist artists such as Turner.
 

mark

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I like looking at paintings and other photographs but I found that if I studied them I started to think like them. I did not like the feeling. Here is what a painter/sculptor I know told me.

If something catches your eye, stop and figure out what about it caught you. It was not just the color, or the texture. You saw the painting/photograph at the time it caught your eye. Once you figure out what caught your eye you are well on your way to creating your own stuff.

I have been doing this ever since. Haven't made it yet, but it keeps me thinking about me and how I see.

I have read Freeman Patterson's books and love his composition. Yeah, he prints with ink but so what, the images rock. If you need to read something I recommend his instructional series.
 

patrickjames

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Patrick's rule of composition-

If it looks good it is good.

Patrick
 

Bill Mitchell

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I think that I've learned as much about composition in the darkroom as under the darkcloth. Not just "how to crop" but "if I'd only gotten a little more (or a little less) of that "whatever it is" in the frame to balance the picture. That sort of thing.
 

Bob Carnie

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(Think about how to put someting into empty space.)

I like this, negative space surrounding a main interest point is very important to me , I think by looking at the edges inward and considering image placement to its surroundings is critical. A blank white sky in itself can create a beautiful form surrounding a bag of potatoes.
A finely crafted photograph always has good negative/secondary space.

 

TheFlyingCamera

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Another interesting art-historical exercise to tackle is to look at original "great masters" paintings and then examine their copies. It is interesting to see how the copies evolve over time, and the way they diverge from the originals. Sometimes the copies end up becoming masterworks in their own right, but oftentimes they're just second, third or even fourth-tier period works. Observe the differences and why the lesser copies are lesser- not just in terms of technical paint application skill, but the changes in gesture, pose, and expression of the subject. It is amazing how much a little quirk in the positioning of something simple like a hand, or a shadow cast by a tree or rock or cloud can totally alter the mood of an image.
 

panastasia

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Bob Carnie said:
(Think about how to put someting into empty space.)

I like this, negative space....
A finely crafted photograph always has good negative/secondary space.
Click to expand...

I think Bob has it!
Creative composition comes out of our right brain (when we use that side) when judging spacial relationships in three dimensions. Left brain, when we numerically calculate size, or something measured. Negative space is everything in between what we look at and when we see in that way we start to compose. Where are the rules for that?

We just do it -
just like birds fly (they don't follow rules, they just do it).
 

bjorke

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It's just like hockey. Don't look at the goalie, look at the empty spaces around him.

(And of course: you miss all the shots you don't take)
 

roteague

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"Rules" is really a bad description of the process, a better term would be guidelines.

However, the best practice is to follow the guidelines as much as possible - and I don't mean only the "Rule of Thirds". The "Rule of Thirds" is only one of the guidelines of good composition. The reason I say it is good idea, is because the guidelines are based in nature and the world around us. Don't believe me? Just look at the petals of a flower. You will see the petals are arranged according to the Golden Mean (another "rule" of composition overlooked). Most ancient architecture of the Greek and Roman worlds follow these "guidelines" as well.

I have some websites at home that goes into these other guidelines in more detail. I'll try to find them when I get home.

I'm not saying that one needs to be a slave to a set of rules, simply pointing out that there are certain guidelines that are based upon the natural world, and based upon western though.

FWIW
 

Bob Carnie

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When I played hockey , I just tried to drive the puck through the silly bugger.
*I hate goalies*
bjorke said:
It's just like hockey. Don't look at the goalie, look at the empty spaces around him.

(And of course: you miss all the shots you don't take)
Click to expand...
 

Michel Hardy-Vallée

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TheFlyingCamera said:
Another interesting art-historical exercise to tackle is to look at original "great masters" paintings and then examine their copies. It is interesting to see how the copies evolve over time, and the way they diverge from the originals.
Click to expand...

My favorite series:

Giorgione's Sleeping Venus:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7b/Venus_dormida.jpg

Titian's Venus of Urbino
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tizian_102.jpg

Manet's Olympia
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6a/Manet,_Edouard_-_Olympia,_1863.jpg

The aristocratic, the bourgeois, and the popular all united by the same love of reclining nudes. Although if someone makes a "degeneration" argument, he's dismissed from class immediately!
 

wheelygirl

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Howdy everyone
!!
Its amazing to me how certain things come up and slap me silly!! What I'm talking about is how, for about a couple of weeks, now, since I am unable to venture outdoors to take photos, [summer heat wears me out hugely] I got a few books, from my public library, on learning how to draw. As I've going along in these books, it occurred to me--gee, this may help with certain aspects my photography!! One of these books, I wound-up buying the newest edition, "Drawing on the Right-Side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards, I feel will benefit me the most, as well as Bryon Peterson's "Learning to See Creatively" [it was cool to read the recommendation of this book, earlier in the thread!!]
My best advice to George is:go ye therefore, and have fun, with ye camera!!!
 

Thorney

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As a Vancouverite, I love goalies!

I heartily recommend that you don't worry too much about composition especially at the time of photographing. You will find that you try too much to compose well and the results will be forced.

I went to art school and majored in photography without any formal composition training - likely for the above reason. What is really helpful is to look at your past work and notice things you do as a pattern - what works and what doesn't work. You'll find that you compose best when it is intuitive - like Ebby Calvin 'Nuke' Laloosh breathing through his eyelids in Bull Durham.

I also think that changing formats can help. Shoot a mix of handheld and tripod-bound cameras. Look over all your contact sheets some evening and really see what works best. View cameras can really help, but so can handheld cameras.

Finally, learn from the masters - buy books of John Sexton, Edward Weston, and others before wasting money on 'theory of composition' books.

My 2 cents worth eh?

Thorney
 

Bandicoot

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I wholeheartedly second the advice to look at paintings, and at photographs - one's own as well as others' - as much as possible. (I also second the recommendation of "Drawing on the Right-Side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards.)

Look at pictures to see how the eye is led through the frame from point to point, what makes it rest in any one place, what makes it feel slowed down or makes it restless. Graphic design - packaging particularly - can also be a good field to look at for these things.

In terms of balancing masses and colours, I often recommend looking at a good book on flower arranging.

Look at your own work to see which pictures you like and which you either don't like, or simply 'pass over' as not holding your attention - the latter are probably the best exemplars of 'bad' composition (if there is such a thing).

Thorney said:
I heartily recommend that you don't worry too much about composition especially at the time of photographing. You will find that you try too much to compose well and the results will be forced.
Click to expand...

I think the goal is to get the the point where any compositional techniques are wholly internalised: one doesn't think about them when shooting, simply framing what 'looks right'. However, reviewing one's own work and examining that of others helps a lot with getting the 'eye' in the first place. The point is not to copy what works for other artists but to learn what does and doesn't excite you, and then file that away in the very back of the brain where it begins to form a set of internalised guidelines that direct your eye when you come to make the picture. I agree that obsessing about 'rules' in the conscious mind when photographing is almost always a handicap, but I think that for many it is a necessary stage to pass through along the road to getting one's eye fully developed and one's sense of composition fully internalised into the unconscious mind.

The one time I do sometimes find myself consciously drawing on the 'rules' when photographing is that situation when I find something and feel that I know there is a good picture in there somewhere, but I can't find it. Then I may apply the 'rules' as a series of ways of looking at the scene, and that process may (or may not) help me find the picture that I felt was hiding from me.

Of course there are lots of books explicitly on composition, and reviewing these as part of the process of looking at lots of pictures can be a help in understanding why certain compositions 'work'. The one I have been most impressed by, and most recommend to students, is "Photo Composition" by Ulf Sjostedt (don't be put off by the cover picture, which is the least good one in the whole book!)


Peter
 
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jovo

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As I don't know how you as an individual learn best, it would be wise to examine all the advice given above and choose what seems most like the way with which you're comfortable. If you're a very verbal person, and learn well through explanation, then a text would be a good starting point. If you're intuitive, and particularly visual, then just looking at lots of well made work will be helpful. If you learn best by doing, then that's the tack to take. But, since most people employ a synthesis of all those modes, exploring them all, at least to some degree, is probably a good idea. But you need to either be able to articulate, or at least 'sense' the 'rules' before you can break them, and have a clue why you're doing so. Otherwise, you will flail about wildly for far longer than you should and pretty much resemble me as a tennis player; now and then I do something brilliant, but haven't a clue how to do it again, and again. Lessons (from whatever source), constant practice, and the discipline to follow the process through to the end (including ciritiques by people you respect) are the only reliable ways I can think of to move in the direction of mastery.
 

panastasia

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Wheelygirl,

It might interest you to know, if you don't already, that Betty Edwards can also teach us about colors and how they work in a visual sense. You may already know that, or have her book on that subject.

Regards,
Paul
 
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