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What is 'Strong Composition"?

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They shouldn't be called "rules" of composition.
They are observations and maxims. They collect common experiences, and provide a useful vocabulary. If you are familiar with their effect, you can either choose to employ them for a particular result, or to flaunt them.
This discussion reminds me of a conversation with a late friend - a wonderful photographer himself, right into his 80s - who related a discussion he had had with a friend of similar vintage who had moved into a senior living facility. He asked her how she liked it. She responded that it was fairly simple: "Just learn the rules, then circumvent them!"
With age comes wisdom. :wink:
 
Vaughn said:
I agree with the first part, but the second part is too limiting (to just eye movement). As 138S mentioned composition is also used to create moods/tension moods -- part of that is eye movement.
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Looking where you want the viewer to look does not confine that process to a single point in the frame. It could be a single point, or it could be a path through the image, or a series of points, or a fluid movement. But it is where I as the photographer want you to look, and how I want you to think about the image. If you're not seeing what I want you to see, then the image is a failure. This also does not preclude your seeing other things that may exist within the frame that I never intended or planned, but you should be able to see what I want at a bare minimum.
 
MattKing said:
They shouldn't be called "rules" of composition.
They are observations and maxims. They collect common experiences, and provide a useful vocabulary. If you are familiar with their effect, you can either choose to employ them for a particular result, or to flaunt them.
This discussion reminds me of a conversation with a late friend - a wonderful photographer himself, right into his 80s - who related a discussion he had had with a friend of similar vintage who had moved into a senior living facility. He asked her how she liked it. She responded that it was fairly simple: "Just learn the rules, then circumvent them!"
With age comes wisdom. :wink:
Click to expand...
To borrow a phrase from Pirates of the Caribbean, "The Pirate Code isn't a set of laws, it's more like guidelines".
 
Vaughn said:
Yuk That's why I know the rules (more or less) but ignore them. The composition has been seriously 'weakened'.

Brad made a point I have been thinking of since this thread started. A 'strong' composition is not necessarily graphic in nature, bold, or strilking.
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Vaughn, I agree totally... carefully following a lot of canonic rules may lead nowhere, or it can deliver a canned look. Many incredible shots simply follow no rule... and composition is way beyond "graphic rules"...


Still let me point that (in my experience) casual viewers appreciate a lot the effect of those classic rules, while the trained eye of an artist may find that those effects are boring.

A bit like with classic musicians... Julia Lezhneva (coloratura mezzo-soprano, Sakhjalin island) will never criticize the simple partitures Adele signs, sporting simple rules in the "composition". Popular music is amazing, but she plays in another league.

IMO in visual arts also we have different targets, not all the public will appreciate the same, and we may simply do what we like. Still many famous painters and photographers (even the greatests) have composed the images to please the general public more than the trained intellectuals.
 
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BradS said:
You’re putting too much emphasis on ‘strong’ - taking it too literally. I think probably the people who mentioned ‘strong composition’ did not mean to imply such overwhelming superiority but rather that something about the composition adds to or improves upon the subject of the photo.
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Taking strong literally would be trying to see it as a measureable force, literal force of which Newton or Einstein might want to discuss.

Looks like we're still on the same side of the fence. Strong implies strength, if applied to an image, that ought to make that image ... stronger ... or isn't it with implied better, hence improved?

Most comments to me fall into the same barrel. What I am saying is only that this is beyond subjective, cannot be discussed objectively, and I brought up Kenna, because his images are from same factory, same assembly line, and could easily be done with PS pre-sets by a truck load, yet are so widely considered impactful (yes, stronger, outspoken compositions), and on further examination, IMO, they are anything but. Yet I don't argue with those who see Kenna as a bloke to follow, or aspire to. I could say same thing about a number of well known names in arts, and I know I would offend their fans. So I won't mention Springsteen, Dion, or Hootie & the Blowfish.
 
Witold said:
Taking strong literally would be trying to see it as a measureable force, literal force of which Newton or Einstein might want to discuss.

Looks like we're still on the same side of the fence. Strong implies strength, if applied to an image, that ought to make that image ... stronger ... or isn't it with implied better, hence improved?

Most comments to me fall into the same barrel. What I am saying is only that this is beyond subjective, cannot be discussed objectively, and I brought up Kenna, because his images are from same factory, same assembly line, and could easily be done with PS pre-sets by a truck load, yet are so widely considered impactful (yes, stronger, outspoken compositions), and on further examination, IMO, they are anything but. Yet I don't argue with those who see Kenna as a bloke to follow, or aspire to. I could say same thing about a number of well known names in arts, and I know I would offend their fans. So I won't mention Springsteen, Dion, or Hootie & the Blowfish.
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Ok, just drop the word strong.
In the visual arts, what is composition?
 
Witold said:
hat I am saying is only that this is beyond subjective, cannot be discussed objectively, and I brought up Kenna, because his images are from same factory, same assembly line, and could easily be done with PS pre-sets by a truck load, yet are so widely considered impactful (yes, stronger, outspoken compositions), and on further examination, IMO, they are anything but.
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I really like Kenna's Holga book.
And when he did much of his most famous work, it was new and unusual. It is the imitations that tend to make it look assembly line now.
 
michael_r said:
It's organization. And of course that doesn't mean organized like necessarily orderly. So maybe "arrangement" is better.
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Amazingly :smile:)) it's more difficult to define "composition" than enumerating the techniques, effects and styles that allow to work it !!

IMO "arrangement" is good, as direct meaning is "putting together"...

The wiki article has to say an indirect definition while having an easy job in describing composition techniques: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Composition_(visual_arts)
 
michael_r said:
Maybe, if there is a message. There doesn't have to be (unless you believe Picasso). I am of the opinion that a work in any visual artform can stand on pure aesthetics.

However, putting an honest, aesthetic idea onto paper, canvas etc. does in a way constitute a communication of sorts, so it can easily be argued there is always a "message" of some kind.

This is a problem with discussions about art. Defining terms is difficult, if not impossible in some cases. What is strong composition? Well, it depends on how you define strong. Ok never mind, what is composition? Some arrangement that supports the message? Perhaps, but what do we mean by message?

You often end up in this vortex of reduction until eventually there isn't much to say except that it is materially subjective.
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I agree. But the aesthetic message could create awe. Great art makes us feel insignificant. There's power in humility.
 
138S said:
Amazingly :smile:)) it's more difficult to define "composition" than enumerating the techniques, effects and styles that allow to work it !!

IMO "arrangement" is good, as direct meaning is "putting together"...

The wiki article has to say an indirect definition while having an easy job in describing composition techniques: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Composition_(visual_arts)
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What makes a pretty girl look pretty or a man handsome? Our brains are wired a certain way. Sure we can point to certain features to support our feelings. Same with art and aesthetics, I believe. Our wired brains made the rules, not the other way around.
 
There are many elements of composition.

I have a gallery on Flickr where I display images created by Flickr users that demonstrate at least one strong element of composition. These images may demonstrate:
  • Picture Elements (such as space, shape, form, texture, lines, color, contrast)
  • Arrangement of Picture Elements (such as repetition, density, variety, centered/off-centered, emphasis, visual flow, layering, transition, juxtaposition, opposition, balance, counter balance)
  • Perspective
  • Mood
  • Impact
  • Subject matter/Content
  • Framing and Orientation
https://flic.kr/y/3vsTxQp
 
It is great to find inspiration from the words of a Pirates of the Caribbean character patterned after Keith Richards.
But please, can we agree, that we don't want to hear from anyone singing like Keith Richards! :tongue:
 
TheFlyingCamera said:
Looking where you want the viewer to look does not confine that process to a single point in the frame. It could be a single point, or it could be a path through the image, or a series of points, or a fluid movement. But it is where I as the photographer want you to look, and how I want you to think about the image. If you're not seeing what I want you to see, then the image is a failure. This also does not preclude your seeing other things that may exist within the frame that I never intended or planned, but you should be able to see what I want at a bare minimum.
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My point, poorly stated, is that composition is far more than eye-movement. For example, the placement of soft-rounded forms amongst hard angular forms -- how they are placed relative to one another can create tension. Placing a point of attention close to an edge can create tension beyond just eye movement.

Get into color photography, and one has the emotional weight as well as the interactions of colors as part of the composition.
 

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michael_r said:
“Now to consult the rules of composition before making a picture is a little like consulting the law of gravitation before going for a walk. Such rules and laws are deduced from the accomplished fact; they are the products of reflection.”
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This is what I meant when posted in post #23:
"'Rules' of composition are inductive in nature. They are/were discovered by reference to observed patterns of viewing and appreciating."
 
BradS said:
First of all, ye haftah be a pirate for the code to apply.
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I have always heard that the pirate motto was, "God helps thems that helps themselves."
 
With my images the first thing I want is for there to be no ambiguity about what I want the viewer to look at and on the other hand I do not want the viewer to be told what to "see." It is my desire that the image will give the viewer an opportunity to discover their own person meaning.
 
One description of composition is for the photographer compose so that the view sees what the photographer saw at the first look.
 
BradS said:
Reading through the recently resurrected thread asking about photographic turn-ons and turn-offs, I noticed several responders mention "Strong Composition"...and I realize, I haven't a clue what, specifically, that is. I mean, what does "strong composition" look like? or what the lack of it look like?
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It's Art Speak if you can't clearly define what makes it a "Strong Composition". It's like saying "It taste good" without describing the flavor profiles and tasting notes. In both cases, there are no right and wrong about what taste good or what is a strong composition.
 
I think in the end, after the wash. . .. "strong composition". just means. " looks good"
 
narsuitus said:
https://flic.kr/y/3vsTxQp
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Really, there are very good shots compiled in this gallery ! Many have powerful compositions to learn from...


Alan Edward Klein said:
Our brains are wired a certain way. Sure we can point to certain features to support our feelings. Same with art and aesthetics, I believe. Our wired brains made the rules, not the other way around.
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Yes, sure... And people may have some different wires, but many of the wires are similar.

Probably a bit like with music, different people like different genres, but most people will appreciate a nice melody from any genre.
 
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