Forget the Rule of Thirds, do this instead…
Summary
TLDRIn this video, the host explores the art of composition in photography, focusing on the balance between main and supporting subjects. They emphasize the importance of identifying what to shoot and how to shoot it, rather than just adhering to traditional rules. Through various examples, they demonstrate how to enhance a scene with supporting elements without distracting from the main subject, aiming to create impactful images that tell a story.
Takeaways
- 📷 The video emphasizes the importance of composition in photography, suggesting that it is often the most frequently asked about topic.
- 🎨 Composition techniques like the rule of thirds, rule of odds, and leading lines are useful but should not overshadow the subject matter.
- 🤔 The speaker suggests that having a compelling subject is crucial, as even perfect composition cannot save a boring subject.
- 🌲 The concept of 'main subject' and 'supporting subjects' in photography is introduced, akin to lead and supporting actors in a film.
- 🔍 Supporting subjects should enhance the main subject, possibly by emphasizing its size, texture, mood, or beauty.
- 📐 The video discusses the balance between including enough of a supporting subject without distracting from the main subject.
- 🖼️ The speaker shares personal examples of photographs to illustrate the interplay between main and supporting subjects.
- 🤷♂️ It is acknowledged that determining what adds to or distracts from a scene is subjective and depends on personal opinion.
- 🕊️ The video mentions the use of spacing and timing to manage multiple elements within a photograph.
- 🏞️ The importance of being deliberate with the inclusion or exclusion of supporting subjects to avoid a cluttered look is highlighted.
- 🌟 The speaker concludes by advocating for a thoughtful approach to composition that maximizes the impact of the main subject within its surroundings.
Q & A
What is the main topic discussed in the video script?
-The main topic discussed in the video script is photography composition, focusing on the concept of main subjects and supporting subjects, and how they interact to create impactful images.
What is the importance of having a supporting subject in a photograph according to the script?
-Supporting subjects are important in a photograph because they help to accentuate the main subject, potentially enhancing its beauty, size, texture, or mood, and contribute to the overall story of the image.
What does the script suggest about the relationship between the main subject and supporting subjects in photography?
-The script suggests that the relationship between the main subject and supporting subjects should be carefully balanced. The supporting subjects should complement the main subject without distracting from it or diluting its impact.
How does the script describe the process of deciding what to include in a photograph?
-The script describes the process as a 'dance' between the supporting elements and the main subject, where the photographer must decide how much of each element to include to support the main subject without becoming distracting.
What is the significance of the 'rule of thirds' mentioned in the script?
-The 'rule of thirds' is a well-known compositional technique in photography that suggests an image should be imagined as divided into nine equal parts by two equally spaced horizontal lines and two equally spaced vertical lines, with the theory that aligning the subject along these lines or at their intersections creates a more balanced and interesting composition.
How does the script relate the concept of supporting actors in films to supporting subjects in photography?
-The script relates the concept by stating that just as supporting actors in films help to make the lead actor stand out and contribute to the story, supporting subjects in photography should help to accentuate the main subject and add to the overall narrative of the image.
What is the script's stance on the use of compositional rules in photography?
-The script acknowledges the value of compositional rules like the rule of thirds but emphasizes that these rules should not be the only guide. It suggests that understanding the relationship between the main subject and supporting subjects is equally important for creating impactful photographs.
What does the script suggest is the key to good photography composition?
-The script suggests that the key to good photography composition is being deliberate about what adds to the story and what distracts from it, and understanding how to use supporting subjects to maximize the prominence and impact of the main subject.
How does the script discuss the role of personal preference in photography composition?
-The script discusses the role of personal preference by stating that what one photographer considers distracting, another might find adds to the story. It emphasizes that the decision of what to include or exclude in a photograph is often down to the individual's artistic judgment.
What advice does the script give on how to approach a scene with multiple potential subjects?
-The script advises that when there are multiple potential subjects in a scene, spacing and waiting are key. It suggests considering the placement of each subject and being deliberate about including or excluding the entirety of a supporting subject to avoid clutter and maintain a compelling composition.
What is the role of the sponsor, Squarespace, mentioned in the script?
-Squarespace is the sponsor of the video, and the script mentions it as a platform for creating websites, which the speaker uses to curate and display their photography portfolio. It also provides a discount code for viewers to try Squarespace for their own websites.
Outlines
📸 Photography Composition: The Importance of Main and Supporting Subjects
The speaker begins by expressing gratitude to Squarespace for sponsoring the video and offers a discount for their services. They then dive into the topic of photography composition, noting that while there are many rules and techniques discussed, such as the rule of thirds and leading lines, the key to a compelling photo often lies in the subject matter itself. The speaker emphasizes that a boring subject will remain dull regardless of the composition techniques applied. They introduce the concept of main and supporting subjects in photography, using the analogy of lead and supporting actors in films. The main subject is what initially catches the photographer's eye, while supporting subjects enhance the main subject by accentuating its features without distracting from it. The speaker illustrates this with examples, such as a caravan photo where a tree serves as a supporting subject, providing context and enhancing the main subject's prominence. They discuss the importance of balancing the inclusion of supporting elements to avoid overwhelming or diminishing the main subject.
🏞 The Art of Selecting and Including Supporting Subjects
Continuing the discussion on composition, the speaker shares insights on how to decide which supporting subjects to include in a photograph and to what extent. They stress the importance of being deliberate in these choices to ensure that the supporting elements contribute to the story without becoming distractions. Using examples like a mine tower and wheelbarrows, the speaker explains how personal opinion plays a significant role in determining what adds to or detracts from a scene. They also touch on the importance of spacing and waiting when dealing with multiple subjects in a frame, advocating for a thoughtful approach to composition that maximizes the impact of the main subject. The speaker shares anecdotes from their own photography experiences, highlighting the process of finding and utilizing supporting subjects to create a more compelling narrative in their images.
🌟 Maximizing Impact: The Role of Supporting Elements in Emphasizing Main Subjects
In the final paragraph, the speaker wraps up their thoughts on photography composition by reiterating the significance of understanding the relationship between main and supporting subjects. They advocate for a methodical approach to composition that involves identifying potential distractions and enhancing elements, using focal lengths and camera positioning to emphasize the connection between subjects. The speaker shares examples of how they have used supporting subjects to frame and highlight the main subject, such as electricity pylons and a house with a track leading to it. They conclude by summarizing their composition process, which involves finding something visually appealing, assessing the surrounding elements, and carefully arranging them to create a harmonious and impactful image. The speaker also thanks Squarespace for their sponsorship and invites viewers to explore their portfolio on their Squarespace website, highlighting the platform's ease of use for curating and displaying photographic work.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Composition
💡Supporting Subjects
💡Main Subject
💡Rule of Thirds
💡Leading Lines
💡Negative Space
💡Focal Length
💡Packing the Foreground
💡Squarespace
💡Portfolio
💡Impact
Highlights
Thank you to Squarespace for sponsoring this week's video.
Today, we'll talk about composition in photography, focusing on what to shoot and how to shoot it.
The most common rules in photography include the rule of thirds, rule of odds, rule of space, leading lines, negative space, and filling the frame.
Important to note: good composition involves not just following rules but also considering the relationship between the main subject and supporting elements.
A strong main subject is essential; no matter how you shoot it, a boring subject will remain boring.
Supporting subjects in a photo should accentuate the main subject without distracting from it.
Examples of supporting elements include a tree overhanging a caravan or electricity pylons framing another pylon in the background.
Composition involves balancing supporting elements and the main subject to create a compelling story.
The goal is to include supporting subjects that add to the story and avoid those that distract.
Deliberate framing and spacing are crucial to avoid making a photo look cluttered or like a mistake.
Supporting subjects can be obvious or require hunting to find elements that enhance the main subject.
Negative space can also serve as a supporting element, emphasizing the main subject.
When including multiple elements, ensure they complement each other and add to the overall impact of the photo.
Personal preference plays a significant role in determining what adds to or distracts from a photo.
Curating a portfolio involves selecting and sequencing images that tell a cohesive story.
Squarespace offers an easy way to create and organize a photography portfolio online.
You can try Squarespace for free and get 10% off your first purchase using the promo code.
Transcripts
a big thank you to Squarespace for
sponsoring this week's video if you need
a website or a domain go to
squarespace.com forward slash James for
10 off your first purchase hi everyone
um I press record and then my laptop
died so I've just rebooted it hopefully
that fixes the problems we'll see
today what I thought I'd do is talk a
little bit about composition which is
probably the thing that I'm asked most
about in photography and I've not spoken
about it for ages so I thought today we
could revisit it
um there are lots of composition videos
on YouTube
lots of information on blogs and in
books and stuff but most of it I have
found centers on the rules rule of
thirds rule of odds rule of space
leading lines negative space filling the
frame packing the foreground all that
stuff all good stuff powerful techniques
and as useful as those techniques can be
I have found particularly when you're
dealing with beginners that often it
will end up informing what they shoot
not just how they shoot and the issue
with that is that if you've got a boring
subject it doesn't matter how you shoot
it and if you've got a leading line
towards it it's still going to be boring
so today what I thought I'd do is talk
through how I think about what to shoot
and just as importantly how I shoot it
in the hope that it's interesting maybe
useful it's not the way it's just a way
as with all photography there is no
right and wrong but uh yes let's
see if this laptop works now the easiest
part of Photography as far as I'm
concerned is working out what it is that
we want to photograph and the reason
that I think is the easiest part of
Photography is that my parameters are
pretty loose really basically if I see
something that I think looks nice I will
want to photograph it now of course
those things will be different for all
of us some of us like mountains some of
us like dogs some of us like insects now
the difficult bit and in fact I think
the hardest bit of Photography is
working out how to photograph those
things and in the main that's what I
want to talk about today now every film
or movie has a lead actor
or most of them do and every film or
movie or most of them have supporting
actors and typically the job of the
supporting actor is to make the lead
actor stand out in some way and so
dialogue with the supporting actor can
make the lead actor seem a bit softer
and equally if the supporting actor
needs saving in some way then the lead
actor can look caring or tough but in
many instances the relationship between
a supporting actor and a lead actor is
crucial for the story and I think it's
exactly the same in photography so we
have our main subjects in our photos the
thing that caught our eye but we also
have supporting subjects and it's the
job of those supporting subjects to
accentuate the main subject and maybe
they'll be accentuating the beauty the
size the texture the mood but in some
way they will be helping our main
subject stand out so this photo here I
think is a pretty good example of that
we've got the Caravan plan which is the
main subject and then this tree
overhanging it which I would suggest is
a supporting subject and I suppose it's
kind of acting as like a shelter a
protector of some kind but I'd also say
it's a crucial part of the story of this
Caravan and whenever I'm photographing
something like this and I see pretty
much straight away that the supporting
subject really is supporting the main
subject and not distracting from it then
I know for sure that I want to include
it in my scene the question then becomes
how much of it do I want to include in
my scene because the key with this photo
and indeed all photos is trying to work
out your quantities how much of your
supporting subject do you need to show
for it to adequately support your main
subject without distracting from the
main subject and so if I was to crop
into this Caravan I think you'd
completely lose the sense of place that
you get with a large percentage of this
tree in the frame similarly if I'd have
gone for a wider focal length or if I
show got this from further back and
ended up with more of the tree in the
frame I think the result would have
ended up with the subject being too
small in the frame and not prominent
enough I saved the subject the Caravan
and so for me composition is really
working out this dance between the
supporting elements and the main subject
and how they can both complement each
other the best and if you look through
my portfolio there are plenty of
examples where I've got a supporting
subject but where I don't include the
entire supporting subject and more often
than not that's because I want a
supporting subject I really feel it adds
to the scene but my concern is that by
including the entire supporting subject
I would dilute the impact of the main
subject so that's definitely the case
with these electricity pylons in Abu
Dhabi I like how the supporting subject
in the foreground acts as a frame for
the one in the distance but were I to
include any more of the one in the
foreground than I think the one in the
background the main subject would just
become inconsequential is that a word if
I made that up inconsequential
it sounds right uh here's another one so
this is a mine down in Cornwall you
might remember this from a video last
year uh and at the mine was this tower
that you see on the right hand side of
this image and in this photo I decided
not to include the entire thing for fear
of diluting the main subject and so like
I say my mindset is this constant dance
between how the supporting subjects
interact with the main subject and
ultimately what we're trying to do is
work out what adds to the story and what
distracts from the story and It's tricky
because that will always be down to
personal opinion so let's take these
wheelbarrows for example which I shot
down in Cornwall last year as well now I
could have made this shot an awful lot
simpler by taking 10 Paces to my right
and then I basically could have got a
profile of them just with the c behind
or if I've got lower I wouldn't have
even had to have had the ocean I could
have just had three wheelbarrows in a
line and then a wall behind them and so
what I've chosen to do actively is is to
position myself to include an awful lot
more than that and in my view the things
that I've chosen to add have added to
the story and to the shot but of course
you may disagree you may find the stuff
in the background super distracting and
think the photo is just way too
complicated uh same with this shot so
this was another one from the frost last
winter we've got the Sheep we've got
this bright orange tree we've got the
steam coming off this Farm or factory
whatever it is then we've got the moon
so on the one hand it looks like quite a
simple scene I think because of the
color palette more than anything else
but also there's quite a lot going on
and how much you include and how much
you take away from a shot will always be
down to personal preference but working
out what you think is distracting what
you think adds I think is the Crux of
good photography and I should say
actually that whenever there are more
than two elements in a scene so here
we've got arguably four potential
subjects whenever that's the case
spacing and waiting are key and if
you've got one half of the image which
is super crowded where all other
potential subjects sitting it's probably
not going to look all that nice on the
eye oh the other thing is just this
image and photos like this I can show
you some other examples too is that
regardless of whether you choose to
include or not include the entirety of a
supporting subject you need to be
deliberate about it so with this shot
for example there is some space between
the subjects and the edge of the frame
and that I have found is crucial if
you're going to include the entirety of
a subject because the closer to the edge
of a frame a supporting subject or a
main subject gets the more likely it is
to look cluttered distracting or just
like a mistake now sometimes supporting
subjects will present themselves to you
in such a way that it's so obvious how
to shoot them that you don't even really
need to think about it this one's a good
example of that these penguins that are
shot in Antarctica I knew I wanted the
Hut as well and I knew I wanted the
mountains they're too fantastic
supporting subjects and so it was just
entirely obvious immediately how I had
to shoot that this is another good
example again in Cornwall all where the
swell was coming in in such a direction
that basically meant the waves were
pointing up to the buildings from the
corner of the frame and it just meant
that the supporting elements are either
waves presented themselves in such a way
that was so obvious that you had to
shoot it like that but then other times
I'll find scenes which kind of look nice
but I'll have to hunt a bit for a
supporting element and this house is a
pretty good example of that so it's a
nice enough country house surrounded by
Greenery but I don't think it's
particularly strong or compelling image
but luckily after a bit of hunting I
found a track leading to the house and
that track basically became a really
effective supporting element and
therefore it was an absolute no-brainer
to try multiple ways of including that
in the frame so yeah the rules they're
great rule of thirds all that fantastic
but I think what matters equally is
having a grasp of main subject and
supporting subjects and how they can be
gelled together to create the most
impactful shot so to summarize I will go
out and try and find something that
makes me think oh that's nice I'll then
look around the subject to try and see
if there's anything that adds to the
subject or distracts from it and
subsequently I'll then try and work out
how I can add some of the stuff
into my frame that supports the subject
and how I can get rid of some of the
stuff that doesn't and finally once I'm
in a place where I've done that I'll
then try and work out if I can use focal
lengths or moving forward or backwards
or getting low or high or whatever to
try and work out how I can best
emphasize the relationship between those
elements and how I can utilize the
supporting subjects to maximize the
prominence of the main subject and when
I say prominence I don't just mean the
size of the frame I mean the impact that
the subject has on you given its
surroundings and sometimes supporting
subjects are really simple it can just
be negative space around a subject and
other times it's more of a jigsaw where
you've got four or five competing
subjects and you're trying to work out
how to piece them together in such a way
that they add up to more than the sum of
their parts rather than less than the
sum of their parts but in short that is
how I go about trying to work out not
just what to shoot but how to shoot it
and hopefully it made some sense anyway
thank you for listening to me uh rub it
on for I've been talking
can't see and also thank you to the
sponsor of this week's video Squarespace
so many of the photos that I've shown
you today are in my portfolio and
therefore on my website because my
website my Squarespace website is my
portfolio and one of my favorite things
in life to do is sit with a coffee and
curate my favorite images and if I get
back from a trip and I've got a couple
more portfolio shots then sitting down
and trying to work out how to add them
to my portfolio and where they should
sit in my portfolio given their tone
given their storyline given their mood
that is just a process that I absolutely
love and of course there are many ways
you can do that some people like to
curate books other people like to do
zines and I love to do those things too
but a website is something you can
revisit time and time again and you can
just sit there and sequence all day
until your heart's content so if you
would like to check out Squarespace for
yourself you can do so for free by going
to squarespace.com to start your free
trial and you can select a template find
one that looks pretty good to you and
then it's just a case of drag and drop
and ordering your photos as you wish and
then when you've got a website that you
help you with at the end of your trial
if you'd like to make a purchase you can
save 10 of that first purchase by going
to squarespace.com forward slash James
yeah and a big thank you to them for
their continued support of this Channel
and to you for watching uh next week
we'll be back outside I always say that
but we will I'm not doing two indoor
videos in a row and like I said I think
at the end of last week's video it'll
probably be in the rain
plus okay I'll see you then
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