Exercise: Balance

In this exercise I identified the dominant parts of a sample of my images. I noted these dominant parts by drawing rectangles around them. Following this I explored the balance in the photographs by looking at the rectangles on scales. The results of this exercise are below.

While this picture of my daughters playing in their paddling pool seems unbalanced I still feel it works well. The eye goes from my daughter in the foreground diagonally to my daughter in the background who occupies less of the space. This movement gives a dynamic nature to the picture.

This photograph of a skateboarder in mid-air is well balanced in my opinion. The skater himself is centrally placed. The large column to his right is balanced by the much smaller dark coloured area to his right. I feel the dark colour adds weight to that area so a much smaller area is required to balance the large column to the left of the skateboarder.

The more central placement of the houses of parliament helps to balance out the larger area covered by Big Ben and the railing on the bridge.

In the portrait above my brother is centrally placed and my daughters are placed on either side of him symmetrically. The picture is therefore balanced.

This photography of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin is completely symmetrical and in my opinion is perfectly balanced.

My daughter forms one element in this composition and is clearly one dominant part of the image. However, I feel the mass of the backdrop also forms a point of interest. While my daughter is much more dominant than the background, the greater area of the background helps to balance out this image.

I found during this exercise that when there were very few dominant components on a simple background that the dominant components were very easy to identify. However, in more complex images such as that of the skateboarder it was much harder to identify the dominant components within the image.

In this exercise I have learned that I have tended to have a good sense of balance in my images. However, balance is not completely necessary to create a good image as is shown in the picture of my daughters in their paddling pool.

Exercise: Focal lengths and different viewpoints

In this exercise I explored the differences in the image captured when a subject fills the frame when a long focal length is used and when a subject fills the frame when a short focal length is used. To carry out this exercise I found a subject with some depth to it. I attached my 70-200mm lens to my Canon 50d camera and set the lens to 121mm, the longest focal length I could use to capture my chosen subject. I composed the scene such that my chosen subject filled the frame. This involved me walking away from my subject first. I then attached my 10-22mm lens and setting the lens to 10mm I walked towards my subject until it once again filled the frame. The results can be found below.

Focal length: 121mm

Focal length: 10mm

You may be wondering why I set my telephoto lens to 121mm rather than 200mm in the first image. The reason for this is that the subject was on top of a hill and were I to walk any further away than where I was when I captured the first image the ground would have obscured the subject.

The two images captured are dramatically different even though the field of view has been maintained by changing viewpoint. In the first image, taken at a relatively long focal length, the image seems flat. The back wall of the hut does not seem too far from the columns at the front. The columns are parallel and even and the proportions of the hut seem even and as they were observed with the eye. The image captured at this longer focal length feels clean, orderly and in proportion.

In the second image, taken at the shortest focal length available to me, the hut feels much deeper. The back wall of the hut is clearly some distance from the columns at the front. The columns themselves are no longer parallel. Instead the columns form diagonals, sprouting out from the ground and exploding away from the centre. The roof appears to be far flatter than in the first image. The diagonals formed by the columns give the second image a more dynamic feel than the first image.

Exercise: Focal lengths

In this exercise I explored the effect of the field of view when the focal length is changed. My camera was mounted on a tripod and I attached my 70-200 telephoto zoom lens to it. Starting with the lens set to 200mm I took a series of images reducing the focal length of the lens for each shot. When I reached the minimum focal length of the lens I replaced it with my 17-55mm lens, being careful not to move my camera during the process. I then repeated the process with this lens.  My results are shown below.

Focal length: 200mm

Focal length: 165mm

Focal length: 127mm

Focal length: 93mm

Focal length: 75mm

Focal length: 55mm

Focal length: 46mm

Focal length: 35mm

Focal length: 23mm

Focal length 23mm, cropped to have similar field of view as 200mm

I observed that as the focal length was reduced the field of view was increased. I noticed that the centre of the wide angle image shot at 23mm is simply a reduced version of the image taken at 200mm. I have shown this by cropping out the centre of the 23mm image and placing it above.

Exercise: A sequence of composition

In this exercise I explored the practical process of composing an image. I found this exercise to be extremely challenging. I had many attempts which failed for one of two reasons. Initially I suffered from shyness. I felt odd about taking candid pictures of strangers. However, as I explored the genre of street photography more and more in my personal reading I became increasingly inspired. This inspiration emboldened me to the extent that by the end of this exercise I was able to go out in to the street and shoot with very little fear or self consciousness. As a side note, I hope to explore the area of street photography far more extensively going forward.

I took two sets of pictures which I felt were worthy of use in this exercise. They were both taken on the South Bank of London, an area rich in culture and variety. My first set was of a person selling Indian soft drinks alongside a man made beach alongside the Thames. My second set is centred around a fishmongers in Borough Market, near London Bridge. I have chosen to use the second set for the purposes of this writeup but both sets can be found by clicking here.

Using my 17-55mm lens attached to my 1.6x crop Canon 50d camera I captured a relatively wide angle view of the fishmongers stall that I was interested in by choosing a focal length of 17mm. The market is under cover and busy so getting a wider view was challenging.

Moving to my left I attempted to capture more of the stall by changing my viewpoint.

Moving further still I positioned myself to the end of the stall so that i was able to capture the full length of the stall along with the customers and fishmongers too.

Zooming in as much as possible to a focal length of 55mm I decided to focus in on one of the fishmongers at work.

Changing my viewpoint by angling my camera down towards the ground I isolated some of the fish being sold from the rest of the scene. I was attempting to capture the horizontal bars and vertical bars produced by the two kinds of fish. I attempted to balance the picture by reducing the strong dark areas and increasing the area covered by the lighter white fish. I learned of this technique from The Photographers Eye by Michael Freeman.

Angling my camera up again and moving around the counter I captured a fishmonger and one customer.

Continuing to adjust my viewpoint I became interested in the groups of fish on display.

I explored the stall itself which was made up of interesting textures and patterns.

Angling upwards I caught more of the fish and a fishmonger. I was close enough for some of the signs on display to become more significant.

The signs caught my interest and I recomposed to make them more significant.

Moving in closer and using a larger aperture to reduce the depth of field I make the sign even more significant in this composure.

As I adjusted my viewpoint I noticed the interesting patterns formed by the pile of squid which were covered in ice and which were hanging over the side of the stall.

Finding the interaction between customer and fishmonger more interesting I raised my camera to capture the wider scene again. However, in contrast to the earlier picture I captured the scene from the other end of the stall.

The spiked fish hanging from the ceiling had caught my interest in the previous image and so I moved to recompose and capture it.

I moved further to my left and forwards to highlight the spiked fish in my composition.

Moving further still in order to isolate the fish from it's surroundings I capture this image with the fishmongers in the background as well as a sign which tells the viewer more about the scene.

Recomposing to eliminate the distracting light bulb I also increased the aperture to separate the spiked fish from it's background. I was careful to maintain enough depth of field to keep the sign in the background legible so that the viewer has some context to the image being viewed.

Finally I changed the cameras orientation and waited so that I could capture a fishmonger busy at work in the background along with the spiked fish in the foreground.

During this exercise I kept my eye to the viewfinder the whole time. Doing so allowed me to see a range of images that I would not normally have thought of capturing. I observed how small changes in position and angle can result in drastically different images being captured. In addition to this keeping my eye to the viewfinder allowed me to detach myself from the scene in some ways and focus on the process of taking a photograph. I was right inside the scene physically and yet I was still able to concentrate on composition and the content of my image rather than my personal relationship with those around me.

I enjoyed two of these images over and above the others. Initially the penultimate image was my favourite as I feel it i has a good balance and in addition to the composition I like the fact that the sign int he background gives context to the image without overpowering it. However, I also enjoyed capturing the people in the images. In particular I liked the image below which I felt works better having been processed as black and white image.

Exercise: Object in different positions in the frame

In this exercise I look at the impact of the position of an object in the frame. I have presented the images captured in order of preference, with my favourite image at the top. As the images become more uncomfortable, awkward and less desirable I have described why I feel this is the case.

MIDDLE LEFT

In this image the subject is prominent and ones eye is drawn immediately to it. The placement of the subject lends a balanced and comfortable feel to the image. There is enough mass to the background such that even with its lack of interest the background is able to balance out the image with its extremely prominent subject.

MIDDLE

This image feels comfortable and balanced. However, this image feels somehow static and lacking in design. Ones eye is drawn immediately to the centre of the frame and there is no movement from there. I do feel this is a successful image. However, this image is less enjoyable to me than the first.

TOP LEFT

This image feels awkward. The subject is in a corner and so the background has a great deal of mass to it and in my view takes on too much importance in the composition. The background somehow overpowers the subject and the image feels unbalanced. I do feel this image is dynamic and exciting, even more so than the first image. However, the balance in the first image is more attractive to me than the movement and dynamic nature of this image.

FAR LEFT

As in the previous image the background overpowers the subject and the image is unbalanced.

I am finding it very difficult to articulate why I find this image less pleasing than the previous images. At first inspection this image should have been second in my order of preference. However something about it just does not work for me. I think this might be because the subject is slightly too close to the centre and therefore there is enough mass to the water on the left side such that the image becomes unbalanced and awkward without the dynamic nature of the previous two images to help it.

This image feels unbalanced and gives me a sense of claustrophobia. The subject is overpowered from above, below and to the right. It seems the subject is being pushed up against the left side of the frame and has nowhere to run. This composition could be of value in a scene where the photographer wants to project claustrophobia or awkwardness. In this scene this was not my intention and the image does not work.

My comments relating to this image are exactly as for the previous image. There is a sense of claustrophobia, imbalance and awkwardness in this image.

This exercise was valuable in helping me to understand the concept of balance better. In addition to this I can see that there will be times when I can use an awkward composition to support an image and emphasise the emotion being conveyed.

Exercise: Fitting the frame to the subject

I spent a long time thinking about an interesting subject for this exercise.  I was asked to select a subject that is compact in shape,  clear in appearance, and affords me the opportunity to take a photograph of it from close by and far away.  I realised that the term compact does not necessarily mean small and is used here to describe a subject that has defined borders and an identifiable shape.

I decided that the London City Hall would make a great subject for this exercise while also providing a visually stimulating and interesting subject to capture.  Unfortunately I was forced to conduct this exercise in relatively bad weather with failing light and without the use of a tripod.  I do plan to return to this location when the sky is more interesting however overall I am pleased with the results I achieved.

Results
The four photographs required for this project consisted of taking photographs with no consideration to composition, with the subject fitting the frame as tightly as possible, a close up photograph without any of the edges of the subject showing and a photograph with the subject occupying 1/4 or less of the frame.  There results of this exercise are below.

No consideration for composition

Tight fit to frame

Close up

Subject 1/4 frame or less

I was extremely surprised at how different each of the photographs above looks.  I realised now that as I view a scene I have preconceived ideas with regards to how a photograph of that scene will look.  By looking at the subject through the viewfinder and at different distances and angles I realise that a wealth of creative possibilities are available that I had not considered when first surveying the scene.

I created several crops from the photographs I took to explore further possibilities.  I have presented these crops below.

I have cropped the above photograph with a landscape orientation and have tried to eliminate unnecessary areas including the foreground and on the left side of the frame.  I have placed City Hall in the top right of the frame and included Tower Bridge in the background.  I feel this is an aesthetically pleasing crop which has areas of interest in the foreground as well as in the background.

Here I have chosen a square crop.  While this shape of crop may be required for certain types of frame or placement I found that this crop did not work for the scene that I was capturing for this exercise.  The curving shape in the foreground is abruptly cut off on the left side of the frame and this leaves this interrupts the flow of the photograph.

The above crop is vertical or portrait.  I chose to place the subject in the top of the frame.  This frame is not pleasing to me for two reasons.  Firstly the curving and flowing structure in the foreground is abruptly cut off and interrupted on the left side of the frame.  Secondly this composition does not include significant features of this scene including Tower Bridge in the background.

This panoramic crop aims to include as much areas of interest from within the scene as possible while eliminating as much of the rather unintersting sky as possible.  In order to fit the main subject, City Hall, in I chose to rotate the frame.  This angled view gives the scene a dynamic feel.  I find this crop to be visually pleasing.  This is a crop I would never have thought of trying before conducting this exercise.

For this final crop I have chosen another panoramic view.  However, this time the scene was not rotated and this results in much of the main subject being eliminated.  I feel this crop does not work for this scene as the missing part of City Hall results in the photograph feeling incomplete and far less interesting than the previous crop.

In summary this exercise taught me to view a subject from a variety of distances and angles.  My favourite crop was the penultimate one.  This was particularly pleasing as that is a crop I would never have attempted in the past.