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Selected Photography Rules and How to Break Them

March 19, 2007

by Drew Harrison Myers ~ harrison photographic inc. and Photo Editor, Touch Calgary

The Kodak Brownie, a small square camera the size of a box of cup-a-soup, brought photography to the masses at the turn of the 1900s. The box cameras evolved to the easy-to-use 35mm film cameras throughout the middle to late 20th century. Now, with the onset of the digital era, the masses have traded in their old 35mm point-and-shoots of yesteryear and have started shooting with snappy little digital cameras. Millions more photos are taken, multitudes of which… are crap. There, I said it. With the increase of images made comes a slight increase of good images, but more so comes the increase of terrible images. Let’s face it – none of us can take a great photo every time we press the shutter button.

So, what can be done? Searching through the internet one can find a wealth of resources on, among other things, how to take better photographs but who has time to dogpaddle through the ocean of information? I am now going to tell you a secret – your parents know things. It’s true, and chances are they know a thing or two about photography from the time when the old 35mm cameras came to the scene in a photographic renaissance much like we’re now experiencing with the new wave of digital photography. On the other hand, even what they have to say should be taken with a grain of salt…

Your parents, had they been avid amateur photographers in their time, may tell you about the Rule of Thirds. This basic rule applies to the composition of your photograph and basically says that if you imagine vertical lines splitting your frame vertically and horizontally into thirds (making nine rectangles in a three-by-three grid), important aspects of the images should fall on the lines or intersections of the lines. So, a horizon should be either at the line marking the top of the bottom third or the top of the middle third. The centre line of someone’s face in a close-up portrait should fall on the line marking the right side of the left third or the right side of the middle third, etc. As a basic rule, this holds up quite well. Having someone shifted over either to the right or to the left of the frame usually makes a more dynamic composition than having them centred in the middle of the frame.

You may also be warned of the woes of shooting outdoor images facing the sun, especially when shooting people. Shooting into the sun can cause the image to have lens flare, distorting part of the image. Also, the bright sun will confuse your internal camera metering, underexposing the image so the people in the portrait appear too dark. If the sun is directly behind your subject, turning the subject around even 90 should cause the sun to begin to light them from the side and be far enough away from the angle of the lens as to avoid flare. Your internal metering system should be now more accurate and the image will expose correctly.

Finally, you may be told to concentrate on what you are including within the frame. Make sure you aren’t cropping parts of people out – back up enough to include the whole head. Include enough of the environment to show context. If you are shooting landscape, don’t crop out important features if they are instrumental to the scene. Missing important parts of the image can make an extraordinary photo ordinary.

Well, these are all interesting tidbits of advice to take in. Remember, now that you have your fancy new digital camera, there’s no such thing as wasting film so go out and try this stuff. When you come back with all your new images, take a critical look at them and make your own decisions as to what you like and what you don’t. Then, throw all the rules out the window and try the exact opposite.

Crop people’s heads in the frame. Zoom in, move closer, get in their space. What you leave out of an image is as important as what you include. Show details of landscapes that appeal to you and don’t feel like you have to show the whole scene. Try showing smaller aspects of a large scene to draw the observers’ attention. You can still show context while being subtle about it.

Shoot into the sun. Try using a fill flash to light the subject from the front while the sun gives a natural ‘hairlight’ – the glowing rim of light you will see around their heads and over their shoulders. Use your hand (or someone else’s ) to shade your lens to avoid flare or just shoot without the shade to see if you like how the flare looks. You’re working in the instant world of digital so try to move around slightly if the flare looks too invasive.

Centre your subjects. Put the horizon line right in the middle of the photograph. It helps to think about cropping the image to a square for printing as the centred horizon and centred subjects tend to work well in a square format. Play around. Maybe thirds don’t work well for you and you want to put the horizon a fraction above the bottom of the frame… or a fraction below the top. You may want to place your model so that they’re practically falling off the side of the frame instead of at a third from either side.

Play around. Experiment. Take advice, try it, keep what you like and throw out the rest. Remember the techniques you like, write them down if you need to. Try them and refine them. Practice different styles and different compositions and find your own. Make your photography yours with your own style, your own flair. Most of all, try to have fun and keep shooting.