Photography is blessed and cursed with both clinical and artistic guidelines. We constantly hear that we need to keep or break them, but there is a lot more to it than that.
One of the huge errors we make in photography is accepting that rules exist. That concept is an old one, most likely stemming from the rule of thirds. I have a photography book initially published by Kodak in 1920 called “How to make great Photos”; my own’s the 1948 revision. On page 70, it states this:
The horizon line in a landscape must never ever divide a photo into two equivalent parts. It is best to have it one-third from the top or bottom.
This is nonsense. Not all of it, however it’s the word “never ever” with which I take issue. Of course, there is nothing incorrect with employing the department of the image into thirds as a technique, but any prescriptive guideline that insists on what a structure should or must not be is outrageous.
Pythagoras’ Theorem is a rule because, with a straight-edged triangle in two dimensions, the square on the hypotenuse constantly equals the sum of the squares on the other two sides. It’s an universal truth. The notion that we need to divide a picture into thirds isn’t.
This is the essential distinction in between science and art. Science is constructed around theories and rules, whereas art is totally subjective. Photography is a distinct blend of both science and art. So, finding the balance between those 2 opposing components is vital for excellent photography. Maybe we need to rename this compositional technique as the Tool of Thirds, a gadget in our compositional tool kit that we can call upon and use if appropriate. We can add that to the golden ratio tool, the tool of armature, the tool of visual weight, the depth of field tool, and so on.
It is a similarly ridiculous concept suggesting we need to use any of these compositional tools in our photography. However, that doesn’t imply we can’t use them. For instance, stabilizing a large object on one side of the frame with numerous smaller sized objects with less individual visual weight on the right does work, however there are times when we might want to have an imbalance in an image. Or we may overlook Cartier-Bresson’s decisive moment or Adams’ device of tones, but it does not suggest we can’t use them if we want to.
Exists a single idea in photography that can not be used or overlooked? Discovering your distinct style frequently results from discovering ways of shooting a topic that is various from how others do it. Whether this implies deserting particular conventions or always utilizing them depends on you.
There is an important difference in between discarding a compositional tool and being ignorant of it. If one is unaware of any of the tools, we can’t select to either usage or overlook them, and your images will be the worse for that.
How we pick to use or disregard the tools very much relies on the purpose of our photography. The greatest number of images are striven mass appeal, generally on social networks. For that reason, one presumes most professional photographers shoot for that purpose. Unfortunately, the biggest area of the professional photographer’s audience is unsophisticated concerning comprehending the finer nuances of structure. They want a pretty, unchallenging picture and very little more than that. Consequently, many professional photographers will shoot to accomplish quite, unchallenging images.
That bleeds over into a lot of expert photography. Photographs are commissioned with a broad audience in mind. Consequently, proficient professional photographers will stick to producing images their customers desire. Those are invariably pictures with mass appeal due to the fact that they are easy to like. That undoubtedly means using the tools of design. The camera is well suited to this as it produces practical art; most images aimed for industrial methods tell a direct story with little space for ambiguity or artistic expression.
For instance, when I shoot a wedding event, the couple anticipates the images will satisfy a set of standards that a lot of wedding event professional photographers will adhere to, which means utilizing compositional tools. Whereas, using my creative professional photographer hat and shooting exclusively for myself, I can press the norms and the borders. I might slip a few of these artistically styled images into the collection of bridal images, and they generally reveal pleasure with them, but I would not shoot the entire wedding event like that. One of the factors I am pulling back from doing as much wedding event photography is that doing too many can seem like a sausage device. A handful of weddings a year assists me stay passionate about them and delight in the work.
Photographic artists have freer rein over what they produce when not working to a quick. As well as what my pal refers to as “arty-farty” photos, I shoot technically exact images too. These are entirely for my enjoyment. They fit within the bounds of what is generally accepted as “excellent” photography.
There’s no right or incorrect here. If you choose images that fit with diagonal structures, splitting the image into thirds, or having leading lines that cohere with the golden section, then that’s excellent. Whether you favor silky-smooth seas arising from long direct exposures, water shot with a quick shutter with every droplet plainly defined, or somewhere in between, that’s your choice, and no one has a right to condemn you for that. Choose what you like and deal with gaining the tools to achieve those outcomes. If you choose you like something else more after a few months, that’s perfectly all right too.
There is one rule that I believe should be prescriptive and inevitably disregarded by too many professional photographers; putting thought into how our photographs look. This isn’t simply picking a particular subject or category however finding and putting our own characters into the image. That is a hard thing for a novice to achieve in the beginning. Only after shooting 100,000 approximately images, analyzing them, and exercising what we like and do not like about what we do is it possible to develop our designs and recognize them in others’ photos. Then, using or neglecting those tools will come naturally and resemble riding a bike. You will not even think of them.