This tip builds on the previous one on Working the Lines in your Photography.
Vertical lines have the ability to convey a variety of different moods in a photograph ranging from power and strength (think of skyscrapers) to growth (think of trees).
As horizontal lines can be accentuated by shooting in horizontal format vertical lines can be used very effectively by swapping the way you hold your camera into a vertical framing. This lengthens the vertical subject further which can emphasize it’s height.
The other option is to break this rule and frame your vertical subject horizontally which will give it the sense that your image can’t contain it (quite effective if the vertical lines are very strong).
Once again it’s important to attempt to keep your vertical lines as much in line with the sides of your image as possible. This is not always possible if you’re shooting looking up an image as the subject will taper off towards the top - but attempt to keep it’s center as straight as possible and you should be ok.
Keep in mind the Rule of Thirds when you have strong vertical lines in a photograph. Placing a line directly in the middle of a shot will effectively cut your image in half. This can be used with dramatic impact but also can leave your image looking segmented.
Keep an eye out for vertical lines that are repeated in patterns in your images as they can be used to great impact - particularly if they are contrasted with other shapes and lines going in different directions.
This tip builds on the previous one on Working the Lines in your Photography.
There’s something about a horizontal line in an image that conveys a message of ’stability’ or even ‘rest’. Horizons, fallen trees, oceans, sleeping people - all of these subjects have something about them that speaks either of permanency and timelessness or rest.
Horizons are the most common horizontal line to be found in photographs and they often act as a dividing point in a photograph - in effect an anchor that the rest of the image is formed around.
If you want to accentuate the calming stable impact of a horizon one effective technique to use is to shoot your images with horizontal framing (with the longest part of your cameras frame from left to right.
Alternatively if you want to reemphasize horizontal lines shoot with you camera in a vertical framing.
Keep in mind that unbroken horizons can often lead to a photograph feeling somewhat static or dull and a good strategy is to use other shapes in the landscape you’re photograph to break things up and give a point of interest (mountains, trees, buildings etc).
Horizons should generally not be placed in the middle of your frame. This leaves an image feeling unsettled compositionally. A much more effective technique is to place them in the upper or lower third of your frame.
Layers of horizontal lines can create rhythm or patterns in an image that can become the focus of an image in and of itself.
Lastly work hard to keep your Horizontal lines horizontal and square with the edges of your images frame. There’s nothing more frustrating that viewing a picture that is slightly off centre.
When considering the composition of an image one of the elements that I suggest digital camera owners look for are ‘Lines’.
The lines that can be found in images are very powerful elements that with a little practice can add dynamic impact to a photograph in terms of mood as well as how they lead an image’s viewer into a photo.
Over the next few posts I’ll consider three types of lines, ‘horizontal’, ‘vertical’ and ‘diagonal’. Each one has a different impact upon a photograph and should be looked for as you frame your shots.
Learning how to use lines in photography doesn’t just happen. It takes time and practice to become good at it.
A good way to practice is to go back through older images that you’ve taken and look for lines that worked well and those that didn’t.
Then next time you go out with your camera, before you frame your shot consciously ask yourself what lines are in front of you and how you might use them to add something to you next shot by working with them rather than against them.
Also ask yourself whether the lines form any interesting patterns that you might be able to accentuate to add a further layer of interest to the shot.
Read the rest of this series so far at:
In response to my weekly newsletter yesterday Harold (a subscriber) sent me an email raising a problem he had with using the continuous shooting mode that I wrote about yesterday. He wrote:
“Thanks for your tip on using the Continuous Shooting Darren. I use it on my DSLR regularly but have one problem - I always end up taking more shots than I want to. I put my finger down on the shutter button and before I know it I’ve taken a whole heap of shots. Any suggestions?”
Thanks for the question Harold - unfortunately there’s no easy answer to this problem except to use the old adage - ‘practice makes perfect’.
I know the problem you have because when I first discovered continuous shooting mode on my old film SLR I had the same problem and could quite easily go through a 36 exposure roll very quickly (an expensive problem). The way I got over it was to practice shooting in burst mode without any film in the camera. As I did that I learnt how much pressure it took to take one, two, three or more shots. Of course with a digital camera you can practice as you go without having to pay for unneccessary shots.
The best advice I can give when taking a shot in continuous mode (or in any mode for that matter) is to work hard at gently applying pressure to your shutter button rather than jabbing at it.
Someone once told me that it’s the same principle with shooting a gun (not that I’m too familiar with that). Rather than jabbing at the trigger and pulling yourself off aim you gentle squeeze it to keep the gun steady.
Using this technique with a camera will give you more control in continuous shooting mode to take the amount of shots you want and will also have the added benefit of keeping your camera still and reducing camera shake.
Lastly - don’t press the shutter with the very tip of your finger - rather use the flat part of it so that the end section of your finger is almost horizontal at the time of releasing the shutter (as pictured). This will help you to have as much control as possible and will also reduce camera shake.
Have you discovered the continuous shooting mode (or burst mode) on your digital camera? Most cameras these days have them and if you get in the habit of using it the results can be quite wonderful.
The above sequence was taken by a Flickr photographer by the name of diyosa on her Nikon D50 DSLR which shoots at up to 2.5 frames per second (this sounds a lot but in the scheme of DSLRs its on the lesser end. For example my Canon 20D shoots at 5 frames per second). That means if she activates this mode and then holds her finger down on the shutter she can shoot five shots like the above ones in just two seconds.
In actual fact she took these shots over a longer period (just under a minute) but it illustrates the effectiveness of shooting lots of shots quickly as it’s produced a beautiful series of shots that would look wonderful framed together like this or even in a photo album on the same page.
Continuous shooting Mode isn’t just something that DSLRs have - most point and shoot cameras have it as an option also.
It’s a particularly useful mode for taking shots of any situation where there is movement. Obviously photographing children is one such situation but there are many others including the photography of sport, animals, and even in portrait photography.
When I’m doing a portrait sitting I quite often use continuous shooting mode simply because I find that subjects often relax and look most natural after the first shot that you take and when they lose the ‘posed’ face. Of course the beauty of shooting in a digital format is that even if the second, third and forth frames that you take are not as good as the first - you can just delete them afterwards with no cost associated.
Using Continuous Shooting Mode
It’s worth noting a few things to keep in mind when using this burst mode:
Read the rest of this entry
I was chatting with a new digital camera owner on the weekend about their camera and they were telling me about how they didn’t think they’d ever use anything but fully automatic mode on their great new Canon DSLR.
They told me that ‘auto’ mode would produce the perfect shot in every scenario - so why would they ever need to use anything else.
I asked them to show me some of the shots that they’d taken on their camera and they allowed me to flick through some shots until I came to this one:
It was taken at a wedding that they attended where the bride, groom and celebrant (I was actually the celebrant - like my pink tie?) were positioned in a fairly dark gothic-like hall in front of a number of large windows.
The Problem
The problem with the shots was that there was so much light coming in the windows that the super little camera that my friend was using in Auto mode thought that the scene had enough light. As a result the window and what you can see through it is reasonably well exposed - but the main subject matter of the picture (the happy couple) are well under exposed. Some of the other shots taken this day were much worse and had the bride and groom as silhouettes.
Obviously the issue with this shot is that there is just not enough light from the front of the subjects to light up the subject with the shutter speed being used.
The Solution
There are a number of possible solutions to this problem but one of the easiest is to override the camera and force it to shoot with a flash - a technique often called ‘fill flash’. Fill Flash is used to supplement existing light in a scene - it’s generally not the primary light source (as a flash often is at night) but fills in light where natural light doesn’t go.
Read the rest of this entry
