Corner Composition
The corner of the frame is all foreground, leading your eye to the sunset and take in the whole frame.
Light is used in the top left and bottom right corner to draw your eye, then look back inward.
In the same setup, but with slight perspective adjustment, now there’s foreground blur as you draw your eye to the corners, then back inward.
This image shows the subject near the edges of the frame with no means of pulling your eyes back into the subject.
PHOTO CHALLENGE | Practice shooting with mindful composition as you view the frame edge to edge. Also attempt a subject focal point near the corner of the scene.
The sense of order, harmony, and balance of a photograph is an intuitive interpretation of the viewer. If you’re someone who can handle a lot of clutter in your life, you might not notice distracting elements like someone who is very tidy might. It’s all about how the viewer perceives.
Balance is a very important aspect in photography that may or may not come naturally to you. The corner areas of a photograph are often the greatest overlooked component in composition, and is one of the top reasons a photo feels balanced or not.
While I do want to focus on corner subjects for this prompt, I want you to look at the following photo comparisons to see how balance and the whole scene (edge to edge) offers aesthetic appeal to the photograph.
Better composition 1 or 2? Please explain why you feel that way.
When you’re looking through the viewfinder, look from side to side and visual the entire scene, notice everything around the main subject. A hint of a stair, window, or tree branches will simultaneously make us feel like the full element is there while still grounding the photo and pushing our eyes back into the middle.
Better composition 1 or 2? Please explain why you feel that way.
Whether we realize it or not, our eyes have a natural tendency to want to dart to the sides of a photograph when we look at it, so it’s important to use the edges to tell the viewer where to look. “Putting” elements in the corners will give the viewer a direction of focus so that they move back into the scene, which can be actual styling or artful composition in the landscape (see photo 1).
Look at lines, paths, or objects and see how they are working within the frame, is there a portion cut off? Does it balance the rest of the scene?
Better composition 1 or 2? Please explain why you feel that way.
Better composition 1 or 2? Please explain why you feel that way.
