Leading Lines
Subtle leading line leading toward the mountains
More of an obvious leading line toward the rock formations
Leading lines toward the book and tea setup
PHOTO CHALLENGE | One of the easiest ways to spot leading lines is through your camera's viewfinder or LCD screen. This flattens the scene, making the lines stand out and seem much more obvious.
Once you've spotted the lines in your scene, it's time to think about how you can use them to enhance and emphasize the most important elements in your image.
One of the most effective ways is to put your main subject at the end of a leading line. For example, if you're taking a photo of a distant building, try to include a road, path or fence leading up to it. Your eye will be naturally drawn along this to the building itself.
One of the most powerful ways to engage your viewer is by making good use of the lines in your scene. They can be used to guide the viewer through the shot, draw their attention to the main subject or create a sense of depth and perspective.
Leading lines are an excellent way to tell a story with your photos. By placing them at key points of your composition, you can influence the way people will view your shot, linking together important elements and guiding viewers through the scene.
Leading lines refers to a composition where there’s a directional line directing the viewers attention to a point of interest, often the main subject of the photo. There is a misconception for leading lines where the line fades off into the distance with no obvious point of interest, this is considered a pathway through an image, not a true leading line.
Leading lines vs pathway photo example by Josh Dunlop:
In Image 1, you see how the trail lines lead off to the left of the photo and the bridge is in the upper right portion, offering no actual direction in either scenario. In Image 2, the trail lines lead you to the bridge as your eyes scan the length of the images. A simple change in perspective made all the difference here and accurately depicted a leading line.
The point of interest is the only true rule for leading lines in photography. It doesn’t even have to be the most obvious thing, it doesn’t have to be straight, or symmetrical; creativity knows no bounds, and instead offers a tool for exploring a unique and intentional composition.
Leading lines aren’t confined to landscape images either, they can be used in any photography genre, with portraits, food, still life, product, etc…
Use depth of field to further draw the viewer into your subject via your leading line.
Allow the lines to create a sense of harmony in the image, you can be as creative as you want, but intentional as well.
Leading lines can be straight or circular, man-made or natural, colorful or contrasting. The lines must work with the rest of the image though.
If you don't have a single main subject, such as in a landscape photo, try to find lines that lead through the scene from foreground to background. This gives the viewer something to latch onto and draws their eye through the entire scene.