Remember that the camera doesn’t see as much as our eyes see. The camera’s vision is limited by the focal length of the lens and the size of the sensor in the camera. Our eyes see what’s in front of us but they also see peripherally around the entire scene. To compensate for the vision limitation of the camera we have to employ various composition techniques to make a photo interesting to the viewer. One of these techniques is called “leading lines.”

A good photo requires two things – an interesting subject and a composition that makes our eyes stop on the image and the subject in the image. Leading lines, when utilized appropriately can greatly enhance an image. Here are a couple of images that demonstrate what I mean.

For almost ten years I saw this scene two or three times a day. One day I stopped to photograph it. I particularly liked the way the sun would shine through the Spanish moss in the mornings. But this image looks nothing like what I saw as I drove down the street. In fact it’s a pretty mundane image. There’s nothing that would make anyone call it a keeper.

This is the same as the first photo except it’s the way I photographed the scene instead of the street being cropped out. The street that curves through the scene takes your eyes from the bottom of the image to the same part of the photo as shown in the first image. While most, if not all, of this occurs on a sub-conscious level it still occurs. Your “mental eyes” feel more comfortable with the second image than the first because they go into the photo by travelling along the street and they can get out the same way.

Leading lines can be horizontal as in this image where the shore line, the trees and the cattails lead the eyes to the boat house on the right side of the image.

Leading lines can be straight as in this image. The leading line can be short as it is here or it can be long. However, a road or highway that begins at the bottom of the image and fades into the distance at or near the top of the image is a photograph of a road and not a leading line that takes the eyes to a subject. A mountain range at the top of the image, for example, uses the road as both a leading line to the mountains and as a subject of the image.

They can be curved as in this image. Here the river curves around the first formation on the right and then disappears between the small hill on the left and the second formation beyond the hill. Immediately the viewer’s mind stops and wonders what’s behind the hill. In this image, the photographer has made excellent use of leading lines.

Leading lines can be convergent. A technique that “forces” the eyes to the subject and holds them; there’s no way out.

However, when the lines become the image, they’re no longer leading lines. The photograph becomes a geometric composition. Nothing wrong with geometric compositions, but it’s helpful to know the difference.

Look at your photos and see how well you utilize leading lines. Here are a few things to consider regarding leading lines:

Does the leading line take your eyes into the image?

A line that goes from one edge of the image straight to another edge does not function as a leading line. In fact, a straight line from edge to edge makes the eyes leave the image before the main subject is identified.

A straight line makes the eyes go fast to the subject. A straight line, like a straight road when driving, tells the brain that it needs to hurry to the subject.

A curved, sweeping or wavy line makes the brain slow down and take its time. In the image of the river canyon above, the brain wants to take its time floating down the river and look at what’s along the way.

Keep in mind that composition is the “art” part of photography. Leading lines aren’t a requirement or rule. Not all images need a leading line. But many images would benefit from the inclusion of one. If you’re not comfortable with leading lines or haven’t really considered them before, now would be a good time to grab your camera and go out and practice. Better composition makes for better photographs.

Photo Credits:

Untitled (River Canyon) by Meredith Farmer on Flickr Creative Commons
Untitled (Church) by Meredith Farmer on Flickr Creative Commons
Leading Lines by hitzi 1000 on Flickr Creative Commons
AmEx Steps by RedDogFever on Flickr Creative Commons
All other photos by Steve Russell

Related posts:

1. Leading Lines
2. How to Use Lines to Enhance Your Photos
3. Composition – Rule of Thirds

The key to good photographs is composition. Because composition is so important, we are featuring a series of articles on composition beginning today with the Rule of Thirds (RoT). Actually, I could write a series of articles on the Rule of Thirds but I’ll resist that temptation.

If you search on the internet you can find thousands of articles about the Rule of Thirds. In fact, when I searched for Rule of Thirds Photography my search engine returned 1.27 million hits. Because there’s so much information out there on the subject and because I’ve written about the subject before, I’m not going to get into what it means, the history of it or a discussion about why it’s so important.

Keep in mind that photography is an art form. It’s not engineering so there really aren’t any strict rules, or at least it won’t break anything if you don’t always follow the rules. However, keep in mind that photographs, paintings, graphic arts and other works of art that follow the “rules” of compensation are generally more pleasing to the eye of the viewer. For the most part, when the RoT is followed the viewer usually doesn’t notice. On the other hand, an image where RoT isn’t followed will frequently jump off the page and not in a good way.

The following chart illustrates the Rule of Thirds in a graphical format.

It is generally accepted that the primary subject of a photo should be centered on one of the intersection indicated by the red dots. This is especially true when photographing landscapes, cityscapes, etc. However, there are times when centering the subject on one of the red dots just doesn’t work. Portrait photography is one of those times. Still, the rule of thirds is used in portrait photography and the general rule is that the top horizontal line should run through the subject’s eyes. This is true, in most cases, for portraits of people and of animals.

To illustrate this and what happens with different positionings of the subject, I selected this photograph of a tri-color heron. You will notice that photographing portraits of birds, as well as other animals, presents some composition problems that usually aren’t present when photographing people.

In most cases you want to employ the rule of thirds when you compose the photo in the view finder of your camera. However, keep in mind that the image the camera is going to capture is the same ratio as an 8″x12″ or 4″x6″ photo. While I do use these sizes when printing photos, 8″x10″ is a much more common size in portrait photography. Since in most cases I’m going to crop the photo to an 8″x10″ I usually leave room around the subject to allow me to try different ways of cropping the photo. In this case, the subject is placed on the left side of the image. In fact, the shoulder, or the point where the wing attaches to the body, of the bird is placed at the upper-left intersection of the RoT lines. I’m not really happy with this composition because the bird’s beak barely reaches beyond the center of the frame, leaving empty space in half of the image.

On this image I cropped to the 8″x10″ size ratio and centered the bird’s eye in the frame. Note that in nature photography (animals) and people photography, the eyes are the point of focus and the part of the subject that you use to compose the image (placement in the frame). Hopefully this image illustrates why you don’t want to center the subject in the frame. While I really like the way the water turned out in this image – the bokeh making the background look as if it’s painted instead of photographed – having the background account for roughly 75% of the image doesn’t make for a good photo.

In this image I centered the eye on the upper horizontal line. A little better but still not a good composition.

This image has the eye placed at the upper left intersection of the RoT lines. Clearly this doesn’t work.

For this one the bird’s eye is placed at the upper right intersection. Closer but still a lot of empty space at the top of the image and particularly over the bird’s back.

For this image I sort of broke the rule. The eye is clearly above the RoT line. In fact, the upper horizontal RoT line intersects the bird at its shoulder. A better composition but to me there’s still too much dead space in the photo. However, notice that by moving the bird higher in the image the reflection of the bird shows better and it doesn’t look like the legs are cut off.

Here I changed to a portrait orientation instead of landscape and cropped the image so that the upper horizontal line intersected the bird’s body and the right vertical line intersected its eye. A much better composition, I think.

There are times when you’ll get a better photo by zooming in on the subject and creating more of what is called a head & shoulders shot when photographing portraits of people. In this image the eye is at the upper left intersection of the lines. Composing the image this way also has the beak placed along the upper horizontal line.

On this last image I used the same placement of the eye and beak, but cropped it to landscape format instead of portrait. This is my favorite of all of the various compositions.

Post processing software, regardless of brand, is a wonderful tool for photographers. Merely cropping the image a number of different ways can change a relatively plain and uninteresting photo to something that most people will like. Play around with some of your photos the way I did with the heron. It’s a good exercise and can be quite rewarding, especially if you end up with the thought, “Now, that’s what I was trying to capture when I pressed the shutter release.”

Related posts:

1. The Rule of Thirds Explained
2. 8 Brilliant Illustrations of the ‘Rule of Thirds’
3. Examples of Great Composition

The photographer is Faye Mozingo. Faye’s a Beyond Megapixels reader, posts many of her images on the Beyond Megapixels group in Flickr and “Likes” Beyond Megapixels on Facebook. Even with all that it was quite by accident that I found her Flick account and began perusing her work. Here are a couple of photographs of roses she has posted in her Flickr account.

Two very nice photos of roses. It’s easy to see that Faye is very accomplished with a camera in her hand and has a very good eye. Here are four additional examples of her work that give a very different view of her artistic abilities.

Is this photography? That’s my question for you. There’s absolutely no doubt that this is art. Much of her work is absolutely beautiful and Faye is clearly talented. But, is it photographic art or is it a different art form that uses photographs?

Nature photography is my favorite photographic genre. Because of this I’m biased about what makes a really good photograph. Nature photographers strive to capture the subject as it is and make a beautiful image. Any manipulation of the image is minimal because we want a goldfinch to look like a goldfinch and not a stylized version of a goldfinch. Because of my admitted bias, my view is that she is taking a photograph that she has captured, like the first two of the roses, and uses various software programs to create a form of artwork that is different from photography.

What do you think? Please add your comments below or on our Facebook page. But, whether you comment or not, I urge you to visit Faye’s Flickr account and view her work. I think you’ll agree with me that she is very talented and a very good artist.

Here are a few more of her images.

Related posts:

1. Nude Photography – Art or Porn?
2. Nature Photography by Sandeep
3. John Shaw Nature and Digital Photography Seminars

———-

Whether you’ve photographed the moon numerous times or have just thought about doing it, Saturday evening, March 19, 2011 May 5th, 2012, is a must do evening. On that evening the moon will be at its perigee (closest to the Earth) and according to one article I read it will appear 14% larger than normal. This event, the full moon at its perigee will not occur again until the year 2029 [editor's note: hmm... it doesn't feel like 2029 to me!]. If you have an open horizon, you might want to begin photographing as soon as the moons starts to peep over the horizon.

If you aren’t sure how to do this here are a few tips:

Use a tripod – you want your camera to be as steady as absolutely possible. If you want a really good image of the moon IS or VR isn’t going to be enough.

Use the longest lens you have – I will be using a 300mm lens with a 1.4X Telephoto Extenter but if a 24-105mm was all I had, I would use that fully zoomed to 105mm.

Use a Remote Shutter Release if you have one. That way you won’t have to touch the camera to shoot the image.

Just before you shoot, lock up your mirror if your camera has that feature as an additional way to prevent camera movement

Why am I being so picky about camera movement? Because even with the 300mm lens and extender, I’ll still have to crop the image to get the moon to dominate the frame and I want the image as clear and sharp as possible.

Now for exposure

Even though it will be dark outside, the moon, once it’s above the horizon enough so that it appears white, is in full sunlight. Therefore, sunny 16 rule – shutter speed the same as the ISO and aperture at f/16. I will probably use a reciprocal of this because I want a low ISO and a fast shutter speed. Because I will be focusing at infinity I’ll probably set ISO at 100, shutter speed at 500 and aperture at f/8. I’ll probably try shutter speed at 1000 and aperture at f/5.6 as well.

Go have some fun and capture some great images of the moon.

———-

We’d love to see your shots! Please feel free to share them in our Flickr Group or on our Facebook Page!

Photo credit:

Full Moon by Steve Russell

Front page image credit Dave Dehetre on Flickr Creative Commons.

Related posts:

1. Photograph The Moon — March 19, 2011
2. Shortcuts and Rules of Thumb
3. How To Photograph Fireworks

All you need is a circular polarizer, and tiny bit of tweaking in Lightroom.

When my husband and I go on our weekend Jeep adventures, we leave the house at around 8:00 in the morning and usually get on-trail at about 10:00 for a four- or five-hour journey. That puts me smack in the middle of the so-called “worst” time of day to shoot. To accommodate these conditions, I bought a Tiffen 77mm Circular Polarizer to attach to my go-to lens, a Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS.

Using a circular polarizer is pretty simple. Just screw it onto the front of your lens – you’ll notice that it doesn’t “tighten”, there is still room to rotate the filter. That’s because, depending on how the light is hitting your lens, the filter can be rotated around to achieve the effect you want. It works best if you’re standing at a 90-degree angle from the sun – then just look through the viewfinder and watch the effect on the scene as you rotate the filter around. Skies should become a deeper blue, greens a deeper green, water a deeper color, etc. If you’re not seeing the results you want, try shifting your position in relation to the sun.

Keep in mind that you may have to use a slower shutter speed, or increase your ISO, to accommodate for the decreased light hitting the sensor. Just as any other filter, once you put something in front of the lens it blocks a certain amount of light. On this particular day, I shot in aperture priority f/16 with an ISO of 400, in bright sunlight.

Once I got to post-processing, I found that I just needed slight adjustments to exposure, contrast, blacks, saturation and vibrance. Then I applied a bit of sharpening and achieved the photos that you see here, of the Broken Arrow Trail in Sedona, Arizona. They were all taken at just about exactly noon. The sky was that blue to my eyes, and the rocks that red. I was happy to achieve near-reality in the photos.

What has been your experience working with polarizing filters? Do you find yourself in circumstances where one would come in handy? Share your experiences with us in the comments or on our Facebook Page.

Related posts:

1. Filters 101 (Part 2)
2. Let’s Talk Filters
3. Photography 101 – Exposure Bracketing

Happy Friday, friends! I’m in the throes of the last week of this semester in college, and Steve is wrapping up his moving extravaganza. So, today’s post is going to be all about YOU.

As we wind down our other responsibilities and gear up for a summer full of great content on Beyond Megapixels, we’d love to hear from you all. What kind of photography advice are you seeking? Which products would you like to be reviewed? What techniques are you eager to learn about?

Some planned upcoming articles include:

- Rear curtain sync
- Special effects photography
- PocketWizard review
- Five ways to use a reflector
- Monitor calibration
- ColorChecker Passport
- What to consider when purchasing your first DSLR
- Single flash drama

What else would you like to see? Do you have any other feedback about our content or our website? Now is your chance to give us your feedback! Feel free to use the comments below, or leave us a message on our Facebook page. We really appreciate your continued support!

Photo credit: William Joyce

Related posts:

1. Color Management – Printer Calibration
2. Freebie: Share a Photography Tip for a Chance to Win a $50 Gift Card
3. Review: Studio Lighting 101 Workshop by SnapFactory

One of the great things about photography is there are few absolutes. Even an image that’s overexposed or underexposed can be interesting and compelling to some people. What really makes a good photograph is whether the photographer thinks it is. It doesn’t make any difference if I like it or if the next person likes it because there will always be someone that thinks it’s really good and someone that thinks it’s drek. It’s true that there are so-called rules but sometimes these “rules” can be broken and the result is a really good image.

One of the great things about BeyondMegapixels, in my opinion, is that Tiffany and I don’t always agree. We never argue about it but we do provide our readers with different perspectives from time to time. We both think that offering different perspectives is a good thing. With this in mind, I wanted to write about a subject that Tiffany wrote about last Wednesday; Is True SOOC Possible? In her article she invited discussion so here goes mine.

My real thought on SOOC is that it’s much ado about nothing. There seems to be a faction of photographers out there that think an SOOC photograph is some kind of badge of honor. Personally, I think that in some cases, not all, SOOC is something promoted by people that either don’t have post processing software, that have the software and don’t know how to use it or don’t want to go to the trouble and effort post processing requires. If that describes you, then great. If you have a really good image that didn’t require any post-production processing, then halleluiah. If you have a really good image that you spent hours on in post-production processing then halleluiah to that too. The important issue is that you have a really good image regardless of how you got there.

The truth of the matter is that there is no such thing as SOOC. The closest thing to SOOC is RAW and there isn’t anything you can do with a RAW image except post process it. I’ll discuss more on this a little later. The truth of the matter also is that most of the people that talk about SOOC are talking about JPEG images and JPEG isn’t really SOOC as much as some people would like to believe. SOOC means Straight Out Of (the) Camera. If it’s truly SOOC then the image would have to contain all the data the camera captured with absolutely no modifications whatsoever.

The closest photographers have ever been to SOOC is slide film. With Kodachrome in particular, you captured a photograph with a camera where the only things you could change was focus, aperture and shutter speed. Yes, you could “push” the film by dialing in a higher ASA but that usually worked much better and was more applicable with color or black & white negative film. Still with Kodachrome the film had to be developed (processed) but there wasn’t any manipulation to speak of. Kodachrome could only be processed at Kodak or Kodak approved labs and every roll of film was processed to the same standards. In other words, you got back from the lab, what the camera “saw” in a way that the chemicals used in the process reacted to the emulsion on the film.

In most modern DSLRs you can elect to shoot in RAW, in JPEG or in both at the same time. When you shoot in RAW the file that is captured by the camera contains all the image data the camera “sees” with the sensor. If you also shoot in ProRGB you capture all the colors possible to capture with a camera. That file would truly be SOOC. The problem is you really can’t do anything with the file except open it and then when you save it, the software you’re using saves it in a different format. Technically, once the file format is changed, the image is no longer RAW and therefore not SOOC but let’s not get that technical. SOOC purist would possibly argue that if you open a Camera RAW image and make any changes to it, even something as simple as changing the color temperature, the image is no longer SOOC. I won’t argue with the logic but that belief is an oversimplification.

When I capture a RAW image the file size is generally around 25 megabytes. If I make changes to it in Photoshop the resulting .psd (Photoshop’s file format) is even larger, sometimes double in size depending on how many changes I make. If you have a RAW image and you want to post it on the internet and/or have it printed, you have to convert it to a JPEG image and change the color palate to sRGB. The resulting file is then around 5 megabytes or only 20% of the original RAW image. Now we have a JPEG image that by any stretch of the imagination can’t be considered SOOC. If nothing else, the act of compressing the RAW file from 25 MB to 5 MB changes the image.

Guess what? If you capture a JPEG image with your camera you have a file that’s around 5 megabytes. If you take that file and put it online or send it to the printer you have a SOOC image, right? Wrong? Your camera captures images in RAW. That’s why you can, with many cameras, shoot in RAW and JPEG at the same time. What actually happens is that the camera captures the image in RAW and based on its internal programming performs post-production processing, compresses the file and saves it in JPEG format. SOOC? I don’t think so.

There are two real questions here and SOOC or not isn’t one of them.

1. Do you want to personally make however many processing changes are required to make the image really good in your eyes, or
2. Do you want to let the software that’s been designed for the “middle of the road” acceptance to make the changes?

In the Adorama video that Joyce provided a link to in her article, Mark Wallace says, “Post production is always going to be better because you can get it to look exactly like you want it to look.” I would suggest a better statement is that post production is always better because it gives you complete control over the final image. Striving for SOOC is the wrong objective. Striving for less time in post processing by thinking about the image before you press the shutter release is the correct goal.

Finally, unless you’re trying to please a paying client, you are the only judge that counts in what makes a good image that you capture. My opinion of your images isn’t really relevant unless you really want my opinion and then it’s still your decision about how to modify any image. I have images that people don’t get all excited about that I don’t understand why and I have images the people do get excited about that I don’t understand why. I’m sure you’ve experienced the same thing.

The image used with this article is SOOC because it is a scanned Kodachrome 64 slide

Related posts:

1. Discuss: Is true SOOC possible?
2. Your Weekend Photography Project – Manual and SOOC
3. SOOC Challenge

1. Relying on one shot. Believe it or not, often times when I photograph something I’ll just take one or two shots of it, then move on to the next thing. It’s like my attention span won’t allow me to consider that it may take a half-dozen or more shots to really get it right. Then when I’m back at home plugging everything into Lightroom I come to realize that I’ve missed a great shot due to my haste. So I’m determined to bracket more, use a burst shutter more, and slow down to more carefully analyze my shots.

2. Relying on auto-focus. There are times when my lens will hunt for focus, or the AF points don’t align with what I want in focus. So I’ll stand there, half-pressing the shutter ten times in order to get the AF points to shift a little (press, recompose… press, recompose), as if I have some sort of reluctance to touch anything on the camera other than the body. All I need to do is shift to manual focus, and I’ll end up capturing the shot in much less time than it would take to get the AF to cooperate.

3. Relying on image stabilization. I have a tripod – two, actually. I have a monopod. I hardly ever use them, instead depending upon IS to save me. I’ve even been reluctant to purchase the much-acclaimed Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L just because it doesn’t have IS. There are SO MANY opportunities that I pass up, where my photography would be that much better for using a tripod and remote shutter release. So from now on, when the camera goes, the tripod goes. (I use a Manfrotto 055XPROB Pro and a Manfrotto 498RC2 Ball Head.)

What bad photography habits have you gotten yourself into, that you’re determined to break? Share your experiences, and your advice, in the comments or on our Facebook Page!

Related posts:

1. Learn From Your “Bad” Photographs
2. Three Simple Tips to INSTANTLY Improve Your Photography
3. Quality Gear That Won’t Break The Bank

Here’s a question for you, my friends. Do you think it is possible to “get it right” straight out of the camera, with no post-production necessary? Or do you think it’s impossible to obtain the correct exposure, white balance, and color balance without post-production?

I recently watched this video, in which Mark Wallace explains why he believes it is impossible to get perfect exposure in-camera. I thought his points were interesting, though the topic itself seems (to me) to be a bit misleading. For example, everyone’s definition of “perfect” differs, so the perfection that I strive for may not be the same quality of perfection that someone else strives for.

Personally, though I think post-production is required if you want to get everything technically perfect, I think it’s possible to get a “perfectly” aesthetic photo right out of the camera.

With the use of custom white balance, a light meter, and good working knowledge of the exposure triangle, I don’t see any reason why a photograph couldn’t be pretty darned close to technical perfection, either. However, if you’re going for such qualities as “absolute” white and “absolute” black, you’re probably doing it for a reason, so post-production is a must.

RAW shooters will tell us that post-production is just as necessary as developing film in a darkroom – that step has always been there, it has just been replaced by digital capabilities. I’ve heard some folks compare JPEG shooters striving for SOOC, to Polaroid photographers – they take whatever the camera gives them. RAW shooters have questioned JPEG shooters, wondering WHY, if they have the ability to do so much more with their photos, they choose not to?

JPEG shooters, on the other hand, will sometimes accuse RAW shooters of being lazy and forgetting their photographic fundamentals. Instead they rely on Lightroom or Photoshop to fix their errors, whereas true photographic capability is demonstrated with the result you get straight out of the camera.

I shoot in RAW so that I have the ability to edit if I need it, but I’m always striving for as little post-production as is necessary to achieve a quality photograph. I rarely find instances where I need the “absolutes” of black and white, and feel that using a light meter and setting a custom white balance pretty much achieves what I need in my end results.

So what is your opinion? Do you think “true” SOOC is possible? Does every photo you take go through some steps in post-production, every time? Or are you of the “it depends” line of thought? Please, discuss your thoughts in the comments, or head on over to our Facebook Page, where I’ve started a thread for this subject.

Photo copyright Tiffany Joyce.

Related posts:

1. Is True SOOC Possible
2. SOOC Challenge
3. Your Weekend Photography Project – Manual and SOOC

Well, now take a look at this photo:

That’s me up there!

Here’s another angle.

Here’s another one. Pretty mountain stream?

Or enormous Upper Falls in Yellowstone National Park? Look at how small those people are off to the right!

If you want to demonstrate how big (or how small) the subject of your photograph is, it’s very helpful to throw in an object (or person) to give a sense of perspective. Just a handy composition tip for you on this fine Monday morning!

Photo credits (all): Tiffany Joyce

Related posts:

1. Three Simple Tips to INSTANTLY Improve Your Photography
2. Composition Tips – Simplicity
3. Change your perspective!