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Lens-Artists Challenge #289 – Tools of Photo Composition

Saint Mary’s Church in Fargo, North Dakota.

Of the many composition factors in photography, this challenge focuses on Shape, Form, Texture, and Light. Though your images probably use multiple techniques that often include several factors in basic composition, for this challenge, consider these four elements. Choose to highlight one or more of these aspects in your response, and present one or two of your favorites. You can decide to focus on only one aspect or include examples of all of them. And you can either choose from your existing collection or venture out for a challenge shoot. We’re eager to see your top picks that utilize any of these techniques.

Architects often use repeating basic shapes in design because the repetition is pleasing to the eye. Photographers often capitalize on the architects’ work by focusing the camera to maximize the repetition of shapes. Saint Mary’s Catholic Church in Fargo North Dakota is an example of an architect’s use of triangles, circles, rectangles, arches, and other basic shapes. In this composition, I focused on a major section above the entrance doors to the church.

Engineer at work.

On an excursion train in Georgetown, Colorado, we were on a siding waiting for the engine to be switched from one end of the train to the other. As the engine went by, I captured a shot of the engineer at work. This photo turned out to be one of my favorite compositions, mostly because there are several repeating rectangles in the image with the engineer being framed by the open window. Even the 111 painted on the engine represents nested rectangles.

Geometric form.

The difference between shape and form can be muddy, but artists typically consider shape to be two-dimensional while a form is three-dimensional. An obvious comparison might be that a triangle is considered a shape and a pyramid is considered a form for the purpose of composition. In the photo above, the architect who designed the atrium of the Heritage Center in Bismarck, North Dakota used a 40-foot by 40-foot cube form as a design element. The nature of the cube is reinforced by the steel rectangular frames around the window panes in the glass and metal structure.

Organic form.

Artists and photographers also consider organic forms and landscape photographers work for years to master organic compositional techniques. Flowers are one of my favorite organic forms as subjects. Removing color from the photograph allows the viewer to focus on the form of this beautiful lily.

A sandstone wave.

Adobe addresses texture in photography with this statement, “From moss-covered stones to prickly cactuses, texture images entice viewers, create moods, and communicate ideas…” In the desert near Page Arizona, the sandstone has been sculpted by wind and water for centuries. As I was hiking in the desert, I noticed the effects of wind as it molded the relatively soft rock into what can best be described as a wave. The wind took centuries to create in sandstone what it does in minutes to the water in the world’s oceans. There are many unique textures created by the elements in the composition, but the most interesting to me was the sandstone wave.

Crystal Caves.

We enjoy visiting caves (if they aren’t too steep or strenuous). The Grand Cayman Island features a network of caves known as the Crystal Caves. There is also a Crystal Caves in Bermuda. That complex is still on my list of caves to visit. What I enjoy about caves is the myriad of textures found on the surfaces (which we are relentlessly reminded we cannot touch). The cave in the photo above is at ground level at one point and all of the textures in the walls and ceiling are easily visible in the sunlight streaming into the cave entrance.

Capturing light.

Photos wouldn’t be possible without light and since the first cameras, capturing light is what photography is all about. We work with artificial light, await the perfect natural light, and are disappointed when the expected magical light doesn’t appear.

If you look up Compositional Tools on the Internet, you might not find a reference to light as a tool of composition. Yet light and shadow are used along with all of the other compositional tools to help us see the photographer’s vision. We position the camera and a light source to enhance the look of a portrait. We might even introduce equipment to create shadows in specific places to set a mood that would be entirely different if we did everything else exactly the same, but didn’t manipulate the light. We might position our camera in such a way as to create a backlight that might ultimately change the composition in its entirety.

Sometimes light is the main subject of our photos, especially at sunrise and sunset… but I am getting ahead of myself. Sometimes it’s fun to have the light as the main subject. In the display above, I captured a spider web of LED lights on display. To add an unusual effect to the image, I chose a longer shutter speed, pressed the shutter, waited for an instant, and then cranked the zoom lens all the way to the full zoom position. That momentary pause captured the bright LED design, and the zoom created light trails that expanded outward. It was a fun experiment.

Magical light.

Ah, those magical sunsets when the light is perfect, or nearly so. What better way to conclude this challenge? Oh, and did you notice the triangular shapes in this composition? The sails on the boat in the center and the mast and ropes on the other two boats form triangle shapes. Even the lighthouse and the terrain on the right form triangles.

You can check out HD versions of the images here via my Flickr site. Last week, Ritva challenged us to do some Window Shopping, a fun and interesting way to renew my hand at street photography and share a few favorites from my gallery. Next week, Ann-Christine will be our host for the Lens-Artists Challenge. Be sure to link to her page so you don’t miss the challenge post on Saturday. If you’d like to respond to our challenge each week and want to know how to get started, check here.

John Steiner

130 comments

  2. Hi John. I really enjoyed your post, photos, and this challenge. It really helped me analyze what makes a visually-appealing photo. Your image of the train engineer is a favorite of mine, too. Your landscapes are great, but in fact, ALL your images really illustrate the tools beautifully. Here’s a link to my post in case the pingback doesn’t appear:

    LAPC #289: Tools of Photo Composition

    Reply

  4. John, these are inspiring examples of shape, form, texture, and light. I love the spider web, but I don’t think I have the technical skills to do something like that. Fabulous shot, though. The church shapes are excellent and well accented by the white paint against red brick. The unique cave picture could inspire any writer or artist. It’s got “other-wordly” written all over it!

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    • Thanks, Marsha! That church composition was also an example of cropping to emphasize the wide variety of shapes in the design. It was a perfect example of the technique.

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      • I agree. The cropping took out any extraneous material and allowed our eyes to focus on the shapes set apart by the contrasting colors. So well done. I’d better go back and see what I did for shape this week. My post publishes tomorrow as usual. 🙂

  15. Such an interesting theme John – I’ve enjoyed seeing all the posts it’s triggered from others 🙂 I’ve not previously thought about the difference between shape and form, your explanation makes a lot of sense. I especially like your ‘light’ examples – the spider’s web LED shot is really effective and that yellow sky is great for silhouettes! I’m late this week – you can blame my holiday (jet-lag, mountains of photos to sort) but also I wanted to double-dip with my Monochrome Madness post as I’d serendipitously already picked ‘texture’ as its theme: https://www.toonsarah-travels.blog/gallery-monochrome-madness-seeing-textures-in-black-and-white/

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  27. This is a very interesting challenge, John. I have enjoyed seeing so many posts and comments, and your explanation of the four composition elements was well done and made it easier to pick photos. Your own examples are excellent – I especially loved the light capture! Thank you for the lesson!

    Reply

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