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Lens-Artists Challenge #275 – Filling the Frame

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This week, Anne asks us to get close enough to our subject to fill the frame. She writes, “When you want your subject to stand out, fill the frame! When you fill the frame with your subject, you eliminate various background distractions. The viewer’s eyes have nowhere to wander. Their attention is where you want it.” You can read her entire challenge post here.

One of my favorite photo compositions, when I go to a classic car auction or show, is to get up close with the subject. It has two advantages for me. I get to focus on something iconic or beautiful about the vehicle and it’s likely to avoid the distraction of people or other vehicles in the image. The beautifully chromed engine in this mid-20th century Ford is an example.

Portrait of a Canadian Goose.

On a trip to the zoo, some geese were wandering around near a water feature. I got down to its eye level and created a portrait with my zoom lens at 220 mm. To further isolate the subject from the background, I used subject masking to allow me to darken the background to eliminate distractions.

Rotunda of the Denver State Capitol Building.

Architectural details are often interesting subjects. In this photo of the interior of the Denver State House, I captured the rotunda. In the original image which was captured at 16 mm, there was much more of the ceiling and the upper level staircase visible. In my final edit, I cropped the image to include only the chandelier and interior of the dome. The asymmetric nature of the off-center dome and the glow in the center of the lights gave the image two points of interest.

Tangled.

The action at a rodeo is intense and capturing the excitement in a split second is not easy. Most of the action I photographed was done at wider zoom levels, but when the images were processed, I cropped tightly to focus the viewer on the subject. In this case, the rider got the worst of the bargain. One other note, the shadow of the bull demonstrates clearly that the animal’s feet were all in the air.

Flower of the day.

Blossoms of any type make excellent subjects and are especially easy to photograph up close. This example was captured at McCrory Gardens in Brookings South Dakota last summer.

Garden display.

In Lincoln Nebraska’s Sunken Gardens, there are several planting areas where the gardeners took the time and effort to create a pleasing collection of colorful plants. This image features different levels identified by different shapes and color combinations. It made for a pleasing composition. I like the composition as it is, but I wonder if it would have been beneficial to blur the evergreens and sky in the background. I could have done that using Pro Mode on my Samsung S23U, but didn’t think about it when I snapped the cell phone photo. Let me know what you think in the comments.

To view these images in 2K HD, you will find the gallery on my Flickr site here. Last week, Donna challenged us with asymmetric images, and Sofia the week before with symmetrical photos. This week, Anne focuses on another aspect of composition, filling the frame. Coming next week, James of Jazzibee blog will be our guest host. Be sure to follow him here so you don’t miss next week’s challenge. If you’d like to join in on the challenges each week but aren’t sure how to get started, you can learn the details here.

I’ve scheduled this post to be published on November 16 when, if all goes as planned, Lynn and I will be traveling to Los Angeles for a weekend boarding on the Norwegian Bliss. My Internet access will be curtailed, especially on the cruise ship, so be patient if I don’t respond to your comments as quickly as usual.

John Steiner

42 comments

  7. John, the Rotunda and Tangled photos are incredibly beautiful. I especially liked the various circle in the Rotunda. As for the plant and your question, I like the composition as it is. I do not see a need to blur the sky and background. The contrast of green and red is very pronounced and perfect for the photo. There is also that dark purple at the bottom of the frame grounding the entire photo. Very well executed and presented!

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  8. I love the rotunda and the bull riding shot. I’ve been to many a rodeo and never seen the bull come off the worse. 🙂 At least these days the riders wear flak jackets and (usually) helmets. But they still take a beating. When people complain about how rodeo animals are treated, I just laugh. They’re worth a lot of money and the cowboys are the ones who take a lickin’ and (hopefully) keep on tickin.’

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  9. I love that rotunda shot in particular, it has a real sense of depth! As for the Sunken Gardens, yes, blurring the distant elements might look good, but why not experiment with going fully full frame with a crop of just the leaves? They have such an interesting texture and pattern!

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  12. Terrific post as always John. Loved the car and the rodeo rider which must have been really difficult to capture -great action! You were very brave (or foolish) to get that close to a goose. They can be quite nasty when provoked!

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