4. Essential One (Copy)
1. Quick RECAP
Personally, I love knowing why something is important because it helps me better remember it and therefore use it more effectively. Lessons 1 and 2 were set up to do exactly this: explain why we need to pay so much attention to composition so our photos more closely reflect what we see and want to capture.
In summary we:
learned the importance of decluttering a scene
understood and practiced how changing our body position is our greatest asset to changing a scene
explored how we read a 2D image differently to our 3D world
Here’s a quick quiz on these three topics:
Option A
Maybe you chose this photo?
Showing the house and front yard is important and was also on my mind when composing the image. It's an important part of childhood memories.
However, if your priority was to highlight this boy's passion (and ability) in kicking a soccer ball - this composition doesn't achieve this as well as option B.
Although the photo shows the boy at home - the child’s emotion is lost in the other details i.e. my eye tends to look straight past the moment, to the house and front garden.
Option B
Here, the camera is closer to the action. We can still see aspects of the house, but this composition removes any 'visual clutter' from the scene such as the front yard, sky and extra deck area. This helps us focus solely on the main star of the photo - the boy and his soccer skills.
I prefer this image - but that’s because my goal was really to show the boy’s football skills and utmost concentration and effort.
This image did win an award - however, as I didn’t enter the other one the scientific experiment would be deemed incomplete.
Answer here
One option would be to move the camera lower, and take a step forward. This declutters the scene, by eliminating the papers on the table, and shifts focus to the boy drawing while in his dinosaur suit.
In 2D (as a photo)
In 3D (real life)
So after a quick recap, it’s now time to start with one of the essential skills.
2. Find a clean background.
Question: What do we mean by clean background?
Answer: Anything that is devoid of distractions.
What’s in the background can single-handedly determine whether or not an image is successful, because what we choose to include in the frame, will either add context to our subject or, more often than not, distract from it.
A clean background, void of distracting objects, instantly makes our images stronger because it always accentuates our subject, leaving no doubt in the viewers mind as to what’s most significant.
A background that is ‘clean’ could be a wall, door, back of a chair, clean patch of grass, the sky, floor, window, table… just about anything with a consistent colour or pattern that helps keep our focus on the subject instead of any extraneous details in the frame.
Example
Using a clean background to accentuate the simple act of playing a piano.
Slide right to see the difference a clean background makes. In this case the clean background is the wall.
The first image is okay, but by cleaning up the background (by raising the camera up, to remove the girl’s legs and the power outlet from the frame), we can feel the solitude of the moment more intently because our eyes don’t bounce around all the other details in the frame.
3. CASE-STUDY
Photographer: Parent keeping watchful eye on daughter.
Subject: 2-yr old cooling off in a make-shift pool.
Question: Apart from the subject, what catches your eye in the image below?
Does the top right corner also distract you from the subject? When I look at it, I see the subject but am then drawn to the top of the frame. It’s lighter, it’s a different pattern to the wall, and I have an instant and innate curiousness to work out what it is.
The effect of a clean background. Below is how I would crop the same image to remove the edge of the window. Take a look below. Does this tiny change now help your eye rest more easily on the subject?
4. Equal weight:
Subject - backgrounD
To really improve our photos, an idea, that might feel weird at first, is to give equal weight and importance to the subject and the background.
At the end of the day, the subject will always be the most important part of the photo - but what often happens is we look at the subject exclusively, and ignore the background completely. To momentarily pretend the background is just as important, helps us notice distracting details more easily - and deal with them if possible.
Example
Here I challenged myself to take a photo back-to-front. I.e., I knew where the subject was - but then I ignored him, and focused only on composing the background. Although I couldn’t find a clean background in the scene - I did want to keep all the lines perfectly vertical and horizontal because in a 2D image - our eyes are very quick to notice when they are not. Once I was happy with this, only then did I bring my attention to where Jens, the subject, was sitting in the frame.
To challenge myself, after taking the photo, I asked the subject to move out of the frame (poor Jens), and then tried to recreate the background, trying to remember exactly how I’d lined up the lights on the ceiling, and seats etc.
You can slide right to see how close the second image was to the first.
Composing back-to-front is a simple concept, and super effective, but it doesn’t feel like a natural way to take photos so we have to consciously bring it to mind.
Next time you’re taking a photo give it a go. It feels counter-intuitive for sure, as it’s natural to first focus on the subject - and forget about what else is in the frame. However, if we can push ourselves to look beyond the subject, sort of training ourselves to pay just as much attention to the details in the background our photos become better because we are super aware of distracting elements and can then easily remove them from the frame.
5. Examples
Here are four photos with clean backgrounds - and the background stories about how they were created.
SUBJECT: Dancing girl
BACKGROUND: A clean space of floor.
By holding the camera at eye level, but pointing it down, ever so slightly, the stereo system on the floor behind the subject was eliminated. This helps keeps the viewers attention directly on the girls dancing feet.
SUBJECT: A young boy taking a rest from walking the streets of Berlin.
BACKGROUND: Cobble-stone street
Crouching down further, to the boys level, would have included cars parked in the background - therefore the camera is as low as possible, to include the boys face, without including anything distracting in the background.
SUBJECT: 2 yr old looking at the remnants of a picnic.
BACKGROUND: Dark shadow created by trees.
It’s really difficult to find a clean background while in nature. Trees, with their irregular leaves and branches and the patchy light that filters through, creates a somewhat chaotic backdrop. I didn’t do anything special to create this beautifully clean and dark background, except pause to appreciate the brilliant stroke of luck.
SUBJECT: 10 day old
BACKGROUND: Muslin cloth on change table.
There were toys and clothes on the edge of the change table, so I framed the image to avoid these items. If it was my home, I would have simply moved them out of the way - which is something you could always keep in mind as a quick-fix.
6. Exceptions
Include the background?
Two reasons to include a ‘messy’ background
Sometimes it’s simply impossible to find a clean background and we’ll learn other compositional strategies to help in those situations.
Sometimes a more chaotic background better portrays the moment.
If we reconsider the dinosaur photo in the quiz above - maybe you’d have preferred to include all the papers and pens scattered on the table as an important part of the story?
And here’s another example when including a ‘messy background’ is important:
The cake and presents on the dining table, have as much impact on the story as the moment between the subjects, because without them we don’t know it’s a birthday.
If you’re unsure whether or not to include something in the background - it’s sometimes helpful to ask:
Does it contribute to the overall understanding of the moment? or,
Is it an important part of the story?
A clean background will add impact and a wow factor to our images, but we never have to feel restricted to always find one. It’s rather an example of knowing the rules and then knowing when to break them.
Physically changing the background
Sometimes, it might be easiest to simply shift any distracting items from view. Why not? There’s no downside to sliding a vase a few cm to the right to get it out of the frame, or throwing a toy or cup under a table…
If the items don’t connect to a deeper understanding of your home and the moment, and you have time - by all means, make life easier and physically shift them out of the frame.
Photography is the simplest thing in the world, but it is incredibly complicated to make it really work.
MARTIN PARR
Next up: Essential skill Number 2.
Approximate time needed: 7 mins.