"This is Home"

This weekend we had the assignment to read about photo composition. Good photos aren't usually just taken. In fact, most of the time they are planned. Granted, an amazing photo can be accidentally snapped, but the best photographers look at the composition of a potential picture while snapping it. They consider simplicity, the Rule of Thirds, line, balance, framing, and avoiding mergers. All of the information about these concepts comes from Kodak Guidelines for Better Photographic Composition.

With this in mind, I decided that my subject of the pictures I'd take would be North College Terrace, where I am living this year. I took a lot of pictures and then chose the 4 pictures that I thought best represented four of the six principles above.

Simplicity
When you take a picture, you want to make sure that the background isn't too complicated. The more complicated the background is, the less the subject stands out. With this in mind, I took this picture. 

I took a few pictures of this Security Blue Light outside my building, but no matter where I took the picture from a tree, a gate or a building seemed to get in the way. I then decided to take it from a lower angle which allowed it to stand out against the plain blue sky and therefore appear as a more compelling, clear picture.

Rule of Thirds 
According to the Rule of Thirds when composing a picture you should divide it into thirds both horizontally as well as  vertically. The subject of the picture should then be aligned with one of the four intersections of lines. This makes a more dynamically compelling picture.

 In this picture, the Be Extraordinary sign is in the upper left intersection of lines. I chose to put it in this position so that the eye would take in the sign and then see the green grass and the pruned shrubs/bushes, which one may classify as extraordinary. The sign is still the focus, however, I also put the sign in the upper left of the picture because if it is in, say, the bottom right, the road and cars would distract even more than the single white car already slightly does.

Lines
Lines can be used in photo composition in a variety of different ways: diagonal lines create interesting composition, leading lines can be used to emphasize the subjects, S curves are compelling, and more. 

I like this picture because it uses the gentle S curves which is aesthetically interesting, and this S curve works as a diagonal line to lead to the subject of the picture, which is the sun in the upper right of the picture. The viewer's eye follows the road down the hill and is then caught by the diagonal rays of the sun.

Framing
Using things already in the scene to frame the subject is a very effective way to emphasize the subject and draw the viewers eye to it. Framing can be used to ensure that the viewer sees the part of the picture that you want them to see.

 The focus of this picture is the front porch and rocking chair of this town-home. The tree, which appears naturally in the scene, is used to frame the house and makes it obvious that this porch area is the subject. The light also hits in the right way to emphasize that this porch is the subject.

So there we go! Just four examples of photo composition principles found in the area surrounding my apartment complex. It really does show that by keeping good photo composition in mind, interesting photos can be created out of less than interesting subjects.
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Title Credit: "This is Home" by Switchfoot

"Who Lights the Stars At Night?"

When I took this picture, my intent was to shoot it from an angle in order to indicate the perspective of the person or thing that Galileo's telescope is pointing at. Because of this, however, the size of portions of his body do look disproportioned. His head look much smaller than the rest of his body. This allows me to emphasize the scientific implications of his discoveries made as opposed to his actual ideas.

The frame of my picture is, for the most part, filled with my subject. However, the background is cluttered and can be distracting. On the other hand, trying to remove the building from the background would require shooting from a different angle may eliminate the possibility of shoot from the perspective of the thing or person being viewed by Galileo.

With this analysis in mind, I went back out to take some more pictures of the Galileo statue.

Although I couldn't continue with the idea of taking the picture from under the telescope, when I took this picture I decided to take it from a low angle because the twisted nature of the statue makes taking the picture from a low angle very interesting.

By stepping back a little from the statue I was able to get the upper third of his body: his head, hands and shoulders, as well as the telescope above the building and bench. This is an improvement over my last picture because I believe the head and the telescope are the most important parts of Galileo and thus the sculpture, so the picture should emphasize them and make them stand out.

The angle of the picture also still brings up the question of what exactly he is looking at because the telescope points out of frame and the line of the telescope naturally leads your eye in that direction.

Altogether I like this picture because it allowed me to take my ideas from the first picture and somewhat apply them to my second in a more aesthetically pleasing way.
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Title Source: "Galileo (Someone Like You)" by Josh Groban

"Nice To Meet You"

Hi! I'm Amy and I'm a Strategic Communications major at High Point University. I'm in the Honors Component of COM 1111: Mediated Communication Systems. I have a little experience in some of the computer software that we will be using this semester: Photoshop, iMovie, and a small amount of Blogger experience. I am by no means a master, however, so I am excited to polish my skills, and learn new skills on both the mediums that I already know as well as one that I am not as familiar with: Audacity, InDesign, and more.

One thing that I really want to learn through this class this semester is designing logos through InDesign. I worked this summer for a Strategic Communication firm and the main idea that was emphasized was branding and the importance of your logo, color scheme, and other aspects of your website, business cards, and letterhead correlating with what the business is all about. I am excited to try my hand at this!

I love music, so my blog entry titles will all be from songs. Today's is Gavin Degraw's "Nice to Meet You."