Three Principles of Composition…

Movement, Space and Balance are three of the seven plus principles of composition that draw the eye to an image.

Composition helps to tell the story of an image. Seeing the suggestion of movements like wind, the ocean, a person or animal walking, a wheel or even facial expressions. The mind through the eye knows what to expect as if you were standing right there in the photo.

Space is everything within the frame for the scene that creates depth and perspective or lack-there-of in a flat graphic black and white image.

The balance of elements large or small, natural or manmade add visual weight to an image. Symmetry and asymmetry are achieved through the balance of the focal point of an image. Think of weighing scales with the one of the left having a sack with a pound of flour on it. The left side will be below the right creating a disruption to the mind and eye as something is out of balance. This is intriguing to the eye and creates visual movement and subliminal weight to the image.

Take a look through some of your photos and make note of the ones that attract your eye. Put those in a separate folder while adding new photos to this folder as you take them. In a short time, you will see a commonality throughout your photos. Try to find some of the principles of composition in your photos that you naturally understood just by finding a scene you liked, pointing and tapping or clicking.

Some other principles of composition are; Contrast, Pattern, Repetition, Contrast, Proportion, Movement, Space and Balance…

Here are eight examples of composition from my own picture. I look for graphic shapes (natural and manmade) that carve out a space against the sky.