Horses

sleist · Oct 15, 2012

Struggling with several shots I took of these guys. Went with square.

Here's a 5x7 crop.

The shrub at the bottom kills it for me, but I don't think I like the fences much either.

Light Guru · Oct 15, 2012

I like the square composition best myself. However the image seems to be flat.

sleist · Oct 15, 2012

Ya, I don't know. Think I need to walk away from this one for awhile.
Clouds would have helped immensely I think. Nothing but blue ....

Majeed Badizadegan · Oct 15, 2012

#1 is a much cleaner composition. That one gets my vote. Good job leaving room around the frame for the tree, one key element of this composition.

Overread · Oct 15, 2012

Shot 1 certainly has the cleaner composition without the wooden fencing getting in the way. However the problem (which is made worse with the cropping) is that the tree really is the main feature of the shot.

It dominates a large part of the photo and is also sitting on a good point of focal interest (look up the rule of thirds). With nothing surrounding the tree as well it really makes it take over, the horses end up becoming like the smaller trees, the fence and the field - they are background elements to the main subject.

something about the lighting on the horses is also jarring, esp with the far left and middle horses the horses themselves almost seem like they are clean "cut and paste" jobs. It might just be the local contrast over those horses and the fact that their angle gives them a strong shadow over their body - but they don't "feel" like they fit with the rest of the photo (including their own shadows on the ground).

A tiny bit of contrast reduction on the horses themselves might help to blend them in a bit more, but it won't replace the fact that, with the composition of the whole photo and the crop presented, the subject is very much the tree.

(ps don't take that to mean that the crop is bad, the crop itself is good, its just not highlighting the horses as a major subject component).

Majeed Badizadegan · Oct 15, 2012

Interesting feedback Overread. I see this shot as a good example as an exception to the rule of thirds. I try to imagine most shots like this printed large, and what they'd look like. The tree would definitely draw the viewer in, but it also works nicely to frame the horses grazing under it.

The horses add two important things: Balance (the way they are positioned in the frame gives them equal visual weight across the plane) and scale (gives the tree size cue that otherwise, we could not extract).

Overread · Oct 15, 2012

A good point regarding balance - and you are right, without the horses the foreground would be far too empty and the shot would feel lacking. I still feel that the tree dominates more than the horses, but I do agree that they have value in the photo itself.