How To "Guide Your Viewers Attention" In an Image?

Ray12

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Hi all,

Trying to collect some advice, tips, studies, and ideas on how to guide or drive your viewer to look at certain parts of your images. How do you create a visually powerful or captivating image? What do you notice first in an image...and why? What elements make it that way? Can you intelligently guide your viewers attention to better emphasize your story?

I can start off with some typical ideas:

1. The viewers eyes and brain are usually drawn to the brighter parts of the image first. So, make sure your central point of focus is well lit... or visually highlighted... to draw attention and create a strong focus. Make your central viewpoint be ever so slightly brighter than its surround for visual impact.

2. The viewer usually looks at the eyes of your subject first. So, make sure the eyes are not in deep shadow, and have a catch light, and are easy to look into.

3. The viewer is usually attracted to lines and angles in an image most easily. So, Use leading lines to capture the viewers interest in an image when possible. In posing... make sure your model has her elbows out, her shoulders at an angle, the head slightly tilted, and the body not pointed straight at the camera etc. Ive heard the catch phrase..."If you want a captivating pose... slightly bend every joint that can be bent...love those Angles". Look at magazines...which poses are most powerful...and why???

4. Viewers brains and eyes are attracted to sharper parts of the image...rather than areas that are deeply out of focus. So, sharpen up areas of the image that you want viewers to concentrate on...and slightly blur areas in an image that you dont want the eyes dwelling on. So, use longer lenses, wider f-stops, or selective focus to blur a distracting background.

5. The eye/brain likes to look at areas that have contrast in them...so it can differentiate detail easier. So, add some contrast to certain areas of your shot... to draw attention to that particular area.

6. People usually feel that warmer colors are more attractive and more advancing than cooler colors. So, slightly warm up areas in a portrait or other kind or part of the shot... that you want your viewers to warm up to. Add an imperceptibly cool cast to parts of your image to force the eye into warmer areas of your image. Warm advances...cool recedes.


QUESTIONS FOR YOU TO ANSWER:


- Do you have some studies or references that you can point us to...on how to make images more captivating?

- Have you found techniques in your work that your customers just LOVE, LOVE, LOVE? What is it? What do people love to look at...and why?

- What do you do to make an image interesting, powerful, captivating, noteworthy, or sellable? What makes Your images or other Photographers images Powerful??

Thanks for adding your own unique piece or part of the story...

Ray
 
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Paths such as trails, roads, walkways, rivers, creeks, etc. should lead the eye of the viewer into the photo toward the centre of interest.
 
QUESTIONS FOR YOU TO ANSWER:

- Do you have some studies or references that you can point us to...on how to make images more captivating?
The Photographer's Eye: Composition and Design for Better Digital Photos: Michael Freeman: 9780240809342: Amazon.com: Books

FYI, reviews say to stay away from the Kindle edition. I have the original (large) paperback and it's great.

- Have you found techniques in your work that your customers just LOVE, LOVE, LOVE? What is it? What do people love to look at...and why?
Customers are quirky. They often like the photographic equivalent of disco. I can't predict what they'll like from one photo to the next, but from my sales, they seem to be drawn to bold colors, more than anything, especially if those bold colors are in a photo that follows other known rules/suggestions for composition, some of which you pointed out already. They're all covered in more detail in the book I linked to above, which I highly recommend.

- What do you do to make an image interesting, powerful, captivating, noteworthy, or sellable? What makes Your images or other Photographers images Powerful??
Portraiture is a done deal, as is. Just light them, pose them, shoot them, print them, collect the fee.

For photos other than portraiture though, which I much more enjoy making, and see repeat sales from as well as sales to many different people for different needs and uses, I make images for my own sense of aesthetics. If they sell, great. If they don't, I don't sweat it. I'm not trying to find or make photographic disco here, and I never will.
 
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Thanks for your great comments! All great ideas on "How To Make The Viewer Look At Your Images...Where You Want Them to Look!!"

There is another way to grab or direct a viewers stare in your images...

People love angles and diagonals rather than straight on shots. So, If you are shooting a model or person...make sure their shoulders are not square into the camera...rotate the shoulders or torso 20-30 or 45 degrees to the camera. This side look always looks more interesting than a straight on shot...unless you are in a lineup or mug shot!

If its a model...have her bend their elbow, tilt their head, put their weight on one foot and slightly bend the knee of the other leg. Someone once said...for maximum pose power...if a model has a joint...make sure that its bent or angled somehow...the elbows, wrists, legs, head etc.

If the image is a landscape...or commercial shot...see if you can also tilt the image diagonally in the frame or environment. Have leading lines leading into the image or away from it or besides it... to draw the viewers look (I think that has already been identified if I can recall).

Anything else you can think of to make your images stand out...or how to draw attention to the main subject in your image???

I love the color comment above. I think some people really are attracted to highly saturated colors in images...and they are drawn to them. Some photographer have a visual style that feature bright saturated colors to help their images stand out from the rest of Main Street.

What other ideas??
 

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