One foggy day

Kalyt

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Hi

It would be nice if you could comment on this picture. I need some constructive criticism and advice, how too improve my photography. In advance thanks.
 

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It's hard to offer helpful ideas based on one picture only. What I like from this picture is your feelings for the atmosphere and the image quality is good. The composition is weighted to the right side with a large blank area of fog which doesn't quite balance out the whole frame. I do like images that use big areas of fog with a smaller element as a focal point. This might be better if it was a tree more isolated from the other trees, and more centered. With a longer lens or closer to the tree with the animal feeding may have given the image more impact. The color, contrast of the image is nicely done.
 
Positives and negatives. Positive in the way you've proceed and presented the image. In terms of colour and contrast you really have conveyed the sense of fog. Negatives in terms of composition.
With composition, asymmetric balance. You can balance your image across the diagonals. When you create the frame that encloses your image you not only create the strong verticals and horizontals but you also create two strong diagonal lines. The problem with your image is that you've put everything of interest on one side of the diagonal. That leads the eye away from half your image and unfortunately off the edge of your image. You're asking yourself, "what's to the right?"

edit-2.webp


So what happens if you shift the subject so it most definitely crosses that line? Instead of your eye starting in the right and progressing to the right, your eye starts at the right and progresses left. You achieve this simply by moving the frame and hence the implied grid-work (diagonals etc) that goes with it and suddenly the interest in you shot appears in a different place in relationship to it. So your eye starts and finishes in different places simply because the centre of the image has shifted.

You impose geometry on an image when you impose the strict rectangle that encloses it. Think of composition as relating the lines of your subject with the implied grid-work of your framing:

edit-1.webp
 
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@Tim Tucker, that's a great crop and an excellent explanation.
 
Positives and negatives. Positive in the way you've proceed and presented the image. In terms of colour and contrast you really have conveyed the sense of fog. Negatives in terms of composition.
With composition, asymmetric balance. You can balance your image across the diagonals. When you create the frame that encloses your image you not only create the strong verticals and horizontals but you also create two strong diagonal lines. The problem with your image is that you've put everything of interest on one side of the diagonal. That leads the eye away from half your image and unfortunately off the edge of your image. You're asking yourself, "what's to the right?"


So what happens if you shift the subject so it most definitely crosses that line? Instead of your eye starting in the right and progressing to the right, your eye starts at the right and progresses left. You achieve this simply by moving the frame and hence the implied grid-work (diagonals etc) that goes with it and suddenly the interest in you shot appears in a different place in relationship to it. So your eye starts and finishes in different places simply because the centre of the image has shifted.

You impose geometry on an image when you impose the strict rectangle that encloses it. Think of composition as relating the lines of your subject with the implied grid-work of your framing:

Great explanation! :clap:
 
(..) I do like images that use big areas of fog with a smaller element as a focal point. This might be better if it was a tree more isolated from the other trees (..)

@xenskhe I agree, it could have been an interesting composition if i could have been done! But thanks a lot for the feedback.

@Tim Tucker Thanks a lot for the feedback, it's really useful. As the other mentioned the explanation is excellent. I'll defiantly have that i mind the next time I compose a picture.
 
You either have a picture that needs cropped from the top to a panorama aspect, OR you need, as was suggested and shown above to crop from the left. Nice mood, and subject.
upload_2016-2-20_6-7-46.webp
 
I actually prefer his original crop - it just needs some of the trunk/branch greys pushed closer to black to increase the tonal range
 
Now I have your attention I'd like to loose it again by exploring this idea a little more. ;)

I'd like to try and show you just how strongly patterns of composition are linked to the frame in which you enclose your image, and are not really contained within the image itself. I'm hoping that this will maybe help in understanding composition.

It may sound a little odd at first.

It may help to understand a little about how the eye works. If I said gauge a distance of 663mm then I recon that I would have a fair amount of variation in ten estimates. But if I provided a rectangle and asked you to judge the centre then I think you could all do it with a fair amount of accuracy. This is because we judge things by comparative size. When you provide a rectangle you also provide a centre, you see this so clearly you barely think about it. With a centre you have divided the image into two equal parts on both the horizontal and vertical axis. Again you do this so instinctively you sometimes barely think about it. The point is that so far all your reference points for balance and scale are entirely about how the subject relates to the frame. No matter how hard you try not to when you impose a rectangle on nature you impose a grid structure which your eye uses to estimate size, scale and balance.

I'd like to illustrate how strong these patterns are with some simple polka dots. It's very important to remember that the relationship between the dots in all three images does not change, all that changes is their relationship to the frame. I will go one step further, if you're willing to take a leap of the imagination, and say that the patterns are entirely a function of the frame alone. They not only become visible when you line the dots up with them, but also disappear when you don't. See how the patterns you see change simply by moving the frame.

The first pattern is random:

dot-1.webp


The same dots with exactly the same spacing, relating in exactly the same way to each other as they did before. Only now the way they relate to the frame has changed:

dot-2.webp


Now the above is just highlighting the obvious patterns within the frame, there are an infinite amount of other, more interesting ones. Again same dots, different frame:

dot-3.webp
 
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(..) I do like images that use big areas of fog with a smaller element as a focal point. This might be better if it was a tree more isolated from the other trees (..)

@xenskhe I agree, it could have been an interesting composition if i could have been done! But thanks a lot for the feedback.

You're welcome. You can crop however, but you're too far away IMO from the cow(?), from the copse of trees. Also the tree needs separation IMO from the copse of other trees. Regards.
 
@Tim Tucker

Once again a great explanation, and interesting theory. Now I only have to get my mind around, how to use it. It gets a little abstract when reading about it and looking at dots ;)
 
@Tim Tucker

Once again a great explanation, and interesting theory. Now I only have to get my mind around, how to use it. It gets a little abstract when reading about it and looking at dots ;)

The landscape is just a more complex and random pattern, I used dots because it's easier to see the effect.

Don't think too hard just look at the results and see the effect it has because you will not see it in the words we use, only in the pictures. ;):)

With the first two sets, the scale and aspect ratio are the same, the dots are the same. So why do you see different patterns in the same set of dots?

With your original crop. There is no diagonal line in the landscape, it only exists between the two opposite corners of your frame, or crop. You suggest it simply by how you line your image up with them.

See in the second dot image just how strongly the diagonals dominate when you line the dots up with the corners of the frame, and see how they don't dominate the image when you don't stress that relationship (first dot image)? In essence that's the difference between Didereaux's and my crops and yours. ;)
 
@Tim Tucker

Once again a great explanation, and interesting theory. Now I only have to get my mind around, how to use it. It gets a little abstract when reading about it and looking at dots ;)

The landscape is just a more complex and random pattern, I used dots because it's easier to see the effect.

Don't think too hard just look at the results and see the effect it has because you will not see it in the words we use, only in the pictures. ;):)

With the first two sets, the scale and aspect ratio are the same, the dots are the same. So why do you see different patterns in the same set of dots?

With your original crop. There is no diagonal line in the landscape, it only exists between the two opposite corners of your frame, or crop. You suggest it simply by how you line your image up with them.

See in the second dot image just how strongly the diagonals dominate when you line the dots up with the corners of the frame, and see how they don't dominate the image when you don't stress that relationship (first dot image)? In essence that's the difference between Didereaux's and my crops and yours. ;)
I'll try not too think to hard about it, and just look at the result. But I must say it makes sense, and i'll keep that in mind :-)
 

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