Monthly Archives: September 2013

Line and Composition

(Bill Ferris)

The last light of day washes O’Neill Butte in a golden glow as seen from Yaki Point on the South Rim. (Bill Ferris)

Every picture tells a story. So, in this blog post, I would invite to think back to your grade school days. Remember the short compositions you were assigned to write? What you did on your summer vacation, what makes your mom the best, why Abraham Lincoln was a great American president. These were (and remain) common themes in the stories written neatly in number-2 pencil in old school composition booklets. These stories can teach us something about photography.

Like a well-written story, a good photograph leads you on a journey. It takes you by the hand and walks with you from beginning to end. And at the end, there is a reward. How do you, the photographer, accomplish this? By employing good composition to take advantage of the natural lines in the subjects you photograph.

In the above image, your eye is drawn first to the lower-right corner by the strong contrast in color and brightness between the green junipers and the shadowed background. From there, your gaze follows the line of the ridge across the image. Near the left side you are redirected to follow Cedar Ridge toward O’Neill Butte. There lies the payoff, a tidal wave of light washes over the ridge and butte creating a dramatic mid-summer scene. By composing the image to play off the natural line of the ridges, I’ve taken you a journey through the photograph. Your eye follows this natural line from beginning to end. And where the line ends, a reward awaits.

A stream of cars scud across the iconic Golden Gate Bridge after dark. Fog shrouds San Francisco, a city aglow with light. (Bill Ferris)

A stream of cars scud across the iconic Golden Gate Bridge after dark. Fog shrouds San Francisco, a city aglow with light. (Bill Ferris)

This photograph of the Golden Gate Bridge also uses line and light to lead you on an adventure. The journey begins in the lower-left corner where the brightly-illuminated bridge emerges from out of frame. The large north tower grabs your attention and immediately identifies the iconic subject of the image. Your eye naturally follows the bright line of vehicle headlights across the bridge to the upper-right. Again, you are rewarded for taking this journey. The south tower, the sharp contrast of the bridge’s shadow against the glassy surface of the Pacific Ocean, and the hazy profile of San Francisco present a mysterious quality of this city by the bay.

By looking for and taking advantage of natural lines in the the scenes you photograph, you can lead your audience on a journey. Like all good journeys, yours should have a beginning and an end. And by delivering a reward to your audience at the end of the journey, you will transform the journey into a story, well-told. Use composition and line to allow your photography to tell great stories.

Get out and shoot!

Bill Ferris | September 2013

Unexpected

An August sun sets over the Lower Lake Mary wetland. (Bill Ferris)

An August sun sets over the Lower Lake Mary wetland. (Bill Ferris)

I left the house with the intention of finding and photographing elk. Lower Lake Mary, with its sweet grass, is a favorite grazing location for elk in northern Arizona. I’ve driven by when literally hundreds of bulls, cows and calves were spread across the broad expanse of the dry lake bottom. It is an awesome sight and I had a hunch there would be at least a few elk to be seen on this particular evening.

My hunch was wrong. There were no elk; at least, none within view. But the late afternoon monsoon clouds were starting to catch that golden light of sunset and water fowl were playing in a marshy area near the road. So, I pulled over, grabbed my gear and started to work the field. I circled the marsh in a counter-clockwise direction looking for an interesting subject to photograph. It wasn’t until I had almost completed the circle that I found the shot I was looking for; the image atop this post.

I worked this location a bit before moving on. There was a small rise to the east of me and it looked as though the top might offer a vantage point from which to compose a nice landscape. But en route to that destination, I found myself walking through a small sea of long grass. The tassels were similar to wheat in texture and their green, silvery hue captured the warm light in wonderful ways. It was completely unexpected.

Tall, tasseled grass waves in a light breeze at sunset on a summer day at Lower Lake Mary near Flagstaff, Arizona. (Bill Ferris)

Tall, tasseled grass waves in a light breeze at sunset on a summer day at Lower Lake Mary near Flagstaff, Arizona. (Bill Ferris)

Unexpected, however, is where a photographer often finds hidden treasure. These are the moments when you need to trust that internal voice whispering, “Ooh, that’s cool.” When a scene captures your eye and you stop, resist the temptation to give the scene a passing look before moving on. Pause a while. Study the scene. Give it consideration and ask yourself if this photograph could be a keeper.

After all, you’re a photographer – a visual artist – and your eye, your sense of composition, is your strongest asset. If you think it looks cool, trust that others will do the same. Or better yet, don’t care what anybody else will think. Take the photo because it pleases you to do so.

I left Lower Lake Mary with zero photographs of elk on that late summer evening. I captured several nice landscapes. The setting sun painting dramatic clouds with yellows and golds over lush green grass and water always makes for a lovely image. But the image I’m most pleased with from that shoot is the image of the long grass. It’s a wonderful combination of textures, tones and hues. The subtle abstract quality lends itself to a diverse set of interpretations. Everyone sees something different in this image and that is something that pleases me.

So, don’t let the absence of a specific plan or subject stop you from doing photography. Trust that, when you’re out and about with your kit, you’ll find an image worth taking. You’ll recognize opportunity when it knocks.

Now, get out and shoot.

Bill Ferris | September 2013

 

Chasing the Light

As sunset's golden light washes over Grand Canyon, a summer monsoon rumbles across the great chasm as seen from Cape Royal on the North Rim. (Bill Ferris)

As sunset’s golden light washes over Grand Canyon, a summer monsoon rumbles across the great chasm as seen from Cape Royal on the North Rim. (Bill Ferris)

A photograph is nothing without light. It is light that paints a landscape, creating the scene we hope to capture with the click of the shutter. And this is just the beginning. Light can do so much more.

Consider the intangible qualities of a photograph, those qualities which cannot be fully captured within the quantifiable aspects of an image. Consider mood, for example. What gives a photograph a joyous, somber, brooding, angry, celebratory or tense quality? In many instances, it is light which imbues a scene with its mood.

In the above image, the warm, golden light of sunset paints the horizon, storm clouds and stone to convey a wonderfully diverse – almost contradictory – collection of moods. On one hand, a dramatic, even subtly angry mood is present. But the gentle curve of the landscape softens the mood a bit, bringing out a feeling that is almost celebratory. This contrast gives the image a compelling quality that would not be present, if not for the quality of the light painting this landscape.

An early September sunset paints the inner Grand Canyon as seen from Lipan Point on the South Rim. (Bill Ferris)

An early September sunset paints the inner Grand Canyon as seen from Lipan Point on the South Rim. (Bill Ferris)

By comparison, this image carries a more subtle and inviting mood. A late-day glow catches just the tops of shrub and stone in the foreground, the ridges in the middle ground and the buttes in the distance. The remainder of the scene is subtly illuminated by a cooler, bluer twilight. Combined the scene has both a calm (cool, blue) and inviting (warm, red) quality that is slightly soothing.

Light is your most valuable, most important tool as a photographer. Whether you prefer working with the ambient, natural light of a scene or using strobes and other artificial light sources, understanding how light can be used to build an image and create a mood will allow you to take more dynamic, more compelling photographs.

So, get out there and shoot!

Bill Ferris | September 2013