Thoughts on Composition and Color
This is the one of a what I hope to be a series of posts on the creative process. As I have posted earlier I am trying to raise my game in photography and in addition to refining or learning technique I also want to expand my creative process and be more intentional about this aspect of my work.
When I picked up film photography as a hobby almost 10 years ago I did spend some time learning and practicing new skills. In particular I benefited from a study of composition. I am now revisiting this subject and as a consequence of this I am more aware of it.
I was watching a Nick Carver video on YouTube today. If you haven’t seen his work look him up. He has a unique perspective and his videos are engaging. As I understand it he makes a living photographing architecture and I think this influences his landscape work. I follow him as he works in film and so his passion as a landscape photographer is aligned with my interests as well. That being said however he often has a very different set of interests on subject matter and and how he approaches it. Rather than being off-putting I find it stimulating to see how he works and how that might influence my work. Also he has a distinctive style and I am always curious to see how to get to a unique or personal style in creative work.
In this particular video he is photographing a sailboat, abandoned, in a collapsed shed, in the middle of the Mojave desert. A great thought-provoking subject. It is not at all what I like to shoot, I am not into that whole abandoned building thing. However Nick is and this is not his first encounter with the subject. Look through his YouTube channel and there are more examples. This is not all he shoots, he shoots traditional landscapes as well. It may be simple minded as I don’t know him personally but his penchant for photographing buildings in his landscape work must derive in some way from his professional work. Who knows.
For me though I like trying to see things through other’s eyes. The thing that got me to writing about this video is that Nick is very specific about what he is after and how he wants to get there. In this video he arrives at his desired endpoint and I became convinced he had done so. This is despite the fact I don’t think the subject is very attractive. The important thing is his ability to articulate his vision and to achieve it. This is rare in my experience so the video is all the more valuable.
There are a few things I take away from this video. One is he is willing to break composition rules. He shoots these subjects centered and straight-on. He does this quite consciously. The photos have an almost technical or documentary quality. He shoots in this case on the very wide 6x17 format which is my current favorite. I was left thinking how little room there is in this format for traditional compositions such as the rule of thirds. Certainly the exaggeratedly small vertical axis limits one’s options depending on the size of the subject. I will need to take these thoughts away and process them.
Another takeaway is his emphasis on the color palette the film and the light provides. This video gives great examples for how different light mixed with a film type delivers different palettes. And he has convinced me that the bluer low contrast pre-dawn palette on Portra works for this as opposed to a warmer golden hour version. I was also minded to wonder if Velvia would have achieved good results.
If reflect on my experience with this 6x17 format I see that it causes a focus on the horizon in that placing the horizon line is emphasized by long aspect ratio. So in a sense the composition is driven vertically, where to place the horizon middle, lower third, upper third on the vertical. I also reflect that in thinking of the horizontal when composing I am most concerned about the two ends. This is in part due to my camera (Fuji G617) having a viewfinder that you have to look into the ends to see the extent of the image. This is either to ensure some feature is present to make sure something unwanted or unexpected is not there. It is such a wide view you cannot see it in its entirety in the viewfinder. In contrast Nick’s 6x17 is created from large format camera some the whole image is projected on the ground glass. This is an example of how the equipment influences the work. Another area of decision are where the center of the image is placed. Finally I have concluded this format with the 90mm lens I have wants to gobble up the foreground and this can create a real problem if the foreground is uninteresting or not of interest to the subject matter. I am still coming to terms about what this means.
So thank you Nick, very well done.
When I picked up film photography as a hobby almost 10 years ago I did spend some time learning and practicing new skills. In particular I benefited from a study of composition. I am now revisiting this subject and as a consequence of this I am more aware of it.
I was watching a Nick Carver video on YouTube today. If you haven’t seen his work look him up. He has a unique perspective and his videos are engaging. As I understand it he makes a living photographing architecture and I think this influences his landscape work. I follow him as he works in film and so his passion as a landscape photographer is aligned with my interests as well. That being said however he often has a very different set of interests on subject matter and and how he approaches it. Rather than being off-putting I find it stimulating to see how he works and how that might influence my work. Also he has a distinctive style and I am always curious to see how to get to a unique or personal style in creative work.
In this particular video he is photographing a sailboat, abandoned, in a collapsed shed, in the middle of the Mojave desert. A great thought-provoking subject. It is not at all what I like to shoot, I am not into that whole abandoned building thing. However Nick is and this is not his first encounter with the subject. Look through his YouTube channel and there are more examples. This is not all he shoots, he shoots traditional landscapes as well. It may be simple minded as I don’t know him personally but his penchant for photographing buildings in his landscape work must derive in some way from his professional work. Who knows.
For me though I like trying to see things through other’s eyes. The thing that got me to writing about this video is that Nick is very specific about what he is after and how he wants to get there. In this video he arrives at his desired endpoint and I became convinced he had done so. This is despite the fact I don’t think the subject is very attractive. The important thing is his ability to articulate his vision and to achieve it. This is rare in my experience so the video is all the more valuable.
There are a few things I take away from this video. One is he is willing to break composition rules. He shoots these subjects centered and straight-on. He does this quite consciously. The photos have an almost technical or documentary quality. He shoots in this case on the very wide 6x17 format which is my current favorite. I was left thinking how little room there is in this format for traditional compositions such as the rule of thirds. Certainly the exaggeratedly small vertical axis limits one’s options depending on the size of the subject. I will need to take these thoughts away and process them.
Another takeaway is his emphasis on the color palette the film and the light provides. This video gives great examples for how different light mixed with a film type delivers different palettes. And he has convinced me that the bluer low contrast pre-dawn palette on Portra works for this as opposed to a warmer golden hour version. I was also minded to wonder if Velvia would have achieved good results.
If reflect on my experience with this 6x17 format I see that it causes a focus on the horizon in that placing the horizon line is emphasized by long aspect ratio. So in a sense the composition is driven vertically, where to place the horizon middle, lower third, upper third on the vertical. I also reflect that in thinking of the horizontal when composing I am most concerned about the two ends. This is in part due to my camera (Fuji G617) having a viewfinder that you have to look into the ends to see the extent of the image. This is either to ensure some feature is present to make sure something unwanted or unexpected is not there. It is such a wide view you cannot see it in its entirety in the viewfinder. In contrast Nick’s 6x17 is created from large format camera some the whole image is projected on the ground glass. This is an example of how the equipment influences the work. Another area of decision are where the center of the image is placed. Finally I have concluded this format with the 90mm lens I have wants to gobble up the foreground and this can create a real problem if the foreground is uninteresting or not of interest to the subject matter. I am still coming to terms about what this means.
So thank you Nick, very well done.
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