Alpha Photography Blog

I’ve been taking photos since I was still in single digits. I’m still nowhere near knowing all there is to know about photography. One of the first things you develop (if you really want to) is the eye. Some people have it naturally, or “by accident”. Others (like me) have to work on it.

My mother is also someone who is starting to work on hers.

Here are two photos that were taken recently. The first I took of my mother, while the second photo, my mother took of me.

This could be considered incredibly pedantic, but for the sake of demonstration, what do you think isn’t quite right about the composition of the photo with me in it?

For starters, the horizon is slightly crooked. Granted, this is something that’s easily fixed in Photoshop. It also looks strange having so much of the floor showing, then half the top of the palm trees cut off. Unless the outdoor tiles are particularly interesting, they don’t really need to be in the photo. Nor so much of the empty tables.

The other element is that I’m right in the centre of the image. Typically, the “rule of thirds” would place the person off to the side. In this photo I don’t find it particularly distracting as the background of the photo is pretty busy anyway.

Here is the photo I took of mum:

This photo fixes some of the problems mentioned above, but the main thing I didn’t do, which I could have done, is move the tables so they weren’t in the foreground of the frame. And, I could have placed mum off to the side, so she wasn’t blocking the fountain in the water feature.

These types of photos are holiday memories, and not likely to be used in a photographic exhibition, but it’s worthwhile making the photos as good as they can possibly be. I hope this helps you do that.

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