Finding Your Frame (and working it)!

Hello everyone,

I wanted to talk to you today about the importance of finding, and working, your frame. When I look back at my early photography, I can't help but notice how often I didn't take enough care to do my framing, and composition, properly. I would arrive at a location, see something that sparked my interest, but then only take a few minutes and very limited number of photographs before moving on to a new location(s).

The more time I spend looking trough a lens, the more I realize the importance of slowing down, the importance of taking my time to photograph. This is what I now call finding, and working, my frame. I do belief that this process is important to all photographers, no matter what subject matter they're interested in shooting. In my case, the necessity of working with a tripod for my long exposure work has practically 'forced' me to realize just how much I could improve my images if I only take enough care to find and work my framing.

These days, when I arrive at a given location, rather than setting up my tripod and camera right away, I take my time and do a walk around the area, leaving my equipment in the car (or the trail).

Once I have identified my subject, my thinking switches as I am working on my initial framing and composition. I am now heavily occupied evaluating just how to best show my subject, and this is what I call 'working' my frame. My tripod isn't being set up until I am satisfied with my initial composition, and once the camera is setup and a photograph made, I do take care and effort in finding alternate compositions by evaluating my initial results.

I can use the time the camera exposes to look around and think about how to change my framing and composition, and once the image is made I am ready to move on right away. People are often surprised that I am not 'bored' while waiting for my long exposures to finish. Because I can use this time to think about my next framing and composition, doing long exposures has actually made me a better photographer. If I took this time to read or otherwise occupy myself, I would miss this important opportunity to think about my composition and how to improve it.

Let's consider the 4 images above. When I was walking through Amsterdam during my recent workshop there in December, I came across these 3 metal pipes. Intrigued, I started taking photographs, first from far away as I was walking closer and closer. I was drawn to the vertical lines of the pipes, and how these related directly to the surrounding tall buildings. Compositions #1 and #2 show the pipes in their 'environment', which I liked but I knew that I wanted something stronger, a composition that would focus even more on the unique nature of the pipes.

In image #3 I decided to start tilting my camera and frame, and although my composition became simpler, the buildings didn't relate visually as well as I had hoped. So I decided to walk around some more and finally arrived at composition #4, which showed the pipes isolated against the sky.

I am convinced that I needed to take all 4 photographs to arrive at this last composition, and because I had been working the frame I was able to realize the strength and simplicity of this final framing.

So now I was ready to setup my tripod, and commit to the long exposure. One final tweak was to include more sky, acting as negative space here, by shooting 2 images and merging those as a panorama. This was show with the Fuji X100, so I didn't have the luxury of switching lenses. So the panoramic image was my only choice for including more sky. I couldn't back up more given the angle I had chosen.

Here are 2 long exposure photographs that I made in this location:

Image #1 above was the first I took, isolating the 3 pipes on the simple background of the sky. The long exposure made the sky look more dramatic. I like this framing, but thought I would try to include even more negative space. Since I couldn't change my lens on the Fuji x100 camera, I decided to shoot a few more images, each one a long exposure, and then combine them into a single panorama. This allowed me a wider angle of view. By the time I had setup for this composition, the sky and clouds had also turned significantly more dramatic. I also extended the exposure time much longer compared to image #1, so the movement in the clouds became more pronounced.

I'm glad I spend the extra time and made the effort to shoot this subject in a variety of ways. Changing my framing has left me with some nice choices as to what my final photograph might be. If I could do it easily, it would be worthwhile to return to this spot for another series of photographs. The more I get to know a given place, the more confident I find myself photographing there. It's a great excercise to restrict oneself to a small space and then do a minimum of 36 photographs there. In fact, this was one of the excercises that Freeman Patterson gave his students in his Master Workshop earlier this week.

Try it yourself and I belief that you'll see a dramatic improvement in your photography...

Comments

[Aline]

A big smile on my face! I do recognize this.
Sometimes you come home and look at your images and think.... no.... no.... wrong composition, this is not what I had in mind.
These days I look and I look again, and again. A step left, a step to the right, bending my knies, low angle, high angle and than... :-)
The long exposures are great, I like the second one the best, because of the empty space!

Next weekend I'll visit the Walter Bos complex in Apeldoorn, Joel made some great images overthere. And.... you can bet I will look at the compositions :-)

[Marc Koegel]

Thanks for your comments Aline. Yes, I am sure you would remember this location :-)
When you go to Walter Bos, send me some of your images you make there. I'd love to see them, and would be more than happy to offer you my critique (if you're interested in it). Keep up the great work and I look forward to staying in touch!
Greetings from Vancouver!
Marc