Published on 2013/01/01 by Denis in Creative Photography
http://denisgrenier.com/Blog/2013/01/creative-photography-5/
Creative photography means that you have to think differently than most other photographers. You have to venture somewhere they don’t or change the angle of view. You could also leave a greater part of the picture unused intentionally. This in turn will create interest and questions.

We are talking about Creative Photography right? How to take pictures differently! How to use a different angle? How to magnify the subject with composition?

This is a good example of Creative Photography:

Lighthouse in Maine, United States
This is what I have done, intentionally with this picture. This is a lighthouse picture and I am sure that you have seen so many of them. This picture was not taken at sunrise or sunset; there is no drama in the sky. This is just a boring lighthouse.

More than that, this lighthouse is really small, on top of a small hill in front of a parking lot. There is nothing interesting in this lighthouse as seen from the parking lot. I walked around it and found out that I could climb down that little hill to go near the water. Doing so, I uncover the hill rose’s bushes. In this late fall, leaves are showing in green and orange and roses seed pods are red, creating these patches of colors. Positioning myself appropriately I was able to keep the lighthouse tower in the sky, making it way bigger than it is.

To make this effect, I used a 24mm lens on a full frame sensor at f/22 to maximize depth of field. The hill seems very tall which in turn would means that the lighthouse is very far away and this translate into a large lighthouse considering the space it is taking in the frame and it’s relative distance.

This is the main reason I left so much of the foreground in the picture. This picture is not well-balanced and it looks strange. Your job as a photographer is to captivate, attract and keep your audience. There is so much competition out there that should you be like everybody else nobody will remember you. Being strange is an awesome quality. It might please or displease but it will have impact on your audience. Being remembered is more important than going with the flow.

There is also strong graphical / shape element in this picture. Do you see the trapezoid, triangles, square and diagonal lines? For our mind, these shapes are re-assuring. They related to order and purpose.

Lighthouse in Maine, United States
Now take a look at this same lighthouse from another original viewpoint. Your job is to tell which one of these two pictures is the most appealing. A) The Lighthouse from the side or B) The other one perfectly aligned from the back. Tell us which one you like the most and why.

Blog Post Q1 - 2013