Photography as an art is one of our most realistic representations of the world that we have, It can capture extraordinary detail in a way that no other medium can. This can be a double edged sword in that we can often get complacent with the realism and forget about the artistic. In the “Developing an Artistic Eye” series of articles we will be discussing artistic properties as they pertain to photography and will develop ideas on how to best use these properties to produce stunning works of art.

We’ll begin the series by discussing the concept of composition.

I believe that the first part about understanding any concept is to define the word or words used to describe that concept. As defined by dictionary.com a composition is:

• the act of combining parts or elements to form a whole.
• the resulting state or product.

This definition shows why we will be starting with composition; because the composition is the image we are creating. We are not taking pictures, we are creating compositions. From the definition we can gather that if we are to create a good composition, or even just a composition by definition, the parts or elements of our photograph must come together to form a whole. If our composition is dis-jointed then is it a composition at all?

So with this understanding we can move into discussion on the techniques for creating compositions. Then in future articles we will go into the elements of design followed by the principles of design; we will then wrap up by coming full circle and seeing how those elements and principles effect our techniques and begin to form the whole in order to produce a good composition.

Alright, no more delays lets jump into the techniques!

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