A Photo a Week Challenge: Off-Center

One of the cardinal rules of photography is to not place your main subject in the middle of your frame. It’s all part of that asymmetry stuff that you learned in high school art classes. If you’ve found a photo with a dead-centered subject that you love, but it doesn’t look quite right, try cropping it with your subject off-centered and see if you like it more. The beauty with digital is that you can try several different ways to see what looks the best and even ask family, friends, or perfect strangers which they like the most.

IN A NEW POST CREATED FOR THIS CHALLENGE, SHARE A PHOTO OR TWO WITH THE SUBJECT OFF-CENTER.

Everyone is welcome to participate, even if your blog isn’t about photography.

Here’s how it works:

  1. Each week, I’ll come up with a theme and post a photo that I think fits. You take photographs based on your interpretation of the theme, and post them on your blog (a new post!) anytime before the following Thursday, when the next photo theme will be announced.
  2. To make it easy for others to check out your photos, title your blog post “A Photo a Week Challenge: (theme of the week)” and be sure to use the “postaday″ tag.
  3. Follow nancy merrill photography so that you don’t miss out on weekly challenge announcements.
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A Photo a Week Challenge: Off-Center

offcenter_nmp

PSA: This challenge is for last week and this week. Normal posting dates will resume on August 10. Thank you.

One of the cardinal rules of photography is to not place your main subject in the middle of your frame. It’s all part of that asymmetry stuff that you learned in high school art classes. If you’ve found a photo with a dead-centered subject that you love, but it doesn’t look quite right, try cropping it with your subject off-centered and see if you like it more. The beauty with digital is that you can try several different cropped to see what looks the best and even ask family, friends, or perfect strangers which they like the most.

IN A NEW POST CREATED FOR THIS CHALLENGE, SHARE A PHOTO OR TWO WITH THE SUBJECT OFF-CENTER.

Everyone is welcome to participate, even if your blog isn’t about photography.

Here’s how it works:

  1. Each week, I’ll come up with a theme and post a photo that I think fits. You take photographs based on your interpretation of the theme, and post them on your blog (a new post!) anytime before the following Thursday, when the next photo theme will be announced.
  2. To make it easy for others to check out your photos, title your blog post “A Photo a Week Challenge: (theme of the week)” and be sure to use the “postaday″ tag.
  3. Follow nancy merrill photography so that you don’t miss out on weekly challenge announcements.

A Photo a Week Challenge: Off-Centered

Red rose bud

One of the first things you learn in most photography classes is that you shouldn’t put your main subject in the center of your photograph. Our eyes love things that are not even. We also enjoy looking at things that aren’t symmetrical, aligned perfectly, or come in even groups (3s and 5s are preferred). A general rule of thumb for framing your image is the law of threes: divide your viewing area into a grid with three rows and three columns. Place your main subject anywhere in the grid except dead center. One thing that’s really nice with digital photography is that you can experiment with the placement of your subject without having to go through the expense of processing the film to see if you guessed correctly.

IN A NEW POST CREATED FOR THIS CHALLENGE, SHARE A PHOTO OR TWO WITH THE MAIN SUBJECT OF YOUR IMAGE NOT IN THE CENTER.

Everyone is welcome to participate, even if your blog isn’t about photography.

Here’s how it works:

  1. Each week, I’ll come up with a theme and post a photo that I think fits. You take photographs based on your interpretation of the theme, and post them on your blog (a new post!) anytime before the following Thursday, when the next photo theme will be announced.
  2. To make it easy for others to check out your photos, title your blog post “A Photo a Week Challenge: (theme of the week)” and be sure to use the “postaday″ and “Photo a Week” tags.
  3. Follow nancy merrill photography so that you don’t miss out on weekly challenge announcements.