Pt 2, Exercise 1, Positioning Points

Points.  I have to admit, I found the text in the course notes somewhat confusing at first and images of multiple points in the middle of text about single points was a bit puzzling!

Anyway, The first subject is a football on grass with a reasonably long shadow.  I reasoned that the shadow was going to be a key element in this photo and it's length and direction in relation to the photo as a whole would dramatically change the feel of the image.

Above are 8 of the photos I took, each with a different position in the frame and/or angle.  All of the images, although showing a static ball on grass give a suggestion of movement due to the long shadow.  I don't feel the images where the ball is positioned near the top of the frame work as it gives the impression that the ball is floating and just looks, in my eyes, wrong.  This is also true where the subject is mid frame as well.  Where the ball is towards the bottom of the frame, there is more belief in the reality of the scene as it seems more 'traditional'.  Of the three images with the ball in the lower part of the frame, the one with the shadow pointing towards the viewer is the least effective.  The one that works best for me is the one where there the edge of the lawn is visible in the top right of the frame.  This lends some symmetry to the image and enables the viewer to interpret the scene more than the others.

The next subjects are spiders.  They seem to have exploded in numbers this year and there are lots of Common Orb spiders in the garden.

1/80, 50mm, f10

The first image Urban Spider 1, shows the subject in the lower right of the frame.  A moderately wide aperture has blurred the background, but left enough detail, though indistinct, for the viewer to interpret the wider scene.  The subject is clearly the spider as it stand out well from the background, even though it is reasonably small in the frame.  I was careful to make sure that the web is just visible, giving more depth to the image and provides extra references to draw the viewer into the subject.  The drainpipe in the background, whilst would normally be a distraction, I feel adds to this picture as it changes a plain wall into a more domestic setting.  The point that the spider makes works well in this picture, the eye is drawn to the spider and the the rest of the picture appears to fade out.


The next two pictures are of another spider, again on a web, but this time captured with a portrait orientation.

1/25, f10, 50mm

1/25, f10, 50mm

Both of the images can be seen in this Flickr set.
The images are both very similar, and there is little to choose between them.  Both draw the viewers eye in well via the web leading the eye towards the spider.  The picture with the spider lower in the frame is the one I prefer, but this is more to do with the pattern of the web and the background than the placement of the point.  With this in mind, I cropped the image to remove the background distractions.

The cropped image works well.  The spider is the only focal point and the structure of the web accentuates this.  The image looks right as well, with the spider low down and on the underside of the web.  Whilst researching the spiders that I photographed, I found out that spiders always use the underside of a web, which is why this image works - it looks right, because it is right.  When I experimented with rotating the image, it just looked wrong.
The lower right positioning adds to the feeling of suspension.