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History of Art and Landscape – Part One
One of the key aspects of landscape photography has got to be composition. Given our subject matter rarely has a strong internal narrative and the subject rarely has intrinsic emotional value, our arrangement of content within the frame and its emphasis, lighting, etc. are the main thing we have to work with. more
Old School Romantic Landscapes
The principles of human perception, have evolved a lot over the past century of modern art, but still remain close to the origin. Hence, I believe it is worth observing those, that have been well formulated in the flourishing heritage left to us by classical landscape painters. more
The Importance of the Sky in our Compositions
As photographers, we are photographing light and the sky, or perhaps more accurately, the sun, as the source of that light. We are drawn to the colours of light around the edges of the day, at dawn and dusk. more
Compositional Controversies
Composition can be rightly regarded as the ‘internal’ signature of the photographer. That is not to say that a photographer’s work will be instantly recognisable in every photograph. more
Turning a New Leaf
For what seems all too brief, the end of October and beginning of November heralds the time that trees withdraw their sap from the green leaves to reveal carotenoids and anthocyanins. more
An Approach to Composition
Preconceptions can lead to missing that little gem of a shot whilst you are en route elsewhere. more
Composition Challenge
Whilst planning the September board meeting for On Landscape and a planning meeting for the conference we decided that another office based discussion could be avoided by hiring a cottage in the Peak District for a few days and combining the event with a bit of photography, food and drink. On the final day we paid a visit to the top end of Padley Gorge and I challenged Joe Cornish, David Ward and myself to find three or four more
Composing Chaos
Let's face it, nature can be pretty chaotic at times. Not really on the small scale, where natural forms can be elegant and beautiful, or on the large scale, where distance and perspective bring order and a ready visual hierarchy - sky, land, sea, patterns of agriculture: it's all there in front of you. No, it's the bit in the middle where things start getting tricky. The middle-ground can often be a chaotic, confusing place but it can also more
On Creativity – Pt 2
Flow was something that happened in my creative life long before I comprehended its significance. Twenty years ago I thought that it was just an odd state that happened from time to time. more
On Creativity – Part 1
During my recent webinar for On Landscape I was struck by the fact that one question kept coming up in a number of different guises: how do I go about finding an image? more
Dalt Quarry – A Compositional Study
The act of finding and constructing a composition is one that struggles to be pinned down. The way each photographer manages this is often quite different and to generalise about the ‘best’ way is a pointless task. more
The Joy of 6×6
Over the years there have been numerous 6x6 rangefinder cameras some with collapsible lenses. The last true 6x6 fixed format rangefinder was the Mamiya 6. more
On Golden Rules…
The great American landscape photographer Ansel Adams wrote, "A good photograph is knowing where to stand." Well, not the most specific tip on composition that I’ve ever come across! For artists of all kinds, mastering the problems of composition seems at once fundamental and tantalisingly out of reach. Little surprise, then, that there is a strong urge to codify composition, to provide not only practical instruction but also, in some cases, a theoretical basis to underpin this. The basic more
The Beautiful Square
Any photographer with a digital camera can crop an image to the square format. Some cameras even let you use the square format when you’re taking a photo... more
Composition – Photographing Trees
Blair Loch – Sony A900, Sigma DG 28-70 - Dav Thomas Well we’ve introduced the two most important aspects of composition, balance and flow, what next. Well, we could talk about these two alone for quite a while - the idiosyncracies of each of these will be part of our discussions in future episodes. In this issue I’d like to talk a little about taking photographs in more