Positioning
your subject
The position
of the subject is probably more important than your background, although a
background should not be ignored. If you
are in a bind and need to quickly take a shot, choose position over
background.
A good photo
follows the photographic principle of the “Rule of Thirds”—“ROT” while this is not a rule to follow, it is a
great basis for taking photos, of henna or anything else.
The ROT is
to imagine breaking an image down into thirds, both horizontally and vertically
so that you have nine parts. The
intersecting lines are where you should consider placing your points of
interest of your subject. The theory
behind ROT is that if you place points of interest in the intersections or
along the lines, then your photo becomes more balanced and will enable the
viewer to interact with your photo naturally.
Studies have shown that when viewing images, people’s eyes usually go to
one of the intersection points more naturally than the center of the
image.
A real life
application is to place an interesting henna motif at one of the intersecting
lines. You can also place your subject
on one of the vertical lines, thereby making it off-center, but
photographically giving the viewer a natural way to look at your photo. In learning how to use the rule of thirds, the most
important questions to be asking of yourself are what are the points of
interest in this shot AND where am I intentionally placing them?
When taking photos of your henna work, you want to
try to place your main focus on the intersecting lines, or in one of the thirds
sections created by the intersecting line.
The ROT is also just a basic principle that should be applied to
photography—in order to generate interest in your photo.
Another photographic theory similar to the ROT, is
the Divine Ratio. This theory is derived from ancient Greek
mathematics. Two numbers are in the
golden ratio if their ratios is the same as the ratio of their sum to the
greater of the two quantities. a/b=(a+b)/b .
Fibonacci’s number sequence also falls into place with the golden ratio.
A more recent theory of positioning your
subject uses the Fibonacci spiral. The spiral
is created by placing connecting arcs in the squares created by the Divine
Ratio depiction. Instead of delving into
mathematics, let’s place this simply. In
photography, you can follow the rule of thirds, which is easy enough to
calculate, or you can follow the Divine Ratio principle, by placing your
subject on the intersecting lines created by the spiral. This is not to say that you should take out
your ruler and protractor to measure your photo’s ratio, but it is a general
rule that can be applied when framing your photo, or even when cropping it when
you edit.
Placing your
subject in the center of the image is okay, so don’t be afraid to do so, but it
is almost always better to place your
subject in one of the “thirds” of your frame.
This goes for all types of photos, whether they are 8x10 prints, or the
square Instagram posts. When you utilize
the third of the photo to fill your frame with your subject, in our case, the
henna body art, you are able to “give away” the rest 2/3 of the frame to your
background, thereby helping your viewer not only bring natural attention to
your henna work, but also connect with the image by the mood you set with the
background.
Next week, we will go over how to take better photos for Instagram. If you are on Instagram, give us a follow and we will follow back @HennaArtCanada. Until then, happy hennaing!