Yesterday I handed in my last assignment for the photography workshop I’ve been taking. Done!

The previous workshop was about all the aspects of exposure. This one was about composition.

Week 1 was about cropping (choosing between vertical, horizontal and square crops) and positioning the subject within the frame: centered vs the “rule of thirds” etc.



Week 2 focused on framing the subject vs. filling the frame with the subject. I already posted a few examples – the the advent stars. (In fact, most of the photos I’ve posted in the last four weeks have been taken with the workshop assignments in mind.)

Week 3 was about shapes, lines and patterns. I found this incredibly hard. I can to some extent see them in finished photos, but it was very difficult to see them in camera while taking the photo, and to see them in advance in my head. This is something that I will definitely need to practice a lot more.

The photo of Adrian’s coffee pot was one of my practise photos for this week (ticking the boxes for diagonals, repetition and reflection). Here are two more, focusing on diagonals and triangles.


Finally week 4 was about perspective: camera angle, distance to the subject etc. Here is the same candle photographed at “eye level”, from below and from above.



These have been four very intense weeks. I practised a lot, got a lot of feedback, and learned a lot as a result. But I also found it quite stressful – it was hard for me to find the time to take a set of decent photos with a given theme, preferably daily. So while I’m pleased that I took this workshop, I’m also grateful that it is over. Now I can start working through the course materials again at my own pace.

A common piece of advice for novice photographers is to practice technical skills with inanimate subjects, even if what they really want to be better at is portraits, photos of their kids, etc. It makes sense in the abstract, but it didn’t work out too well for me. Yes, of course it’s easier to take a photo of a bowl of fruit or a stack of books or a candle. They follow instructions and don’t move around. But if the subject isn’t meaningful to me, it’s hard for me approach it with any real interest and energy. The art and craft of photography itself isn’t sufficiently important to me.