Rapturous! Inspirational & Interesting Photography

I love the sharp greys, the contrast and the gradients in this. Stunning!!

Great take on the use of Perspective.

Great spiral image.

This one reminds me of the Golden Mean and the rule of thirds.

Enjoy your week!

A little while ago we talked about changing your perspective, and recently a group on Flickr took this to heart with a little competition it was running in the application of this to trees – [See the Upward View of Trees group, and the group Tree Photos - Looking Up Competition].

Some of my favourites are featured below for your enjoyment.

Sydney red gum by LSydney

Umbrella in the Rain by Stephanie Krishnan

Gum Tree Branch BW by johnno_oz

Gone but not forgotten by M??K

view from my beach chair by Marlis1

I was with a friend recently and he told me about his Dad taking photos… basically he uses a camera that has a swing out LCD screen, and takes the photos from about hip or thigh height.

It got me thinking about perspective, and how I like to occasionally put the camera on the floor and take a photo, so here goes with 7 things you can do to change perspective in photos and make them more interesting.

1. Lay on your back and look up – this works really well under a tree or in a field of flowers, but can work equally well for buildings, in rooms, under stairwells, underwater (if you have the gear), to name a few. In some cases you don’t need to lay on your back… some good shots can be taken with your camera on the ground pointed up, but it may take you a few goes to get it “just right”.
2. Turn you and the camera, or your subject, upside down – this can give startling results. If you are upside down, and you focus on composition, sometimes the change in perspective can give you a new way to look at an old subject. Subjects can also be turned upside down for interesting results, although be careful with pets – I will not accept any responsibility for scratches and other injuries!
3. Take a step back – I use this one for portraits, and it works well with camera phones as well as regular cameras. Taking a step back from just a person in a shot often forces us to consider a principle composition technique that is used with landscape photography – include a foreground, a midground and a background. The photo on the left is one that I took of my nephew could have just been an expression of joy on his face as he was placed on the Ben & Jerry’s cow by my brother. Taking a step back included the cow (the source of the joy), and the background (Singapore Zoo’s Ben & Jerry’s outlet), and provided a bit more context and interest for the shot.
4. Tilt the horizon – be warned with this one… you either do it a lot or not at all. What I mean is either tilt the horizon drastically, so that it looks deliberate, or keep it flat and straight. A small tilt usually ends up looking like you couldn’t be bothered setting up the shot correctly.
5. Shoot from the hip – don’t use your eye in the viewfinder, or (depending on whether you’re trying to be surreptitious) even look at the LCD screen. Shooting shots from this low perspective can either be done so that people don’t realise you’re taking the photo, often resulting in more candid photos, or just a different height level – 2 or 3 feet off the ground, instead of 5 or 6. And because you aren’t consciously framing every detail of the shot, sometimes you can be pleasantly surprised by the results.
6. Get down on their level – advice often given for taking photos of children and pets, however this works on objects as well.  A popular example is flowers in a vase – don’t (some say never) shoot from above. Try side-on or below. This works for rooms as well. If you take the photo from a 5-6 foot level, you often see all the clutter on tops of surfaces. You could try taking at a lower angle where less clutter appears (just make sure you dust, because at this angle it can be quite apparent if you haven’t )
7. Shoot from above – this works for subjects that you wouldn’t normally look at from above, like buildings and adults. As the objective here is to change the perspective, don’t include pets and children in this one, as we are constantly looking at them from a height above. This is probably why a lot of people like aerial shots.

Obviously the above is not a definitive list, and if you have more ideas or links to sites that have other suggestions, please post in the comments below.

Other articles that are available with information on shooting from a different perspective are as follows.

• DPS has a brief bit with an assignment on Get Down and Dirty for a New Perspective On Your Photography
• Capture Photos from Different Angles explores different ways to take photos to make them more interesting

I’ve included some different perspective pics below, but have gathered a few into this Gallery on Flickr – Change your Perspective. Enjoy!

Looking Up, Many Branches, Topsy Turvy Perspective by Fractal Artist

Bliss by Dave Ward Photography

Super-Cat! (Aka Evie) by Chrissie64

Fisheye: Proud and Heavy by garreyf

Catching up on reading!! by Houry Photography

paris...moving fast...3 by skantzman

brz-lubi_09 by mariczka

Digital Photography School forums has a photo assignment based on breaking some photographic rules.

I did a post a few days ago about Breaking the Rule of Thirds, and one of the ways to do this was to centre your subject in the photo – also called the Bulls-eye technique.

So get practicing and submit your photos  – the topic closes at 8am GMT on 3rd Feb, and make sure you check out the rules…

• Photo Assignment – Bulls-eye

And if you need some inspiration, check out the photos at the link above, or in the Breaking the Rule of Thirds Gallery on Flickr.

From the Chartered Institute of Water and Environmental Management’s website:

CIWEM’s Environmental Photographer of the Year honours amateur and professional photographers who use their ability to raise awareness of environmental and social issues. The competition encourages entries that are contemporary, creative, resonant, challenging, original and beautiful. But most of all, we want your pictures to inspire people around the world to start taking care of our environment.

ELIGIBILITY
The exhibition is open to all professional and amateur, national and international photographers of all ages working with digital and film photography. However, you must ensure that the image quality meets the competition’s criteria.

I think this is a really interesting competition as it has some inspiring categories (if the environment is not already inspiring enough for you). They include:

• Mott MacDonald’s Changing Climates
• Innovation in the Environment (New Category for 2010)
• The Natural World
• 

  Human Waste by alancleaver_2000

  The Underwater World (New Category for 2010)
• Quality of Life
• A View From the Western World (New Category for 2010)
• Young Environmental Photographer of the Year – Under 16
• Young Environmental Photographer of the Year – Under 21

Some of the past entries are really interesting and moving in terms of content, and get you thinking about our natural resources and the impact of their pollution and loss on our lives.

Entries close at 5pm on 31st July 2010.

Check out the competition website for entry conditions, information and inspiration!

Good luck!

This is the Grand Copthorne Hotel (Waterfront) in Singapore. We were picking up some colleagues of my husband’s and I looked up and noted the shape of the building. Unfortunately it was a dreadfully overcast day and the sky was just terrible.

The U-shape of the building just invited something else to be added to the composition, so I stepped into the frame – lucky positioning on this one, as I only took this shot and I ended up more or less dead centre!

I was almost going to submit a photo of just the building (see below).