Composition and form + Research

Great compositions don’t just happen by accident. They take planning, patience, and a knowledge of all the visual elements at your disposal. The great thing is, no matter how much or how little talent you have, you’ll always be able to improve your art by sketching out a good composition before you begin.

POSITIVE & NEGATIVE SPACE

 Positive space is any object or shape that stands out from the background and registers to the eye as “something.” Negative space is the background, or space around objects. Usually it’s suggested that you keep approximately equal amounts of positive and negative space to make a work feel more balanced. If you don’t have enough negative space, your art may feel busy and crowded, but too much negative space can cause the work to feel empty and subdued.

CONTRAST

Visual art should have a full range of values from dark to light. Without bright highlights and dark shadows, an image will often feel gray or washed out, and will be less interesting. Darker areas in a predominantly light section will stand out and draw the eye, and the same is true for the reverse. Use this to focus attention but watch out for unintentionally doing so. Make sure you’re not adding emphasis to a corner or edge of a painting if your focus is meant to be in the center.

SIMPLIFYING DISTRACTING ELEMENTS

Too many shapes, lines, or colors can distract or confuse viewers. If you want the viewer to notice or return consistently to one part of the painting, simplify the rest of it. Decide what the focus should be and if YOUR eye gets distracted, change it! Another way to simplifying your art is to get closer to a single object. Leaving out the peripherals and zooming in until the whole frame is filled with only one thing always brings attention where you want it. Of course, doing so will change your positive/negative balance drastically.

reference: http://emptyeasel.com/2006/11/24/9-steps-to-creating-better-compositions/

Guidelines for Better Photographic Composition: Rule of Thirds

 The lighthouse seems well placed in the upper right just because the rest of the scene fits nicely into the format.

 

FRAMING

 The horses and their riders add considerable foreground interest to this scene. The overhanging tree branches complete the frame and add depth to the subject. When you use people for scale and foreground, make sure they look into the picture area.

 

SIMPLICITY

 So, you can simplify your pictures and strengthen your center of interest by selecting uncomplicated backgrounds, avoiding unrelated subjects, and moving in close. If you want to make your center of interest even more dynamic, place it slightly off center in your frame as we have done with this young artist. 

 

Generally, pictures with subjects directly in the center tend to be more static and less interesting than pictures with off-center subject placement. 

reference: http://photoinf.com/General/KODAK/guidelines_for_better_photographic_composition_rule_of_thirds.html

The information gathered for the composition in photography came in very handy when designing the layout for the website. It provides with very good examples that improved my understanding about composition and form.