Digital Photography Composition Tips

Why call this page Digital Photography Composition Tips?

Most of the articles sharing tips for taking digital photography on this web site can be applied whether you have a digital camera, a video camera or a traditional film camera.

Photography composition tips can be used in many kinds of artwork and design projects, including landscape design, paintings, drawings, even decorating your holiday dining table. Composition is defined as the combining of distinct parts or elements to form a whole.

The two tips I am sharing below may seem obvious, but sometimes many of us don't remember to do the simple things. I want to install in you a desire to really enjoy the process of experimenting with your picture taking activities.

We live in a time of amazing technology and advances in standard of living. Yet our happiness quotient is down. I encourage you to have the curiosity and wonderment of a child and adopt a playful attitude with your camera.

So with that philosophical thought out of the way, here are the two digital photography composition tips in this article:

Use your Zoom
This does not mean to simply aim your camera with your subject centered and take several photos with different zoom settings.

Try first taking a photo of the overall scene using a wide angle setting on your camera. Then look for photographs within that scene. It is a great exercise that forces you to actively think of composition rules.

The three sample photos above were part of a photography assignment I gave myself to capture Urban Decay. They were taken in an old, vacant factory building that had been deteriorating for 30 years.

Do the Triple Crop
Use this technique after you have loaded your photos onto your computer. Try this little trick and you'll be amazed at your results.

Use this technique for a set amount of time such as the next 10 photos you look at on your computer, or perhaps for the next 30 days. It's easy is to look back at the pictures you have already taken and experiment.

Use your favorite photo editing software and crop your image in three different ways. Remember the goal is to find three new pleasing compositions within your original photo.

These tips were included in this article on Digital Photography Composition Tips because of the nature of Digital Photography. There is no penalty for trying to make a great photo and not succeeding on your first try.

You can delete your newest attempt or undo the cropping. Of course the only thing you must have is lots of memory available in your camera and your computer to use.

Know the rules, but don't try to use them all at once.

The most famous tip on composition: Rule of Thirds

Here are 11 more tips for digital photography composition: Photo Composition

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