Rule of Thirds

There are several aspects of photography that are vital to improving ones photography skills and these factors can distinguish a professional from an amature. The Rule of Thirds is, arguably, the most important photography rule that an aspiring artist will learn in his or her career. Understood and followed by photographers around the world, the Rule of Thirds will elevate your pictures from a mondane photo to an astheticly pleasing and ballanced visual representation of what your eyes see.

The Rule of Thirds states that the main subject of interest in a picture should not be right at the middle of the picture, but should be positioned at two third postion. More specifically, divide a frame into tic tac to style grid, then position the main object at one of the thirds intersection. Basically, this rule removes that terrible habbit of point-and-shoot amatures who position their subject smack dab in the middle of their frame.

The following shot by HuHu Lin is an illustration of the Rule of Thirds, because it places the tree(subject) at the intersection of the "tic-tac-toe" lines (not in the middle of the frame) and the horizon is also at the two-thirds line. You can check out the rest of his portfolio here.

In landscape photography the Rule of Thirds applies to horizons just as it would apply to the poissitioning of a face in a portrait. The horizon line should be at one of the two-thirds lines, not directly in the middle of the picture. While placing it in the middle wil be fine for a memories book of your vacation, it will remain a simple snapshot. So while your composing your next sunset picture, either show more sky or more land/water, but try not to split the difference. :-)

The above shot was taken of a road near my house. Even though the subject is rather simple, a road, the angle at which I took the shot places the horizon closer to the two thirds line, instead of the middle of the photo. Apply this rule as you go out on your next photography venture and see if it yeilds a more stunning collection of photos.

It is true that every rule is meant to be broken and this one is no exception. There are award-winning shots that do not follow this rule, but in general it is only those who have mastered the rule that have the freedom to break it and still produce stunning work.

Happy shooting-
DC