Recap: Simplicity & Contrast

This week, students started learning the basic skills of photography composition. In this series called "Elements of Expression," various techniques taught are tools, not rules. They are intended to be useful guidelines that are used as elements to help photographers express their message.

Today, we went over the elements of Simplicity and Contrast. Simplicity is the art having a single object be the main focus of the photograph. This can be accomplished by having a plain background, removing any other unnecessary objects from the frame, or zooming/cropping in to the object of focus. Here are some professional examples of simplicity:





Contrast is the technique of making a part of a photograph stand out. An easy way of thinking about this is opposites. There are many different forms of contrast, but here are 3:
1. Black & White - putting a very dark and very light object/background next to each other
2. Color - Using opposite colors
3. "Bokeh" or blur - Students briefly touched on this effect, and practiced it with their cameras. It is the technique of having one object in sharp focus, while everything else is blurred.

Here are some examples of photographs using contrast. Can you name which types they are?