Your Theory of Photography

[mxrider155]

Rule of thirds, head room, dead space. Composition, color, exposure. What is your theory on what makes a good photo a great photo? What are some of your tips to share for those just getting into photography? What do you find beautiful about the art of photography?

I guess I'm just rambling on now, but what do you think?

[1_21Guns]

in all honesty, I don't like following rules, or theories as most of the pictures I take are outdoor, I just snap what I like, see what works and what doesn't. Theories are nothing but theories, and don't apply in every case.
in my opinion, as soon as you start limiting art,
it's not art anymore.
I think it's possible to make a good picture out of anything, you just need to know how.

[Ender]

screw the rules, i will take the picture the way i want make it mine and make it original :D

[mxrider155]

thank you! i am in a photo art class at school and the teacher has been just saying rule-of-thirds, make sure ur on a third line, make sure it looks good (his definition), etc...

i definitely agree with you, that photography, just like any other art, should be about doing it however you want to, taking the way you want to

[The Madness.]

Creativity.

It's not as creative if you follow someone else's guidelines.

[aussiecasper]

i have a couple. my bigest rule is to take 100s of pictures! you never know if your going to catch something great. always take more then one picture of a shot, in different but only subtley ways.
but other than that just some ideas you might think about are good composer, keeping the eye focused on you item of interest(not haveing distracting background noise, like a random building that looks out of place in a nature shot), good lighting(to much and to little are underated, good neutral lighting is boring, strain the eyes a little but not to an unsetingly point), distance, closer is almost always better, dont make your viewer gusse what the details in you picture. just a few of the far to many things to think about when takeing a picture, but the more you do it the more second nature it all becomes.
and screwing these theroys and rules is great it makes for some great shots but it also makes terrible shots. so learning the rules and therory is the first thing you need to do in order to break them hahaha. and dont discredit the rules, because in the end the rules are to help make pictures that the eye is natraly attracted too. your taking pictures to appeal to our counsious minds to figure out and for our un-concsious minds to enjoy.:) hope i helped a little.

oh and check out some of my pics http://www.virtualteen.org/forums/showthread.php?t=86183. not really for reference i just want to get some feed back from other people:)

[Whisper]

When i get horribly depressed and want to die I grab my camera and go play around w/e happens happens
I don't follow rules rly...I'm to stupid to know any of them :)

i love this site tho...
http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/

[nick]

I think its best to be aware of things like the rule of thirds so as to have some idea about composition. Just because you know about it that doesnt mean that you always have to stick to it. Understanding the effect of depth of focus makes a big difference.

[Painted_Indian_Horse]

i agree with nick. it's definitely a good idea to know a little about how a good composition comes together, but it's never set in stone. that's why i like photography-- the rules can be broken! :P

for me, timing is everything. i like taking pictures of things in action, so the perfect moment can come and go in the blink of an eye.

[Theatheist of doom]

In my opinion a good photograph is usually a photo exposing something's true beauty that you wouldn't necessarily have noticed without the photographer's help