Video: 7 common landscape composition mistakes beginners make and how to avoid them

 

 

Photographer Nigel Danson has captured a lot of photos over the years. That means a lot of opportunities to take great photos. It also means a lot of chances to make mistakes. Like all of us, Danson has made some of those over the years. In a new video, Danson discusses seven types of composition mistakes he's made and how to overcome them. A bad photo doesn't need to be just a bad photo. It can also be an opportunity to learn and improve.

Before diving into compositional mistakes, it's worth taking a beat to define composition itself. Danson says, 'Composition is all the elements of a photo. It's basically everything in a photo and how you decide to piece those bits together.' The three ingredients to an epic landscape photo, as Danson sees it, are composition, subject and light/weather. You still need a compelling composition if you get a fantastic subject and beautiful light. Otherwise, you can get home and realize that you have taken snapshots of great weather or light but haven't quite created a great photograph. We want to avoid getting caught in a bad cycle of taking photos, not liking the photos when you see them in a photo editor, and then going out and capturing more photos. There's a crucial step that this cycle misses, figuring out why a photo doesn't work.

The first mistake Danson used to regularly make is having things too tightly packed together in a photo and having too many elements right along the edge of the frame. You want to make sure that you're giving elements in your photos room to breathe. You don't need a lot of empty space in your compositions, but it's a good idea to make sure you aren't crossing compositional lines over each other and packing too much into any one area of the frame. A related mistake is not using negative, or empty space, effectively.

The third common mistake is not thinking about light in a composition. You've got to think about how light and shadow affect the viewer as they look at your photo. Bright areas draw the eye, so it's important to ensure that you don't compose an image with relatively bright areas dotted throughout the frame, as the viewer's eyes will bounce around the image.

To learn more about these three common mistakes and to see the other four photo composition mistakes, watch Danson's full video above. If you enjoy his video and would like to see more of his content, subscribe to Danson's YouTube channel. To see more of his excellent photography, visit his website and follow him on Instagram.

(Via Nigel Danson)