Shooting in Squares—Part 1

 

Our Grumpy Old Photographers Group, who gather for coffee each Friday, decided that Trump had world events well under control, so for this week, we would neglect to provide any solutions. Instead, we talked about Vivian Maier's photography, including how she went about her craft and how her culture for street photography was much different than ours today. Our discussion led us to an experiment of sorts in order to see how Vivian saw the world through her camera. To us, one of the simplest ways to do this was to start creating our compositions in squares, like she did with her two-and-a-quarter-square film negatives.

The two photos I decided to share this week are the beginning of that experiment. The top photo is a model of the Titanic, which was put on display at the local art center. The model was beautifully constructed with fine details showing its deck chairs still in perfect alignment. It was displayed in a four- to five-foot glass case, and that is the reason you see the top edges of that case in my photo. I thought about cloning them out of the picture but couldn't develop a compelling argument for doing it or not doing it. Therefore, I left the display case edges as photographed. Because I chose to shoot a low camera angle as if from the iceberg, I had my background blown out by the bank of windows, giving the appearance of a white blanketing fog. My intent was to provide a minimalist look to suggest isolation. Upon further review, I think an even lower camera angle may have offered more symmetry within the frame.

By taking this photo, I learned that symmetry is more important than balanced elements are when shooting squares. I also learned how programmed I am in seeing compositions as the rule of thirds subconsciously.

Both photos this week were taken with an Olympus OMD em5, a 15-year-old Micro Four Thirds camera. This is important because I had only one lens with me when I came upon the old tow truck. That lens was a 45 mm lens, which is the equivalent of a 90 mm lens on a full-frame camera. I found it hard to fit the subject in the square frame without shooting from some distance. This is not the way that I shoot normally, and the result and my approach were different. I was not able to get some of the detail shots composed the way that I saw them in my mind. For me, this cost some loss of intimacy with the subject. Consequently, I am going to use a wider-angle zoom and revisit this scene to get the photos I couldn't take during that first visit.

My initial impression of shooting squares is that the frame fills so easily, but that gives some concern for how to exclude some scene elements without making the corners of the frame feel uncontrolled and messy. I am not feeling that my eyes are going through the frame in the same way as when I compose in a 4:3 ratio. I think using leading lines in square-format landscape photography would be challenging. During the coming week, I am hoping to do some architectural photos because I think the square would lend itself well to that type of photography. I will also attempt some close-up and landscape photos to see what challenges they might present. 

I am thankful for the opportunity to get out of my comfort zone and to have my square-shooting, grumpy, old friends share their experiences with me during the next week. It's great to have photo buddies to help me learn. Photography, at its best, should never be a solely individual experience. This experiment should make for an interesting part two blog.