Take a Look at Some Borders

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Having fun while waiting for our food to arrive.  I seem to pull my camera out a lot when we are out to eat.  I'm not sure if it's the texture of the food or the colors, but out it comes.  This was fun.  I really like the look of ice and the air bubbles that sometimes get trapped in the glass, not to mention the condensation that forms on a glass full of cool liquid.  And, really the bright color was what drew me to this glass to photograph.

After taking a few photos of just the glass (for example last night's photo) itself I decided to have a bit of fun.  The first thing I always tell people when they express an interest in taking better photographs - always pay attention to the borders of your image before snapping the picture.  How many of us have taken a photo only to find something very distracting in the background?  It happens all the time.  Just pull out the old family photo album and I'm pretty sure you will see photo after photo of less than stellar images.  Mostly because there is something undesirable in the image.  The best are the kids that look like they have trees or flag poles growing out of their heads.  You know what I'm talking about right?

Well, in this instance, I intentionally wanted to include the person just beyond the glass.  And by putting that person just slightly out of focus, it is not so distracting in the background.  By paying attention to my borders I was able to include more information that helps to tell a story.  I've included what I wanted to, and left out what I did not - the table of people to the left. 

So, practice shooting by only paying attention to everything you see in your image.  Don't worry about anything except those borders, until that becomes habit, and you will find that one simple step will improve your images.

The power of imagination makes us infinite.  ~ John Muir