Lines in your photograph - Lines are especially abundant in most photographs. These lines could be as concrete as the sides of a building, the pathway in a garden, the sidewalk, the road in your vicinity, or even the pedestrian crossing lanes. Lines can also be the row of trees in the main avenue, bored people cueing in a lone ATM machine, and the queue of cars during heavy traffic. Visibility of these lines all depend on certain angles they were photographed. Lines can be utilized to enhance image composition. Here are some applications:

Repetitive Lines – this type of line is equally abundant. The row of streetlight lamps or the palm trees at Macapagal Avenue viewed from a certain angle, are actually short vertical lines repeated in a row. Another example is the long stairway that is actually a row of short horizontal lines.

Line Patterns - Short lines that intersect from any angle repetitively arranged, becomes a pattern and a pleasant subject to photograph. Good examples are the bricks in a wall, or pathways. The floor tiles or even the row of a low cost housing in government subdivision projects can be examples of short lines that become a pattern. There are other patterns that maybe in front of the photographer already but aren’t noticed.

The above are just a few ideas to use lines effectively in your composition. There are better and plenty other ways to implement the technique. Just train your eyes to identify and utilize these elements and take time to shoot. Photo enthusiast in this generation is truly blessed. We no longer worry about the cost of film that used to prevent us from taking more pictures. Keep on shooting guys.

Human eyes have the tendency to follow lines. In this photo, the dike is the line that draws the viewers’ attention to the main subject (the farmer) that is cleaning the dike in preparation for the rice planting season. Secondary subjects are the grass, the rice seedlings and horizontal heavy lines of rice field dikes.

Converging vertical and horizontal lines in this architectural edifice, denotes permanence, stability and lack of change. While strong vertical lines, accentuated by deep shadows stands for elegance, magnificence, and strength. Shooting from a low angle, (Photo B) tends to make the parallel vertical lines to converge to the top; this makes the subject look more imposing and evokes the feeling of strength or might.

A slight change of camera elevation will introduce drastic change of perspective. Which one is better depends on the intention of the photographer.

Curved lines and "S" curved lines are graceful leading lines to your main subject. A classic example of an "S" curve is the road leading to a hill, a portion of the Banawe Teraces, and even the neck of a swan. Keep an eye for these pleasing elements that are rarely photographed. At above photo, the subject of interest was chanced upon in an intersection of a curved and a straight line.

There are certain elements that attract the viewers’ attention more in a photograph. Among them are; contrasting colours, the lightest portion in a photograph, and the lines in it. Effective placements of these elements within your pictures can be considered as the "success formula" of a spectacular photograph. To learn more about this "success formula", we will study each of the elements, and we start with:

Lines in your photograph - Lines are especially abundant in most photographs. These lines could be as concrete as the sides of a building, the pathway in a garden, the sidewalk, the road in your vicinity, or even the pedestrian crossing lanes. Lines can also be the row of trees in the main avenue, bored people cueing in a lone ATM machine, and the queue of cars during heavy traffic. Visibility of these lines all depend on certain angles they were photographed. Lines can be utilized to enhance image composition. Here are some applications:

Repetitive Lines – this type of line is equally abundant. The row of streetlight lamps or the palm trees at Macapagal Avenue viewed from a certain angle, are actually short vertical lines repeated in a row. Another example is the long stairway that is actually a row of short horizontal lines.

Line Patterns - Short lines that intersect from any angle repetitively arranged, becomes a pattern and a pleasant subject to photograph. Good examples are the bricks in a wall, or pathways. The floor tiles or even the row of a low cost housing in government subdivision projects can be examples of short lines that become a pattern. There are other patterns that maybe in front of the photographer already but aren’t noticed.

The above are just a few ideas to use lines effectively in your composition. There are better and plenty other ways to implement the technique. Just train your eyes to identify and utilize these elements and take time to shoot. Photo enthusiast in this generation is truly blessed. We no longer worry about the cost of film that used to prevent us from taking more pictures. Keep on shooting guys.