Rules of Photography: Meant to Be Broken?
Rule of the thirds, rule of odds, reciprocal rule, leading lines, foreground interest, depth of field, negative space, low key… Every person who starts in photography often hears these rules and terms and feels terrified. At least, I was when I started hearing all of these words that made no sense to me at the moment, but then became very familiar.
As photographers, it is important to know about the rules of composition, about the types of image we can create if we follow them, and everything related to them. However, the most important thing a photographer needs is to keep our eyes trained and open to be able to detect, identify and capture the precise moment.
After learning about some—way far from all—of these rules, I became a rule-of-the-thirds maniac. To me, it was impossible to capture a good photo if I hadn’t followed that rule to the letter, and it is obvious that forcing them constantly came back to haunt me.
At the time, I was shooting with my first camera, the Samsung KENOX S760, and sometimes, focusing on something and changing the framing would lead to me losing that focus. Also, we need to understand that a defective point-and-shoot camera will normally fail in a fast-paced shooting environment.
As a result, for about two months, my photography was a little bit below garbage—and I think I am being nice to myself here. Trying to force the rules into my framing made me lose crucial moments, sacrifice lighting, and even “dismember” people unwillingly. In other words: it was total mess and chaos. Trying to shoehorn every rule that I had learned led me to empty photographs, meaningless moments, and (what is worse) an evident sacrifice on my critical and documentary eye. Rules to follow had become more important than the story to consider.
When I upgraded to my two bridge experiences (the Fujifilm FinePix S1500 and the Fujifilm FinePix S4200), my manic tendency to try to follow every rule had withered vaguely. Yet, there was this involuntary trend to try to follow the rule of the thirds (maybe because it was the first one I had learned) at all costs. That, of course, led me to lose elements that later on I realized should have been on frame.
Life led me to start looking at the work of other photographers, better photographers, icons of the industry. Meeting Kathy Willens essentially turned my world upside down. I have already said in the past how much she helped me, taught me and influenced my photography. With Kathy, I learned about the importance of wide angle, hunting your moment, and making sure that you had as much as possible in frame. Her critique to my work was more of a parent educating a child than of a teacher working with a struggling student.
I also learned the value of color, how to work with the amount and the direction of light I had, angle, and zoom. She also told me that in order to edit a photo properly, I had to magnify it to 100% so I made sure it was not too pixelated or it didn’t have too much noise, although she also taught me that sometimes you need to accept some grain in order to have a sharper image. However, one of the most valuable lessons she ever taught me was to look at the work of all the masters of photography, and whenever possible, reach out to them and ask them questions.
Thanks to that, I lost my fear to reach out to other lens professionals and try to learn from them. I met Jean Fruth (also thanks to Kathy), Yosel Vázquez, Mike Kaminski, Byron Motley, Yohn Yates, Hugo Pech, Malcolm Lobban, Robin Williams, Alain Gutiérrez, Yudith Vargas, Odette Fernández, among many others who not only taught me things, but also encouraged me to be the best photographer I could be.
Working alongside them or talking to them taught me that the rules of photography are meant to be broken more than they are meant to be followed. Reading about Magnum Photographers, looking at their work, looking at National Geographic photos, getting my hands on every book about photography I could find, helped me realize that sometimes you follow your gut while taking a photo, and the rules tend to fall into place by themselves.
I realized that it was great to learn them, great to use them as an experiment, but your instinct as a photographer and storyteller always had to be stronger and always had to rule your actions and your shooting. A photo taken following all the rules and techniques properly means nothing if it has no story to tell because you excluded an important element of the image in order to follow a given requirement.
Instinct, story, and soul matter way more than following the rules.
