November 17, 2008

Photo of the Week: Nov. 4, 2008

HOW I GOT THE SHOT: During a recent workshop with a group of young students, we spent an hour exploring one of Jerusalem's old neighborhoods looking for the hidden treasures of great photography: compositional frames. Using water pipes, tree trunks, a street sign and a hole in a wall, I taught the group of teenage boys how to crouch and bend their bodies, and their vision, to see through layers of depth and compose images with foreground frames that isolate the main subject. This photograph of a vineyard in the hills near Alon Shvut in Gush Etzion is a slight variation on that lesson in that the frame is the main subject, with the distant hills offering just a hint of the majestic fall landscape. To accentuate the vibrant colors of fall, there is no better technique than shooting directly into the sun and letting the light pour through the multi-colored, translucent leaves. That can create difficulties with lens flare on a cloudless day, but one easy solution is to find something to block the sun from shining directly into the lens. This photo demonstrates how making a tiny adjustment in the camera's position placed one leaf directly in front of the sun, allowing only a few select spikes of sunlight to filter through. Once you catch on to how easy this is, you may find you are seeing frames even when your camera is safely stowed away for the day.

2 comments:

the sabra said...

Wow! It's gorgeous!

And thanks for the tip. Never thought of using the FRAME as the main subject of the shot. I'm eager to start!

Yisroel Reiss said...

I love this picture so much! It really inspires me. The Gush is my absolute favorite place in Israel. Thank you.