{"id":147,"date":"2008-07-03T18:28:04","date_gmt":"2008-07-03T10:28:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/?p=147"},"modified":"2008-07-03T18:28:04","modified_gmt":"2008-07-03T10:28:04","slug":"digital-photography-tip-trick-one-third-rule","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/digital-photography-tip-trick-one-third-rule.html","title":{"rendered":"Digital Photography Tip &#8211; the rule of thirds"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Here&#8217;s a basic digital photography tip trick that every photographer should know &#8211; the one third rule to compose the picture. When I mentioned it to a friend, he was surprised that there was such a rule. It was such a basic rule that a photographer should at least learn about this before embarking on his digital photographic adventure. <!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Why the one third rule? If you place your subject dead center in the picture it tends to make the picture rather dead. The idea is that by placing the subject matter off-center it will create a more interesting picture composition. If you study most of the famous photos including arty movies, the subject will nearly always be placed at about one third in the picture composition. Of course there is exception to the rule, but most of the time this one third rule is followed to make the picture more interesting.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.janleow.com\/imgs\/komtar_penang_500x281.jpg\" alt=\"Here's one digital photography tip using the one third rule to take this landscape photo. I placed the building and the horizon on one third while capturing the stunning twilight sky. Picture of Komtar building in Penang taken from a hotel room.\" \/><br \/>\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\"><!--\ngoogle_ad_client = \"pub-5685769204706262\";\ngoogle_alternate_color = \"eeeecc\";\ngoogle_ad_width = 336;\ngoogle_ad_height = 280;\ngoogle_ad_format = \"336x280_as\";\ngoogle_ad_type = \"text\";\n\/\/2007-08-06: JanLeow.com Blogs\ngoogle_ad_channel = \"5832813811\";\ngoogle_color_border = \"FFFFFF\";\ngoogle_color_bg = \"FFFFFF\";\ngoogle_color_link = \"CC0000\";\ngoogle_color_text = \"000000\";\ngoogle_color_url = \"808080\";\ngoogle_ui_features = \"rc:0\";\n\/\/--><\/script><br \/>\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\"\n  src=\"http:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/show_ads.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>If you bought a compact digital camera nowadays, there is a setting to leave a tic-tac-toe like lines on the LCD display. If you had been wondering what the use for it previously, scratch your head no more, because now you know what is the purpose. It is used as guide to place your subject matter. The guide lines will divide the LCD into sections of thirds horizontally and vertically. The guidelines will assist in your photo composition as you place your subject matter at any of the lines depending on how you want to capture the picture.<\/p>\n<p>The horizontal guideline has another purpose especially for landscape photography. This handy little line not only can be used to place the horizon on a third in keeping with the rules of thirds, but also to help you ensure the horizon or any composition lines are straight.<\/p>\n<p>However this rule cannot be followed strictly as there are times the rules do not apply. Rules are meant to be broken as they said. There are times a subject dead on in the center may be more appropriate, at other times, the subject matter is placed at the edge of the picture to create a photo with more impact or to convey some kind of message. This require some judgment to the situation whether to use the one third rule, to break it or to use another technique.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.janleow.com\/imgs\/digital_photo_tip_250x188.jpg\" alt=\"One third rule digital photo tip\" style=\"float: right; padding: 2px; margin: 2px; border: solid 1px black\">But basically following this one third do get you some interesting snapshots. Whether you are using a DSLR, a compact camera, or even your mobile phone camera, you can achieve some interesting photo shoot. Like they said, it&#8217;s not the equipment; it\u2019s the person behind the lens that determines how well a picture will turn out. Of course good equipment helps and a whole lot of other factors come in. Mastering a few basic techniques can improve the picture many fold.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ll leave you here to digest this basic tip and with the advent of digital photography, there&#8217;s no need to worry about film development cost. So keep on shooting!<\/p>\n<p>Related posts:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/digital-dslr-camera-photography.html\">Switching to a Digital SLR Camera for photography<\/a>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/digital-photography-tip-trick-one-third-rule.html\">Digital Photography Tip &#8211; the one third rule<\/a>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/canon-eos-30d-dslr.html\">My Canon EOS 30D DSLR<\/a>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/canon-powershot-a720is-digital-camera.html\">I got myself a new Canon PowerShot A720IS camera<\/a>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here&#8217;s a basic digital photography tip trick that every photographer should know &#8211; the one third rule to compose the picture. When I mentioned it to a friend, he was surprised that there was such a rule. It was such a basic rule that a photographer should at least learn about this before embarking on &hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"> <a class=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/digital-photography-tip-trick-one-third-rule.html\"> <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Digital Photography Tip &#8211; the rule of thirds<\/span> Read More &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[15],"tags":[37,52,170,121,140,146],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1bS5F-2n","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4166,"url":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/basic-photography-composition-rule-of-thirds.html","url_meta":{"origin":147,"position":0},"title":"Basic photography composition &#8211; rule of thirds","author":"Jan","date":"22 October 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"One of the fundamental photography basics rule that every photographer should know is the rule of thirds. Once, I chuckled when viewing an instructional video tutorial about learning photography when the instructor advised us to avoid putting the subject dead centre in the picture frame because it is deadly! Truly\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Photography Composition&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Photography Composition","link":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/category\/photography-composition"},"img":{"alt_text":"This shot of the Komtar building in Penang basically uses the rule of thirds for placing the building and the horizon to make an interesting photo composition. Of course a somewhat dramatic sky add to the effect.","src":"media\/komtar20070126_500x281.jpg","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4165,"url":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/basic-photography-composition-technique.html","url_meta":{"origin":147,"position":1},"title":"Basic photography composition technique","author":"Jan","date":"22 October 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"So you got yourself a brand new digital camera, so let's go take some photos! Without some basic photography composition technique, you find that most pictures turn out to be uninteresting. You remedy that just by learning photography basics composition techniques. There are many rules, but the rules are not\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Photography Composition&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Photography Composition","link":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/category\/photography-composition"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":200,"url":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/portrait-photography-tips.html","url_meta":{"origin":147,"position":2},"title":"Portrait Photography Tips","author":"Jan","date":"9 March 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Taking a proper people portrait is very different from taking pictures of say a picture of family and you in a holiday travel destination. For one, you are not taking a picture of \"I was here\" in this so-and-so vacation place. Sure those photos are memorable and show a happy\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;People Portrait Photography&quot;","block_context":{"text":"People Portrait Photography","link":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/category\/people-portrait-photography"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"media\/portrait-photography-tips.jpg","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":99,"url":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/photo-composition-the-four-key-points.html","url_meta":{"origin":147,"position":3},"title":"Photo composition &#8211; the four key points","author":"Jan","date":"25 October 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Besides looking at the rule-of-thirds for photo composition, you can use the four key point intersection of the vertical and horizontal of the imaginary lines for the placement of subjects. The four key points create interesting eye catching subject in photography. By placing the subject on the one of the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Photography Composition&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Photography Composition","link":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/category\/photography-composition"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"media\/perth_curtin_university_dad.jpg","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":201,"url":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/digital-dslr-camera-photography.html","url_meta":{"origin":147,"position":4},"title":"Switching to a Digital SLR Camera for photography","author":"Jan","date":"11 August 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Using a Digital SLR is very different from using a compact camera. It is far more complicated to use with its myriad settings and accessories. And it is definitely not cheap! Getting the body was the first step to building a suitable camera system. Since it is costly to equip\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Photography&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Photography","link":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/category\/photography"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":207,"url":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/photo-composition-shape-form-pattern-and-texture.html","url_meta":{"origin":147,"position":5},"title":"Photo composition &#8211; Shape, form, pattern and texture","author":"Jan","date":"18 March 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Photography basically is not just about snapping a picture, scenery or a person and just left it at that. To make it more attractive, you want to convey something distinctive like a shape, form, texture or pattern in the photo. Keep your eyes open in a scene or situation for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;General&quot;","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/category\/general"},"img":{"alt_text":"Silhouettes are great and sometimes dramatic way to emphasize shape.","src":"media\/silhouette_palm_trees_johor.jpg","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.janleow.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}