Composition expressions

Different composition convey different feelings. Not just a sad or happy face can express emotions but also the right composition.

But how does it works?

The human brain lives from experiences. That means that human see what they already know. As soon as we see an image we start thinking about it and put it in a known context. Therefore we are able to read stories out of photographs for example.
We see a dead body and a fire so we expect that he got burned. When we see a dead body at the beach we think the sea washed him ashore and he died because he drowned. That also works with composition.

The following photos show different feelings by using the right compositions.

I liked the task because I have not thought about the importance of composition earlier.
At first I had some struggle to come up with ideas how I could use compositions to convey chosen feelings on purpose. After a while I figured out that I have to think about images which makes me feel sad or happy and do not show this emotions in a person.

Happy:

I am happy when I see bright colours and action. Therefore I choose to take pictures of a girl cocking her orange hair and palm trees in front of a blue sky.

Sad:

I had problems to find an image which conveys sadness. I thought about a girl just sitting on the ground that I shoot from the bird perspective so she would look powerless. I was not happy with this photo because it was too obvious and I think the girl´s face expression and not the composition conveys sadness. Therefore I had the idea to take photos of a dead leaf and edit it in black and white and also of some brown and grey grid. Those colours and images expresses sadness and mopishness to me.

Jump:

I wanted to take a vertical photo of somebody standing on a bench with one leg up so it would look like she would be higher than the ground. In addition I wanted to have a movement in this picture so I was shaking the camera while taking photos.

Fall:

To give the watcher the feeling something fell down I chose to lay an open book on the ground next to an armrest. There is not movement shown. Just a book which is located at an unusal location.

Crush:

Chrush got me thinking for quite a while. Then I thought about a person who got crushed. That led me to think about broken things like a plate that fell down. In the end my idea was a sheet of paper conglomerate to a ball.

Echo:

When I think about echo I think about repetition and transition. Therefore I choose one picture of two girls casting clouds on the wall and another of a reflection of the inner side of a bus while another bus from the outside is shown.