Personal Pearl of Wisdom: Place your subject way off center, cause its much more better.

I’ll use it only when I know that the people reading it will realize that I really do know that it’s incorrect to say it… grammatically illegal!!!

However one must note that one cannot place more or most before better. Why is that? Simple. Better itself means “more good”. So “more better” would be “more more good” which doesn’t sound good.

But I digress!!

Ok, you’re asking yourself how in the world can he (Joe) segue this into something that relates to photography?

When I’m talking to one of my students that take my online class with the BPSOP, or when I walk up to someone that’s in one of my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops someone on the planet, or in the daily critiques during that said workshop, I’ll say it’s “much more better” if you compose your photo so as the subject is way off center…Why?

Well, there are two answers: The answer to the first why is to get a reaction from them since what I say is not grammatically correct. I want the short discussion to be remembered, and I’ll do that any way I can; a brief chuckle before my explanation is just the ticket!

The answer to the second why is that when you place the subject close to the edge of the frame, you’re creating visual tension. Don’t ever let anyone tell you differently. Especially those old-school hardliners (usually the officers in their camera club) that live and will die by the ever so silly Rule of Thirds.

So the next time you’re out shooting and you’re in a position to have your subject either somewhere in one of those pesky (Rule of Thirds) intersections go ahead and take the shot. However, before you move on to the next photo, try placing the subject close to the edge of the frame. Realizing you’ve probably been brain-washed, take a leap of faith while getting over the hump.

When you’re sitting in front of your computer place both versions side by side and really study them. Be honest with yourself and decide which one offers the viewer not only decidedly more visual interest but visual tension as well.

Visit my website at www.joebaraban.com, and check out my workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime.

JoeB

Food For Digital Thought: Dealing with Distortion Part II

I see three triangles with the help of the edges of my frame.

In my latest part I post, I was dealing with distortion. I talked about the difference you get when you stand off to one side or the other while photographing a building, or standing in the middle of it to achieve symmetrical distortion.

In this post I want to talk about the entire composition; thinking about everything that’s contained within the four edges of your frame. I’m talking about both the positive space (the space that has mass), and everything else that would be called the negative space. I call it, “The whole enchilada”, and several years I wrote a post on it.

When I talk to my online students at the BPSOP, and in my daily critiques with those that take my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around out planet, I talk about why we shouldn’t crop anywhere but in the camera.

There are several reasons, one of them is to use the edges of your frame as a compositional tool. If you’re familiar with my teachings, that is incorporating the elements of visual design into your photography, You know that shape is one of the basic elements, and squares, circles, rectangles and triangles are the four basic shapes.

If you were to think about those four shapes when you’re composing one of your photos, it would open up a new door for you as far as creating visual interest and tension. Of course, this would take right-brained thinking to be able to see these elements.

Keeping in mind what I just talked about in my part I post on symmetrical distortion, and add to that thought this post on shapes, and using the edges of the frame as a compositional tool, you’ll come up with images as the one I submit to you now.

In composing this photo of an office building in the Galleria area of Houston for the oil company that took up several floors, I thought about shapes; specifically triangles. By using the right side of my brain, I no longer saw a building (left brain thinking), I saw a triangle. I thought about the triangle I was creating with the building by standing (up close and personal) in the center, and the two triangles I created on either side all with the help of the edges of my frame.

So my fellow photographers, the next time you go out shooting, think about the effects of negative space that borders and defines the positive space ie., your subject, and try to create shapes wit

Visit my website at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my 2017 workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime.

Send me a photo and question to: AskJoeB@gmail.com, and I’ll create a video critique for you.

JoeB

Workshop Stuff: Maine 2017

Joe
January 22, 2017
Workshop Stuff
0 Comments

I was walking around the festival when I saw this happening.

I wanted to repeat some of my earlier posts that dealt with photos taken from my Maine Media Workshops to show you some great images that are taken during the week. This coming July marks my 29th year there and I look forward to teaching there every year.

There’s several workshops going on that week so the energy level is way up there. All classes eat all three meals (great food) at the homestead so there’s constant photography chatter and you see people taking pictures all around the campus. Each year starting from the beginning I’ve picked the same week because it coincides with the Lobster Festival just down the road in Rockland; the reason is simple.

Beside what my fellow photographers have come to expect as far as small fishing villages, lighthouses, flowers in peak season, and landscapes in general, the Lobster Festival offers a completely different set of photo opportunities: color, light, design, great people watching and portraiture, and lots of movement; not counting the variety of foods including seafood and plenty of lobster.

As I do in my online classes with the BPSOP and my own personal “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around the planet, I show photographers how to incorporate the elements of visual design into their photography. I go out with the class in the mornings as well as the sunset shoots to see what people are thinking and I’ll always talk to each one individually offering advice and perhaps a different way of looking at the same subject.

Here are some classes:

2012 Maine Media Workshop

Maine Media Workshop: Class images

2014 Maine Media Workshop

2016 Maine Media Workshop

2015 is not shown because of the recovery of hip replacement surgery.

Since I know that so many photographers have to plan so far ahead for vacation time, I wanted to send a link out now so people have a chance to read the description and sign up:

https://www.mainemedia.edu/workshops/photography/stretching-your-frame-mind

Visit my workshop at: www.joebaraban.com, and watch for new workshops at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime.

Send me a photo and question to: AskJoeB@gmail.com, and I’ll create a video critique for you.

JoeB

Life Before Photoshop: Shell Rotella Oil Calendar

I miss the good old days when you had to actually think before you pressed the shutter; you had just one click to do it right.

By today’s standards, it was very difficult to do it all in the camera, but since we didn’t know any better it seem the natural thing to do; it was the only thing to do!

I often think back to some of my photos and think what they would have looked like if Lightroom was around and Adobe was not just a type of house in New Mexico. Maybe I would have been dangerous, but i like the way it turned out.

Having said all this, I certainly don’t sit around every day pining for days gone by. I like to rely on Photoshop when something I want to do can’t be done at that moment…the decisive moment when I press down on the shutter and record what is.

What I don’t do and what I tell my online students with the BPSOP and my fellow photographers that sign up for my “Stretching your Frame of Mind” not to do is tell yourself that you’ll just fix it later. Instead of moving to the right to create a better balance between the negative and positive space, or to get that telephone out of someone’s head, or to fix the ridiculously overexposed subject the meter told you was just fine by bracketing, people will sit in front of the computer and deal with it then.

I was shooting a calendar for Shell Oil, and every year owners drive their huge eighteen-wheelers to a designated city in hopes to be featured on one of the month’s pages.

In the past they simply rented a huge warehouse that had a large overhead doors at each end, put up white seamless paper and each rig drove through, stopped, had it’s picture taken and drove out; I wasn’t interested in doing that.

I presented an idea to the art director. The idea was to take portraits of all the owners and try to make it work with a particular month. I sent my producer ahead of time to find me interesting locations I might use as a backdrop. We arrived in Nashville a couple of days early to look at the locations and decide on the twelve trucks we wanted to use. I walked among a hundred rigs looking to pick out the ones that were simply the coolest!

Since I love purple and Manny and his son (who was spending the summer driving around with dad) were great guys I picked their rig to be on the July’s page. We found this great location and went for the 4th of July theme.

What you see was taken on one 35mm Kodachrome transparency, and just one click of the camera.

Visit my workshop at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my 2016 workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime.

Don’t forget to send me photos and questions to: AskJoeB@gmail.com, and I’ll create a video critique for you.

JoeB

Quick Photo Tip: Using the Least Likely Lens

Joe
December 31, 2016
Quick Photo Tips
0 Comments

I’m a huge believer in coloring outside the lines and I’m always telling my fellow photographers that take my online classes with the BPSOP and the ones that join me in my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around our plant to do just that.

I wrote a post on it almost four years ago and because of it I followed my own advice. I was in an area in the south of France, and when I got out of my rent car to walk along the area surrounding a chateau, I decided to not use my usual go-to lens and put on something I would never think about using for this type of situation…my 100mm Macro.

It was a fortuitous decision as it turned out giving me what I still consider to be a very unusual depiction of swans that were nestled in a small stream next to this incredible well-known chateau. Although (sadly) it looks like I did considerable post processing work to it, it was shot in the camera, one exposure on one 35mm Kodachrome frame with no post work done to it; this is what Kodachrome looked like, and boy do I miss it!!!!

I know so many of you out there get comfortable with one or two lens that always reward you with good photos. The only problem is that they always look the same, as in the same compression or lack thereof, the same focal length that might be on one of your zooms, or the same dOF because you’re using a lens (like a prime) and rendering the same F/stop to all your compositions.

So my fellow photographers bite the bullet, take a leap of faith and grab a lens you haven’t use in forever, or one you would never use in a situation you’ve been in a hundred times and have been comfortable to the point of being complacent.

Visit my website at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come color outside the lines with me sometime.

Keep sending in your photos and questions to: AskJoeB@gmail.com and I’ll create a video critique for you.

JoeB

Anecdotes: Apache Oil and Gas

Joe
December 19, 2016
Anecdotes
4 Comments

I was shooting the annual report for Apache Oil and Gas, and the company sent me to Egypt to pretty much shoot whatever I wanted that represented the people and country. The reason being that they were going to enter into a partnership to begin drilling there.

The one photo they did want was a photo of a new tower that was recently built in Aswan; a city just south of Cairo. When I got to Aswan, I was driven out to somewhere close to the middle of nowhere, and there was absolutely nothing around except this tower.

As the sun was getting ready to set, I was doing the best I could to try and create an interesting picture out of basically nothing but a tower and some rocks.

In my online classes with the BPSOP, and in my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around our planet, never give up! There’s always something you can do and whatever it’s going to be, it’s going to be better than what most people would shoot…why?

Because not only do I show people how to incorporate the elements of visual design into their imagery, but I also give my Did It Do It list for good composition out to my fellow photographers; on that list is pre-visualization.

Btw, I also send them a link to one of my favorite quotes said by Eddie Adams .

As I was thinking and scratching my head, this man appeared out of nowhere and came up to see what we were doing. I thought to myself, “Did I just get really lucky or what??? I told our driver to ask him if he would be willing to be in my photo, and that I was willing to pay him the equivalent of ten dollars in his currency.

Even though that was more money that he would see in several months, he was simply to shy to pose for me; and the money wasn’t really a factor. We finally got him to be in it providing he was far away from the camera…photo #1.

As he became more comfortable, I moved him closer to the camera, knowing where I wanted him to end up…photo #2

FYI, the featured photo above was what I had pre-visualized all along.

When I was done and gave him his modeling fee, his friends decided to get in on some of the action; they were also each paid, but just half…photo #3

Visit my website at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime.

Keep sending in your photos and questions to: AskjoeB@gmail.com and I’ll create a video critique for you.

JoeB

Ask JoeB: Is this a good use of light, atmospheric perspective and line?

Joe
December 13, 2016
Ask JoeB
0 Comments

Gary, one of my long time blog followers, sent me this photo to talk about. As usual, I like to let my readers know what my fellow photographers had to say. The reason being that there might have been times when the same situation happened to them, or perhaps they had or have a similar question.

Here’s what Gary had to say:

“Hello Joe,

I know your a big believer in light and how good use of light can really kick your photos up a notch. In this photo I was trying to use the sunlight as best as I could to really make it feel like a tangible part of the picture. Also with virtually every part of the image at the same focus (infinity), I tried using atmospheric perspective with the background mountain ranges to create depth. Lastly I tried using the railroad tracks to create some movement in the picture to help lead your eye to the mid ground rock formation. Of course no train ever seems to come at the right time when I am taking the picture :).

Is this a good use of light, atmospheric perspective and line?”

Thank you,

Gary

Gary,

First of all it’s important for people to know what is meant by Atmospheric Perspective. I talked about it in my online class with the BPSOP, and in my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around our planet. I actually wrote a post in 2014 that touched on it: https://joebaraban.com/quick-photo-tip-adding-depth-to-your-photos/

Atmospheric Perspective isn’t necessarily something you try using, it’s something that’s naturally inherent in our daily lives; simply a scattering of dust particles that’s between you, the subject, and the horizon. As photographers we merely work with it or around it, and it’s not always going to be in our best interest…photographically.

The phenomenon has been around since the time of Roman wall paintings. Leonardo da Vinci wrote about it, ” Colours become weaker in proportion to their distance from the person who is looking at them”.

For me personally, the fact that the farthest away objects takes on the color of the haze is not appealing and as a result I usually try to avoid it.

Take a look Gary:

http://www.screencast.com/t/fOqAHtjFRWVQ

I’m not sure Line comes into play here as there’s not really any leading or directional lines, or a Vanishing Point that moves the viewer around the frame. It’s the depth from front to back that’s moving the viewer from front to back.

One last note…I’m not sure the viewer would ever see the train tracks unless you mention that they’re there. Since you won’t be around to explain your thought process, it would need to be a “quick read”.

I like your photo, as it has a certain quiet mood created by the de-saturation (caused by the scattering of water vapor) occurring from front to back.

Thanks for the submission.

Visit my website at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime.

Keep sending in your photos and questions to: AskJoeB@gmail.com, and I’ll create a video critique for you.

JoeB

Student Work: November Part I BPSOP Class

Joe
December 7, 2016
Student's Work
2 Comments

As most of you that follow my blog know, I teach three online classes with the BPSOP. In my part I class, I show my fellow photographers how to incorporate the elements of visual design into their imagery: Light, Color, Line, Shape, Texture, Balance, Form, and Pattern. We also work on the relationship between negative and positive space, ways to create depth , and the power of a Vanishing Point as a tool to move the viewer around the frame.

At the end of the four week class, they walk away with what I call an Artist Palette that has all these elements on it. Now, they are armed with the tools to “make pictures” instead of taking them. They can now begin to “see past their first impressions”.

The left side of the brain (the analytical side) says it’s a tree, but what else is it? The tree is the completed puzzle, but the pieces of the puzzle are the patterns, the lines, the texture, the way the light hits it, and the color of the leaves; this is what the right side of the brain (the creative side) sees. Besides talking about this in my online classes, I also talk about it in my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around our planet.

I just completed my part I four week class and the images that the class created are amazing. I would safely say that it’s one of the all time best classes since I began teaching at the school almost six years ago.

I’m certainly impressed, and I hope you are as well. If there’s too many, think of all the ones I’m not showing…just keep the mouse on the arrow and let it roll!!!

Enjoy the show:


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Visit my workshop at www.joebaraban.com, and check out my workshop schedule at the top of the page. Come shoot with me sometime.

Keep sending me photos and questions to: AskJoeB@gmail, and I’ll create a video critique for you.

JoeB

Life Before Photoshop: Pacific Bell

I shot corporate and advertising photography spanning a forty year career, and most of those years (the dark ages) were spend without the help of Lightroom, Adobe Photoshop, and the plethora of plug-ins one can find shopping on the internet; if ones needs help that much.

In fact, Adobe was a type of house in the Southwest part of the US. Thinking back, I can also remember when there weren’t even computers, and as they came into being companies were quick to include photography of their new (freezing) computer room to go out to stockholders in the form of annual reports; to assure them that they were on the leading edge of technology. It’s amazing to think that my maxed out iMac27Retina is probably as powerful than the entire room full of giant machines.

Most of my fellow photographers that take my online classes with the BPSOP, and take my “Stretching Your frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around our planet became photographers during the digital age and have no idea that you can actually “make” good photos before clicking the shutter.

A million years ago, right after the dinosaurs disappeared, I was shooting an advertising campaign for Pacific Bell, the California based telephone company. I was sent to three locations: Nameless, Tennessee, Remote, Oregon, and Home, Pennsylvania. Three very small but real places spread across the US. With me, I had a phone booth a wall phone and a phone that was mounted on a stand and placed where people could drive up to it.

Before I left my studio, I had a sign made up to look like it was a sign you would see on a road stating the miles left to a particular town or city; in this case Home, PA. I had an idea in mind so in case I found the right location, I would have the prop I needed.

Using my Sunpath coordinates I found just the road I wanted where the sun would set just to one side and down the road apiece!!

We set up the sign and with a portable generator, lit it up.

I remember it missing something and was going to put the rent car driving away from the phone, but at that moment an Amish man drove by and saved the day. As Eddie Adams once said, “When you get lucky, be ready”.

I know that in today’s world, the phone and sign would have been shot in a studio, and the back end of the Amish buggy would have been bought from some stock agency and added after the fact.

I consider myself very lucky that I started out in the film days when you were able to use your head and imagination to solve problems… in the camera where it was fun instead of in front of a computer.

Visit my website at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my workshop schedule at the top of this blog. come shoot with me some time.

Keep sending in those photos and questions to: AskjoeB@gmail.com, and i’ll create a video critique for you.

JoeB

Personal Pearl of Wisdom: 25X4=100

In both my online class with the BPSOP, and in my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshop I conduct around our planet, I have my Pearls of Wisdom that my fellow photographers have become to know and I dare say…grown to love?

Maybe.

One of my all-time attention grabbers is when I say it’s all about 25X4, and I especially remember using it a lot in my last “Springtime in Sicily” workshop. I used it every day that we were walking around Palermo, Siracusa, Cefulu’ on the West side of Sicily and Catania, Taormina, and Ortygia on the Eastside.

As I do in my workshops, I show people how to see things occurring all around them. As Henry David Thoreau said, “It’s not what you look at, it’s what you see”. I’ll suggest they look at things with the right side of their brain, the creative side instead of the left side which is the analytical side.

The analytical side sees a tree, and the right side sees texture, patterns, lines, color, light, shapes, and form; all basic elements of visual design.

Having said all that, if you just look straight ahead while you’re walking, you’re only using twenty-five percent of your possible vision that has an immediate correlation to photo ops that either surround you or you pass by. I can say from years of experience, the majority of photographers do just that; it just doesn’t make sense.

It reminds me of the blinders that some racehorse trainers have their horses wear to keep them focused on what’s in front of them rather than what’s behind them or on each side. It keeps them focused on the race rather than the distractions around them.

YIKES!!! Is that what you want to be compared to…a racehorse with no distractions? I think not!!

OK, when I’m walking around hunting that elusive “keeper”, looking for the light in all the right places, I use 100% of the potential shooting area that’s always there following me down the street. In other words, I look straight ahead twenty-five percent of the time for a few steps, then to my right side (a few more steps) twenty-five percent of the time, to the left twenty-five percent of the time and behind me twenty-five percent of the time…now that sure makes sense to me.

In the above photo taken after my workshop in Sicily in Lisbon, if I hadn’t been looking from side to side instead of straight ahead, I would have never seen this guy mixed in with several of his friends….missing what would soon be one of my favorite photos/examples.

BTW, I will also look up and down, and have discovered many of my best shots doing just that.

So there you have it, my 25X4 pearl of wisdom. I can guarantee you that if you make a conscious effort to follow my advice, a whole new set of photo opportunities will open up for you, and it will be a lot more fun.

🙂

Visit my website at www.joebaraban.com and be sure to check out my 2016-17 workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime.

Keep those eyes wide open and always moving around,

JoeB

AskJoeB: A photo from a recent class.

Joe
July 25, 2016
Ask JoeB
0 Comments

Harry submitted this image for me to take a look at. I always like to show what the photographer says to me. Although it’s not in question form, here’s what he had to say:

“I took your part I and II online classes with the BPSOP over the summer and don’t think my submitted images were particularly good, but the material presented in class has stuck with me. I just finished a nature and wildlife photography class at the local college and I referred to your class material repeatedly, and I always have my artists palette with me! Here’s one of the photo’s from my recent class. Other students may not have seen this as “nature and wildlife” but I couldn’t resist the Line, Shape, Pattern and Texture, with a payoff at the end, a fisherman! I can’t thank you enough for your wit, wisdom and patience as a teacher.”

First of all thanks Harry for the kind words. Not only do I create the artist palette for people in my online classes, but also in my “Stretching your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around the planet.

I really liked your photo and I’m pretty sure the viewer will also enjoy looking at all the elements of visual design that are so much a part of it.

Take a look:

http://screencast.com/t/tLVZTjxXFo

Thanks for the submission and I’d love to see more of your work.

Visit my website at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my upcoming workshop description at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime. I have recently written the description for my next “springtime” workshop to be next May 17th, 2017. We will be spending three days in Vienna, and three days in Budapest. I hope you can join me for a wonderful week in two of Europe’s most beautiful cities…during festival time.

Keep sending in photos and questions to:AskJoeB@gmail.com and I’ll create a video critique for you.

JoeB

AskJoeB: Your Opinion

Joe
July 15, 2016
Ask JoeB
2 Comments

Valeriano sent me these two photos to comment on. I usually like to copy the question the photographers that submit photos write and some explanation of why they took it, but this time he choose not to say anything and only wanted my opinion of the photographs.

Well, in that case let’s just get to the video critique of both images:

http://screencast.com/t/MhAKz5ODp

Here’s Valeriano’s second image and video:

http://screencast.com/t/di0FFxjVEHK

As I tell people that take my online class with the BPSOP, and also in my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around the planet, before you raise your camera up to your eye determine where the sun is in relation to your subject. If your subject is anything translucent, try to backlight it as it will appear to be glowing…as it does in Valeriano’s two images.

Really nice photos!!

Visit my website at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my upcoming workshop description at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime. I have recently written the description for my next “springtime” workshop to be next May 17th, 2017. We will be spending three days in Vienna, and three days in Budapest. I hope you can join me for a wonderful week in two of Europe’s most beautiful cities…during festival time.

Keep sending in photos and questions to:AskJoeB@gmail.com and I’ll create a video critique for you.

JoeB

Food for Digital Thought: Form

My background is not in Photography, rather in Art. Up until I was twenty-0ne I had either a colored pencil, brush, or a piece of charcoal in my hand.

I studied just about everything there was to study as far as courses in art were concerned. Throughout my years of study, I was always interested in the elements of visual design, and how they made a drawing or painting stronger.

When I changed the medium to a camera, those elements came with me, and now as I help students in my online class with the BPSOP, and in my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around the planet become stronger photographers, these same elements play a key role in developing their eye.

One of the elements of visual design that I talk about is Form. To many of my fellow photographers, Form can be taxing and difficult for photographers to capture, although if you pay attention to where the source of the light is, it’s really quit simple.

Form simply refers to the three dimensional qualities of an object. Since the camera has just one eye, it can only see in two dimensions…height and width. Where the light is coming from is critical in creating the third dimension, depth.

Light from 3:00 o'clock — Light from 3:00 o’clock

To best create the illusion of depth, the light should be coming in from the side. On my imaginary clock, for straight sidelight the light needs to coming from either 9:00 o’clock or 3:00 o’clock.

Value refers to the lightness and darkness of an object, and it defines Form. I talk mostly about the sidelight on a subject or even a landscape, but what you also have to consider in sidelight is the shadows that will be created. The soft to strong contrast within a composition will also define the limits where the highlights and shadows edges are placed.

It’s the shadows that give the illusion of depth, and as I always tell my students, shadows are your best friend.

Visit my website at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my 2016 workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime. The end of July marks my twenty-eight year at the Maine Media workshops. It’s a wonderful way to immerse yourself for a week and think about nothing but photography. It’s the same week as the Lobster Festival down the road in Rockland, and offers a completely different set of photo ops than the beautiful Maine coastline, amazing lighthouses, and quaint fishing villages. The full description is at the top of this blog.

The Los Angeles Center for photography has invited me to come out and conduct a three day intensive workshop over the July 15th weekend. I’ll be making a presentation of my work on Thursday July 14th and the public is invited. The full description can be see at the top of this blog, with a link to the site. I hope to spend the weekend with all of you.

I have added a new workshop to my 2016 schedule. On September 21st, ten photographers will get together with me at my evening “meet and greet” to begin a fantastic five-day workshop in New York, New York. Check out my description at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me.

Send me a photo and question to: AskJoeB@gmail.com, and I’ll create a video critique for you.

The Use of Gestalt in Photography: Similarity

The psychology of Gestalt has been around since the 1920’s and was founded by a group of German psychologists. I started reading about it several years ago and began applying these six different concepts to the way I was approaching the way I took photos.

It’s all about managing what the viewer perceives and processes when looking at the visual information we lay out to him in the form of a photograph. Visual input is a part of our everyday lives, and it’s our objective to present this information in a way that will keep the viewer around longer…looking at our photos. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I like it when people look at my images for a long time.

Besides the part I and II classes I teach online with the BPSOP, relating to the elements of visual design, I now teach my fellow photographers how to incorporate these six concepts in a class strictly on gestalt. These are also areas I talk about in my “Stretching Your Frame of mind” workshops I conduct around our planet.

One of these concepts is called Similarity.

Similarity is perhaps the easiest of all the concepts to recognize and therefore explaining it without going into too much detail.

Similarity occurs when forms, colors, sizes, and objects look enough alike to be perceived as a group or pattern in the viewer’s mind. All these different elements, when occurring in your photos, give a sense of rhythm and will connote harmony.

The viewer loves to see photos that are designed with a variety of colors, shapes, and forms, and when the viewer sees these similar characteristics, he’ll perceive the elements as being related due to the shared characteristics.

Here’s a few examples of what I mean:


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Visit my website at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my 2016 workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime. The end of July marks my twenty-eight year at the Maine Media workshops. It’s a wonderful way to immerse yourself for a week and think about nothing but photography. It’s the same week as the Lobster Festival down the road in Rockland, and offers a completely different set of photo ops than the beautiful Maine coastline, amazing lighthouses, and quaint fishing villages. The full description is at the top of this blog.

I have added a new workshop to my 2016 schedule. On September 21st, ten photographers will get together with me at my evening “meet and greet” to begin a fantastic five-day workshop in New York, New York. Check out my description at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me.

The Los Angeles Center for photography has invited me to come out and conduct a three day intensive workshop over the July 15th weekend. I’ll be making a presentation of my work on Thursday July 14th and the public is invited. The full description can be see at the top of this blog, with a link to the site. I hope to spend the weekend with all of you.

Keep sending in photos and questions to: AskJoeB@gmail.com, and I’ll create video critique for you.

JoeB