Rule of Thirds

The other day, I discovered another great source of digital photography tips – The Digital Photography School. Founded by Darren Rowse, who calls himself a digital photography enthusiast, DPS is a community of photographers of different experience levels who share their knowledge and views of photography. So, if you are a professional photographer or your are just beginning to play with your digital camera, DPS is definitely a source of simple tips that work.

Today, I am going to share with you an important photographic principle I learned about when visiting www.digital-photography-school.com. It is the “Rule of Thirds.” The basic principle behind the rule of thirds is to imagine breaking an image down into thirds (both horizontally and vertically) so that you have 9 parts. As follows:

With this grid in mind, you now have four important parts of the image. The theory is that if you place points of interest in the intersections or along the lines, your photo becomes more balanced and will enable a viewer of the image to interact with it more naturally.

The most important questions to be asking yourself when using the “rule of thirds” are:

• What are the points of interest in this shot?

• Where am I intentionally placing them?

Now - time to put this principle in work! Go out and make as many pictures as you can. Practice makes perfect!