(speaking French)
- In this video,
I wanna show you five composition tricks
that totally saved my life over the last 17 years,
you know I struggled so much with composition for many,
many, many years
and eventually came up with these five composition trick
that I wanna share with you,
so let's get started,
but before we do,
I am so happy to announce that my latest course,
a new course,
I haven't done a course in about 18 months,
called How To Achieve Natural Drama,
Cityscapes Master Class just now,
it is four different project,
I show you the gear that I use,
the behind the scene,
I give you the raw files,
I walk you through everything.
You know when I started photography 17 years ago,
I struggled a lot to get good photos at night,
all of my photos were blurry or very bad,
or taken at the wrong time,
then you know I was coached by a photographer
who told me to shoot at the right time
and then I went into a new disease,
I started over-retouching my photo big time for many,
many years until 2010 when I saw for the first time
the Peter Lee Gallery,
I don't know if you've ever been to Peter Lee Gallery,
but the rent must be like $40,000 a month,
crazy, officially the guy sold it for half a billion
dollars in photography
and I was like,
"Wow, you know I know there's controversy,
but this guy did achieve something
and I love his work,
and he really achieved something called Natural Drama."
So, I spent years learning this,
so what is Natural Drama?
It's a photo that is dramatic,
but it's still natural that could look
that something really happened,
that this was a real event that could have happened,
that sky was like this,
that you know not something
from Mars or something like this,
so it's a very specific workflow,
when I figure out the Natural Drama,
this is when I started making a living as a photographer,
so don't underestimate this technique,
check out the link down below.
All right, let's get started!
Five tips to improve your composition,
let's jump right into it,
before we do that,
my definition of composition
because I looked at a lot of definition,
it is one that I found that I really like,
which is this one,
"The arrangement of elements within a work or art
to convey a message."
So, you're an artist,
you're trying to communicate a message, okay?
But, there are many rules that can help you
convey a message,
but let's go over just a few,
which I think are very important
and the most common one.
The first one is the Rule of Third,
it's very simple,
straight forward,
you imagine two lines from left to right,
two lines up
and down,
that's gonna give you four different points,
some people call that the golden points,
the important points,
whatever, four different points
and I use it for different reasons,
you can put it on your camera,
it's easy to put on the grid,
most camera have that,
even the phone has that
or you can imagine it in your head,
but the idea for example on this photo
is that you had like 1/3 of water
and 2/3 of sky.
Often people ask me like,
"When there is water
and the city,
how much water?
How much sky?"
I say, "Well, what is the nicest?"
In this case,
I thought the clouds were nicer,
so I put 2/3 of clouds
and 1/3 of water.
Another example,
this is Tunnel View in Yosemite,
most of the mountain is 2/3
and just 1/3 of sky,
the waterfall is on one of the golden points
and it just makes a more dynamic thing,
I actually discovered The Rule of Third
when I started photography,
I remember I was watching a lot of Hollywood movies
and there was one that really struck me,
which was Forrest Gump,
where Tom Hanks is often on the right side
or on the left side of the picture
and there's a lot of space,
and I thought that was like really interesting,
I was like,
"Yeah, it makes the photo more dynamic."
So, this is another one from Oregon,
where you see you have like,
this is the opposite now,
you got 2/3 of land
because I thought the land
and that little sort of waterfall was nicer than the sky.
Let me show you an example in Lightroom,
so this is the Musée d'Orsay,
I wanted to take a really good photo of this museum,
it's an old train station that became a museum
and it has a lot of impressionist photo,
it's really amazing
and I'm just gonna use one of my preset to retouch it
because I'm lazy
and my presets are really awesome,
you can get them on my website if you want,
but voilà, just a quick retouch
and the problem is that you know I'm very centered,
I got as much water than as much sky,
so you know I try to go here on the left,
this point is already retouched with some of my preset,
I didn't like it because like this whole part
for me was confusing
and so what I did is I ended up doing this
where I got the Louvre on the right side,
the Musée d'Orsay on the left side
and like The Rule of Third,
you have like 1/3 from the bridge,
from the Musée d'Orsay on the water
and 2/3 of sky,
the sky was amazing that night.
I wanted to post this on Instagram,
the problem is that if you post this on Instagram
because Instagram loves portrait photo,
I did a lot of research
and found out that all my photos which were in portrait
had twice or at least 40% more interaction like likes
and comments than if it was in landscape,
so what I do now is I go here,
I go 4x5 which is Instagram
and I press X
and I always have The Rule of Third,
and I am gonna move this around,
and I'm like,
"Okay, I wanna get,
yeah 1/3 maybe?"
Yeah, 1/3 here,
have the Musée d'Orsay here,
like next to this point
and voilà, that's what I posted on Instagram.
Now, the next one is vital,
Leading Lines
and this is a great example of Leading Lines,
you see, often when we take photos,
everything is kind of squashed
because you know it's a two-dimension item,
with Leading Lines you can add dimension to your photos,
you know this is a lavender field in South of France,
you get a chance to go,
it's amazing,
it's gonna blow your mind.
This is another one,
this is the Imperial Dunes in California,
nice Leading Lines
and I'll show you the behind the scene on this one.
Ah, this one I remember,
this is Diamond Beach in Iceland
and I was on a tripod,
and my tripod kept getting pushed by the water,
and I was so wet,
and I was just trying to get these lines
from the lone exposure,
it took a lot of shots until I got all these lines,
you know to get the perfect speed of the wave,
but I love this photo.
Let me show you a couple of examples in Lightroom,
check this out,
this is the lavender field on a beautiful sunrise
and I on-purpose shot it at the wrong side to show you,
and then I just move 45 degrees or 90 degrees,
and boom,
this one was more interesting
and boom,
this is another one that I found,
you see Leading Lines is much more interesting,
it's more dense than no Leading Lines like this.
Okay, the other example of the Imperial Dunes,
so this is the Imperial Dunes in California,
I got there for golden hour,
I was waiting for the sunset,
I was like,
"I need the Leading Line."
And so I tried to do something with my buddy Duncan,
it didn't really work because everything
was really squashed,
so the sunset finally came
and I was like,
I ran
and ran,
and I found that Leading Line,
then I was like,
"It's good,
but it's from left to right,
I need to get it in center of my camera."
So, I move,
move, move
and I finally got that shot.
Now, this one (speaking French),
this one is the most important one of all,
not the most important one,
but let's say the hardest one,
Foreground, Middle Ground,
background, so you gotta imagine you wanna tell a story
and what you put as a foreground,
what you put as a middle ground,
what you put as a background,
anybody going to the Mont Saint-Michel
can take 1000 of photo of the Mont Saint-Michel,
but I wanted something very strong
and I was with my buddy Scott Kelby
which you can see here,
I don't know if you can see here it's small,
but that is Scott Kelby,
an American writer,
made over like 60 books on photography,
he's my mentor still today
and I wanted Scott to be the foreground element,
to also give like a sense of how big the place is
and then you have the Mont Saint-Michel,
you know you can walk around anywhere on earth
and find like a nice church or a nice monument,
a nice sky,
but what you're gonna put as a foreground element is vital
and for example,
this is a church monastery actually in South of France
and I used this as a Leading Line,
as a foreground,
same thing, that's Iceland again,
first I had the water,
then I moved back so I could get the rocks
as a foreground,
middle ground
and background.
And this is Zion National Park,
I wanted to have this trees as a foreground,
middle ground
and background.
Let me show you a cool example actually taken
from my latest course on Natural Drama,
I've always wanted to take an original photo
of the Eiffel Tower that's kind of a bit different
and I saw a lot of people taking that street on Instagram,
and especially that coffee shop
as the foreground element for Notre Dame
and it was the Leading Line of the street
leading to Notre Dame,
so I went there,
of course it was pouring rain,
my wife was helping with an umbrella
and I was like,
"I'm never gonna make a good shot here."
Look at this it's like trucks
and there's cars
and so much people passing by,
so I said,
"Maybe if I do it like in portrait mode,
I'm gonna get less cars,"
it was really bad light,
I was like,
"Nah, I gotta come back,
I gotta come back."
So, I moved into the street
and I found this pub here called the O'Brien pub,
an Irish pub
and I was like,
"That could be kinda cool if I come out the right light,"
because this is like,
I love the structure of the pub
and what was better is that they had this terrace here,
and this terrace prevented cars to park in front of it,
I was like,
"Maybe that could work."
So, what I did is that same night I came back
when the light was right
and I kind of liked this photo,
but I hated this car,
these cars was ruining,
you know it's what I said when you compose,
you have to ask yourself,
"Okay, what can I take out that's not helping me
to communicate the message I'm trying to do?"
Okay? So, for me,
I'm trying to communicate the beauty
of the pursuit of Paris
and the Eiffel Tower,
and these cars are not helping,
so what I did is I moved further down
and I moved in the middle of the street
until I had the O'Brien,
no cars in front,
I just had the trashcan,
but okay,
I said I'm gonna erase this in Photoshop
and boom, that's the final shot I got,
this is one of the photo where I show you everything,
how I erase the trashcan
and everything,
and make it really clean,
but this is what I wanted,
a beautiful Parisian street,
a Leading Line
and the Eiffel Tower,
that is what I wanted to communicate.
Here is another extreme example,
this is the view of Notre Dame from Notre Dame
before it burned
and now it's getting restored,
and I love this view of Paris,
but I'm like,
"It's missing something,"
so I said,
"I need a foreground element,"
so I moved two meters on my left
or six feet
and boom!
The gargoyle was there
and I got this shot,
and I really love it,
I printed this shot for my home.
You know I spend 90% of my time looking
for foreground elements because you go to Paris,
you know you have beautiful monuments,
you can have beautiful sky,
but what you're gonna put in front
is what's gonna make the difference between a great photo
and an amateur photo.
Let me give you another example,
a few more actually.
This is Gordes in the South of France,
beautiful village,
I didn't like so much the flowers of foreground elements,
so I just moved back a bit
and now I had the tree,
and this other trees as a foreground,
I thought it was more interesting
and then I asked for a friend to stand in,
and I thought that was even more interesting,
you know foreground,
middle ground, background.
This is a photo I shot of the Louvre,
I waited for the Louvre to be closed,
it was a beautiful night
and I absolutely wanted to get these lamps
to be my foreground element,
the Leading Lines to the pyramids
and then this is another example,
you know if you go on the Alexandre III bridge,
by your night like this,
you will see literally everybody's stopping taking photos
of the Eiffel Tower,
but I stop
and I want to get these two statues as a foreground element
to the Eiffel Tower.
This one is in Joshua National Park
and I was just taking photos of (indistinct),
and I liked it,
I was like,
"It's missing something."
And there was some kids playing around with a LaserSaber,
and I asked if I could borrow it,
and I asked a friend to stand in there,
and I love that photo,
it actually made the cover of Lightroom Magazine,
I think the photo without Luke Skywalker is not the same.
One last example,
I was hired by National Geographic
to take a photo of the Eiffel Tower by night
and I was like,
"I kind of like this photo
because there is a mood,
but it's missing something."
So, then I looked,
I looked
and looked,
and looked for like one hour,
and I found this,
I was like,
"This is a cool foreground element
leading to the Eiffel Tower."
Okay, so this one is totally optional,
but I love it so much,
I wanted to share it with you,
it's called the Frame in a Frame,
when you can find in nature or in the city,
some natural elements or existing element
to frame your photo,
it's kinda cool.
So, this is,
let me show you a couple of example,
so I'm here shooting Notre Dame
and it's a classic shot by day
and then I move back a few feet,
and boom, I got that shot
and I like it a lot more because you got the tunnel,
I even added as a foreground element a buddy of mine
and I just feel the photo is much stronger than this one,
Frame in the Frame,
this is another example of Frame in a Frame,
I always try to look for natural elements
that can frame something,
it doesn't have to be a tunnel or a bridge,
it can be like two lamps like this one
or you know a bridge like this,
a metal bridge that's gonna frame the Eiffel Tower,
I mean the possibilities are endless.
Now, the last one is the most important of all,
it's Tell a Strong Story,
at the end of the day,
we're trying to tell a strong story
and often,
you know I have a coaching group where every Wednesday,
students send me their photo
and I see a lot of people taking photos
of stories which are not really interesting,
meaning the subject is not very interesting.
This is a lonely tree in the lavender field,
I thought it was an interesting story,
this is like for example in this one,
there was like 50 people you know on each side
and I zoom in on these two rocks
because they were the most interesting one
with the sun how they were reflecting the light
and that's the story I wanted to tell
of Diamond Beach in Iceland,
not 50 people in Diamond Beach.
So, composition,
the arrangement of the elements to convey a message,
so it's always,
look at it from the viewpoint of like,
okay, what do I need to take out
to communicate what I wanna communicate?
What do I need to put in to communicate
what I wanna put in?
And that's how I got this shot,
this one is obviously very clear,
it's got a strong story,
this one has got a really cool story,
it's the Hollywood sign,
you see,
this was my third or fourth time to shoot this
and every time I was not happy with my photo
because I always had the fence
in front of the Hollywood sign
and finally I got the idea
to attach my camera to the fence,
so I only had the Hollywood sign
and the city,
and I did not have all these other things, you know?
Again, what can you take out
that does not help your message?
Lavender fields you know that's a very clearcut message,
the roof of Paris,
very clean message,
this is The Lady in the Wind,
it's a rock that if you look at it,
looks like a lady
and her hair is in the wind,
it's Page Arizona,
the Antelope Canyon,
that's how the Indians call it,
it's a very simple photo,
it just communicate one specific element.
Tunnel View, Yosemite,
very clean,
my daughter, she dressed up like as a vintage photographer
with my 4x5 camera that I got in Japan
and we went to the desert,
and I got that shot,
it's a strong story.
Me playing Indiana Jones,
you know with a 3D background,
it's a strong story.
All right guys,
I hope you like this,
I hope you gonna try applying this five compositions
to your photography
and you can always send me
on Instagram @photoserge your examples.
Check out my new course,
it's gonna blow your mind,
the best one I've done in two years,
with the latest version of Lightroom and Photoshop,
I cover also most of the new tools,
you are going to love it,
I'm telling you,
it took me years to find this Natural Drama formula,
now it's for you.
Have fun
and I'll see you in another video.