Angle Photography - How to Use Angles to Create a New Perspective - Digital Photography Composition Techniques

Rhonda Callow
Categories : Photography ,Multimedia
Tags : Multimedia photography topics beginner photographer

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This article belongs to a series of photography composition techniques. To start from the beginning, please refer to The Big Picture – Photography Composition Techniques.

Explore Different Angles

Typically we view the world head-on, in a straight forward direction. After all, our eyes are in the front of our face, unlike a chameleon whose eyes can go every which way. So it isn’t surprising that this is how a majority of us take photos. It’s time to think outside the box and explore different angles.

(Click on any image for a larger view)

A New Perspective to Your Photography

What sort of perspective would you like your image to portray? Establishing this can often assist in which angles should/could be used. Of course, this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t experiment and try all sorts of angles – it can simply aid you in where to begin.

Let’s start off by pretending we’re taking a picture of Uncle Bob. Your old way of doing things would be to stand in front of him, take the picture and you’re done. Now throw that photo in with the bazillion others you’ve taken in the past that are exactly the same.

If you were to get down onto the ground and angle your camera up and towards Uncle Bob, the result of that photo would portray superiority (you’re looking up to him). The same can be done for anything that you’d like to emphasis the size of. Great building structures, elephants (watch your toes!), monster trucks, etc.

Now, let’s place Uncle Bob at the bottom of a flight of stairs. If you climb four or five stairs to position your camera to angle down and towards him (hey, I’m only 5’4” – it’s the only way I can make this work!), the end result will be that Uncle Bob is looking up to you. As previously mentioned, this doesn’t just work with Uncle Bob. If I were to take a picture of my son while we were hiking and my goal was to portray the steepness of the trail, I would walk ahead of him slightly so I’d be looking down on him as well as the trail.

These are only two suggestions of the use of angles. There are unlimited possibilities. Experiment, practise, take loads of pictures, but most importantly – think outside the box.

I’ll leave you with a couple images which used creative angles to give a whole new perspective of their photograph.

Perspective Photography - Photo by Rhonda Callow

Shooting from different angles - by Rhonda Callow

More Photography Tips

For more tips on this photography technique, check out this Sympatico article called Shooting from Different Angles for Better Photos.

This post is part of the series: Photography Composition

To take the best photos, there are many different photographic composition techniques you need take into consideration. This article series on photography composition will provide you with guidelines, tips and techniques to help you learn how to take better photos.