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Get Down Low to Frame Out Ugly Backgrounds
There’s nothing that ruins a good photo faster than cars and power lines in the background. Unless these are your main subject or closely related, they are distracting and ugly. I’m tired of drab backdrops; it’s time to fix things. I hope you’re wearing old jeans because we’re about to get dirtier than a hooker on Sunday.
How Low Can You Go?
I wasn’t kidding when I said you should be wearing old clothes. Take your shiny new digital SLR and get down in the dust with it. Shooting your subject from below will give you one of the best backgrounds available - the sky. This is best accomplished on a day that’s sunny, with a few clouds. I’ll take any kind of sky over a rusty Ford Taurus as your background.
Low is also not the only option, but it is the most fun. Getting above your subject and shooting down works as well. You can’t just walk circles around your model; sometimes you have to get creative with angles to have an adequate backdrop.
Smoke ‘Em If You Got ‘Em
I guess we’re a few paltry decades beyond using magnesium flash powder, but you know what I mean. Shooting from below with the sky as a background introduces the problem of exposure. Your camera will want to expose at two dramatically different levels; one for your subject and another for the scenery.
Use a flash to help balance that out and narrow the tonal range to something that your camera can handle. Ideally, you should have an external off-camera flash for this, but the one built into your DSLR will work in a pinch. It just requires a bit more creativity. David Hobby’s recent post on balancing flash at twilight is highly recommended reading if you’re going to attempt this.
Use a Wider Lens
People only come in limited heights, so you’re going to have to put that shiny 70-200mm back in your camera bag. Unless you only want photos of your model’s forehead, of course.
Whipping out a 10mm isn’t necessary, but a lens on the wider end of things will give you a much better shot than a telephoto. Try using something in the 15-35mm range like Canon’s 17-40mm F/4L.
Oh the Drama!
Shooting from below is a very dramatic angle. The added distortion a wide angle lens provides can make people look imposing. It can also be used to convey a child’s sense of wonder.
Someone once said “The most boring photos in the world are taken from six feet high.” Every time I’m out taking photos, this echoes through my mind. I try to take as few photos standing normally as I can.
Another Way of Making it Work
Another sneaky trick to getting rid of tacky backgrounds is to heavily overexpose the shot. This is harder to do than simply getting on your knees, but it does make your photos look artistic. I’m not going to go into too much detail when someone else has already done the work. Go read Brian Auer’s excellent post on whether to expose for shadows or highlights.
Related Entries:
- The Best Models Money Can’t Buy
- How to Take Great Photos Under Pressure
- Getting Backgrounds Right at Digital Photography School
Brian Auer Said,
September 9, 2007 @ 12:26 am
Great stuff — I always enjoy seeing photos from creative angles. I probably need to be better about this type of thing, especially when I “whip out the 10mm”. I have, however, been getting much better about paying attention to my backgrounds. I’ve found that a distracting background can ruin an otherwise good photo.
Roger Barnes Said,
September 9, 2007 @ 1:32 am
A tip which I’m not too proud to share is one I discovered on a recent holiday…
We were walking along a river at Ile de Pins in New Caledonia, and occasionally found ourselves in water up to our knees. The scenery was fantastic but I really wanted to isolate one particular foreground subject with only sky as the background. Of course, getting down low with a camera while knee deep in water is tricky, especially with an SLR camera where you can’t see what your composition is like when holding the camera low.
The solution: I faced the opposite direction, planted my feet, bent over and took the photo with the camera upside down between my legs. This let me see the scene in the viewfinder, stay clear of the water, and get low enough to get the background I wanted.
Saturday Link Lovin’ and Photo Highlights - Sept. 15, 2007 | Sublime Light Said,
September 14, 2007 @ 10:02 pm
[...] Get Down Low to Frame Out Ugly Backgrounds - I live in Austin, so there are no ugly backgrounds to be found. Yeah right, ugly backgrounds can be found anywhere. Here’s a technique for getting rid of it without any post processing work. [...]
Link Roundup 09-15-2007 | Epic Edits Weblog Said,
September 14, 2007 @ 10:26 pm
[...] Get Down Low to Frame Out Ugly Backgrounds goldengod Tips for improving the background in your photos by changing your perspectives and getting creative. [...]
funkypancake Said,
September 15, 2007 @ 12:23 pm
i regularly go one step further and take photos at street level:
http://www.funkypancake.com/blog/archives/2007/09/the_key_to_a_di.html
great articles. keep up the good wrork
Andrew Ferguson Said,
September 15, 2007 @ 5:58 pm
@Roger: That sounds a bit like bowling, granny-style! I can definitely see some situations where that’s useful but I’m a bit more limited than you if I do it over water: I have long hair!
@funkypancake: That’s an awesome example! The photo where you’re right down on the ground is way more dynamic and interesting than the one from standing height. The DoF on that shot is particularly good, too.
…And your name *totally* cracked me up when I approved your comment.