Learning to Photograph - Volume 2: Visual Concepts and Composition

The two volumes of the Learning to Photograph series give students and interested amateur photographers essential information about technique and design as well as an understanding of the big concepts of photography. Beginning and advanced photographers alike will find the content instructive, thoroughly explained, and effectively illustrated, making this book a useful resource for readers to develop their own craft.

This second volume addresses the topics of visual design and composition. The authors describe various methods of visual design and how you can use these methods effectively. You will learn which techniques to use to design your images while at the same time training your photographic eye. You will develop the ability to support the message of your subject purposefully, hone your photographic style, and analyze your own work and the work of others competently.

The striking images and informational graphics not only illustrate the concepts at hand, but also make the lessons visually pleasing and offer useful examples for readers to mimic in their own work.

Topics include:

• Visual perception
• Composition, shapes, and lines
• Managing light
• Color and its effects
• Sharpness, blur, and movement
• The interplay of visual design elements
• Image analysis and evaluation

The previous volume in the Learning to Photograph series addresses cameras, equipment, and basic photographic techniques.

Born in 1981, Cora has been photographing since 2002. Her craft is unique in that she almost always has the finished, edited image in her mind when she releases the shutter. She opts to shoot infrequently but with great intention and purpose. Cora's visual language is clean and quiet. She likes light, bright images featuring harmonious, subtle, and desaturated colors, and she is a borderline perfectionist when it comes to designing her images. Her award-winning photography has been exhibited in international competitions.

Cora's diverse photographic interests include portrait, beauty, fashion, nude, erotic, and floral photography. Top quality color management is a part of her daily craft, which she produces consistently for initial exposures, fine-art prints, and everything in between.

Professionally trained in the cultural sciences, she works as a freelance graphic designer and photo editor for exacting photography publications. Together with Georg, she also works as a writer for magazine and book publishers and develops concepts for educational materials about photography. Her contract work ranges from stylish arrangement and ideal lighting for product photography to portraits and aesthetic nude and erotic images. She directs the contract photography curriculum for the artist's workshop at Artepictura. Additional information can be found at artepictura-atelier.de.

Born in 1969, Georg has been photographing since 1984. His style is characterized by approaching his subjects closely, playing with sharpness and blur, and designing loudly and colorfully with off-kilter perspectives. His attention to detail is common across his interests in portrait, lifestyle, erotic, nude, travel, and detail photography. He sees subjects in everyday scenes that others tend to miss and he excels at capturing these details with a spontaneous and instinctive shooting style, though he prefers to thoroughly prepare portrait shoots conceptually.

His contract work as a photographer centers on lifestyle images, everyday scenes, and employee and company profiles. For the past five years, he and Cora have written for photography textbooks and magazines. Georg studied economics and social education, and as a management consultant he pairs his photographic expertise with extensive experience in project management and sales to help corporate clients with their visual representation and professional image design needs.

Georg has devised and independently built three structured courses of study for photography, including the photography department at the college in Rhein-Main, the photography school at the university in Lueneburg, and Artepictura Academy (artepictura-akademie.de). He is currently earning a teaching degree in Media Management in Wiesbaden.