By Ron Leach

October 18, 2005 — Life is too complicated, right? Well, so too are many photographs. You can often create more effective images by following the old adage that less is more. So how about this for an assignment: Instead of trying to incorporate as many elements as possible in your next series of images, try to include as little as possible instead. In other words, include only those compositional elements that add significantly to the scene—and nothing else. At first, this approach to photography takes a bit of discipline But you may find that the results are well worth the effort.

A clean, simple composition with only three elements adjacent to a bustling city intersection. Photography by Ron Leach

The reason for this exercise, of course, is that if you utilize too many elements in your images, the result is often confusion on the part of the viewer. Simple compositions, on the other hand, draw viewers into your pictures, and enable them to take it all in quickly and effortlessly. Then they can take their own “tour” of the photograph and ask their own questions about the scene: Why is this bench empty. Who is the bench for? Where was this photo taken?

Here the photographer came upon a weathered bench in front of a mid-city restaurant with shuttered windows. And that’s exactly what he captured with his camera. He intentionally did not include the entire building, or its surroundings. The resulting image gains its simplicity because it only includes three elements; the bench and two shutters. A simple scene? Not really: a wide-angle view would reveal distracting overhead wires, another bench, aa glass door, more windows, a fire hydrant and parked cars in the foreground, and a busy city intersection to the left of the bench.

The asymmetry caused by the off-center positioning of the bench adds just enough visual tension to make this simple shot interesting. If you use your imagination to drag the bench to the middle of the composition, you’ll see what I mean. The intent was to use the simple composition and muted colors to create a painterly effect.

So the next time you take a stroll with your camera, follow the old adage that sometimes less is more. Keep things simple and you may just create more magic.