Micro Contrast Composition
Having said what I can about seasonal photography, opportunistic seasonal decoration capture, and holiday image grabbing, now we come to the part of the show when we discuss composition against “type”. Whereas the eye might skip over a fully thematic image composition, contrasts can create interest and spark a reaction.
Review the above image of Autumn seasonal objects arrayed on a kitchen counter. It should be evidently immediately that the objects all work from the warm Autumn palette of browns, oranges, rich dark reds and mauves. Look at the background. These objects have been purposely organized against a cool texture of smooth tile and cool pink and glass inserts.
Now look again. The ceramic glass pumpkins pick up the same texture as the aqua glass tile inserts in the counter top. The tomato red jumps out against the pink background, yet the purple and blue red laves and stems of the vines don’t look as disharmonized as they would with no other pink blue tones present.
Practice using this method to bring out the most in your subjects with limited time or space to photograph them. The visual statement is organized, confident, and clean looking with no artifacts. This image could be used for tags like housewares, home, kitchen, Fall, autumn, winter, plenty, Thanksgiving, pumpkin, design, and decoration. Probably more keywords apply as well.
Get skilled using your flair for ad hoc composition when confronted with limited interior space choices and work with texture and color in a way that makes your low cost legal images distinct, not “blah”. One day this technique will jump right out and slap your viewers with a image that makes your micro stock career. Depend on it!
