Chapter 10. Designing the Frame: Posing and Composition

Consulting the rules of composition before taking a photograph is like consulting the laws of gravity before going for a walk.

—Edward Weston

In this chapter about posing and composition, I’ll describe considerations you may want to explore to position subjects within a frame in the most compelling way possible. I have earnestly studied all of these rules and concepts, and probably more important, I have practiced each one in more than a thousand full-portrait sessions over the last decade (no exaggeration, believe it or not!). Here’s what I know to be true, given theory and actual practice.

First, some of the oldest rules in the book are relevant for a reason—they just work—improving your imagery time and again. And so I’ll use them time and again, and remain grateful to the first person (and the many who built upon that initial offering) who discovered such connections within visual communication and took the time to explain it to others, thus creating more beauty in the world.