This setup can offer huge advantages. For starters, you can instantly see your shots on the large screen of the computer instead of the small LCD on the back of the camera, but it also saves time downloading images from your camera as the images are already in Lightroom.

So how do we do this?

Obviously, you first need a cable to connect your camera to your computer. You probably got one with the camera, it’s the same cable you use to download images from the camera. If you don’t have one, you can buy one from most computer and/or camera stores. Just check the connections in the computer (usually USB) and the camera (mini USB) and make sure you get one that is long enough for your setup.

You will need the software utility that “talks” to your camera. If you have Canon, that software is the EOS Utility which came for free with your camera. Unfortunately Nikon does not give their software away for free, you need to buy it. The software is called Nikon Camera Control Pro and you can get it at B&H for around $145. Here is the link

As I have a Canon, the following screenshots represents a Canon-specific setup.

In the Canon EOS Utility, you’ll need to identify the folder the EOS Utility will deposit the photos in. This is set up like in the screenshot below. I called this folder “incoming”.

Now we have completed the link between the computer and the camera.

Next is to setup Lightroom to watch this folder for incoming images. This is done in the Auto Import Settings under the FILE menu. First you need to “turn on” the Auto Import function, by selecting the first option, as seen here:

Then, you set it up in the Auto Import Settings . . . .

As you see below, I selected the “Incoming” folder as the folder to “watch”. That is exactly what Lightroom will do. It will sit there and monitor that folder waiting for anything to arrive. When you take a picture, the EOS Utility will save the picture into that folder where Lightroom will pick it up and process it, just like a normal IMPORT session.

The rest of the Auto Import Settings therefore look very similar to the normal Import settings. You specify a folder where you want Lightroom to put the image and you select the various other settings like presets and keywords.

Now you are all set!

Connect your camera to the computer, launch EOS Utility and Lightroom and shoot away. Every shot will be automatically imported into Lightroom.

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Several things hit me when watching this video. First of all, the setup required to take a photo of something seemingly simple, two iPhones. The lighting, the setup, the post processing, the number of people, etc. all show there is a heck more to taking these types of shots than one would imagine. Then, after the photoshoot, the front-page design exercise starts, which is in itself an interesting process.

Interesting to note too that the video itself was taken using a 5D MarkII because of its HD video capabilities. Peter explains how he used a 24-70mm lens and shot in sRAW1 to get smaller file sizes.

Thanks to the time-lapse approach of shooting this video, what you see in a few minutes actually took half a day.

Enjoy the video

Cover creation from Peter Belanger on Vimeo.

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Controlling Dynamic Range

I shot two pictures of the same scene, but each with a different exposure. By using the histogram, I ensured that I captured all the highlights in one image and all the shadows in the other.  Here are the two pictures with their corresponding histograms:

Overexposed, but shadows OK

Clipped Highlights

We can clearly see how the first exposure has clipped highlights (shown by the red circle). In other words, critical tonal information falls outside the tonal range of the picture. That data is lost and we cannot retrieve it. In the picture this shows up as a white expanse in the sky. No detail in the clouds, just a white patch.

The rest of the picture is very usable. We see detail in the shadows and the histogram tells us that all the dark pixels fall within the tonal range of the image.

Underexposed, but highlights preserved

Clipped Shadows

In the second image we see just the opposite. There are dark pixels that have been clipped, as indicated by the red circle in the histogram. The picture shows black areas with no detail, just a black patch. The sky however is properly exposed. We can see detail in the clouds and the histogram tells us that all the light pixels fall within the tonal range of the image.

After opening both images in Photoshop we can combine these two images and blend them using the properly exposed portions of each shot to makle a composite that is nicely exposed for both shadows and highlights. The first thing we need to do is combine the two shots. We’re using Photoshop so you can do this simply by opening both images and dragging the lighter exposure onto the darker one. You can do this by selecting the layer and just dragging it to the darker image as seen in the screencapture below.

Drag one layer to the other image

Hold down the “shift” key when you do so. That will cause the new layer to align with the underlying layer automatically.

You should now have two layers. Your layers palette should look like this:

Two layers

With the new layer selected (the top one), pull down the “Select” menu and select “Color Range”

Select Color Range

In the Color Range Dialog box, make sure you select “Highlights” and tick the “Invert” option.

Explanation: The term “Color Range” is somewhat misleading here. By picking the “Highlights” option, we are asking Photoshop to find and select all pixels that are considered to be highlights. This is far more accurate than us trying to select a portion of the image manually. Especially in shots with intricate detail such as tree branches, etc. Photoshop can do a much better job.

We are going to use this selection to create a mask. A mask, in Photoshop, lets us selectively hide or expose portions of underlying layers. Remember we have a darker image underneath the one we’re using and we want to hide the overexposed portions of the selected layer (which are the blown areas in the sky) and have the properly exposed sky from the underlying layer shine through instead.

The darker a mask is, the more of the lower layer shines through. Therefore we need to make the selected highlights dark and we do this by inverting the selection. See the screenshot below, the sky is black, the rest is white. Now click OK. You should see your image with sections selected with the so-called “marching ants”

Highlights are selected

Now we can create a mask using this selection. We do so by clicking the Add Layer icon in the Layers Palette.

Click Create Mask Icon

When you do that, your picture will look quite awful! That is because the transition between the two layers is too abrupt. You fix this by blurring the layer mask. Do so by selecting the mask and go to “Filters” – “Blur” – “Gaussian Blur”. Slide the slider to the right until you like the result. In this example, we needed to go all the way to 250 pixels.

Blur the mask

Now you should have a nicely blended image with highlights and shadows perfectly exposed and you can apply further enhancement techniques to finish off the image. See below the properly exposed image, ready for color correction and other processing steps.

Blended image with perfect exposure

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I’m going to assume you have a Digital SLR camera, but even if you don’t, read on as I have some tips for the advanced compact shooters too.

Reach

Obviously, the reach of your lens will be a huge determining factor in your photography. Too short a lens (wide angle) will give you a nice picture of the field with surrounding areas, but don’t expect to see any exciting actions, frozen in time. Your subjects, the players, will appear too small to really see what is going on.

You will want at least a 200mm lens. Even this, will really only give you a decent coverage of half the field. In itself that is actually OK. Lacrosse has 4 quarters so if you stay in the same spot for the entire match, the rotation of the teams will give you coverage of both teams, twice. However, 300mm or more will prove to be an ideal lens for this sport.

Lacrosse

Where to stand

A most important issue is actually where NOT to stand. I found that standing at the middle of the sideline is a bad location (unless you want shots of players coming off). When standing here, you rarely get a shot of a player from the front and you’ll be too far away from the goal and crease to get a good shot of any real interesting action that usually takes place there.

Instead, to get some good action, see if you can stand behind the goal (not all refs will allow that), if you can’t, stand at the sideline as near to the goal as you can. In these locations, you can often get great shots of the attacking team as they run towards you. However, be careful! If you DO stand behind the goal, remember that players shoot at the goal and often miss. The Lacrosse ball is a hard rubber projectile that can do a lot of damage to you and/or you camera equipment.

Shooting for action

There is nothing so rewarding as a great shot of a player frozen in full action with the ball clearly visible in the shot. To get such shots, you will need to shoot with shutterspeeds of 1/350 or faster, 1/500 being better. Anything less is likely to cause blurry feet, arms, ball, etc (which can be creative, not for all shots).
Remember also that if you are shooting at 300mm, a 1/350 sec shutterspeed is about the minimum recommended for a hand-held shot. The length of the telephoto reach will cause slight camera shake to be magnified, resulting in less than sharp pictures. So, in short, a fast shutterspeed is good.

Then, I set the camera in the “AI Servo” mode and select the fastest “frame-per-second” setting I can. On my camera, this is 5fps. Some cameras, like the Canon 400D, Nikon 40D or Nikon 80D are slower at 3fps. The Canon 40D and Nikon D300, have around 6 fps, and then there are the pro cameras such as the Nikon D3 wich offers 9fps and the Canon 1D3 which offers 10fps.
Don’t worry if your camera does not shoot that fast, it does not mean you won’t get good shots, you will, but you may not get all the action, all the time.

The camera settings

Assuming you have a digital SLR, you have some options. The most obvious one is to use shutterspeed priority and set at the aforementioned 1/500 and let the camera pick the aperture. However, on bright days (lots of light) I like to set the camera to aperture priority (Av) and dial in a large aperture such as f4. The large aperture plus the bright day pretty much assures me I will get fast shutterspeeds. What the f4 gives me however, is a nicely blurred background. There is usually a lot going on around sports fields and as you have no control over where the action is taking place, you have no control on what is seen in the background and sometimes a good shot is spoilt because of a distracting background.

Now you are ready to start shooting and the best advice I can give is ANTICIPATE!. Don’t wait for the action, as you’ll be too late when it happens. If you feel like something is going to happen, start shooting, yes you’ll waste a lot of shots, but chances are you’ll get some real good ones too. Here is where one of the main advantages of digital becomes evident. Doing this with film, is downright expensive. With digital, who cares if you shoot 500 shots and only use 15. It is better than shooting 36 shots and using 4, even if that is a better ratio.

Your shooting strategy

Depending on your objective, you can either “follow the action” or “follow the player”.
If you are after exciting action shots, then obviously you will “follow the action”, but realize that you’ll most likely get a lot of shots of the same (key) players. If you are a photographer for the team and want shots of every player, then “follow the player”. This of course implies following players that are not always the center of activity so it may take a while before you have acceptable shots.

However, if it is a school team you are taking photos of, then they will love you for having pictures of everyone.

Processing

So you have completed a few matches and have come home with 500 pictures. This can be daunting if you do not have the right tools to parse these pictures, select the good ones and process them to your liking.

I found Lightroom to be wonderful for this kind of work. Furthermore, it actually lets you shoot in Raw, so you retain maximum flexibility in your processing options, even if it does take up more space in your memory card and hard drive. The camera typically will be plenty fast for most scenarios with many cameras allowing bursts of 15 or more Raw images before the buffer fills up.

Coming back to Lightroom, it is exactly this type of work where the application shines. It turns a tedious job into an efficient one, which in turn will remove your reservations when shooting. It liberates you as you know that sifting through and post processing large numbers of images are no longer an issue, leaving you free to shoot without you subconsciously worrying how to process all these shots.

I have regularly come back with over 500 shots, selected over 100, processed them and exported them to 800×600 pixel jpegs for the team website, then exported 20 or 30 as full sized jpegs for printing. Furthermore, I’d do that ALL that in around 30 minutes! Just impossible in a workflow where you need to call each picture up individually.

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Regardless of the level of photography you engage in, getting blurry pictures sucks!
Sadly, many people blame such pictures on their camera not realizing that with a little care a more satisfying result could have been obtained.

Let’s look at some ways to ensure getting sharp pictures:

Use a Tripod

I guess everyone saw this one coming, but it is hard to argue the fact. A good sturdy tripod WILL make your images sharper. You might be surprised to learn that the pros ALWAYS use a tripod, even in bright daylight.
The slightest camera shake will result in “soft” images, images that are not quite as tack sharp as they could be. This effect is amplified by using a larger zoom. Why is this amplified? Imagine a “level” where a small amount of movement at one end, results in a large amount of movement at the other end. Your camera is at the “small amount” side and the longer a zoom you use, the more the movement will be at the other end.

Fortunately, there are tricks one can use when a tripod is not available:

Use the Self Timer on the camera.
All cameras have one, read the manual if you have never used it. By placing the camera on a sturdy surface and tripping the self timer, you can take the shot without holding the camera. Almost anything can be used, a fence, a mailbox, steps, a parked car (don’t scratch it!), anything. Some care is of course necessary. For example, don’t put the camera too far from the edge of a surface as you’ll likely get a nice shot of that surface in the foreground.

Use a Bean Bag

Yes, a bean bag, you know, one of these small bags filled with birdseed or dried beans, often used to in the home to sooth aching muscles by heating the bag up in the microwave. They are cheap to buy and easy to make, in fact a couple of hand-fulls of birdseed in a zip-lock bag will do the trick just fine.
The point here is that the contents (the seed or beans) absorbs movement and provides a very sturdy base for a camera, even when you trip the shutter with your finger. Of course, using the self time AND a beanbag is even better.

Don’t press the shutter by hand

As mentioned earlier, a pro always uses a tripod. But a pro ALSO always uses a Cable Release. This is a cable that plugs into your camera and lets you trip the shutter by pressing a button at the other end of the cable. This avoids you having to touch the camera at all, removing ANY possibility that your hand creates minuscule movement (similar to using the self timer).

Shoot at your lens’ sharpest aperture

A lens is rarely really sharp at its largest or smallest aperture. So the astute photographer will try to avoid those settings if and when possible. Often the “sweet spot” lies 2 or 3 stops smaller than “Wide Open”. So, for example, if your lens is an f/2.8, you can expect an f/5.6 or f/8 setting to render the sharpest image. This can be easily tested yourself, by taking a series of images at different apertures and comparing the result. A small investment of time to find that “sweet spot” of your lenses.

Image Stabilization

New technology is helping you get sharper pictures too! Image Stabilization (IS), Vibration Reduction (VR), Optical Stabilization (OS) and Vibration Control (VC) are all terms used my different manufacturers to indicate their stabilization technology, which can be built into a lens or into the body of a camera.
This technology is quite amazing. It is based on the principle of counteracting the minuscule movement of your hands and arms. It does so by moving the optics or the sensor (depending if the stabilization happens in the lens or in the camera). The method is very effective and can be quite essential for, say, photojournalists or sports photographers who cannot always afford the time to set-up a tripod to get the action.

Beware! However, you do need to be careful when also using a tripod. When using a tripod, make sure you turn the stabilization OFF. Yes, that’s right, — OFF. The reason is simple. When turned on, the stabilization mechanism is looking out for movement and that “seeking” can cause some vibration by its own.

Mirror Lock Up

By now, you should already be getting much sharper pictures. But there is more!
One additional trick, used by the pros, is something called Mirror Lock Up. This ONLY applies to cameras with a mirror of course, the DSLRs (Digital Single Lens Reflex).
Those cameras let you view the scene through the lens itself by using a mirror. When you trip the shutter, the mirror is briefly flipped out of the way, so the incoming light can be directed to the sensor. It only takes a fraction of a second and is why the view finder briefly goes black every time you take a picture.
Well, you can imagine that the slap of this mirror can also cause minute shake. In some scenarios, such as macro photography, where great magnification is used, this minute movement can cause blur in the shot.
Mirror Lock Up, as the term suggests, is a camera feature that allows you to flip the mirror out of the way and lock it in its flipped position. Then when the shutter is tripped, there is no movement by this mirror.
Obviously, when the mirror is flipped aside, you can no longer see through the lens, so you need to compose the shot before you take the picture.
You will need to look up your manual to see how to invoke the Mirror Lock Up feature.

Buy quality lenses

You will be surprised by the difference between a good lens and a bad lens. Sadly, the “kit lens” that often comes with a DSLR is not of the best quality. Typically, if the camera with lens combination is less than $100 more than the body only, you can pretty much be assured that the lens will not be the sharpest.
There are some exceptions of course. The Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 is a plastic lens that costs around $70. It’s build quality is pretty low, but it is a legendary lens as it performs magnificantly.
If you are serious about your photography and do not believe the difference a good piece of “glass” can make, I suggest you go to your local camera store and see if you can rent a lens for a day. That way you can try it out for yourself. I suspect you will be surprised.

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If your camera has the “Long Exposure Noise Reduction” feature , you have may have wondered how it works. Some cameras, like Canon’s 1-series, the 5D and the 30D, have an Automatic setting as a default, so your picture may be benefitting from this without you even knowing it.

Many photographers however, knowing about this feature, may prefer to control its use and will toggle the “On” or “Off” setting accordingly. In the Canon models, this feature is found under the Custom Functions, Number 4 in this case (C.Fn-4). In the 30D’s case, the function only applies to exposures of 1 second or longer, hence its name, LONG Exposure Noise Reduction.

How does it work? When you switch it on, you will most likely notice one particular thing, the exposures will take twice as long! Perhaps, marginal at 1 or 2 seconds, but try an exposure of 25 or 30 seconds and you’ll be waiting for quite a time before the camera is ready to shoot again.
What is going on?!

Well, the Noise Reduction funtion is using a technique called “Dark Frame Subtraction” which works pretty much as the name may suggest.

For short exposures the noise of a digital camera’s sensor is acceptable, but for longer exposures, the noise gets amplified along with the subject of the image. The longer the exposure, the more noise.

However, it’s generally true that sensors are noisy in predictable ways in the sense that some areas of the sensor are usually noisier than others. This means that if you were to know WHERE that noise is, you can compensate for it. And the way to do that is: Dark Frame Subtraction. What happens when this custom function is set, is as follows:
You take your normal picture, and the camera then takes another, a “dark frame” of equal length and exposure settings (which is why the time doubles when you use this feature). The idea of the dark frame is to gather the noise without any subject matter. The camera then does a “subtraction” between the two, and voila, the noise is reduced, if not eliminated. This happens in camera, BEFORE the image is written to the card, hence it also applies to RAW images, not just to JPEG as some people may think. The results can be stunning.
Give it a try. Happy shooting.

By the way, if your camera does not support this function, it is possible to do it yourself, using an application such as Photoshop. All you need to do, after you’ve taken your long exposure, it to put the lens cap on and take another. Do not change any of the camera settings. This will give you that second, dark frame. Now you can do the extraction in Photoshop.

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MTF Characteristics explained

MTF stands for Modular Transfer Function and is a method of evaluating the lens performance based on its contrast and resolution.

Contrast expresses how well an image differentiates between the object’s black and white lines.
Resolution expresses how well object detail is expressed, how sharp it is. A high-resolution image will display crisp edges and shows much detail while in a low-resolution image detail can run together causing blur (also expressed as “softness”).

MTF charts are created by measuring how well lenses capture a series of evenly spaced lines of black and white. By measuring multiple “densities (how close together these black and white lines are), we get meaningful information at how well the lens can distinguish the boundary between black and white.

The Canon MTF curves (which are the ones we’ll be looking at) display results measured at 10 lines per millimeter and at 30 lines per millimeter. Generally speaking, the 10 lines/mm curve is a useful indication of contrast while the 30 lines/mm is a useful indication of resolving power. Many photographers are primarily interested in the 10 line/mm curve.
Measuring these characteristics is of course influenced by the aperture used so the MTF charts typically display two sets. A black set for measurements at the lens’ maximum aperture (note that this can vary by lens) and a blue set for measurements at f/8 (always f/8).

Another characteristic that can influence the lens’ performance, is the lens curvature from center to edge. This is reflected in the chart on the horizontal axis where the numbers “0″ to 20″ are millimeters. Zero is the center of the lens.
The dotted lines vs the solid lines are measurements representing the orientation of the black and white lines. Strangely enough, most lenses resolve these differently as you can see in the difference curves below.
Putting this all together in the illustration below, we can see an MTF chart (in this case of the Canon EF 300mm f/4 L IS lens).

As indicated in the illustration, any line above 0.6 is considered good. Above 0.8 it is considered excellent. In this example, wide open (the black lines) the lens is excellent, with both black lines being well above the 0.6 mark. When stopped down to f/8 (the blue lines) the results are even better.

What is also evident here is how the lines are relatively flat from left to right, especially the solid lines. This indicates the lens’s performance is consistent all the way to the edge. In other words, little deterioration in sharpness and contrast towards the outer edges.

What is also immediately evident, is that a Full Frame sensor will be more prone to differences in edge-sharpness than smaller sensors such as the APS-C sensor found in the Canon Rebel and Canon 30D/40D lines.

A Full Frame sensor is 36×24mm. Measured from the center, the longest side is therefore 18mm. Looking at the MTF chart above, one can see this puts the “edge” close to the outer edge of the chart. Here we see the curves starting to trail downwards, a sign of lesser performance, indicating a “softer” picture.

The APS-C sensor is 15×22.5mm. Here, the longest side is only 11.25 when measured from the center. That puts the edge of that sensor in the middle of the MTF chart. Usually at a spot where the curves have not yet trailed downwards, or only very slightly. Therefore, you’ll find the cameras with this size sensor to have better edge-sharpness characteristics than Full Frame cameras.

This lens used in the example above (the Canon EF 300mm f/4 L IS lens) is a very sharp lens with excellent contrast.

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Information about using ICC profiles on Canon printers appears to be scarce. It exists, but it is well hidden and not all that intuitive when found. We’ll take a look at what to do and how to set up a color managed environment using a Canon printer.

Those Color Profile Names

The first area of confusion lies in the naming convention that Canon has applied to their profiles.

Their profiles are named like: Canon Pro9000 PR2. While we can figure out what Pro9000 means (it’s the printer we’re using, in this case a PIXMA Pro 9000), we have no idea what PR2 means.

Likewise, other profiles come with names that include codes such as SG1, MP2 or PR3, all of which are meaningless. Well, to come right to the point, the letters indicate the type of paper and the number indicates the quality setting. This table will be your friend in identifying those codes:

The lower the number of the quality setting, the higher the quality. In other words “1″ is high quality and “4″ is low. This quality setting should match the quality setting that you select in the print driver. It is not automatic!

In the printer, you will find this quality setting by selecting the properties of the printer. On the “Main” tab, first select the appropriate paper you will be printing on and on the “print Quality” section, select the custom option then click the “Set..” button.

Canon printer Driver

This will bring up a dialog box with a slider in which you can select the quality setting we’ve been referring to. This should match the color profile you have selected or wish to use.

Set Print Quality

If, for some reason, you cannot match the numbers up, select the ICC profile with the lowest number. So, for example, if the slider is set to “3″, but your system does not have SP3 available, select SP2 rather than SP4. That way, you will be picking a higher quality setting in the profile than the printer will render. This is better than the other way round. Of course, best is to have the two quality settings match.

So, now that we know how Canon names their profiles we are in a much better position to select the most appropriate one for the job at hand.

Now we can complete the color management set-up of our print workflow.

Because we prefer to be in control of how color is rendered and do not want the printer to override what we’ve specified, we will need to tell the printer not to interfere. We therefore need to turn the color management in the printer OFF. This too is set in the properties dialog.
In the “Main” tab. Tick the “Manual” option of the Color/Intensity section and click “Set…”

Then select the “None” option under the Color Correction pull down. This turns off all color management activity inside the printer, allowing us to trust what we see on-screen when editing the photo. We typically use applications like Photoshop CS, CS2, CS3, Photoshop Elements or Lightroom for that task.

Set Color Managent to OFF in the Printer

No Color Management in the Printer

Preparing the Photograph

The most common color space used by digital cameras is the sRGB color space. It is a good idea to have this color space associated with your images if you use them on the web or have them printed by a commercial printing lab (although some of the higher quality labs may provide you with alternative instructions).

However, the sRGB color space does not provide the widest of color gamut. The reproduction range of the modern Canon printers actually extends beyond the sRGB range. If you have your camera set to assign sRGB profile to the images you take, then you are limited as you cannot increase the gamut. It is advisable therefore, to set your camera to AdobeRGB, a broader color space, especially if you plan on doing a lot of printing on your Canon printer. [note to Canon users: Your camera produces files names like IMG_6733 when shot in sRGB, but changes the naming convention to _MG_7355 when the AdobeRGB profile is selected. So now you know, your camera is not broke, ]

Remember to assign sRGB to your images when sending files to labs or when putting them up on the web!

To assign in Photoshop, go under the FILE menu and select the “Assign Profile . . ” option

Assigning Profiles in Photoshop

Now we are ready to print.

In summary:

1. We have the photo represented on-screen in a color gamut that is suppored by the printer.
2. We’ve turned off all color management inside the printer, so it will not override what we send it
3. We have loaded the printer with a specific type of paper
4. We know the naming convention of Canon’s paper profiles, so we know which one to pick.

Now we can proceed with printing the photograph.

If using Photoshop, select the Print With preview.. option, found under the File menu.
Double check to make sure the photograph has the Adobe RGB profile assigned.

Then, in the options, select the following:

1. Color Handling = “Let Photoshop Determine Colors”
2. Printer Profile = Here we select the Paper Profile that matches our paper and selected quality setting
3. Intent = Perceptual

Printing from Photoshop

When all is confirmed, click “Print” and you should get a beautiful print that matches what you see on screen.

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First of all, we should establish that there are no hard and fast rules. Photography is an art form and you don’t get great artistic results by following strict rules. However, there are “rules of thumb” that can be helpful, guidelines so to speak that when followed, can lead to results that are esthetically pleasing. The only real “rule” is that the photographer should follow his or her creativity and feeling when pursuing that perfect shot.

So, the The Rule of Thirds is a guideline that suggests dividing a scene into threes, both horizontally and vertically. This creates four places where imaginary lines intersect. Positioning your main subject at those points will make a picture more pleasing to the eye.

Let’s check it out. Here is a very simple, image, that has been divided into threes.

In this shot, the Rule of Thirds is applied in both horizontal as well as in vertical direction. The green grass makes up about 1/3 of the image in a vertical sense and the old shed is placed at the intersection of the lines, 2/3 across in a horizontal sense. Composing like this often adds some tension, energy and interest to an image compared to placing the subject matter right in the center of the photo, which is what many of us tend to want to do instinctively.

To prove the point, here is a shot of the same shed, but this time centered in the photograph. As we can see here, it makes for a decidedly more “boring” composition.

So, we can immediately see that the Rule of Thirds does indeed help make a picture a bit more interesting.
Let’s have a look at some variations (click on the thumbnail to see a larger version):

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