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Do you need to know...
the rules before you can break them? I say absolutely. How bout you? Sep 15 06 06:45 am Link Yes sir. You must master the rules to be set free! Picasso said that after learning to draw professionally he spent a lifetime trying to draw like a child. Sep 15 06 06:48 am Link Bob Randall Photography wrote: Nope. No one needs to know rules to break them. How many compositional rules get broken by noobies who wonder why their pics suck and cant figure out why! Sep 15 06 06:49 am Link Bob Randall Photography wrote: It unquestionably helps -- especially if your work leans more to the commercial than towards pure art for art's sake. The "idiot savant" deconstructed look comes and goes, but the come is usually short-lived, and I would argue that somebody who knows the rules actually does the idiot savant look better than a real idiot. . . Sep 15 06 06:51 am Link Well obviously no one needs to know the rule of the thirds to break it, lol. But you need to know and understand it to figure when it is appropriate to break it and give more power to the image. **edit: don't look at my avatar, ROFL** Sep 15 06 07:07 am Link Most of the replies here seem to have assumed a different question. Obviously, if you know the rules, and understand them and their purpose, then you can creatively break them at the right times. It like a landscape photographer shooting a lake and deciding that the reflection of the sky should have equal weighting to the sky and using a central horizon. Most of the time its a bad idea but sometimes it works. The trick is to know when those 'somtimes' are. Sep 15 06 07:12 am Link There are lots of rules, and they're all up for breaking, I think. Sep 15 06 07:14 am Link RED Photographic wrote: Anyone know what the rule of tension is? Sep 15 06 07:44 am Link Bob Randall Photography wrote: Could not find it in Google. Maybe I know it by another name. Sep 15 06 07:52 am Link If one doesn't know the "rules," one doesn't know he's breaking them. I can't think of many artists that weren't first masters of the craft. Grandma Moses is the only exception that comes to mind right now. And I never really liked her work. There are always going to be those who jump up and say, "I didn't need to learn no stinking rules," but in most cases that is so glaringly obvious in their pictures that it would be cruel to point it out. I will modify the original statement to read, "It is best to know the rules before breaking them," allowing the occasional exception. One thing is absolutely true, without knowing the craft (or the rules), one has a serious handicap to overcome in both making pictures, and in talking about photography. -Don Sep 15 06 07:54 am Link whatcha talkin bout you have to know the rules b4 you can brake the rules..... or EVEN MAKE YOUR OWN RULES simple example How do you recognize a GWC!!??? in their composition.... rules of composition that is..... -quadrant -rules of 3rd -symetry -horizontal line -composing outdoors -repeat of elements -framing -vanishing point -compositional pointers -perspective they dont have a clue.... Sep 15 06 07:55 am Link RED Photographic wrote: I agree 100%. I also think that the speed limit signs are merely 'suggested' speeds. LOL. your post made me laugh. Sep 15 06 07:56 am Link STANLEY LAFLEUR wrote: You forgot slicing models limbs in half and leaving stumpies Sep 15 06 08:01 am Link A razor, not a rule: There are two kinds of photographers, those that use the frame as a feature of composition, and those that don't. (Sort of an afterthought. My mentor, Jacque King, told me this glaringly obvious "razor" well after photo school, but it wasn't obvious to me then.) -Don Sep 15 06 08:08 am Link Still cant find a rule of tension. I know that tension is the use of negative space to create a dynamic element to a static image but I cant find a rule for it. Will someone please tell me? Sep 15 06 08:11 am Link I've only ever known of two relevant rules: In photography -- Look. In music -- Listen. Everything else is just fine print and legalese. Sep 15 06 08:19 am Link STANLEY LAFLEUR wrote: No one was talking about any particular group of people and the term GWC implies a negative connotation that is simply no longer acceptable on the threads I post. Sep 15 06 08:32 am Link It's my party and I'll cry if I want to..... =p Sep 15 06 09:12 am Link STANLEY LAFLEUR wrote: To be honest, I'd disagree. You can intuitively compose without realising that you know the 'rule'. At least in theory. But then you can argue that you know the rule without being told it. Now I'm confusing myself, but you know what I mean. Hopefully. It's certainly easier if you know you know the rules, that's for sure. Sep 15 06 09:18 am Link You can break the rules..............as long as you don't take the sand out of my sandbox..........then I won't play with you. Sep 15 06 09:31 am Link DannyBourne wrote: Why then are there so many pictures taken by such a wide variety of people in which the subjects head is centered in the frame about the size of a pixel. (Sorry, size of a silver grain souped in Crawley's FX15 with distilled water at 68 degrees Farenheit in a dilution of 1:3 using stand developement for 2 1/2 hours) Sep 15 06 09:35 am Link Cats and Wookies and GWCs cough up hairballs all the time. Some people say that's art. To me it follows no rules except gravity (falls to the floor). I call it what it is - regurgitated crap - regardless of the angle or perspective. Rules are the rules. Obey the law and you'll be much better off. Sep 15 06 09:47 am Link DannyBourne wrote: I don't think it's intuition; it may be unconscious, but you've still learned by years of study (again, possibly unconscious) of those who came before us. But if you've never been to a museum or opened an art history book, this type of training wil take a looooong time... Sep 15 06 09:49 am Link Devil's Advocate time (not necesserily my POV): If you know how to make a wheel.. You will make... Wheels. If you don't 99 times out of 100 you will make.. Nothing.. 1 time out of 100 you might make a wheel.. ..and 1 time in a million you might make something.... new? After all, was the inventor of the wheel trying to invent a wheel? Or a bigger, better brontosaurus tenderizer? Sep 15 06 10:14 am Link You could argue that the rules are our collective set of limitations or road blocks to preconceived ideas about a given subject. It's not the rules we need to know, it's a deeper understanding of the subject, then we can see rules for what they are. Those who break the rules, know the subject. Those who keep the rules, know the rules. Sep 15 06 10:33 am Link DannyBourne wrote: Bob Randall Photography wrote: False dichotomy. Sep 15 06 12:25 pm Link W.G. Rowland wrote: You ever see that crap that passes for pictures on a cave wall..... Wheel school chalk board! Sep 15 06 12:27 pm Link Bob Randall Photography wrote: how can the rules be implemented if those rules were never published...... Sep 15 06 12:52 pm Link DannyBourne wrote: its like you saying you can intuitively bake a cake without realising that you applying the principle of baking.... Sep 15 06 12:55 pm Link Ignorantia legis neminem excusat (c)Gaius Terentius trnsl: Ignorance does not excuse. form the times of Julius Ceasar this general pricipal has been used by both moral and civil laws. PS: and in photogrophy laws too, sorry forgot to add. Sep 15 06 01:04 pm Link there is only one visual rule: there are no visual rules. there is like and dislike. there is conformity and non-comformity. rules provide safety. rules provide protection. rules do not govern aestheticism. rules? wear safety glasses when pouring lab chemistry. --face reality Sep 15 06 01:30 pm Link I'd like to be a musician. Do I really need to know anything about rhythm or tempo or melody or harmony? Won't they just get in the way of my artistic expression? Can't I just do what I like? Sep 15 06 01:36 pm Link Brian Diaz wrote: In modern music? Quite possibly.. Sep 15 06 01:37 pm Link Brian Diaz wrote: become the next dexter gordon. Sep 15 06 01:44 pm Link You don't need to know the rules to simply break them, but you DO need to know the rules to break them effectively and creatively. Basic design Sep 15 06 01:59 pm Link FaceReality wrote: Okay, I've sampled some Dexter Gordon, and he distinctly strikes me as someone who knew the rules so well, he was able to pull off breaking them successfully. Sep 15 06 02:02 pm Link |
