Beginner

Abstract Photos you can Shoot Close to Home

Glossary

Sometimes the subject of your photographs may not seem to be a subject at all but more of an abstract scene or view.

Take a different look at photography—at finding new subjects and new ways to view those subjects. With abstract photography, composition can be key. You can go the route of shooting a macro view of a subject—asking the viewer to try to figure out what it is they’re looking at or simply finding colors or shapes, patterns and textures intriguing enough to you to make a photograph. Use the idea of monochromatic—not necessarily as just B&W but as an image that is all about one color.

Play on light and shadow. Shadows are just as important in an image as the light hitting the subject.

Feature the mundane. Pick a subject that you might see often in your home or yard, or even on solitary walks in a local park that you can capture. For instance, how many times might you come across walls with chipped and peeling paint, Create an image that is all about the texture, light, shadow, shapes and tones of color. Once you shoot a couple of these types of images, you may find yourself seeking them out and now you’ve got a personal project.

When you begin to look at simple objects differently they become more interesting than ordinary.

Crop into a subject. Instead of photographing a shed with its moss covered roof, just zoom in on the roof itself. Now you’ve got an image that is all about pattern and color.

Take a macro photo that showcases only a tiny part of a subject. Again, as an abstract, it becomes more a story of shapes, lines, light and shadow and less about what the object really is. Hint at the actual object. Even a close-up of a boulder ceases to become a large rock—and becomes a study in texture and color.

Photograph the reflections of an object in water, whether it’s a pond, pool or puddle instead of that object itself. If the water has any movement in it, the reflected subject will become wavy and dilute.

Go so far to the abstract that your images become painterly. Use long exposures or blur techniques, make an image more about the bokeh (the blur of the background) than a person or object.

Look around you and see your world differently.

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