Mastering Composition: The Definitive Guide for Photographers Paperback – May 1, 2015

For those of you that wants to know what it takes to be a renown photographer you have to understand the psychology of how people see. If you have taken a class in "Intro to Psychology" you will enjoy this book. The author breaks it down to simple terms on how this is achieved. I learn a lot about composition from this book that I didn't take into consideration before. Like neutral space and balance in a photo. It has changed my view on compositions considerably. I didn't know I was already using this idea in architectural photography, but for some reason the concept didn't carry over into landscapes with me. Now I have a better idea on how to convey the message I want to create when I photograph the ocean or desert and how other people will see my work as opposed to what I see.

Perfect, it's what I expected

It’s a very interesting book with mathematical points of view and clear rules about photography. But if you know the basics there’s no need for this book.Great for beginners

The book is well laid out, with well-chosen photos used as examples for his topics. I normally get bored reading photography books because it’s more of a person saying how they did whatever they did this specific time for this specific thing. I know that serves a lot of people well, but for me it’s sooo specific that it’s easy to lose attention for it. This book is general enough to be immediately useful, but not so general that it’s low value.I just highly recommend this. I’ve been making photos from intuition and was somewhat worried that becoming too versed in the mechanics might take away the intuition or “Magic.” But now that I’ve been learning the “why” behind photo construction, I’m one hundred percent thankful for this book and don’t feel like it took away ANY of that natural creativity or vision away; it gave me more ways to be creative.

I've never taken an art or photography art class but I would guess this could be a textbook. It covers a lot of the principles dealing with art in general as well as photography. It was rather affirming that a number of principles came naturally, but others were good things to think about and apply in the right situations. It's not so dogmatic as to say you have to do exactly as the book says. While technical, I felt like it also encourages exploration and personal style. As time goes on, I review the info at times just to get some reminders of things I hadn't realized before.

I have an inflexible rule. Don't buy composition books. Edward Weston said, "Composition is the strongest way of seeing." My way of seeing may not coincide with your way of seeing. In other words, an image, whether it be a painting, a drawing, or a photograph, that pleases or interests me in some way is the best composition of that image and that subject., for me whether I made that image or not.Now this book. If you have any interest in becoming a better image maker, you need this book. It doesn't give you data, (f-stop, exposure, etc.) but beautiful images illustrating a rule or concept that the author has presented.Besides snippets of historical, scientific or art information that are interesting in themselves. Such as the origin of the Rule of Thirds. He discusses the Fibonacci sequence and golden ratios, golden spirals and other visual impacts.Read the other reviews. I am at a loss as to why anyone would give this book a negative review.. One reviewer said none of the images gave him a "wow". Well, this is not a picture book. Every image illustrates a concept or principle or rule discussed in the text.

I am a new photographer and most of what I have learned has been from books. This one is one of the best I have read. The information is clear and easy to follow. I learned so much about composition that I can now put into practice. I would highly recommend this. I read it cover to cover and now have it as a reference for the future.

First of all this is an extremely well written book and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I'm an intermediate photographer that loves to travel for outdoor photography. I would often study many photos of the same scene that I have taken that are just slightly different. But however how close they appear to be at first glance one will usually stand out as more pleasing but I never knew why necessarily. This book explains really well, with nice pictorial examples, the why. This book now helps me look at a scene more analytically and abstractly and to take a step back from the extreme details of a scene and look at the general basic shapes, tones, curves and lines of a scene before I take a shot. Such a valuable book and fun read.