Design Concepts: Rule of Thirds

The most basic principle in photography, layout or design is The Rule of Thirds.  The basic idea is that you can divide your photo into an equally divided 3x3 grid with focal targets [sometimes called "sweet spots"] occur at the line intersections.  Photos that the human eye perceives as good or powerful tend to follow the Rule of Thirds.  Even the masters -- painters from hundreds of years ago -- used the Rule of Thirds... although it didn't really become a "rule" until photography came into being.  And even then... it's more of a guideline.  :)

So how do we use the Rule of Thirds in our own compositions?

If you were to look through a viewfinder or at a camera screen you can divide it into thirds by mentally making a Tic-Tac-Toe grid:

Many cameras have a grid or boxes or "corners" indicating where the "sweet spots" are in the photo:

Some phone apps (the iPhone Photo App, for example) have pre-built "Rule of Thirds" helpers:

The idea is that the human eye focuses most on the areas where the lines intersect.  So if we put the focal point of the photo in one of the intersections, the image becomes more attractive or interesting.

Another use of the Rule of Thirds is to place the subjects eyes on the horizontal line.  Ideally one of the eyes would be on one of the interesctions, while the eyes would be looking to the opposite side into the empty space.  This image of a cat is fairly close.

If you are taking (or cropping an existing) landscape photograph, the Rule of Thirds can be used to help add interest to the shot.  Sometimes the horizon line is on [or close to] one of the two horizontal lines.  Sometimes the picture can be divided into three areas -- the foreground, the focal point, and the background.  In the example below, the horizon line follows the bottom line while the subject of the photo is exactly on the interesection.

Here are a few more examples demonstrating the Rule of Thirds:

Now look at the following photographs and see if they follow the Rule of Thirds -- and if so, in what ways:

The Rule of Thirds is utilized in movies as well as photographs.  This is an example of a commercial with the Composition Lines overlayed on the movie.

This guy did a music video about the Rule of Thirds:

A more advanced explanation about the Rule of Thirds can be seen in the video below:

http://blog.muddyboots.org/2007/07/rule-of-thirds.html

http://www.everydayhdr.com/?p=1367


By comparing three different shots, you can see how the placement of the subject in the photo makes a difference in impact.

Remember, that although these are called "rules", they are really more of a suggestion. There are always exceptions to these rules. This photograph, for example, had a very strong subject, it was a simple design, and it broke the rule of thirds -- but it's still a powerful image.