Reply To: What draws you in to a photo without obvious subject?

[Ian]

HI Richard, I, too, like this image, and for me, the following makes it interesting and engaging.

1. You have collected some interesting ingredients – the beautiful dappled warm light and the school of scattered fish with only a few in the bottom LH that are nicely exposed.

2. The strong diagonal compositions – the sunburst with the fish, the angle on the bas reef, the movement/direction of the schooling fish. The directionality of the sunburst adds to this effect. Also, the diagonal of tonal contrast from the top RH corner to the bottom LH

3. The dappled light creates immediate impact

4. The complementary colour palette of the blue/greens and the warm dappled light make the image a pleasing and comfortable image to spend time looking at

5. I like that the sunburst and fish are sort of “wedged ” between the top blue water on the LH side and the reef along the bottom

6. Some might say the fish are swimming out of the image(bottom LH) and taking your eye out. It also creates some mystery/intrigue – where are they headed, what’s out there, why in that direction. Sometimes what is left out of the image can be as important as what’s included in the image.

Really nice that you were able to collect these ingredients; the shallow depth and low-angle light are not always easy to put together. You have given me new ideas for some of my local sites.