Composition 2

Composition 2

Composition has a very simple definition: the arrangement of visual elements within a work of art. However, it can be quite an abstract concept to grasp. When you're considering the placement and cinematic stating of real estate on a rectangular canvas, how much did you actually just follow your gut feeling on what looks good?

Well…most of your intuition is probably right!

Brainstorming composition is like laying an essential blueprint, providing the perfect plan and groundwork for the wooden frame, cement, bricking and paint that is your story! You are a designer for the emotion that the final work of art will compel. In this article, we will further explore that, but first, be sure to read Composition 1 before diving into this one!

The main purpose of studying composition is storytelling. Where each object is placed cumulatively determines the movement of the eye, the order of priority, and in what stylistic font the story is being told.

A lot of the daunting theoreticals of a good composition are actually psychological! It’s attuned to how our brain and attention span works, and what we think looks appealing to us! In this article, let’s delve into some of the magical components behind a good composition, and then some beginner friendly ways of how we can start practicing our compositional skills!

Before landing on any composition, creating effective guidelines can be the quickest way to generate a skeleton for your painting. And…there are many tactful ways to do that!

When you take photos, have you ever turned on the grid in your camera app? Well, a lot of iconic and stunning photos align with those grids! These grids determine the framing, or the arrangement of foreground, midground and background elements in a constrained space.

Another type of line we use in compositions are leading lines, which converge into / diverge from focal points. There are various ways in which framing and leading lines could be arranged to form interesting compositions.

Rule of Thirds is an easy way to create a powerful composition through dynamic framing. Rather than placing subject matter right in the center, they are sectioned slightly off center to create more breathing room and movement in the eye. In this keyframe by Marcine Jakubowski, the viewer’s eye moves naturally through the story, travelling through subject matter on the opposite side of the value spectrum on each third of the canvas.

With images that use foreground, midground and background as significant storytelling devices, the rule of thirds is an extremely powerful tool. In the shot of my original short film “The Flauna Friseurin”, I want to emphasize the greatness in scale of the Poppybird airmobile and the surrounding environment, while drawing attention to the barber shop wandering across the terrain, since this is a travelling montage. Therefore, I placed those two focal points on the thirds of my canvas with contrasting values so the eye naturally follows through both from left to right.

Leading lines can converge at focal points or vanishing points near the horizon line. They are not limited to straight lines! Curved leading lines can create dynamism and flow in your work, mimicking the roundedness of your peripheral and pupil!

When you squint while looking at a work of art, you’re taken away from all the noise of texture, color variation and material of the subject matter you’re looking at, and all that’s left are blobby shapes. Groups of shapes with value and the emotion a shape exuberates are essentially what makes a compositional thumbnail.

In compositional thumbnails, we can make use of shape language (watch the Shapes & Forms video for a deeper dive!), scale and proportion, and contrast to add character to those shapes and help guide the eye.

Different shapes, or primitives, tell different stories. Human brains are made to associate emotions to different forms:

Pointy shapes such as triangles often look protruding and sharp, and pierce through you! Triangles in compositions can create intimidating, confrontational feelings. Inverted triangular compositions could also seem unstable and toppling over anytime, a unique emotion to take advantage of in your work!

Squares, parallelograms or rhombuses (diamonds) can be used in compositions that are symmetrical, stable, and grand.

As the polar opposite of pointy shapes, elliptical round shapes create an approachable feeling. Utilize circles and rounded shapes to create whimsical, fluid, and organic compositions!

Of course, those feelings above are generalized, you can always result with different creative interpretations.

A visually intriguing composition is a tactful remix of different shape languages, manipulating their features in accordance with compositional framing and leading lines to create depth and richness in the world and story of your illustration! Time to be a visual DJ!

Create variety in their size relationships (incorporating small, medium and large shapes), and play with the contrast in quantity and density of shapes in different areas of focus, and you’ll have a bustling, inviting image!

Now that we’ve tackled the visual business of composition…what about those negative spaces of rest? Space is an essential element that determines where the eyes would look either more / less! Pay attention to the contrast between the real estate vs. sky in your image. More real estate creates claustrophobia and a cluttered, enclosed look. However, by incorporating some sky and atmospheric space, the world immediately becomes more breathable and expansive.

Again, we can apply the Rule of Thirds. Wherever there is sky, there is more room for the viewer’s imagination. It’s important to show and not tell, and let the viewer’s mind wander!

Once we’ve grasped the 2 dimensional elements of composition, it’s time to consider the 3D environment by thinking of where a camera is placed! By shifting the tilt and height of the camera, the perspective and placement of foreground, mid ground and background elements also change around. The camera is the only external window into the artwork’s world in place of the viewer. Make sure your artwork is seen in the angle you want it to be seen!

A great way to observe the impact of camera angles in compositions is through storyboards, or thumbnails of story beats throughout the arc of an animation / piece of film. The same cast of characters, and similar settings, but in drastically different framings and courses of action. To reiterate, what story you’d like to tell dictates exactly how close and where you’d like to place your elements in your image.

This is the final equilibrium that determines a good composition, combining all the aforementioned lines, shapes, space and camera angle to create the ultimate piece! There are two types of balance: symmetrical and asymmetrical. In a symmetrically balanced piece, an equal amount of visual weight on both sides of the central axis immediately creates a more stable and orderly composition. In an asymmetrically balanced piece, like my illustration below, elements, regardless of being unmirrored, still exhibit a sense of completeness.

Here, I illustrated a cozy, cluttered yet whimsical barbershop for whimsical plant and animal hybrids - flaunas! I used the Rule of Thirds to highlight the action between the big stomping flauna and the little girl; I incorporated a mixture of shape languages from round to rectangular to create feelings of whimsy and grandeur; and I left a controlled amount of space behind the curtain for the viewer to wander, since I want to portray a cluttered interior.

Here are a couple of handy exercises I use to practice developing an eye for composition by applying everything above into media I consume and everyday life!

When watching films, whether they are live action or animated, or marvelling at a painting, take mental screenshots of each moment when the composition or camera angle radically changes! Place them on a single page, and start summarizing and contouring the intricate frame into big general shape groups. Pay good attention to where they’re placed, and ask yourself- how is each shape laid down intentionally to push the story forward?

In the following compositional breakdown of Monet’s “Luncheon on the Grass” (1865-1966), I first drew compositional guidelines to lay the groundwork for my primitives. I recognize this painting as an asymmetrical visual balance and a diamond composition.

Composition cannot be copyrighted, so feel free to take the composition lines and shape from photographs & reference, and translate them onto your own canvases! This next exercise is a direct continuation from exercise 1!

In this painting, I used the primitives from the previous exercise as a guide, put on my visual DJ headset, and created new dynamics in shapes! I stylized, distorted, and transformed my original breakdown into an arrangement of shapes with a new flair, placement and levels of complexity, like fingers, or stars! By creating different variations of these, you will slowly gain a more creative and versatile part of your brain that comes up with new, exciting possibilities for compositions based on something you’ve seen!

Then, I picked one of my geometric breakdowns, and created a whole new original illustration with it as a blueprint! Comparing my end result to Monet’s painting which I drew inspiration from, those are two different compositions, with a similar dynamism and visual appeal! This exercise really allows you to reengineer your brain, and start thinking of compositions as an endless array of possibilities for visual storytelling!

Composition does not have to be complex spreads of characters, props and an environment. You can develop an eye for composition just from studying and redesigning simple, individual objects to have them look visually appealing as a whole! A great way to study the arrangement of shapes and primitives in a complete entity is through a practice called design tracing.

Only during cases when you’re studying reference images or other artwork only for your own educational benefit, tracing is okay! It is the most direct method of studying and building muscle memory for shape language. In this following example, I traced and broke down the general shape language of various palace chandeliers so I could build muscle memory of the overall lantern structure, its ornaments and attachments. Then, I could remix those design elements into my own!

At the end of the day, what makes an effective composition is essentially what you believe is most appealing to the eye, and this theory is there to guide you! It is a psychological exercise that defines your own unique standard for aesthetics, and to improve that sense of composition. So, what are you waiting for? Start looking at the beautiful life around you in a picture frame!