Setting the stage and leaving it empty

The Stage is Set. Boulder, Colorado, 2011

This is something I seem to do a lot–and I very often do not see it until later, when I am post-processing my images. I’ll set the stage with a nicely composed image, but then it falls flat because there is no real center of interest, that is, nothing “on the stage.”

The above image is a good example. It was captured sometime last year on The Hill in Boulder. I suppose the stairs and the closed door and windows may imply some sort of story, but imagine the increased interest if, for example, there were a couple embracing by the door…or a black cat on patrol on the steps…or someone doing a handstand between the stairways.

The image below is another example. I was shooting the sunrise on Trail Ridge Road in Rocky Mountain National Park and had my camera on a tripod, so why didn’t I put the camera on the 10 second timer and climb up on that “diving board” for a nice silhouette shot? Or, better yet, imagine someone doing a handstand there! It would have given a sense of scale to the image as well as a center of interest. Sometimes we forget that there is no law that says we can’t be our own model in our images.

So, from now on I am always asking myself, what is the center of interest in this image? Does it need one? What does the image need to add interest and impact? Have I set the stage but left it empty?

Pre Dawn. Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado, 2012