Within the Frame: The Journey of Photographic Vision

Excluding It from the Frame

As important as it is to get every element within the frame, it’s equally important that you exclude the rest. You know how they say “less is more”? Well, sometimes less is just less, as when the story you are trying to tell within the frame is missing a key character or element. But when you’ve got it all there and the visual story is complete—and your vision realized—anything extra has a subtractive effect on the impact of your image, and more is less.

The story is told of Michelangelo being asked about his methods for sculpting. He replied simply that he worked on a block of marble, removing all that was not part of the sculpture until only the sculpture remained. I suspect this oversimplifies the art of sculpture, ...