Better photography by studying film: Part 1 – Framing
The best movie directors either studied film in college or developed a sense of compostion by studying great films from the past. Strong composition makes for a compelling film scene as well as straight photography.
Those sweeping epic landscape shots in film are simply still photographs or even paintings, rendered in motion pictures. The film makers has the ability to move the camera around but in essence is still following the basic rules of composition discovered by painters from the past.
In photography, “framing” is a compositional technique where a photographer uses natural elements like tree branches, doorways, windows, or arches to surround and highlight their subject, effectively directing the viewer’s focus to a specific area within the image, adding depth and context to the photograph while creating a more visually engaging composition.
John Ford’s Western “The Searchers” from 1956 has inspired many a film maker by it use of strong compositional elements. One of these is the concept of framing which can be seen in several pivotable moments in the film.
Compare the following scene from The Searchers (1956), cowboys on horseback framed by the edges of a cave to photographer Edward Fielding’s image of a sea cave on Maui, Hawaii. In the movie the characters are going to be exploring the cave looking for a missing girl. The cave might hide unknown dangers to their mission propells them inward and towards possible unknown dangers.
It a rather striking match between the cave in The Searchers and Fielding’s photograph of a sea cave or lava tunnel on a beach in Maui, Hawaii. In this case I feel like I am moving towards the light, wanting to get out of the cave and into the sunlight beyond.
In another moment at the end of the film a door way is famously used to frame the subject, in this case the star of the film, John Wayne. By framing the scene in a doorway or through some kind of entrance, the film is allowing the viewer an inside look to see something that might not normally be seen – something that is behind closed doors, or cut off from the world. The character can be viewed as removed from the inside. Perhaps outside of the normal. He is alone in a vast, empty landscape while we the viewer are sheltered safely inside. Where does he belong? Outside in the wilderness or inside with the rest of us?
As an example for framing in still photography, the colorful fall foliage is framed by the doorway of a Vermont horse barn in this photograph by fine art photographer Edward Fielding. Do you find yourself yearning to be outside in nature, or inside the shelter? Do you see yourself wanting to expore what is beyond the doorway or are you content to entertain yourself with the details of the barn?
In this photograph by Edward Fielding, the subject of a historic train bridge in Vermont is both the main character of the photograph presented in symetry as well as providing a frame around the edges of the image.
The Searchers is now available in 4K Ultra HD as well as HD Blu-ray.
Working together for the 12th time, John Wayne and director John Ford forged The Searchers into a landmark Western offering an indelible image of the frontier and the men and women who challenged it.
Wayne plays an ex-Confederate soldier seeking his niece, captured by Comanches who massacred his family. He won’t surrender to hunger, thirst, the elements or loneliness.
And in his five-year search, he encounters something unexpected: his own humanity. Beautifully photographed by Winston C. Hoch, thrillingly scored by Max Steiner, and memorably acted by a superb ensemble including Jeffrey Hunter, Vera Miles, Natalie Wood and Ward Bond, The Searchers endures as a great film of enormous scope and breathtaking physical beauty (Danny Peary, Guide for the Film Fanatic).
Named the greatest American Western by the American Film Institute in 2008, The Searchers was among the first 25 films deemed culturally or aesthetically significant by the U.S. Library of Congress in 1989, when it was inducted in its National Film Registry.
Now meticulously restored from its original negative, this new presentation of The Searchers presents this masterpiece with unparalleled image quality, accompanied by an impressive array of special features.