Critiquing Photographs: On Subjects and Focal Points

This blog explores why some may see a photograph without a single, distinct focal point as lacking a subject. I offer that a photograph inherently has a subject, but not every photograph needs a focal point that leaps out of the frame. Understanding the difference will help us critique accomplished photographers’ work and may even reduce the sameness of photos on social media.

A focal point is a feature that becomes the center of attention. The subject of a photograph is a bigger concept. The starting point to identify the subject is to ask what is pictured in the frame. The inquiry then turns more broadly into: Why did the photographer include the subject in the photo? What story was the photographer telling us? Did they succeed? Did the subject help?

Photography is an art form with its own vocabulary and grammar. The photographer uses those conventions—or breaks the rules—to share something. It could be as simple as here is an impressive scene, or it could be a more involved emotional message. Once a photographer has shown command of composition and exposure, critiques of their work should be for message not technique. They should not be “I would have …” or “you should have … .” Once the photographer enters this  accomplished realm, critiques that narrowly question the photographer including or excluding a focal point risk missing the photographer’s message.

The question to ask when viewing an accomplished photographer’s work is whether the subject they chose tells their story. Applying that standard, however, is not easy.

Photography’s ubiquitous representational nature is part of the problem.

A photograph necessarily starts out with a real scene in front of a lens. Paintings and drawings need not start out this way. For example, I had a friend in college who would draw what he experienced during hallucinogenic trips. Without any manipulation other than the techniques of drawing, he was able to show what he saw—at least what he said he saw.

Now, imagine if he saw a sunset and perceived it in wild hues of yellow sky and purple light. If he photographed that instead of drawing it, the initial product of that photograph would be the light blue sky and yellow sun as perceived without altered senses. Post processing on today’s computers might allow him to achieve the colors he recalled, but the essence of a photograph is that it would start out as a representation of what was actually there.

Movies, television, social media, and print media inundate us with simple, representational photographs, and that’s why we expect a focal point.

The ubiquitous use of photography to inform, to urge social change, to stimulate desire, or to preserve a memory makes us look for a focal point in each photograph. We are bombarded every day with images. They are mostly pictures of something in particular. It could be a war-ravaged building or a flooded home; it makes us want to do something—to do anything—to help. It might be a sports car or a watch. The photo may include a gorgeous model to tell straight men that she can be had if only they buy the luxury item.

We see these so often that when no obvious center of interest jumps out at us, something seems wrong. Indeed, the lack of a focal point is a characteristic of snapshots. Think of a tourist seeing a breathtaking mountain view, stopping at an overlook, and snapping a photo. The natural tendency, influenced by the qualities of inexpensive cameras and some smart phones, is to jump out of the car at an overlook and quickly make a wide-angle photo that includes too much of the scene. Unlike the person who was present and could scan the scene and train their eyes on each feature, the audience is left with a two-dimensional image that makes everything small in the frame—especially when viewed on a phone or tablet. The subject may be the beautiful view that captivated the photographer, but it is photographed in a way that makes it hard to appreciate.

The difference between a tourist’s  snapshot and a serious photograph of a scene comes when the photographer uses light, shadow, and composition to show us what they saw. The photograph below is not dramatic, but it is more than a snapshot. It:

o   includes a single, distant feature,

o   uses the angular line of the trees to guide our eye to that feature on the right,

o   has a background that fades away and shows depth, and

o   includes enough of the sky to show that the rock formation stands alone rather than as part of a bigger outcropping.

That photograph had a focal point. However, a landscape photograph need not show us any recognizable feature at all. The subject in the photo below is the layers of the Smoky Mountains’ famous blue haze and what those layers symbolize.

While this photo doesn’t have a single focal point, few will say it lacks a subject. Indeed, the receding mountainscape shows us the vastness of nature. Some may view it as God’s country. Others may call it transcendent beauty. As a work of art, it lets each viewer make that choice.

Let’s change how we critique.

The purpose here is not to impose my view on others. For some, a distinct focal point is vital. If that is your style, keep working that way. But I encourage you to return the favor and not ask the same of everyone else. Whether you give a thumbs up or not, I encourage you not to give any technically proficient photo a down vote without asking why the photographer did what they did and if they did it well. If so, the appropriate response might be: “While I prefer to have one focal point in photos I make, I see what you’re trying to do and think you did an admirable job of composing and exposing for that. It may not work for me, but it very well may for you and others.”

Indeed, the very existence of these subjective approaches brings us back to treating photography as an art. If photography were solely a representational craft, we would just need to plant our tripods where others did before. We would use different focal lengths and cropping merely to narrow our focus to a far-away feature. We would effectively return to the days when one could buy mass-produced slide sets at popular tourist destinations to show the folks back home.

Instead, let’s appreciate each other’s work and keep social media from becoming a derivative stream of the same styles.