Or: A Guide of Thirds and Halves

The world would be boring if every photo were a straightforward shot with the subject perfectly centered. Variety makes life more interesting. This rule draws lines that divide an image into thirds horizontally and vertically. You can often place your subject onto one of those lines to make the photo more interesting, but it’s stronger to compose an entire scene while dividing the landscape into thirds.

Take a moment to look at the first photo. What is it a picture of? If you think it’s a picture of a trail, you’re missing the majority of the photo. This is a picture of a forest, which is made more interesting by a trail that splits the frame neatly in half. The trail creates a symmetry in the forest - which is to say, it cuts the image into two halves that are similar. Also, the vanishing point of the trail is halfway up the frame, which establishes a horizon line right in the middle. While the forest fills 2/3 of the frame, it’s the mixture of thirds and halves that makes this a good shot.

One more reason to include the trail is to lead the viewer into the forest.

Here’s another example, this time with a horizontal orientation. Looking at the horizontal lines first, you can see that the bottom line separates the foreground from the background. The top line separates the background mountain from the sky. By keeping the background feature in the bottom 2/3 of the photo and allowing the featured peak to push above it, the dramatic jut of the mountain is emphasized. The vertical lines divide the photo into three obvious pieces: tree, mountain, tree. One natural tendency is to set the tree trunks directly on the grid lines because of the rule of thirds. The trees are still organized into their own sections, but they don’t have to sit directly on the grid to fit into the concept of thirds.

To continue, I need to clarify that this is not a picture of a mountain. This is a picture of friends watching the sun set in a national park. With that said, the mountain juts above the horizon and crosses into the top third of the image. Breaking the lower third of the image into thirds shows that the hikers’ heads rise above the “horizon” just like the peak of the mountain. Slicing the image vertically would show that the hikers occupy the middle third, but balance the two halves. Again, thirds and halves.

One side note on framing: The pink lines make it clear that the trees are not perfectly balanced around the mountain. Natural scenes are often imbalanced. Because this is a photo of hikers, I chose to balance the image around the hikers rather than the trees.

One last example here: The gray grid divides the photos into thirds. The sky is the top third, the mountains are the middle third, and the foreground and the valley is mostly in the lower third. Just like the last photo, you can divide this one further into more thirds and halves - but in this photo, I’ve highlighted some points of intersection. Halfway up the bottom third, a hiker is visible. In the center section, the middle mountain ends right where the center line crosses the vertical thirds. On the top line, the prominent peaks are placed on the intersections. Every place the gray lines intersect, you can see the landscape change.

It’s easy to draw a mental tic-tac-toe board over the scene in front of you. Use that to get comfortable with dividing the landscape into thirds. As your compositional skills improve, you’ll be able to start using halves of thirds and thirds of halves to make your photos much, much more interesting. You just have to remember that variety is what makes photos interesting, and that the “rule” of thirds is actually a guideline to aid in composition.

This is a great time to read my guide to practicing photography, even if you’ve read it before. There are only a small handful of simple rules for photography. The difficult part is applying those basic rules consistently, and the only way to do that is practice frequently. If you’ve read the practice tips recently, you’re ready for another lesson. After thirds and halves, it’s time to learn about depth.