Think Perspectiveily

In our lovely postmodern world today, you may have heard something along the lines of "Its all in your perspective" or "a flower is merely a weed seen with joyful eyes". These sorts of cliche statements are wonderful and can either motivate you to smile on a dreary day or make you want to kick a little puppy (not that I would do that but I thought it would be fair and go both ways with the analogy). As this is true with life experiences, so it is true with photography. The angle at which you present a subject can make a huge difference on how people interpret the shot, which I have tried to show here. Above you see an evil little girl prowling Draculasiously in the hopes of giving a nice deep kiss to your jugular. Naturally, I fled the scene immediately after this shot was taken, throwing garlic as I ran. Below we have a picture of a girl who was kind enough to let Mr. Bluebird take a break from sitting on Uncle Remus' shoulder.

The two shots were taken of the exact same statue, which you probably guessed already. What you may not know however is that the statue was not even moved to take the shots, even while having very different emotions to the shot. What you also may notice is that the bottom picture is a little more boring (at least I think it is). If it is more boring to take a shot of something straight on with the subject centered in the frame, then you may be wondering WHY DO SO MANY PEOPLE TAKE PICTURES OF EVERYTHING IN THE EXACT CENTER WITH NO VARIATION ON COMPOSITION OR POINT OF VIEW!?! That is a good question. I think it is because they have just never thought about it before, so time to think about it. Generally, if a shot is taken from a low angle towards the subject, they will seem larger, stronger, etc. If the shot is taken from above it makes the subject appear smaller or weaker. These are just general rules and are not always true. So basically, just experiment. Next time you photograph anything, try taking the shot at a couple different angles so that you aren't just another tour bus rider. I have some more shots below to emphasize the difference angle can make.