Our third homework assignment for the Intro to Photography class was to choose a picture from another photographer that we liked and bring it in to class. The class critiqued each picture, pointing out the composition elements we learned in action.
For this assignment, I choose a picture of the Nurburgring in Germany, taken by Ben LoveJoy. The photo I choose can be viewed directly here or you can view it with the rest on this page. The photo is of Wehrseifen on the Nurburgring Nordschleife.
I choose this image mainly because of its use of contrast and rule of thirds. The first thing the eye is drawn to is the line between the track and the grass in the foreground of the picture. The curves of the track encourage the eye to weave back and forth through the image. If you look closely, the track continues way into the distance, and above that mountain ranges flow into the further background planes of the photo. The first bend (looking foreground to background) is roughly one-third of the way from the lower right corner of the image, and the second corner is one-third from the top left. This composition really pulls you all the way back into the image and then lets you explore back out again.
My selection was validated during the class critique, when another student pointed out exactly the composition techniques I had identified when selecting the image. I received other position feedback from the class and the instructor on the choice. Going forward, the challenge will be thinking about all these composition techniques when I go to take my own shots.