Sequencing photographs
In trying to understand what makes a good photo story, I knew that sooner or later I would have to look at sequencing photographs. Let’s say you have 20 photos: how should you arrange them to have the most impact?
Most photobooks either present two images at once (one image on the left spread and one image on the right spread) or one image at a time (usually on the right spread). In either case, the photographer has to work out how to sequence the pictures.
An obvious way of dealing with this is to sequence the images chronologically. This may work for some documentary photo stories, but it won’t work for all of them, for example where the story is thematic in nature, or if the images are a collection of unrelated images in a portfolio.
As I mulled over this idea, I came to the realisation that there are three general principles to follow when pairing images. You can combine images to reinforce, contrast and/or catalyse.
- Reinforce: One way of pairing photographs is to reinforce a concept. It’s like using a highlighter pen to direct the viewer’s attention to something common in both images.
- Contrast: Whereas Reinforcement is about emphasising similarity, contrast is about emphasing differences.
- Catalyse. The Reinforce and Contrast principles are additive in their effect. With the Catalyse principle, you create a third emotion, feeling or idea that was never part of the original two images. It’s like 1+1=3.
I decided to pair up some of my photographs to explore this idea.
This is photo story 22/52. More details about this project.
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