Tip Number Three: Improve your Pictures Instantly! Using the Rule of Thirds

The Rule of Thirds is not really a "rule," but more so a guideline that helps your pictures become more interesting and balanced.  The idea emerged from painters hundreds of years ago and photographers have adopted the rule to help create a more balanced picture.  The belief is that images should never have equal parts because the equal parts tend to steal attention away from each other.  Hence, an image should always have a principle subject, and everything else in that picture exists purely to enhance that principle.  If this does not make sense, think back to your high school or college writing class because this idea is somewhat analogous to writing a persuasive essay.  You need your main argument and all the mumbo-jumbo in your paper needs to support your thesis to make it believable.  If you have two or possibly even three theses in a paper, your ideas are too scattered and your paper becomes confusing or uninteresting.  Now let's look at what the Rule of Thirds means in in photography.

Look at the image below and imagine the grid layered on top of your image.  

The Rule of Thirds is quite simple actually.  Basically, to follow the Rule of Thirds, all you need to do is to place your subject along one of the lines or place your subject where the lines intersect.  To put this more simply, all you need to do is imagine a grid on your viewfinder when taking a picture, and place your subject somewhere on the grid.  Following the Rule of Thirds is one of the easiest and simplest way to immediately enhance your photo's composition.  

I included some examples below to help make this idea more clear.

In this image, the subject's eyes are aligned with the top horizontal line (you have to imagine the grid) and her body is aligned with the right vertical line.  Compare this picture with the following picture where the Rule of Thirds is not followed, then decide for yourself.  Which picture looks more pleasing to you?

This is the exact same image, but the picture was cropped so that the subject was more or less centered in the middle of the photo.  Her body has moved closer to the middle and her eyes are slightly above the top horizontal grid line.  I don't know about you, but this picture feels cramped to me, especially because her fingertips are right next to the edge of the image.  

One more example for landscape photographers =)

The subject here is the dandelion (again, you have to imagine the lines).  The dandelion is placed where the lower horizontal and right vertical lines intersect.  Now I'm going to crop this exact picture so that the dandelion is centered.  Watch what happens.

In this picture, the dandelion is centered in the middle.  How do you think this picture compares to the first?

Now that you've seen a few examples of what the Rule of Thirds entail, try taking some pictures using the rule as a guideline and determine whether you like the results of using the rule.  Remember, the "rule" is more so a guideline and there really are no right or wrong answers.  Rules are meant to guide you and should not dictate your creativity.  So I say, use the rule to your advantage when you want, but always stick to what looks best to you!

Follow this link to more visual examples!

http://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&hl=en&source=hp&biw=1107&bih=873&q=rule+of+thirds&gbv=2&oq=rule+of+th&aq=0&aqi=g10&aql=&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=863l1852l0l3192l10l7l0l0l0l0l174l897l1.6l7l0