[crewl1]

Hey, that's how I dance !

[RioRico]

Hey, that's how I dance !

About the same here, except that I flail-about more. Give me PLENTY of space (negative or positive) to avoid impact. [Over time, I learned not to humiliate myself with such displays. Whew.]

[falconeye]

negative space in the photos.
One of the reasons is that I started doing more street photography and prefer showing people in context with their environment.

This is a very nice photo!

However, it makes me think about the term.

This space right to the girl seems to be part of the message, as you say, adds context. It also is in the same focal plane and brightness plane, i.e., not blurred or darker or brighter.

I thought negative space is more like an added background which makes a photo "breath", i.e., makes an eye find the main subject.

IMHO, the conflict between "fill the frame" and "wide frame" isn't any. You just don't want distracting elements which defocus an eye from the main subject. E.g., if you can't separate a subject from distracting elements, you fill the frame or even clip into the subject.

However, if you can separate a subject from distracting elements, e.g., by a shallow DoF, brightness difference or simply because the background is "silent" rather than "busy", you'll do and use it as negative space to give the subject room to breath. Often but not always using some kind of rule of thirds.

However, the kind of photo "subject plus a context" to me is more kind of a ying and yang game. You have a peaking subject attracting the eye. But you also have a wide subject appealing to the eye in the same way. You have two subjects forcing to look at different FoVs. This tension can provide for a great photo. The typical example is the big single tree in a wide green grass land. However, I wouldn't then call the grass land "negative" space and the tree "positive" space. Negative space may then be sky behind the horizon if it exists.

[falconeye]

Remember that we're not capturing subjects -- we're capturing LIGHT.

I don't agree.
We're all pattern recognition monster machines.

[RioRico]

I don't agree.
We're all pattern recognition monster machines.

Indeed we are. But our cameras aren't. Yes, we see patterns, true or false. And we see what we expect. Some cognitive studies I've read suggest that major portions of our brains are engaged in 'mapping', fitting sensations into slots. Our cameras don't see those patterns. Our cameras capture light, and we humans try to make sense of it.

A point I've raised before: Our visual systems distinguish between things and personas. With things, we want to see detail. So when we shoot and see machinery, 'scapes, structures, stuff without personalities, we want fine resolution. We are much more forgiving with personas. Our pattern-recognition engines can recognize faces, figures, varied bits of human and animal anatomy, given very few visual details. The classic example is the 12x12 pixel block that is recognizably Abraham Lincoln if we but squint a little. I'm looking right now at 40x40 pixel block that is obviously the Beatles' ABBEY ROAD album cover. Impossibly little detail, yet instantly recognizable.

We can apply AI warez to captured images, to recognize patterns. But the camera only captured light. We still need some brainwork to sort it all out.

[falconeye]

Indeed we are. But our cameras aren't.

Yes, but that wasn't my point. You said before:

The positive vs negative isn't space (filled vs not) but illumination vs shadow.

And I disagree.

The whole concept of positive vs negative space is applied to brainworks, not anything the camera does.

And IMHO, illumination vs shadow is plain wrong. It can happen to be illumination vs shadow in a particular example, but it is anything which partitions an image into two in general.

A point I've raised before: Our visual systems distinguish between things and personas. With things, we want to see detail. So when we shoot and see machinery, 'scapes, structures, stuff without personalities, we want fine resolution. We are much more forgiving with personas.

Good observation. Thanks. Makes me think.

However, I've the impression that we're forgiving with personas we know. With personas we don't know yet (and possibly could spread our genes) we are very keen in seeing all the details, it seems to me

[abacus07]

I think one reason there tends to be a fill the frame vs leaving open space debate is that the natural tendency for most at the beginning is to center the object filling the space. But then you study photography more and discover some truly powerful photographs with negative space. But you have to be careful since not all negative space is complementary to a photo.

[MRRiley]

It depends on what you want to do and what the "negative space" needs to do.



In this photo, the black environment is just as much if not more the true subject of the photo as the model is..In fact if it were cropped down to just the model there would be little emotional impact and would not have the oppressive weight that is crucial to the message. The negative space in this case is crucial.

Mike

p.s. "negative space" is not just having lots of stuff around your subject. It is a deliberate contrasting space which surrounds or contains the subject.