Trees filling voids

Saturday, April 22, 2006 -

The village of Gourdon is known as “Nid d'Aigle” (eagle's nest) because it was built on the top of a ravine and if you want to capture its essence you must use a wide-angle and get at least a part of the ravine. If you shoot in a crystal-clear day and there are no clouds in the sky, you face with a problem: how to “avoid the void”? Empty room in a photo is not necessarily a problem in my opinion, and in some shoots I don't dislike big portions of deep blue sky; but I think it wouldn't be good in this case, since it woud distract the attention from the subject.

In such cases the problem can be easily solved by searching for a tree and letting it fill the void. I personally prefer trees without foliage since you can still see the sky through the branches and they aren't perceived as an obstruction.

Gourdon (Alpes-Maritimes, France). Nikon D100 + AF-S 12-24 f/4G @ 24mm, 1/350 sec @ f/8, ISO 200, handheld.