Importantly, Cartier-Bresson articulates why “rules” are not the way composition is done. Henri Cartier-Bresson’s Behind the Gare Saint-Lazare (1932) is often cited as an example of his “decisive moment.” He Disses The Rule of Thirds, Golden Mean, and Other Rules Besides, it very rarely happens that a photograph which was feebly composed can be saved by reconstruction of its composition under the darkroom’s enlarger the integrity of vision is no longer there. If you start cutting or cropping a good photograph, it means death to the geometrically correct interplay of proportions. I find that this demonstration of physics is a good illustration of how moving objects in the real world can seem chaotic and random, but periodically, in certain moments, there is pattern and harmony, which quickly dissipates (You might want to mute the sound on this video): And capturing it really cannot be accomplished through organized thinking and forced structure- it happens through instinct, of pressing the shutter release at an instant based on intuition.Ĭomposition must be one of our constant preoccupations, but at the moment of shooting it can stem only from our intuition, for we are out to capture the fugitive moment, and all the interrelationships involved are on the move. It is true, however, that when all those compositional elements align, the thing that you’re photographing can reveal something magical and iconic. His point is that in the swirl of humanity and nature, all around us, there are occasional fleeting moments where moving objects align naturally in the frame. The decisive moment is a property of vantage point and framing (and of course timing), and not about the quintessence of the external event. Photography must seize upon this moment and hold immobile the equilibrium of it. One does not add composition as though it were an afterthought superimposed on the basic subject material, since it is impossible to separate content from form.Ĭomposition must have its own inevitability about it.īut inside movement there is one moment at which the elements in motion are in balance. What the eye does is to find and focus on the particular subject within the mass of reality… In a photograph, composition is the result of a simultaneous coalition, the organic coordination of elements seen by the eye. Photography implies the recognition of a rhythm in the world of real things. If a photograph is to communicate its subject in all its intensity, the relationship of form must be rigorously established. The Decisive Moment is Only About Composition Note: All quotations are from Cartier-Bresson’s “The Decisive Moment” Simon and Schuster/Editions Verve, 1952. He used the term “decisive moment” in his writing, with very specific meaning, but the term was appropriated as the title in the English translation and has led to a generation that misses the point entirely. It was quite literally about taking pictures in a dynamic and moving world. The book Cartier-Bresson penned in 1952, in French, was called Images à la Sauvette (“Images on the Run”) and along with a great portfolio of his work, is a very concise review of his process of photojournalism. The 1952 first edition of The Decisive Moment by Henri Cartier-Bresson. While it might seem like a somewhat academic debate, I not only find Cartier-Bresson’s writings to be particularly instructive today but also that the misunderstanding undermines anyone trying to learn street photography. Much is written about the psychophysical experience of “decisive moments” but these inferences, while interesting and cool, are not what Cartier-Bresson was talking about and the wrong takeaway from his writing.
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