Most digital photos are taken at a 3:2 width to height ratio, same as on a 35mm camera. However, some cameras such as the medium format Rolleiflex and Hasselblad (used by Richard Avedon, Irving Penn, and Diane Arbus, among many others), as well as the old consumer Polaroid produced a square image. I find the square image pretty novel, but I can’t plunk down the insane amount of cash for a square format camera, so I’ve been emulating it by using a square crop on my 3:2 originals. The square format seems to have a few advantages: (1) it never needs to be rotated 90 degrees, (2) it works really well for portraits, and (3) it surprisingly captures background really well.
Below are some of my square crops from Arlington Neighborhood Day 2007. Click on the photos to leave comments if you’d like. The rest of the photos, square or not, are in my Neighborhood Day Parade photo set.
30mm, 1/160 sec, f/8, ISO 200, aperture priority mode
30mm, 1/640 sec, f/5.6, ISO 200, manual
30mm, 1/640 sec, f/5.6, ISO 200, manual
30mm, 1/500 sec, f/5.6, ISO 200, manual
30mm, 1/500 sec, f/5.6, ISO 200, manual (the top of this photo is slightly overexposed)
30mm, 1/500 sec, f/5.6, ISO 200, manual
30mm, 1/500 sec, f/5.6, ISO 200, manual
30mm, 1/500 sec, f/5.6, ISO 200, manual
30mm, 1/500 sec, f/5.6, ISO 200, manual
I didn’t have a zoom lens with me, so the crops were almost a necessity to get better aesthetics. Being able to clip away most of the overexposed sky in these square crops also helped to save/improve a number of the photos in the set. In afternoon sun, it’s easy to end up either with an overexposed sky or an underexposed subject. Some more research is in order to find out how to get it right.
