Photography tips: Watch your lines when snapping people

If you're the type of person not interested in photography in the same serious way as professionals, but are prone to going slightly OTT when it comes to snapping every moment, do take some time to consider your shot.

After all, you're taking these images for a reason, something to look back on in memory books in the distant future, laughing or grimacing at what you once got up to or found interesting. Thus, a little effort is worth it for a lifetime of memories.

Today we focus on lines.

Often we snap the subject and ignore the surroundings. Now, while to the untrained eye the image may appear routine, fine even, the "noise" of the background can ruin or spoil the ambience of an image.

Fair enough most people centre on the subject and ignore everything else, but subconsciously your visual senses are not as satisfied as they would like to be.

For example you might take a picture of someone outside of a building, focusing on the person and nothing else. When you look back at it, you notice that because you were holding it at a slight tilt, the building, its brickwork details, the window pane and so on, are to some extent off kilter.

It's not as good as it should be and a few millimetres to the left or right would have, to all intents, allowed for a perfectly composed shot.