Noir: Oblique alley

Usually a photo looks more appealing if the lines in a photo parallel the frame of the photo. For example, in a landscape photo the horizon would world parallel the top and bottom of a frame. In an architectural, walls and columns would parallel the vertical lines photo’s frame. There are lots of exception to this rule, but generally it’s a good idea to strive for this.

Unfortunately, nature and the world doesn’t always cooperate. In this case, this shopping mall alley way was either built poorly or has settled over time. The walls on either side aren’t perfectly vertical and tilt in to varying degrees, and the ground is actually sloping to one side.

The odd thing is, this imperfection in the alley forced what looks like an oblique angle on the photo. I admit, I did add a little bit more of a tilt, but I didn’t do much.

The oblique angle, which gives a viewer a sense of uneasiness, combined with the dark alleyway with the figure at the end, combine for a nice noir image.