Piers are often used subjects in photography. There are many aspects of their setting that automatically make photos better. Obviously, piers extend over bodies of water or hills that descend quickly underneath their foundation. This solves one problem in most photos – a busy background. Eliminating distractions in your frame is difficult in most settings. There are always things on the ground. Or they are in the back of the frame, and in front of your subjects. This can be distracting.
Pier portraits are easy to setup. On a pier, usually background elements are very far in the distance compared to your subjects. The sides have almost nothing in the frame as the ground is also very far below your subjects. Even without using an open aperture, these parts of the photos will fall into a pleasing blurred background due to compression. They are too far from the lens to be rendered sharply much like using a wide open aperture.
Another aspect of pier portraits is that the pylons on the sides automatically give you leading lines. Having these directional cues in your photos help draw viewer’s eyes to your subjects. Subjects will automatically be in the right position since they always walk between the pylons! Yes, this technique can be cliche for some, but it is very easy to execute. Similar techniques can be done on railroad tracks, but the distracting background elements can be harder to deal with depending on your particular setting. Let me know how it works for you!
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