Four lines, nine squares: the rule of thirds in a snapshot.

Welcome to my latest blog, which today is going to look at one of the most basic aspects of photographic composition, the rule of thirds.

Do your photos feel... boring? Most people put their subject right in the middle, which makes for a predictable shot. To prevent this happening you need to learn about and apply the rule of thirds to every shot you take. It's a simple trick that pros use to create dynamic, engaging photos.

In my last blog I talked about cropping as a way of improving the composition, the point of focus, and story. That was all in post, but now I am going to show you how to use the four lines, nine squares grid feature to transform your everyday snapshots in camera.

First, you have to find and turn on the grid (Camera > Settings > Grid). Next, instead of centering your subject, place the most important elements (like a person's eyes, a tall tree, or a far-off horizon) along these lines or at the four intersection points. It is best when shooting landscapes to place the horizon line on the lower third or upper third, not dead centre. For portraits, holding your phone in portrait mode, align the person's face or body along the left or right vertical line.

Why does this work visually? It works because in photography you want to draw the viewer's eye into the image, whilst at the same time causing them to explore every element before coming to rest on the subject. Placing your subject off-centre forces the viewer’s eye to move across the whole image, making the photo feel more balanced and interesting. It also helps make your photos feel more natural and cinematic.

Case study: this is one of the photos I took before I knew anything about photography, and certainly anything about photographic composition. I was trying to capture the lovely, delicately coloured flower sitting in amongst the various colours of the lily pads. It's not one of my best photos because as you can see I placed the flower in the middle, which could work sometimes, but not here because surrounding it are a lot of distracting elements.

After testing various compositional options, I opted for placing the centre of the flower at the intersection of the top right horizontal and vertical lines. I also cropped quite tightly to eliminate some of the distractions, but left a few of them in for context.

I couldn't then resist a few more editing tweaks to bring out the colours in the flower and the leaves. You can see the edits I performed on the right below.

I hope you agree that the final image is more dynamic and colourful, and that the subject is now front, without being centre!

Here's my challenge: go out and take five photos today using nothing but the rule of thirds as your compositional tool. See the difference!

All of my edits were done using the free Snapseed app on my Google Pixel tablet, but could have equally been carried out on my Google Pixel 8 Pro phone. It took me no more than 5 minutes to transform the initial photo.

Thank you for visiting my blog. If you've enjoyed it, please drop a comment below. You can also follow me on Instagram and Threads at @smart_phone_photographer_53, and on my Facebook page 'Words and Frames'.

Until next time!

© Mike Young 2025.