Is composition still king in the internet era? I’m sorry to say, but the average viewer probably cares more about the final edit than photographic composition

As a serious photographer, I will always stand by the age-old phrase "composition is king.” In my view, there will never come a time when anything other than the way a photo is crafted will stand as most important.

But when I put myself in the shoes of the average person who looks at photographs online, and I consider how the vast majority of images they see are taken by a layman with a smartphone, I wonder if the scroll-stopping factor of pictures these days is how they’ve been edited rather than how well they’re composed.

For me, digital technology not only revolutionized how we create photos, but also how we view them, and, subsequently, I think this has changed what the mark of a good photo is for the general public.

Previously, the average person would mostly be exposed to high-quality, well-composed images printed in magazines and newspapers, or hanging from gallery walls. Now, we have access to a bottomless sea of digital photos that demonstrate little to no understanding of compositional techniques.

So, if it’s not a well-defined subject, or a leading line, or the use of negative space, for example, that grabs the attention, what is it? In my view, it mostly comes down to how aesthetically pleasing the color palette is and how much the image ‘pops’ with contrast and saturation.

Of course, there are other factors, especially for images posted on social media, where the subject itself is often what keeps people lingering. But strong colors and contrast alone can evoke all kinds of emotional reactions in viewers.

I’d even go as far as saying that some contemporary professional photographers are guilty of prioritizing editing over composition, which further engrains what I think is a general view that the glitz and the glam added in Lightroom is more important than the scene itself.

I'm seeing a lot of images that show little in terms of photographic principles, but which show extremely well-honed editing skills. I don't think that is something we saw in the days of film photography.

Not that I was around to witness this, but with the post-processing firepower that we now have access to, of course, even some professionals would be distracted by this instead of mastering getting it right in camera.

For those who know what makes a good image, photographic composition will always be most important. And in the past, it probably was something similar for the average viewer, too.

Before the days of social media and mass access to photography, I can imagine more people in general being able to look at an image and pick up on the use of lighting or some compositional technique as being the reason why that photo ‘worked’.

But now we are so swamped with poorly-composed photographs that people are naturally drawn to the edit, and, I’m sorry to say, but, I feel like the careful thought I put into meticulously crafting a scene probably goes unnoticed the majority of the time.

I’m certainly not saying composition is no longer king. How a photo is crafted matters. But if you haven’t already, I think it’s time to accept that the edit can have a much greater impact than you want to admit.

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