Triptych Photography Examples and Ideas

What is a triptych? It’s a type of three-fold art that is typically hinged together as carved panels side by side. The artistic works compliment each other with similar subjects or a relatable message. Many early triptychs started showing up in religious gathering places as altarpieces and could be folded up and easily transported.

Photographers have also grown to appreciate the triptych style, using it to arrange three of their images within one frame with clear borders between them, or by using a separate frame for each photo and mounting them on the wall next to each other. Triptych photography might involve taking one picture and splitting it into three different parts or shooting three separate photos that are related.

Triptych Photography

Here are 15 great examples and ideas of triptychs along with some links to some helpful resources for your efforts at creating beautiful and unique works of art with your photography.

Single image triptychs work well when a beautiful photo is cropped and spaced properly. It also looks good when you separate the image into three different frames and hang them on the wall proportionally.

JR Wheatley – Manhattan Skyline from Brooklyn Bridge Park – Triptych

A perfect subject for a series of three are portraits. Whether you use different portraits with a variety expressions or focus on one image and create an interesting composition.

Andrew Bartram – Who Sees – Fenland 2015

Creating a before, during, after sequence of photos will help your triptych tell a better story.

Garry Smith – Lily Triptych

Michael – Deion Lavender Dunk

Have a hobby or activity that you really love to do? Photograph topics that highlight the main aspects about your interest.

Pranavian – League of Champions

Ashleigh Jarvis – Books Grid

Ryan – American cars

Nature, weather, and seasons provide great content to work with. A couple of ideas; shoot a tree in the summer, winter, and fall, a storm rolling into the area, or a field of flowers from three different perspectives.

ceratosaurrr. – saving up my courage for a rainy day.

Emily Carlin – Sunny Triptych

John – Strolling Leaves

You can also also mix up the design of your layout. Every picture doesn’t need to be the same size or lined up horizontally.

Ted – power house locks

Erik Beck – Triptych

Bala Sivakumar – Road-Trip-tych

Our 2017 photography challenge, which provides 52 subjects for you to photograph, includes making a triptych. Have fun trying something new or pushing yourself to do better in your pursuit of becoming a better photographer.

Bala Sivakumar

Môsieur J. [version 9.1] – charabia

Resources

Nick Carver Photography – Fun With Triptych Photography
A a simple but interesting article from photographer Nick Carver and how he created a triptych with photos of clouds and trees.

Abstracted Reality – The Art of Creating a Triptych
This blog post focuses on the design of a triptych, rather than the technical process. It’s perfect for refining your image compositions, the variety of layouts, and digging deep into your creative side so that your 3 photos are presented in the best way possible.

Canon Blogger – Triptych Photography 101
A basic 101 article that helps explain the sequence and definition of triptych photography.

DPS – Creating a Triptych in Lightroom
Adobe Lightroom is one of the most used post-processing programs out there, so it only makes sense to link to a tutorial on how to create a triptych with it.