What is it about looking over someone's shoulder? Or from under someone's arm? It seems that when shooting one person facing another (or facing a group) I just like that view.

Last week when photographing people lined up at a local food bank I shot from that sort of viewpoint as numbered tickets were being handed out:

I could have stood off to the side and included the person handing out the numbers, but that person isn't as interesting as the group of clients who've been waiting to come in. And not showing that person makes for a tighter, simpler photo, which is almost always desirable. Then there's another reason that this angle appeals-- everyone is looking at the numbered ticket, so putting the camera by the ticket gets a shot of all of these folks looking with interest toward us ("us" being the viewers of the photo).

In a shot of the removal of a car from Wapato Lake I chose the under the arm viewpoint:

Here we don't see a bunch of faces, but it is likewise useful to not include all of the tow truck driver who's tossing the cable. Simplifying the shot down to the diver, twists of cable, and concentric little waves benefits the composition. Those elements come together to make the photo more intense-- the composition drives our attention toward the diver.

And now some over-the-shoulder examples from my visits to Iraq:

A U.S. soldier trains Iraqi army recruits in 125-degree heat. (2004)

An Iraqi policeman searches, and an American soldier checks the I.D. of, a possibly crazy man who backed his car wildly into a ditch. (2005)

Again, these shots benefit from eliminating nonessential elements.

I guess the main reason that I like these two compositions is that they are "layered", meaning that the main elements of the photos are distributed over several distances, some near and others far. You might say that the photos have depth.

Looking over the shoulder of someone in the foreground (while still showing part of them) puts us very close to the nearest layer. This maximizes the range of the layering (meaning the range from nearest layer to farthest).

Bear in mind that these explanations are ex post facto. As far as I can tell, I simply like this style of shooting and I'm just making up reasons after the fact.

To my eye the compositions look cool.