More Imagination Please...

Out of the Blue

If you haven't been to my Facebook page recently, you might wonder why I'm posting satellite images from space...

Where Two Worlds Meet

Cool images right? The roiling frozen ocean in the first one. A distant deserted valley colliding with a body of water in the image directly above. Dry and hilly terrain flanking two distinct roads in the photo below.

Paths Divided

Wow, Christine... when did you have time to fly to the space station? 

Those of you who have been on my Facebook page in the last 24 hours know exactly what you're looking at... the rest of you aren't sure but you're pretty certain that in between my last blog post and today's that I did NOT take up space travel. You can click on each image to see it enhanced. What you see is an abstract study of frost on a window and this photographer got excited about it. When was the last time my imagination soared? How about yours?

Whatever you see in those images right now is why this is so fun and so rewarding by the way. Three minutes ago you were contemplating how to start your day, or how spend your next break at work, or if you really want to fold another basket of laundry, and within the first minute of perusing the blog you suddenly had your imagination engaged... and as imagination is usually apt to do, you were transported with very little coaxing.

I've been asked before about the point of abstract art by folks who "just don't get it". To which I always answer with another question: Well, what's the point of imagination?" The answer I get ranges from 'it let's you explore life unhindered, free of stress, open to magical possibilities' to 'it's what lets the giant box the refrigerator came in turn into the invisible plane you fly as a superhero!'... 

Both answers are correct. And that's Abstract art too. For the viewer, it can be whatever you want it to be. Or you can use your imagination to gage what the artist's intent was... and you might get it right, or you might not care if you do at all... what matters is if it stopped you even for a moment and made you mull the possibilities over, got your imagination going, musing, or transported you elsewhere. And do you walk away slightly altered... ?

And for the creatives, for the artists, abstract is the chance to take what you love about compositions, and the power of shapes, lines, and colours, or the lack thereof, not to mention the medium itself, and infuse it with whatever strikes your fancy. It can romp, it can be expressive, it can be purely aesthetic, a puzzle to be solved,  or it can have important concepts needing to be conveyed. 

Or it can just be some everyday winter frost on a window pane photographed out of context. Personally I say let the 5 year old superhero out, and wreak havoc. Your art will thank you every time.

And all our 5 year old selves chant, "MORE IMAGINATION PLEASE!!!"

Closing In... Part 2 ~ Wide Angle Wednesday

"From the Earth to Your Table"

Picking up where we left off yesterday... composition matters. Walker Evans was quoted as saying, "Shoot whatever and however you want. Don't listen to anybody else, just go in the direction you've chosen. But you need to look before you see!" How are you choosing to look for subject matter? Are you limiting yourself? Or coming away with images that feel like they contain everything but the kitchen sink?

In the past when I've felt like this, and don't know what to work on fixing first, I've gone back to the Elements and Principles of Design and tried to pick one that seems to be lacking from my images overall. Then I go out on a shoot with that foremost in my mind as I look for a scene or subject that will help me define it. It sounds methodical but it gets the creative juices flowing and helps you target elements so that you naturally start to recognize them over time. And you start to think outside the box.

Today's image isn't a phenomenal work of art by any one's standards, but it helps me close in on the other elements and principles I couldn't cover yesterday without my brain exploding! That, and I like purple. But I digress. Now, there are elements from yesterday's chat in this image to be sure. Can you see them? I hope so. But along with those, I tried to get a shot today that helps give a visual clue as to the other elements to be discussed. They are form, value, and size. This image had some really definitive light considering I took it very late morning. Because the light was slightly to the side, it created shadow and highlight... and they help define a subject as being dimensional as opposed to flat. This is the importance of form, you realize there is depth to the basket and it contains a pile of turnips, nice and round, instead of looking rather 2D and uninteresting as a result. The light this morning also adds the element of value... a range of lights and darks, helping to define your composition further so colors and shapes are left looking stale. And let's not forget the use of size. When looked at closely, there's a variety of sizes that causes you to look around the rest of the image, taking in the few that are different or uneven in appearance.

Isn't it amazing that the brain registers all of this without you asking it to. And you may wonder if we really need to know any of this in the long run, but how else will we be able to recognize when a photograph lacks impact of any kind, or that we've been stuck in a rut? As for the principles shown here, besides a couple from yesterday, there is a very obvious center of interest here. A very tight shot of the turnips, a lot of turnips, leaves no doubt of what the center of interest is. (I'll give you a hint, it rhymes with lurnip...) And color aids in this as well, as they are all uniform in color which draws the eye. Also, there is the way I've used the principle of balance. I've composed do that you know the basket and pile of turnips are round, yet you needn't see all of it in order to come to that conclusion and my asymmetrical composition adds interest instead of centering the entire thing in my lens. Whew... dissecting a shot is harder than it looks! My head hurts.

So there we are. The building blocks that naturally occur within great compositions, and now that we know what to be on the lookout for, great compositions will be a little easier to produce. Thanks so much to all the folks who already know this stuff and are just tuning in to see the shot for the day. And thanks to the few of you i heard from that have enjoyed learning more about how design influences composition. At least how it does subconsciously somewhere in my own noggin as I frame up a shot. Scary huh.

Thanks for the lengthy ramble gang! Have a good one!

Closing In On Design ~ Telephoto Tuesday!

"The Single Rental"

(1/320 sec.@ F/13, ISO 400, 200mm fl, Exp.Compensation -0.7, late day sun)

Whew. Where to start today? 'Cause I've been challenged to take on a big topic! Composition. Now, I wasn't exactly double-dog dared or anything quite that serious, but when I say I'll do something, I like to follow through on it. So here we are, on my 100th post no less attempting to share my thought process when I'm considering composition. This might be one wild ride. Here we go.

Because of my art background, Elements and Principles of good design have been lodged in my brain from an early age. And you should become familiar with them at some point, you'll see your images improve. I tend to lean towards looking for good line, shape, texture, and color automatically as I look around me for subject matter or interesting scenes. These are the elements that people are most familiar with whether they know it or not. The other elements (to be broached tomorrow) are size, value, and form. The image today has the first four elements prominently used here. Repetitive shape immediately gets your attention, then you'll notice lots of lines taking your eyes up, down, and across respectively. Those lines on the roof allude to smooth cool textural details, and we also see texture in the wire over each dove cote, not to mention the single cote with the texture of the only nest inside in the bottom right corner. Wow, those elements are really hard at work already... and this is why. Combined, they contribute to principles of design needed to make your composition work on a new level.

You mean to say there's Principles of Design too? I warned you this could get wild, *wink*. Look again at today's image. When you really look hard do you also see balance, contrast, harmony, and rhythm? If so, that means that the combination of lines, shapes, colors and textures have worked together to utilize principles of design. Didn't see that one coming did you? You did? I knew you would.

The pattern created by the rows of dove cotes, each one the same color yellow against the slate blue/grey, gives the composition a sense of harmony and rhythm. Not to mention balance since I chose to emphasize the symmetry of the roof top, every dove cote evenly spaced. The image pops with contrast because of the shapes dotted out across the composition, and the black of the mesh fronts against the yellow. The yellow also contrasts enough against the blue roof. And the textures also contrast nicely, the roof looking smooth and cool, and the cotes textures looking more rough and warmer in hue. Tomorrow we'll try to include the other two primary principles - center of interest, and movement.

Still with me? Gosh I hope so. All of that was to say this; most of these things your eye can pick out every time you assess a scene in front of you. Why, because these are things the human brain desires and uses so it can make sense of whatever you look at. When I looked up at the roof of Dundurn Castle's tower, my brain registered that this was the prominent feature for very practical reasons... and the artistic side of my brain took over, assessing if it was aesthetically pleasing to look at over and over. Certain things began to assert themselves and I was careful to compose around them in the best way I could. Of course, you don't have to concretely think these things every time you raise your camera... after a while, from shooting and composing long enough, this all becomes second nature. The more you look around you, the better you'll see engaging compositions no matter what the subject matter or where you are.

I recommend always taking time to look through your picture files. Single out the images that stand out as being stellar compositions or just seem to have a wow factor. Compare what elements worked together well. Decide which principles had to be used to make the composition come together too or best portrayed your personal vision for that photograph. It's your personal vision that brings it all together and makes it meaningful by the way. In the end, perfect composition can only do so much. There needs to be some soul poured into each image too... perhaps more important than all the rest.

Hey, we did it! Day one on composition is done, with day two to come! Thanks for the very specific ramble gang! Hope I didn't let ya down! Have an awesome day folks... now get out there and think about seeing great compositions wherever you are.

Not So Random Trees ~ Mono Monday!

"Poplar, Pine, and Karst"

Someone asked me the other day why composition seems to come so naturally to me, while they struggle with it daily no matter what they aim their camera at. It took me a while to sort out an answer, and I still don't know if it's even a remotely intelligent one but I gave it my best shot.

"Firstly," I said, "we need to clear something up. Composition doesn't 'come" to anybody, naturally or otherwise. You have to be on the lookout for it. I call composing in the lens 'containing the chaos'. Creating order in the lens from subject matter that initially captivated some part of you, the photographer. Secondly, being careful about how we word the concept of composition is key here. Two things have to happen if you want to size up things compositionally. You have to understand elements of design, and be able to see the prominent elements in whatever scene you're viewing... but you also have to be able to decide if they help accomplish whatever purpose you had in taking that photo, whether it was to provide a story, emotional responses or simple information. And to be so aware of what makes up a great composition, that eventually the process from seeing to photographing becomes as easy as breathing. Some of us need more time getting to that point than others that's all."

What ensued was a pretty lengthy chat on really looking around you and seeing things beyond their immediate context to create artistic images, and so on and so forth. And that's a story for another blog post. But what they did suggest was perhaps I could review here on the blog the building blocks of composition and design and include images that would help define them for the artistically challenged, or those that just want to understand why they love certain things looking a certain way in their photos. And I thought, why not? Even if I'm the only person that benefits from it, (and I know I could)

this could be a good challenge.

As for today's image, I love the challenge of photographing the nature trails in the area. Finding a solid composition within the forest layers. Those aren't just random trees I decided I liked framed. The forest floor climbs and weaves into the scene in the foreground, the trees are fairly uniform in shape and size and have light patterning across them, and they seem to surround the one piece of karst giving it proper emphasis. It has interesting tones throughout, some nice contrasting shadows, and feels very solitary. And I knew this type of composition would translate into B&W well.

So, coming up next... examples of design and composition, and my favorite ways to use them in a photo. It won't be anything mind blowing, won't win me a Pulitzer by any means... but you get to step into my brain. If you dare.

Thanks for the ramble, and have a good one.

The Power of Shape ~ Wide Angle Wednesday!

"Stratosphere"

Reading primarily about the building blocks of a composition right now. More specifically, how the combination of light and shape determine how an image feels. And perhaps even more importantly, how to stop giving labels to the subjects around us and instead photograph them as abstract forms.

The great Freeman Patterson likens it to going back to having the mind of a child. In other words, dust off those imaginations!!! You have to stop seeing a thing as it's label, and begin to look through the lens as an explorer.

In design, primary shapes are powerful, and represent structure, rules, and indestructibility and order. Primary shapes get your attention! These would be any subject that resembles a circle, square, or triangle. They really get your attention when one shape is the theme throughout. Look at the image I posted for you today. When you look at it, do you only see a hydro tower? Or are you seeing the myriad of triangles? In fact, the entire composition of smaller triangles when looked at as a whole, is one giant triangle or pyramid... do you see it?

Having difficulty finding things to aim your camera at? Turn off your analytical brain and start seeing things in a different context. The context of shape.

Thanks for the ramble today... I dare you to head out later with the camera and find some cool shapes to explore!