Mind the Gap...

   I decided to give myself a challenge the other day.  I would go out and photograph only the top of my patio table which was speckled with little yellow honey locust leaves and still wet from the four days of rain we had.

   This is my favorite composition of the lot and it really was all about composition.  Me being "artsy".  As soon as I looked at it I had to laugh.  Placing an "empty" space right in the middle would have made my drawing teacher back in the day crazy!  But I love it and I think it is because the red brick showing through doesn't seem like empty space to me at all, just a rich red line.

   I like the simplicity and abstract quality to the composition as well as the color.  I have to admit, it was really fun to just think in compositional terms for a bit and not deeper meaning and metaphor.  But it did remind me of the warnings I've seen in London subway stations...to "Mind the Gap".

   Actually, this is an excellent exercise for anyone who wants to explore design.  Pick an impossibly small place and see what sorts of compositions you can come up with.  Make a lot of photographs...horizontals and verticals.  Get in close and go for the pure abstract expression if you want.  Above all else, just have fun with the exercise and don't give a second thought to the gap.

A Contemplative Look at the Principles of Design - Emphasis

 Special attention is given to one part of a photograph.Emphasis can be achieved through placement, contrast, color, size, etc. Emphasis creates a focal point.

   Every day I look out the back door to see what is happening in the crab apple tree.  This particular morning the light etched the icy twigs beautifully.  I waited for quite some time for one of my little chickadees to land on the branches to create a focal point.  The right light, the right placement of bird on branch, it all contributed to a lovely composition in my mind...simple and elegant.

   The lines of the branches intersect at the tiny bird drawing your eye in. The bird is also located within the "magic box" and near one of the four corners which define the "law of thirds"...a compositional strategy I learned in art school.  This is always a good location for your focal point.   I've practiced this for so long that I really don't think too much about it when I'm photographing.

    Using any of the design principles I've spoken about in this series can enhance the artistic effect of your photograph but, like most photographic "rules", should not get in the way of your pure enjoyment of what is in front of you.  Perception first, appreciation second and composition third and in that order.  Practice the principles of design by all means but don't fixate on them.  It was the light on the ice that drew my attention...the rest is just me being "artsy".  Not all that important in the long run for my form of contemplative photography.

  

A Contemplative Look at the Principles of Design - Harmony/Unity

The arrangement of elements to give the viewer the feeling that all the parts of the photograph

 form a coherent whole.

   Of all the principles of design, this one is the most difficult to illustrate, to understand in fact.  As I use to tell my art students, "Unity means that you cannot take away any part without damaging the whole."

   Like all the design principles, applying them to photography is a challenge because, unless you stage the photograph, what is before you is what you can photograph.  Framing becomes critical and cropping can emphasize various elements.

   In this photograph, made on South Uist, each element (the two flowering plants, fence post, the barn, the mountain and the sky) all flow together...each a crucial element.  If you take your finger and block out one, the whole photograph falls out of harmony.  Each is necessary.  The flowers anchor the foreground, the fence post creates a bridge through the middle ground to the horizon, and the focal point, the barn buildings, give your eye somewhere to travel to.  It is an inward and upward path.  The mountains delineate the horizon line and lift your eye into the sky.

   I  made several studies of this scene before I felt I had re-created the experience of being at that particular place in that moment of time.  The only cropping I did was to take a tiny bit off the sky so that horizon line didn't bisect the composition...something I never like particularly.

   With your first response to the landscape, you may not be too aware of the individual elements and their relationship to the whole.  Take your time and do several studies.  One will stand out for you...one will contain the harmonious unity you seek. Again, it is with a conscious awareness that some level of mastery occurs.  It is the difference between the thoughtful conceived image and a "snap shot". 

A Contemplative Look at the Principles of Design - Rhythm and Movement

The use of recurring elements to direct the movement of the eye through the photograph.  There are five kinds of rhythm: random, regular, alternating, progressive and flowing.

   These five mourning doves were sheltering in a recent snowstorm.  Puffed up to withstand the cold, they waited patiently for their turn at the feeder.  Doves are shy birds that are easily startled into flight, unlike my chickadees who seem to tolerate my presence.

   Sitting quietly and evenly spaced, they are regular notes along the branch.  Your eye will follow repeating shapes very naturally and the elongated format simply adds to the movement. I've begun to love long, lean formats...the Chinese scroll on its side!  Their peachy brown feathers a warm counter-point to the blue grey surroundings.  The eye will always go to warm colors first.  The light waves from warm colors reach our eyes first which is why stop signs are red!

    Another classic way to direct the eye is with the "S curve".  Again, your eye seems to want to follow an implied line in the landscape.

   This photograph, made in the Western Isles of Scotland, uses the regular rhythm of the fence posts and the subtle curving, linear road to lead your eye into the photograph.

   Soft, undulating curves are restful and sharp, zig-zag lines create a sensation of energy and quick movement.  All are artistic devices that will lift a photograph out of its stasis and energize the experience for the viewer.

   You will become more aware of rhythm and movement if you take the time to study it; not only in your own work but in the work of masters of our craft.  Slowly, over time, it will become instinctual and you will apply it to your work with nary a thought.

   

A Contemplative Look at the Principles of Design - Balance

A feeling of balance results

when the visual elements are

arranged symmetrically or

asymmetrically to create the

impression of equality in

weight or importance.

  I prefer asymmetry.  It comes, partly, from my love of Chinese landscape painting.  When things are symmetrical, I am overcome with a feeling of static and somewhat boring certainty.  Like the image above...it is most unpleasing to my eye.  A horizon line right in the middle gives nothing importance...it makes no "statement" about what you are seeing and how you are seeing it.

   Now if I were to crop the image into an asymmetrical composition, I immediately like it far better.  There is a tension and a visual movement that is lacking above.  You can begin to see that even though the horizon line is still relatively centralize your eye moves between the large bail and small bales...into the picture.

   The large bale is balanced by the many little bales as well as the large open area to the left of it.  As in Chinese painting, "empty" space is very important, giving the eye a place to rest.  Interestingly, when I tried this with the left side of the photograph it didn't work.  The hay wagon and small bales were all on the same plane and didn't create the visual recession I like.

   Experiment with balance when you are photographing.  Try both vertical as well as horizontal compositions...symmetrical and asymmetrical balance.  See what each has to say to you.  Do you like to keep your focal point centralized or off to one side?  Do you think much about it at all?

   You might like to look at a post I did on "Framing Your World" as this also touches on the idea of creating different types of balance in your photographs.  Each will give a different interpretation to the landscape.

   Photographers are dependent on what they find in the landscape but you are in control of how you frame it...that will make all the difference in the world to the outcome of both the photograph and the reflection.

A Contemplative Look at the Principles of Design - Pattern

A regular arrangement of alternated or repeated 

visual elements

(shapes, lines, colors) or motifs.

  A primary characteristic of human thought is the recognition of and search for pattern.  I make the search for pattern part of my love of "simplicities" or photographic abstraction.  You can find examples nearly everywhere you look.  This still life is in my bathroom.

   Patterns can say a lot to the contemplative photographer. As I've said before, repetition is revelation.  We feel comfortable with pattern because it is knowable and predictable.  But life is seldom that.  Perhaps that is why we seek it out.

   I particularly like to find examples of pattern that offer a counterpoint as well.  Like this photograph of the crumpled and imprecise facecloths in the uniform and repeating containers. People seem like that to me.  We seek the comfort of uniformity while squirming within its confines to express our individual uniqueness.  It is a love/hate relationship.

   Now, I've looked at this still life everyday for years and thought nothing much of it.  But when I went in search of pattern in my home for this post, it fairly leaped off the wall for me.  I use to tell my students that they can never really learn something until they perceive some need to do so.  It is like that with contemplative photography too.  We won't see the metaphors until we feel a need for them.  Imagine all the wonderful messages all around you right now just waiting for your contemplative eye to both acknowledge your need for them and then to seek them out!

A Contemplative Look at the Principles of Design - Contrast

Fire and Ice

The juxtaposition of different visual elements in order to highlight their differences.

 In a previous series I looked at the contemplative possibilities of the visual elements.  Today I will begin a series that will show how the principles of design can be viewed from a contemplative perspective rather than an artistic one.  There are plenty of design books that will innumerate the artistic application of these principles.  Here I want to see how they might apply to contemplative thought.

    If the visual elements can be considered the building blocks of art, then the design principles are the instructions on how one can variously arrange those blocks.  It is a deliberate attempt to order your image for effect.  A painter has full control of this process...a photographer must rely to some extent on what presents itself to them.  Camera angle and viewpoint will then accentuate the idea.

   The first principle I will discuss is contrast.  In photography, we often speak of contrast in terms of light and shadow but I want to approach it from a contextual viewpoint.  It is a crucial one for this contemplative photographer who is inspired by Taoist ideas.  The yin/yang paradigm is central to Taoist thought.  All things exist in pairs and in this photograph, one such pair is illustrated.

   It is not just an exercise to find these pairings in the landscape.  What the concept of contrast does for the contemplative photographer is to stimulate a dialogue.  By placing these two concepts side by side, each becomes amplified.  This will then lead to new ideas that might reconcile the opposition in some way.

   I think the primary benefit, contemplatively speaking, in photographing examples of contrast is that it enables me to muse on both their individual meanings and the third meaning...how, taken together, they offer a different message.  In my Photo Lectio with this image,  I saw fire as passion and ice as detachment...there is a time for both and an excess of either can be unhealthy...like heatwaves and ice storms!  I also mused that taken together, passion will eventually melt away detachment and that can be good thing if it draws people into an important cause or idea.

   Looking for ways to use the principle of contrast in your photographs is a good exercise in discrimination.  It trains the eye to look for ways the landscape offers us points and counterpoints.  Contrast, as the Taoist principle eludes to, is not a bad thing...it is the nature of the world because in it it creates the balance we all strive for and Nature always seeks balance.