Rhythmn and Pattern

For this exercise, at least two photographs were required, one showing rhythmn, the other pattern. I chose three photographs: one demonstrating rhythmn, one pattern, and one both.

The important contrast is that rhythmn photographs suggest dynamism, leading the eye through the image, whereas pattern images are static.

I chose an image taken at the Champions League Final in May to demonstrate rhythmn:

The colours in the crowd appear from  coloured card left on people's seats - these are raised over their heads to spell out a message and, also in this case, alternate between the red and blue of Barcelona's colours.

The rhythmn effect derives from the eye being lead to the right by the three banners on the pitch, the half written "football" leading off frame, and the curvature of the stadium.

A school exam room provided an ideal location for a photograph demonstrating pattern. This is most definitely static. The notes made clear that patterns should extend beyond the frame with no boundaries thus enabling the eye to see beyond them - this effect is enhanced in this image by the perspective induced from the camera's position.

This image  taken at the Champions League Final demonstrates both pattern and rhythmn. The pitch lines created by the mower clearly are a pattern and extend way beyond the shot, whereas the umbrellas seem to be more of a rhythmn - there is no definite pattern, that came later in the first shot above when the girls arranged themselves on the pitch, but the eye roves along the row looking for more order than exists.

I partially desaturated this shot by extracting the green channel in order to emphasise the umbrellas; the pattern on the pitch was strong enough not to risk losing some of the rhythmn effect by having a dominating colour.

This was a very useful exercise making me think about how to photograph pattern and how to view rhythmn in one's images - what do I imagine my viewer is going to see and in what order? Stressed to me the importance of having empathy with the viewer. 

Real and implied triangles

This exercise follows on from the notes where the subject of shapes in general, and triangles in particular, are presented as one method of organising the image and providing structure.

The notes (and exercise) distinguish between real and implied triangles: real triangles have clearly definable edges; implied triangles where the eye detects the shape as result of three well-defined points creating implied lines.

The first task is to find a triangular shape:

This is the rear badge on my wife's Mitsubishi Colt. The reflection of the sky in the badge adds some interest and increases the contrast from the background. Of course it could be argued that this is an implied rather than real triangle as the edges are not truly joined (and there are several implied triangles within the shape) but I think the basic structure is clear enough.

The next task was to create a triangle by perspective converging to the top of the frame. I decided to add the opportunity to experiment with a technique that I had not done before: using slow shutter speeds to make lines from head and tail lights of vehicles. I set up a tripod on a bridge over the A4174 ring road east of Bristol and got the above image.This image was taken at 4.0 second shutter speed, obtaining a good run of lighting and also meant that f8.0 aperture could be used, allowing a reasonable depth of field.

The triangular prespective is achieved by the road lighting but the head and tail lights emphasise the shape and add interest.

An inverted triangle by perspective was more difficult to locate. I found two examples that have used here. The first is an uninteresting image of a canopy, the second is a leaf from interior plant, the veins providing clear lines leading downwards.


The second part of the exercise was to demonstrate implied triangles using still life, ideally five or six objects.

With some encouragement, I managed to get six satsumas to stack into a classic 3-2-1 format to demonstrate a triangle whose apex is at the top of the image. I used blue crepe paper as background as orange and blue are classically viewed as harmonious colours (see p94 The Photographer's Mind by Michael Freeman). There was sufficient natural light but the addition of flash from an off camera Speedlite 430 to the right balanced the lighting and reduced shadow.

An inverted triangle was created by setting up three apples (stability with six apples was impossible to achieve) and placing on green crepe paper (again the harmonious colours). Some carefully placed Blu tack helped to stabilise the base and the top apples were anchored by using needles. Off camera flash was used as for the image above.

The inverted triangle looks unstable; our natural instinct is that a top heavy structure is unbalanced. I find the image difficult to look at for long because of this.

The image below was taken of three people so as to show their faces in a triangle: 

It is a scalene triangle on account of the relative heights but demonstrates the point.

One can look back at other images taken for different reasons to see real and implied triangles. Here are some examples from the first part of the course: 

 

And some more recent examples taken from this part of the course:

Implied lines

The object of this exercise was to locate and point out implied lines within photographs.

The first task was to locate implied lines in two photographs in the course notes:

There is a dominant line from the bullfighter to the bull - we know he must be looking at the animal to judge its next move; and a secondary line (also shown above) of his cape leading from right to left following the one in his left hand.

The implied line is from the horse to the man on the right.

Next, the exercise required the same analysis to be applied to three images.

I chose firstly an image taken in the Carpathian mountains of a local smallholder tending a fire. Here the implied line is the man trying to see what he is doing through the smoke.

I selected next an image taken not long after the first; here I wanted the road leading down from the house to lead the viewer towards the two walkers in the bottom right - what is called a reveal.

The FA Cup Final between Man City and Stoke provides a third image. The players are looking to the centre left where we must assume a player has the ball.


Lastly in this exercise I took two photographs at the Champions League Final using two kinds of implied lines.

There is a very obvious implied line of sight from the eyes of the Barcelona supporter as he balances a football and a Coke tin on his head.

The implied lines are more subtle in this image but there is an extended implied line as the dancers on the goal line face those performing in the centre circle, an effect emphasised by having the umbrellas behind their backs.

As a result of this exercise I understand the concept of implied lines better, and feel more confident in using the concept when considering composition of images in future.

Curves

The last exercise in this sub-section is to take four images to demonstrate movement and direction.

The first image is of an athletics stadium in Brasov, Romania. The curves are concentrated in the near end but both the curved seating and the curved track do provide a sense of movement - the eye tends to go right to left following the track round in an anti-clockwise direction. The mere fact of it being an athletics track adds a connotative element: we associate an athletics track with movement.

This image is of the exit route for the Cabot Circus Shopping Centre in Bristol. The curves in the outside wall are subtle as we are looking head on but evident enough, and emphasised by the shadows on the lower two levels and the slight downhill. Again there is a connotative element: the cars add to the association with movement.

Taken just round the corner from the second image, this shot is taken of the bridge leading from the car park into Cabot Circus. We get a curved effect both from the side rail and the roof and there is a pronounced sense of movement and direction, enhanced by the foreground figure walking in that direction.

This is a sculpture by Hereford School of Art for the Hay Festival.The sense of movement is achieved by taking the curve at an angle - the same structure photographed head-on was more static. Movement and direction are created by the eye moving from the bigger parts of the sculpture to the smaller.

From this exercise I realised that curves do enhance a sense of movement and direction and have demonstrated this in a range of subjects, also pointing out that the sense of movement and direction may manifest themselves differently.

Diagonals

This exercise was to find some strong diagonals in images.

Diagonals can arise naturally or because of the perspective of the camera shot. I took one image that is a completely natural diagonal:

 

The image was taken in a silver birch forest in the Carpathian mountains.

There are two pronounced diagonals caused by the falling trees among the vertical growing trees and the knowledge that this is a completely natural occurrence in virgin forest does I think make for a powerful impact - nature in action.

In away this second image is an extension of the first image, still dead wood but this time being stored for use in the yard of a rural Carpathian household. The length, amount and size of the logs accentuates the diagonal.

Diagonals of the third and fourth images are created purely by perspective:

This the back of the BRASOV sign on Mount Tampa that dominates the town below Hollywood style. Taking the image from the side at the back creates the strong right left diagonal and the strength of the image is completed by including the town below.

Closer to home this is the A4174. Here the diagonals are again created by perspective and the sense of movement increased by using a slow 1/4 second shutter speed.

From this exercise I learnt that  diagonals manifest themselves frequently in photography and can be natural or created by perspective.

Horizontal and Vertical lines

The exercise is to locate and photograph specific examples of horizontal and vertical lines.


The images are set out below with appropriate captions, four horizontal ones first:

A trail path sign in the Carpathian mountains. It demonstrates horizontal lines painted over some natural vertical lines in the bark of the tree. The creation is deliberate to help walkers find their way. This is an alternative to the subject suggestions in the notes

A pile of logs in rural Romania as a row of objects at the same distance from the camera. The rounded piece had no obvious function but served to break up the obvious lines. 

A man-made object - the horizontal appearance is due to the nature of the towel rail. The light helps to add some depth to the image. This image incorporates another horizontal effect in the tiles.

In a way the most interesting image, this is the effect of raking a golf bunker. The lined effect is emphasised by the shadows created by the ridges. This is not one of the suggestions in the notes and of course could equally be used to demonstrate vertical lines.

Trees are probably the most obvious subject for vertical lines - this is a silver birch forest in Carpathian mountains. I chose an image that looked downhill to add interest while retaining the strong vertical emphasis.

Roads are another example included in the notes - interestingly this image could be used to demonstrate diagonals due to the perspective effect - there is strong sense of movement notwithstanding the absence of vehicles.

This is different subject from that suggested in the notes. A single vertical line dominates the photograph - the clouds provide a base for the image.

A more classic vertical subject this image combines the man-made posts and lines of the building structure with more natural verticals from the trees

In this exercise I located several examples of horizontal and vertical lines, both natural and man-made.

Multiple points

The object of this exercise was to arrange objects in a still life that is "active rather than obvious" (though not sure that these are actually the opposite of one another - one can be obviously active....).

Using the guidelines in the notes, I set up a home gaming still life, using a bridge scoring card and some playing cards to add some limited framing, then added dice and playing pieces to the scene.

This is how it played out after some rearranging:

By the end, we have a couple of groups - the similarity of the dice tends to make the eye naturally group them together and the curve the dice form almost seems to exclude the green and white playing pieces and the black draught (which in themselves then form a natural triangle) making a trapezium shape with the black playing piece and the counters.

The relationship between points

The direction of the line tends to move from the "stronger" point to the "weaker" and towards the one closest to an edge of the frame.

This relationship between two points in a frame, thus the strength of the line connecting them together, becomes weaker when the background increases in complexity.

I took two images from a golf course. The first is a of a putter. The quality of the image is not great but it demonstrates the power of the relationship as the eye naturally looks from the golfer's feet to the hole.

See first the image as taken:

The feet are lighter and bigger so is naturally the stronger point. The eye naturally moves from left to right anyway and will also naturally want to see where the ball is heading.

I have added the arrow below to demonstrate this:

A more subtle case is the golf holes:

 The flag catches the eye making it the stronger point but less obvious than the first example.

Lastly I used an image taken from the garden.

This time I left some colour in  deliberately to see if the effect of the colour of the flower in an otherwise desaturated image would balance the greater size of the piece of wood, and I would say it does. There is a clear implied line between the two made more pronounced by the almost finger like positioning of the jagged edge of the wood. The wood is the stronger point by virtue of size and the jagged edge but not by much.


As an example of where both points attract equal attention is below:

I think the eye is attracted equally to the swings and tends to flick from one to the other.

Lastly, a shot of just two eyes was taken. 

As the course notes suggests, the eye has a problem resolving the composition, quite distracting.