Lay of the Landscapes

I took my camera out with me a lot this week as I drove to and from work. I took several different routes between Shelburne and Vergennes in order to get a wider variety of landscapes from which to sample. I couldn't capture great shots of the mountains along any of these paths due to rain and hazy weather conditions, so I stuck to landscapes closer to ground. I stopped at golf courses, dams, farms, fishing areas, railroads, and more. Every time I pulled over to take pictures I had a framing in mind, but I walked around to view the landscape from other perspectives. I often kept the camera up for this and looked at the scene through the viewfinder. Sometimes what I found surprised me because what I thought I would like didn't always turn out to be the best shot once I analyzed the lay of the land.

I found that many of the shots I was particularly fond of involved adding some sort of framing in the foreground to add depth to the picture, so I tried to find more shots where I could incorporate this aspect. Even so, sometimes that didn't work, and for every shot that I liked there must have been 5-10 that I didn't. As such, there are a lot of shots that I didn't end up using, but these are some of my favorites.

Mergers

I learned about mergers and near mergers and how they can be distracting or unsettling in photographs.  A merger is when two objects overlap in such a way as to look like they have merged. Common examples of this are when it looks like foliage is growing out of someone’s head or when two people (or animals, as shown below) overlap and it looks like the person in the front has additional limbs. Near mergers are when an object nearly intersects with your subject in such a way as to be distracting. These problems can often be solved by changing the camera's perspective on the scene before taking the picture--in more extreme cases a complete background change may be prefereble.

Another kind of merger is when objects merge with the frame of the picture. Examples of this include cropping people at the wrists, neck, or ankles in a photograph. Obviously there are great ways to frame a photograph where parts of an object are cropped, but it needs to look deliberate or our mind is distracted by wanting to see the missing pieces. Not cropping the subject or cropping more so it looks more deliberate can solve this problem and make the difference between a well-composed, professional-looking photo and a your average candid photo.

What's in a frame?

I experimented with framing on a variety of different planes. Some framing was quite literal while others were more implied.

3rds

I have a pose-able artist's dummy that I chose to use as my subject for the rule of thirds. I thought it got much more interesting as I moved away from having it centered within the frame. I started by having the full object in the viewfinder and centered. I then shifted the object to one side of the frame while still keeping it from crossing out of frame. I then punched in closer so that the object was being cropped slightly from both the bottom and right sides of the frame. I then moved in even closer so that a much larger portion of the object was cut off by the framing. I like the fourth picture best because the cropping and off-center framing create a lot more interest from what is otherwise a basic figure. The one thing that I like from the first three figures that is absent in the final picture is the sun streaming in over the shoulder. The sun was covered more in this 4th picture, which instead started to put the figure into silhouette, which adds its own sort of interest and mystery into this picture.

 

Pitter Pattern

One of the things we read about this week was patterns in photography, and while that wasn't part of an assignment for this week I wanted to post some pattern pictures that I took because I kept happening upon patterns in my pursuit of pictures using framing. Enjoy.

When all other lights go out

My lamp post broke recently, but I haven't gotten around to picking up the top of the post that fell off, so it's just been hanging out on my lawn near the walkway. It can't make light on its own now, but it seemed like the ideal subject for this light-themed assignment. This week has been tricky to capture a wide variety of different lighting options because of the rainy weather, but I found a few brief moments when I could get outside and take the following shots. I tried to maintain a similar composition even though I couldn't plant my camera in one place because I wanted the focus to be on the changes in the lighting rather than changes in composition or perspective. I was surprised by how the mood is changed by lighting changes even looking at the same subject in a roughly similar composition.

The first picture has an almost tranquil quality to it with its soft, warm light. The second picture has a much colder and more tragic feel to it. The third also feels somewhat ominous to me because in the bright light of the camera flash I feel like the broken glass is more emphasized, which makes it feel more like a crime scene. I then took a series of photos playing with different angles with a flashlight (my husband was kind enough to hold the flashlight for me as I took photos in the dark). The first flashlight shot almost looks like it is truly lit from above--not from a flashlight but from a heavenly or alien light source. Finally, the last two shots somehow made it look as though the light was coming from the bulb inside this broken lamp rather than coming from the flashlight beaming through the glass, which I thought was an interesting illusion knowing that this lamp is broken and can't possibly produce light now.

5:30 pm with no flash

7:30 pm with no flash

9:30 pm with the flash turned on

Flash(light) Photography

Light from above

Close light source from the right

Close light source from behind

Taste the Rainbow

I'm a fan of complimentary colors, so I was sure I would choose a complimentary color photo for this assignment, but then I had a craving for gummy bears and these little guys were just dying for a close-up, so analogous it is. (Also, if ever there was a good reason to lick something to claim it as your own this would be it...without licking their feet and pressing them onto the plate they kept falling over). I was pretty proud of the way this picture came out. My light was a bit dim, so I had to play with the settings in my camera, but I think it paid off because this looks like a gourmet food photo to me.

They say it's not easy being green, but when the one room in your house that isn't painted white is green it must be a sign that a green monochromatic picture should be taken in that room. I wish I could have captured more of a light to dark scale in this picture, but I was limited in colors around my house, so I saw stuck with more of a medium to dark green instead. There are some subtle hints of lighter green, but this picture is a little flatter than I would have liked.

Patchwork

I latched onto the idea of using the macro lens in order to capture textures, so I decided to take pictures of every fabric I could find in my house. Once I had them all assembled I thought they had a patchwork quilt feel together, so I chose a fairly basic collage option for arranging the pictures to further perpetuate that initial impression.