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By Ira J. Schneller
In the heyday of modern art, from the late 1960’s through the mid-80’s, a completely white canvas might have been called “Ghost Lost in a Snow Storm” while a totally black canvas might be titled “Blind Man in a Snow Storm”. Obviously, neither work would be recognizable for what it was without the title. Artists used a variety of techniques to create their pieces of modern art. A blank canvas, a single circle, splattered paint and a host of other effects were used as creative tools. Basically, they were just abstract design elements, so the style became known as abstract art. Sometimes it worked, and sometimes it didn’t.
But there’s a different type of art that works very well in photography, and that’s the concept of abstractions. At the simplest level, abstractions are portions of larger scenes that have been distilled down to the type of individual design elements used in abstract art. What makes sense in the broader composition may not make sense in an abstraction. At the same time, what may be a minor element in the larger composition becomes the main sublject. Various types of abstractions exist. For example, they can be minimalist, consisting only of lines, colors and shapes; illustrative, resembling drawings or paintings; or photo-realistic, where subjects are still recognizable, but the subject loses its importance. Abstractions are very subjective forms of creative expression. Different photographers may interpret the same subject in a variety of ways. Still, there are some simple guidelines that can improve your potential for success.
Simple abstractions work best. A line, curve, shadow, or two fields of colors can all be transformed into powerful minimalist abstractions. There are times, however, when abstractions appear busy, almost chaotic. Design elements like repetitive patterns and geometric shapes within a larger image can result in interesting compositions. Abstractions tend to be more effective in high contrast. It might be contrasting colors in color photography or intense blacks and stark whites in black-and-white. The secret to creating abstractions is the technique, not the technology, although technology can be used as a creative tool. Digital imaging is an ideal medium for creating abstractions, as they can be created both by the camera and by the computer. Whether shooting digitally or with film, it’s best to use a zoom lens with a long maximum focal length. This makes it easier to focus as close as necessary to get the right shot. When created in the camera, abstractions are a form of close-up photography. With traditional close-up photography, though, one or more elements, such as stamps, coins or flowers, can be the primary subject. With abstractions, the subjects tend to become secondary. Their colors, shapes and positioning are the primary considerations. In close-up photography, it’s pretty obvious what the primary shot should be. However, determining the final composition for an abstraction requires some visual exploration. When a particular scene looks promising, pan across it several times. When something interesting appears in the viewfinder, zoom in and out on it to see what the optimum framing might be. After some practice, you’ll get a pleasing composition in the viewfinder.
Your approach can be a little different when shooting digitally. One of the nice things about digital photography is that it’s cheap to experiment. Even if no composition stands out in particular, shoot it anyway to see what the results might be. Marginal shots can easily be erased.
While shooting abstractions works well enough, some of the most interesting effects can be achieved with a computer. It’s possible to take an average file photo, crop it creatively, apply certain adjustments, and arrive at a unique abstraction. There are several ways to experiment with electronic images on a computer screen. The most obvious is to simply select a certain section of the larger image, copy it, and make a new image out of it. Another way of finding the right composition hidden within the original photo is to enlarge the image several times its original size. The final magnification depends upon the size of the original and the subject matter, but generally 200% works well. Scroll up and down and side-to-side to see if a composition looks interesting. Sometimes it’s just a matter of moving the active window slightly one way or the other. Abstractions tend to look better when the aspect ratio is exaggerated so that the final frame is considerably wider than it is tall, or much higher than it is wade. Beyond cropping images, it’s also possible to use a variety of special effects and natural media tools to compose the compression. For instance, a repetitive surface with an interesting look may be covering part of the intended abstracted area. Cloning that repetitive pattern into the rest of the frame could strengthen the image. Similarly, a creatively cropped leaf can be turned into a powerful composition by such things as changing the hue, saturation and lightness of the cropped image, inverting its color palette or changing colors with bucket fills. One of the problems of cutting or copying small sections of digital files is that the abstraction becomes pixelated. That problem can be reduced by resizing the derivative image, but it’s tough to emiminate it totally. One
final note about abstractions: the rules are just guidelines. Breaking
them can sometimes result in the most fascinating images. Once cropped,
modified and optimized, abstractions can be enlarged for some interesting
display prints that force the viewer to take a step back to see
what the subject matter really is. Or they can be generated as small
display prints, to draw the viewer in closer to study the composition.
In either case, abstractions can often be viewed with more interest
than “straight” photographs in general. |
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