civilized ku # 117 ~ a different kind of depth
Wednesday, November 5, 2008 at 09:38AM 
Garden gate ~ Montreal< CA. • click to embiggenOne of the visual characteristics of Montreal's Old City that I really like is its unremitting grayness - it seems that everything is made of gray stone.
This appeals to the graphic designer in me because nothing makes colors pop better than when they are presented against / within a gray /neutral color field. Individual colors' ability to emerge from or recede into the 2-dimensional surface of a print are greatly enhanced with the visual presence of a neutral "backdrop" in an image. I believe that this visual phenomena is responsible for Matthew's response to and like of my autumn pictures (as mentioned in yesterday's entry).
I mention this little bit of color theory - simply stated, warm colors emerge, cool colors recede - because so many "photographers" are hung up on the idea that to get "depth" into a picture requires the use of "receding lines", "receding s-curves", and other such pictorial devices. Most are totally oblivious to the simple practice of using color as a device to create depth. In a picture, color is, in fact, more than just color.
Try this exercise with today's picture: click to embiggen and then let your eyes move around in the tight center space of the picture - the space that has the left side of the wall with red leaves, the grays of the roof / building / walkway / street, the blue sky, and the warm yellows (and yellow greens along the top of the wall).
Now, it just might be that over time I have "trained" my eyes to recognize the emerging / receding effect in a picture but, wham, bam, thank you ma'am, my eyes see an incredible amount of "depth". The sensation of depth is, in fact, accentuated by the receding lines of the garden path, however, if you cover that part of the picture with a couple fingers, the effect is not diminished in any way.
Not convinced? Click to embiggen yesterday's civilized ku # 114 picture. To my way of seeing, my first impulse is to get out the scotch tape and put tape over the cone and hydrant so that they don't fall off my monitor screen.
I just thought that I'd mention this little bit of info because, while some of you may be cognitively aware of these color effects, most may not and perhaps this might help explain something that you "feel" but don't quite "understand" when viewing a picture that uses these "rules" of color effectively. And, hell, once you "get it", it might even help you in way in which you see and picture the world around you.
FYI, I don't consciously "use" this color effect when picturing or consciously try to "find" scenes that evidence this color effect when pictured because, truth be told, my eyes/brain seemed to be hardwired to see in this manner as my natural way of seeing. Without a doubt, my eye is instinctively / intuitively drawn to such things.
Are any of you aware of this phenomena with yourself or your pictures?
Reader Comments (3)
I think maybe yes, no and sometimes all at once (how's that for a firm on-the-fence approach?).
Yesterday's image definitely exhibits the traits you mention, strongest is the Rue St Paul sign. Today's I think less so. Here I feel the sense of depth comes much more from the fact that receding surfaces are brightly lit, the verticals in shadow.
I get sense of depth in images from a complex mix of visual experiences: colour, brightness (tonal variation?) and saturation differences (on this last, I read a scientific paper once that said we see close, central objects with greater saturation than peripheral, distant ones).
But of course, I'm odd. I've learnt to see depth from a wide variety of visual clues as I have no depth perception.
I was wondering what made this photo so appealing to me, and reading your thoughts on depth and color answered it. Thanks for bringing to my attention yet another thing to think about the next time I'm out with the camera. My head is already stuffed too full with photographic thoughts I'll surely get a brain cramp and make some crappy shots next time out :-) Seriously, thanks for the photo and your thoughts. Very helpful!
funnily enough, the person that banged on about this idea often enough to cause it to stick and make me go and learn more about colour theory, was Craig Tanner on one of his workshops that I did.