last week I went for a walk around the little lake, the one right in town, in search of interesting reflections
I've always found reflections to be such interesting things... there, but not real, at the mercy of light and movement
fleeting
I had read recently that a good way to abstract something is to heavily edit a photograph of it... altering colour, definition, cropping and so on and I was keen to try it out
I wanted images of reflections because I've been doing a lot of work with water images lately and want to continue exploring it but also because I like the tension of trying to distort something beyond it's reality when it really has no foot in reality at all
below is the first original image, no editing at all and from this, I created the next one
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I like how extreme cropping changes the texture of the branches, emphasising all the bumps, buds and knots
a "dramatic warm" filter flattened the background, lightened it, evening out some of the values and adding some interesting highlights
this next one is the original for the two that follow
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again, heavily cropped, right through the horizontal middle
the same "dramatic warm" filter
a heavy crop with just the left half remaining
it was interesting how just cropping it changed the value, darkening the branches and the background dramatically
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the final one
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cropped, same filter
cropped agin
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and then cropped the crop
love this last one - it's the one where I finally get closer to abstraction
it's not all the way there but the elements are distorted enough that I think the image would be understood to not be of the landscape as it was seen
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the more I crop the more interesting things come to light - I suppose it's something to do with the magnification, isolation and/or distortion of various elements and components, the way colours get altered with the underlying tones coming forth
and with reflections, it's also the way things just aren't quite the way should be
I like that photographs that are not at all good can still yield very interesting images, with the simplest little digital editing in just minutes
I think I won't be quite so quick to hit the delete button from now on
4 comments:
Coincidentally, I have also been reading about cropping an image in order to focus on what I really want to express in a painting or sketch rather than including too much peripheral clutter. Your image editing does this and more, cutting out clutter for sure but enhancing or diminishing elements so that they become patterns and yet still retaining the essence of the original to a greater or lesser extent. The tonal values seem to change with the colour alterations too. To me, drawing and photographing something is an act of observation and noticing whereas abstraction is seeing beyond the details and finding the soul of something in an expression of feeling. I think the latter follows the former ... we see first, then feel. I love your examples of transition, especially that very last image.
the final would make a wonderful abstract painting
Ooh, yes, interesting results there - and isn't it lovely to find that you can make good use of photos that may not be tip-top!
Personally I have trouble with abstraction in my own work, preferring instead to dwell in my perfectionism and wanting to recreate what I actually see with my eyes. Methinks I will have to try embiggening photos to see where they might take me, just for the challenge of it. One of these days, when time permits, I'm going to have a grand re-read of your blog and prepare myself to be bombarded with inspiration!
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