Viewpoints Expressive Perspective

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Viewpoints Expressive Perspective version: ViewpointsPerspective.P3 2006 2013 David Lee Myers www.davidleemyersphoto.com 1 Think of a nearby person as your fore-subject.

Do you want the mountain to feel emotionally remote and insignificant, or do you want it as a looming, dominating presence? This is your choice to make, without moving the building or the person. How?

1 Viewpoints Expressive Perspective version: ViewpointsPerspective.P David Lee Myers 1 Think of a nearby person as your fore-subject. In the distance is a large building or a mountain. How do you want the picture to feel? Do you want the mountain to feel emotionally remote and insignificant, or do you want it as a looming, dominating presence? This is your choice to make, without moving the building or the person. How? Viewing up close, framing with a wide angle lens. Did I move the obelisk? I don t think so! The mountain? Viewing from way back, framing with a long lens. This monument to the residents of the Manzanar Relocation Camp, in which Japanese-American residents of the California coast were involuntarily interned during World War II, is in California s Owens Valley, east of the Sierra Nevada range. The war between Japan and the United States is close to me. I was conceived and born in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, by parents who were working in the Manhattan Project. They had enlisted in the war effort, and learned later that they had helped to build the atomic bombs which had destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. My father went on to spend a life researching radiation biochemistry, working towards ways of reducing radiation damage. Today, thanks to a brother s marriage, I have a Japanese sister-in-law and half-japanese nephews. The Japanese write prayers, fold the papers in origami style, and leave them at shrines, under stones or tied on. I wrote a prayer for eternal peace between our peoples, that we never again make war devastating each other s families. The mountain in the background is the Mount Williamson which Ansel Adams made famous with a photograph made from nearby under very dramatic skies. He was in the area to document life in the Manzanar camp. Expressive Perspective. Start by thinking about what you want the back-subject to feel like in relation to your fore-subject. Then the secret is to choose the viewpoint from which your subjects have the relationship you want. Finally, after you ve selected your viewpoint, use a lens which fits your subjects appropriately into the picture. To make distant subjects feel emotionally present to the fore-subject and the viewer, step back and use a long lens. From a great distance, the fore-subject will appear small against the back-subject, which is thus large by comparison. Then use a long focal length (telephoto) lens, frame your scene tightly, and the back-subject looks very present and shows its immensity. This also gives a flattened, compacted sense of space. Or to separate your fore-subject from the back-subjects and convey open spaciousness, move close to the fore-subject. Since you re so close, you ll need a wide angle lens to frame the whole subject. Such a view can give a great sense of depth. Art Theory. Is photography a plastic art? The origins of the word plastic are in the Greek plastikos meaning to mold or form. The plastic arts are traditionally considered to be those in which the material is molded or formed by the artist, such as in sculpture and painting. The effects shown in this exercise establish the plasticity of space, of photographic perspective by the command of the photographer: The relative sizes of images of different subject elements, even those whose physical positions are fixed, are artistically controlled.

2 version: ViewpointsPerspective.P David Lee Myers 2 How it s Done To demonstrate, start with a view from very close. It emphasizes the largeness and presence of the shelter, while diminishing the ship and giving an expansive view of the river and sky. Vantage: 5 yards from nearest shelter post standing next to the fence which will show in the next picture. Lens: 17mm wide angle

version: ViewpointsPerspective.P3 2006 2013 David Lee Myers www.davidleemyersphoto.

3 version: ViewpointsPerspective.P David Lee Myers 3 For the alternative, step way back, and photograph the scene again with the same 17mm wide angle lens being careful to align the shelter and ship as before. Vantage: 39 yards from nearest shelter post. Lens: 17mm wide angle. Crop? None below is the whole camera shot. Vantage: 39 yards from nearest shelter post. Lens: 17mm wide angle. Cropped to the ship. Vantage: 39 yards from nearest shelter post. Lens: 111mm zoom setting. Crop: None not necessary framed in the camera!

The technique is coordinated changes, first in vantage point, then in lens focal length. What differences do you see? Vantage: 5 yards from nearest shelter post. Lens: 17mm wide angle.

4 version: ViewpointsPerspective.P David Lee Myers 4 Compare the two finished photos one taken up close, with a wide-angle lens, the other taken from way back, with a telephoto lens setting. The technique is coordinated changes, first in vantage point, then in lens focal length. What differences do you see? Vantage: 5 yards from nearest shelter post. Lens: 17mm wide angle. Vantage: 39 yards from nearest shelter post. Lens: 111mm zoom setting. Less ship, more river, more sky. Background is shown smaller scale, so more of it fits in the frame. (And we look over the fence instead of seeing it.) More ship, less sky. Background is magnified, so less of it fits in the frame. (And we see the fence instead of looking over it.) In Review Expressive Perspective. Start by thinking about what you want the back-subject to feel like in relation to your fore-subject. Then the secret is to choose the viewpoint from which your subjects have the relationship you want. Finally, after you ve selected your viewpoint, use a lens which fits your subjects appropriately into the picture. To make distant subjects feel emotionally present to the fore-subject and the viewer, step back and use a long lens. From a great distance, the fore-subject will appear small against the back-subject, which is thus large by comparison. Then use a long focal length (telephoto) lens, frame your scene tightly, and the back-subject looks very present and shows its immensity. This also gives a flattened, compacted sense of space. Or to separate your fore-subject from the back-subjects and convey open spaciousness, move close to the fore-subject. Since you re so close, you ll need a wide angle lens to frame the whole subject. Such a view can give a great sense of depth.

three positions, first up close, then after backing up a bit, and finally after backing up much

essentially the same size in all three pictures.

5 version: ViewpointsPerspective.P David Lee Myers 5 More Examples: Viewpoints Expressive Perspective I photographed these stop signs from three positions, first up close, then after backing up a bit, and finally after backing up much more. Each time I backed up I put a longer lens on my camera, to make the nearer stop sign essentially the same size in all three pictures. Close Viewpoint Middle Viewpoint Far Viewpoint Now ask this question: Does the far stop sign seem present to the close one? Does that answer change with the viewpoint?

6 version: ViewpointsPerspective.P David Lee Myers 6 Sit on the bench under the tree. What tree?

7 version: ViewpointsPerspective.P David Lee Myers 7 Only the camera was moved. Background effect changed. Apparent shape of the face changed!

8 version: ViewpointsPerspective.P David Lee Myers 8 The bridge is remote. The kayaks are stretched. The bridge feels close. The kayaks are compressed.

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