Shadowy Abstracts

Photography is an art form that allows you to express yourself through the images you create.  While we tend to focus on light and how we use it to create images, we forget that the light is really nothing without the shadows.  The shadows are what define our subject.

The other day while cleaning up in my kitchen I noticed the shadows cast by a wine glass on the counter.  The bright sunlight pouring through the kitchen window created a shadowy abstract shape.

I decided to experiment with this observation by using different types of glasses and a white sheet of paper.  I found that by allowing the paper to curl upward toward the back, the shadows cast by the sunlight through the glasses created a series of distorted shadowy images, that seem to twist and turn depending on their placement.  The images presented here are examples of how light and shadows interact with each other within an image. 

All images shot using a Sony A7II camera using natural window light.                                       

 

Photographic Still Life Simplicity

 Still life photography is a genre that allows you to create and compose objects within a pleasing presentation.  The layout of the objects should be arranged in a simple composition that allows a viewers eye to focus on the main object in the arrangement.  The space required for this genre can be as simple as your kitchen table.  The lighting can be any combination of window light and a portable LED light.  The background used can be two pieces of black poster board on a tabletop setting.

The use of flowers can make for a colorful still life.  In this post I use a series of different flowers separately composed into simple arrangements using singular props to accent the arrangements.  I have kept the layout simple in order to have the color and shapes of the flowers be the main focus of the viewer’s eyes.  However, the composition can be as creative as your imagination.  

All images were photographed using a Sony A7II camera.  I can be contacted for comments or questions at nymacc@gmail.com

Standing Still

Standing in my backyard, I practiced just being still for a brief period observing my surroundings.  I was in my still point standing in one spot and meditating visually.  Although I had taken a camera out with me, it remained silent as I visually dissected the scene before me.

I was slowly allowing my eyes to travel across a series of tile roofs of neighboring houses.   While each of us might view this scene differently and photograph it as whole images of houses, I found myself breaking it up into a series of sections.  What I saw was lines dissecting lines, shapes and light dissolving into shadows.  What I was looking at was a series of abstractions each forming an individual image.  It was at this point that I picked up the camera and began recording these fragments of images.

Standing in my backyard, I practiced just being still for a brief period observing my surroundings.  I was in my still point standing in one spot and meditating visually.  Although I had taken a camera out with me, it remained silent as I visually dissected the scene before me.

You might think of this as a process of discovery that becomes an endless source of creativity.  I like to think of it as the art of being still...a sort of still point where your eyes begin to build a series of photographs on the canvas in your mind.

 

All images shot using a Sony A7II camera.  I can be contacted at nymacc@gmail.com 

Halloween Dreams

It is that time of the year again when the goblins and witches start to make their appearances on the front lawns of neighborhood homes…it’s Halloween.  I made a short walk through the neighborhood with my camera to captures some of these scary apparitions. 

So this post is a recomposed series of images to fit my minds view of Halloween Dreams, from the images I captured walking through the neighborhood.

Images were shot using a SONY A7 II camera and recomposes in Photoshop.

All questions and comments can be addressed to nymacc@gmail.com

 

 

Pandemic Light

Since this COVID-19 mess began...I have found my photographic pursuits a little curtailed.  I find myself anchored in my home missing some of the photo walks I use to take part in outside my present environment.   However, it has enhanced the art of perceiving and appreciating the small things within my limited environment.

Lately I have been noticing the light, both morning and afternoon that spreads its tentacles across the walls and floors.  So being rather confined to this living space during this pandemic I decided to pursue this light and the patterns formed by it, photographically.  It is a photographic theme that has become my personal project over a period of days. 

In pursuing the light I am examining through photography the relationship between the light and the objects that fall in its path.  Because most of the light that I am working with is filtered through Venetian blinds, it creates a pattern on all the subjects it envelops.  It could be said that this dream like atmosphere between the light and shadows in these images is a metaphorical interpretation of the conflict that is happening during this pandemic.

The filtering of light through the Venetian blinds is an example of Gobo Lighting, where the light source falling on a subject leaves a pattern.  All images were created with natural light with a SONY Alpha 7II camera.  I can be contacted for questions at nymacc@gmail.com.