Abstract

[Manfred M]

The two photo clubs I am a member of are both pushing the membership to try producing abstract images this fall, so I have been letting my creative juices flow a bit and spent several hours with some images that I have and have been pushing them with Photoshop's built-in creative filters as well as experimenting with some blending modes I usually don't use.

This is the result of one of my efforts. I think it is effective, but I'm not sure I'm quite where I need to be yet.

[Urbanflyer]

Fun to play. Consider playing so the center of the swirl is not dead center of the image--??

[Manfred M]

Fun to play. Consider playing so the center of the swirl is not dead center of the image--??

Thanks Judith - I had already done that and liked the centred version better. Here is the off centre version:

[pschlute]

I think having seen the original is perhaps colouring my judgement. Not doing it for me I am afraid.

[purplehaze]

Interesting, Manfred. I would be interested in seeing motion blur introduced into the cityscape that follows the trajectory of the swirl, but I imagine that would require a heck of a lot of work, if it is even possible.

[Tom Barry]

I find the one with the swirl centered the more interesting. However, the idiom "circling the drain" keeps popping up in my head, and I don't know if that is an unconscious political thought, or the fact that, at 81, I look at stuff "circling the drain" with great frequency.

[bambleweeney]

Interesting, when I first saw it I honestly didn't like it at all, now it's grown on me considerably.

[billtils]

Since they are abstracts any comment will be subjective. My immediate reaction was "interesting but looks like someone playing with the software to see what it can do rather than setting out with something in mind".

I especially don't like the vortex/whirlpool centre, but did like the off-centre distortion, like this:



but as I said, it's very subjective.

[Manfred M]

Since they are abstracts any comment will be subjective. My immediate reaction was "interesting but looks like someone playing with the software to see what it can do rather than setting out with something in mind".

I especially don't like the vortex/whirlpool centre, but did like the off-centre distortion, like this:



but as I said, it's very subjective.

Bill - I think that statement can apply to any image that is done photographically simply because the way the camera works and the way the human visual system works are different and any image has a degree of deliberate abstraction.

I do very few purely random images and this is no exception.

I stumbled across a technique of creating swirls using Photoshop's built-in filters that gave swirls and loops and used blending modes to assemble them. Instead of just creating "pretty abstracts" I set out to use this technique to "enhance" somewhat abstract image I had already taken.


I started out with this shot of La Paz, Bolivia at the base material for the abstract swirl:







I then used this raw material with a somewhat formulatic approach to create this swirl:




I combined the two and used Photoshop blending modes and opacity controls (plus the usual dodging and burning and cloning) to try different combinations of crops to come up with the final images. I expected that the colour palette being common would result in something that works together fairly well. By moving the relationship between the two components I was able to accentuate parts of the original image. Yes, trial and error play a big part in this work flow, but to be honest, there is a certain amount of trial and error in all of my retouching work.

[Tom Barry]

I really like that last version best of all thus far.

[FootLoose]

Hmm… well, to use that horrible hackneyed expression that is so popular here on CinC : sorry, but this isn’t working for me.

I do not consider this to be abstract. It looks like what it is – a cute bit of photoshop trickery. Granted there are plenty of images like this on the net passed off as abstract, but they are generally the works of dilettantes impressed with the functionality of their image editors.

You might as well desaturate the image and try to pass it off as a black and white. But you know the creation of a black and white image begins with the selection of the subject to be captured in the field, and then the careful conversion of the Raw file with the aim of producing a black and white image, and then the refining of the tones by various means with curve layers etc. Black and white is not the default option to improve a poor colour image, and likewise applying novelty effects to an image as an afterthought does not make it an abstract. At least, not a photographer’s abstract

You could apply motion blur to your image and try to pass it off as ICM. But ICM requires skill and patience and the people who practice successfully can spot a fake in an instant.

Or you could duplicate your image half-a-dozen times, offset and rotate each layer slightly, then set the opacity of each one to a different percentage value and try to pass the result off as a multiple exposure.

The point is, each of the above would be photoshoppery not photography.

If you want to produce an abstract image, learn a bit about the theories behind abstracts first, ingest the works of painters and photographers who produce abstract images, saturate your mind with them, then pick up your camera and go out into the field and try to see an abstract composition.

[Manfred M]

Hmm… well, to use that horrible hackneyed expression that is so popular here on CinC : sorry, but this isn’t working for me.

I do not consider this to be abstract. It looks like what it is – a cute bit of photoshop trickery. Granted there are plenty of images like this on the net passed off as abstract, but they are generally the works of dilettantes impressed with the functionality of their image editors.

You might as well desaturate the image and try to pass it off as a black and white. But you know the creation of a black and white image begins with the selection of the subject to be captured in the field, and then the careful conversion of the Raw file with the aim of producing a black and white image, and then the refining of the tones by various means with curve layers etc. Black and white is not the default option to improve a poor colour image, and likewise applying novelty effects to an image as an afterthought does not make it an abstract. At least, not a photographer’s abstract

You could apply motion blur to your image and try to pass it off as ICM. But ICM requires skill and patience and the people who practice successfully can spot a fake in an instant.

Or you could duplicate your image half-a-dozen times, offset and rotate each layer slightly, then set the opacity of each one to a different percentage value and try to pass the result off as a multiple exposure.

The point is, each of the above would be photoshoppery not photography.

If you want to produce an abstract image, learn a bit about the theories behind abstracts first, ingest the works of painters and photographers who produce abstract images, saturate your mind with them, then pick up your camera and go out into the field and try to see an abstract composition.

Greg - You are working with a very narrow definition of what contemporary abstract photography is (and is not). My view is based on the definitions that CAPA (Canadian Association of Photographic Art) uses. So far as I know, this is in line with what organizations like PSA or FIAP use as well. The abstract photograph category is very broad. Shape, colour and lines are the main components used in this genre.

When I look at the CAPA Judges Manual it there are some pages dedicated to this subject, but the relevant point for me is the statement "any abstract we are asked to look at must have originated from a photograph". The manual further states "Any image created by light is a photograph ans so these abstractions, although the information they convey is out of the ordinary, should be accepted as a valid kind of photography."

That suggests that the photograms (where objects are placed on photographic paper and exposed to light) are photographs; the old masters of this genre like Christian Schad, Man Ray, & Laszlo Moholy-Nagy will be cheering as will the more modern ones like Thomas Ruff, Floris Neusüss and Marco Breuer. Their works are viewed as being abstract photographs.

Are Alfred Stieglitz's "Songs of the Sky" a set of abstract images or are they merely some mediocre shots of some clouds? What about Hiroshi Sugimoto's "Seascapes" series just a bunch of pictures of the sky and sea where the horizon line runs through the centre of the image or are they abstract images?

What about Andreas Gursky's well known 1999 work "Chicago Board of Trade II"? It uses post processing tools and modified / electronically manipulated overlays (not all that different than my approach). Minor White’s “Empty Head” uses heavy manipulation in the traditional darkroom; this is okay, while modern digital modification is not? There is a lot of post-processing in Burtynsky's "Altered Landscapes"; are these truly landscapes or are they abstracts?

Abstract photography is a ambiguous term, without a highly accepted definition, although the term "non-objective" often creeps into the definition. It covers broad representational work with abstractual elements (the sub-genre you do a lot of work in), to wholly non-representation images. They use wide variety of photographic materials, processes & equipment. Not always created with just a camera and can involve digital manipulation of the image.

The images that I posted that you so nicely disparaged are me trying to represent my my thoughts and feelings on my first day in La Paz, Bolivia. The view of the buildings built up the hills, while I was breathless due to the high altitude and wandering through the narrow streets trying to find the "Witches Market". I wasn't just pushing a few buttons here and there, I spend hours refining the base image and then generating many versions of the overlay and positioning it to accentuate certain parts of the base scene.

[Wavelength]

Is that swirl a superficial layer / the buildings appear not much affected by the whirl....

[Manfred M]

Is that swirl a superficial layer / the buildings appear not much affected by the whirl....

They are affected by the swirl based on the use of blending modes; I did not warp the buildings and they are just an overlay on the swirl.