Art of Photography: Project 24

Project 24 still focused on design elements, but moved from lines to shapes. Here I learnt the basics of 'shape' and that a shape can be an outline or an enclosure depending on the subject, and that again as with lines, a shape is mostly defined by contrast, either of light or of colours.

I also learnt that shapes can be regular or irregular, and that regular shapes such as triangles, rectangles etc, are more easily recognized and therefore play a larger part in composition than irregular shapes.

I enjoyed learning that even when a shape is not clearly defined (it may be broken or uneven), as with lines the brain fills in the gaps to define the shape. I also enjoyed the examples of contrast playing a large part in forming shapes. A light subject such as a white building can have its shape defined strongly by placing it on a dark background. In the example a dark blue sky was used for the background, utilizing a circular polarizer to further darken the sky, which made the building and its shape clearly stand out. The other opposite example used a light background to define the shape of a silhouette, another effective technique which also removes detail from the silhouetted subject, further emphasizing just its shape.