Diminishing Perspective

Perspective, a particular attitude toward or way of regarding something: a point of view. In photography the art of creating perspective of a three dimensional scene laid out in a two dimensional space. Utilizing the choice of lens, hight of camera, tilt of lens are only a few of the many tools at our disposal to create perspective. Forced perspective can helps us make objects appear smaller, or larger depending one’s desire. A wide lens was chosen for this image along with a lower angle of view to force the perspective a bit more. Direction of the sunlight and the shadows help to push the feeling of perspective and depth in this image. The pattern in the concrete wall as it diminishes in size also helps bring the desired effect. Utilizing focus, contrast depth of field, and color can also be played with to increase the feeling of perspective.

ORD is the three letter code for Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, where you’ll find this underground walkway between the terminals.  It reminds me of the paint aisle at a Home Depot:  an explosion of color, albeit a bit better organized than your average junk yard (see “Pop Cars,” by Russ Widstrand, yesterday).

Climbing to new heights, high heels with dice, Vegas triangle (begin shapes), circle, circle, girl in a circle, girl on a square (end shapes, begin girls), girl on a car, girl in a car in black & white (end girls, begin cars), cars photographed in black & white from height:  full circle.

Following Flower Power by Russ Widstrand, herewith Wind Power.  These windmill farms are sprouting all over the mid-west like flowers in springtime, this one amidst the fields of farms near Mendotta Hills, Illinois.  One of the farmers told me that the leases the wind farmers pay him exceed the money he’d earn growing crops, so his land is now doubly profitable in terms of dollars per acre. The big question for me today was Which image do I play?  We’d been having a brief behind-the-scenes discussion recently and one of the other participants mentioned that he attempts to play the game defensively.  It was kind of funny because I’d recently been thinking exactly the same thing. Playing defensively, of course, is useless but that doesn’t mean that I’m not thinking about it.  Good example:  Jay posted a picture of soldiers’ boots the other day, got me thinking about pulling an image from my files of soldiers on patrol dating back to my time as a war correspondent.  But I was also thinking that it’s time to pitch my sneakers into the trash despite the fact that they’re comfortable and have become my favorite footwear, so I photographed them here in my studio.  Unfortunately for the sneakers, the game took another turn and so that image will have to wait for another day.