Is emotion important in images?

pgriz

Been spending a lot of time on here!
Joined
Jul 30, 2010
Messages
6,734
Reaction score
3,221
Location
Canada
Can others edit my Photos
Photos OK to edit
We all talk about the importance of emotion in the images we see, but really, how many images do we see that really pluck the emotional strings? Putting aside subjects such as your loved ones, or favorite places, how many times do you get "moved" when you see an image? What grabs your attention? WHY does it affect you?
 
I'm more moved by images that I don't understand, because then I don't have a reference to fall back on to really tell me what emotion I should be feeling.
 
When I am shooting that is what I seek out. Emotions and connections. This is what I love about photography the most. I am actually editing a wedding right now and one of my favorite images is where the groom is dancing with his mom and she has a single tear running down her cheek and she is holding on to him so tightly on the back of his jacket. It is a priceless image and I could just feel the emotional connection between the two of them during that dance. That is truly what it is about for me.
 
Emotion is easier to feel and see when we're photographing fellow humans doing important stuff (like getting married, being born, grieving for someone close), but how do we get the emotional connection in nature shots, or scenery, or architecture, or abstracts? Put a cute kitten or puppy in, and it's AWWWW.... but if we don't have the obvious emotional triggers, how do make the emotional connection for the viewer?
 
it is if your a romantic, but romanticism isn't the end all to art - this despite what we learn about "self expression" in highschool art class and kids wearing WAY too much eye shadow pouring their hearts out onto canvas.

Personally, I think appeal to emotion is kind of cheap.
 
I think that people are looking at this a little narrowly.
It is not that the image necessarily must depict emotion.
What makes photos great is the connection that they have with the viewer and the emotions that image stirs up in the viewer.
Patriotic images, disaster images, sports images - all may be non-emotional representations but, because the pictures stir the viewers' heart strings, they connect.
 
I think appealing to emotion is the sole purpose of photography. I want people to see my images and have a reaction. If someone looks at my image and feels nothing I have failed (which I do a lot).
 
I don't think entirely in terms of emotion, but in terms of reaction. Art can make me think, wonder, shout, recoil, or a million other things. It can also make me feel.
 
I asked the question more in context of getting an image to evoke emotion in a viewer, rather than capturing a moment of emotion. In interpreting and evaluating images, emotion is ONE of the criteria which allows us to say the image is "good" or not. We often look at a technically-perfect image and have no feeling evoked - does that make it a "poor" image?

I'm more moved by images that I don't understand, because then I don't have a reference to fall back on to really tell me what emotion I should be feeling.

That's partly what I'm trying to explore - what is it in the image that affects your emotions? Ignoring for the moment the cute pictures of laughing babies, cuddly kittens and adorable puppies, which images in the past few months clearly touched you emotionally, and why?

When I am shooting that is what I seek out. Emotions and connections. This is what I love about photography the most. I am actually editing a wedding right now and one of my favorite images is where the groom is dancing with his mom and she has a single tear running down her cheek and she is holding on to him so tightly on the back of his jacket. It is a priceless image and I could just feel the emotional connection between the two of them during that dance. That is truly what it is about for me.

Capturing emotion is definitely a good skill to have, and makes the subjects relate well to the image. It also allows us to project our feelings in a similar situation. But the question was more along the lines of whether evoking emotion with an image is a goal that the photographer should have when capturing the image. And in this context, I'm thinking of the viewer's response to the image.

it is if your a romantic, but romanticism isn't the end all to art - this despite what we learn about "self expression" in highschool art class and kids wearing WAY too much eye shadow pouring their hearts out onto canvas.

Personally, I think appeal to emotion is kind of cheap.

Why? What kind of "appeal to emotion" do you feel is inappropriate for an image?

I think that people are looking at this a little narrowly.
It is not that the image necessarily must depict emotion.
What makes photos great is the connection that they have with the viewer and the emotions that image stirs up in the viewer.
Patriotic images, disaster images, sports images - all may be non-emotional representations but, because the pictures stir the viewers' heart strings, they connect.

You're getting the the crux of the question - is emotion a key ingredient in great photos? It is a suitable criteria only in a subset of images (say, those involving people and animals)?

I think appealing to emotion is the sole purpose of photography. I want people to see my images and have a reaction. If someone looks at my image and feels nothing I have failed (which I do a lot).

That's a high hurdle. And one that I'm trying to figure out. If a macro of a bug, however brilliantly rendered, doesn't stir me to tears, is that to be considered a failure?

I don't think entirely in terms of emotion, but in terms of reaction. Art can make me think, wonder, shout, recoil, or a million other things. It can also make me feel.

Maybe we're using the words in a different way, but I think that if something made me "feel", I'd say it touched my emotions. Are you saying therefore that if an image made you react, it was successful?
 
I don't think people truly connect to a picture unless it stirs something in them emotionally at some level. Doesn't have to be any one particular emotion, and it doesn't necessarily have to be a strong one, but it has to be there.
 
I like no emotion such as when our model picks the bugs right out of her teefs

SWP_0069.jpg
 
I don't think people truly connect to a picture unless it stirs something in them emotionally at some level. Doesn't have to be any one particular emotion, and it doesn't necessarily have to be a strong one, but it has to be there.

As Andy said above, it is not necessarily emotion that one appeals to but also possibly intellect. I, and Andy and probably others, want to stir some reactions in the viewer. THe nature of that reaction is variable and can be mixed but the end result is involvement with the photo or its concept.

A great photo bot only evokes that involvement with a good proportion of the people who see it but any technical defects in the image are minor enough - in comparison - that they don't interfere with that involvement.
 
I think appealing to emotion is the sole purpose of photography. I want people to see my images and have a reaction. If someone looks at my image and feels nothing I have failed (which I do a lot).

That's a high hurdle. And one that I'm trying to figure out. If a macro of a bug, however brilliantly rendered, doesn't stir me to tears, is that to be considered a failure?

QUOTE]


I may not cry over the bug but I may look at it and say "Wow look at those antennae. I had no idea that's what they looked like." I would say that you then succeeded in appealing to my emotions. This time it was interest and curiosity.
 
We are, I think, using words the same way, pgriz. When I say art has made me "feel" I mean it has touched my emotions.

Now, to be fair, any reaction will tend to have SOME emotional component, but it's not always the primary one. A powerful picture of suffering might primarily make me think, in the sense of starting a flow of actual words in my inner monologue "... wow that man certainly looks poor, but see how firmly he looks at the camera, he has his pride ..." whereas another reaction might render the inner monologue briefly silent, " ... ", while I process the feeling of raw grandeur, or sorrow, or peace, or whatever. That latter image I would say made me feel even though it probably made me think as well.

Reaction is simply anything that changes me a little. Perhaps it's more useful to say it that way: Art changes the viewer, however slightly. Even that is a little silly, since we're always changing, all the time. The sight of a brick in the gutter changes us, subtly, it makes us think ".. where did that brick come from? Did it fall off that house? This neighborhood is going to hell! ... " or whatever, but it's probably not art.
 

Most reactions

Back
Top