Seeing Pictures

[amolitor]

The first time we see a picture, our eye moves over it picking things out, settling here and there, and so on.

This sets, I believe, a pattern. It is quite difficult to "re-see" a picture, the second time. We're going to tend to fixate on the things we noticed the first time, we're going to tend to move our eye across the image in a pattern set by that first experience of the image (not necessarily in the same way as that first time, but that first time will tend to set in stone what we "find interesting" about the picture, good or bad).

This has some consequences:

- you, as the photographer, know what you think is important. You will look at your photograph in a way that is informed by whatever idea you had taking the picture. This is probably quite different from the way a "cold" viewer will look at the picture. The main purpose for learning all this business of "leading lines" and whatnot is to develop some intellectual way to guess how that "cold" viewer is going to look at your picture,

- you probably shouldn't show unfinished work to people, especially if the "unfinished" part is important to experiencing the image. If the subject is muddy, if the relationships are confused, but you have ideas for how to clarify those, do that work before you show the image to anyone. If someone sees your photograph in the unfinished state, they are too likely to "see it wrong" and then they'll never be able to see it "right" even after you do the work. Even if the post work is successful, and does in fact make all clear, the people who saw it before will be unable to re-see the image the way you intend.

- your goal as a photographer, or other visual artist, is to try to arrange the image so that a viewer coming at it cold will see it in approximately the same way you do. If they see it in a different way, you might get lucky, but you're not in control and arguably you have failed. You may have made a fine image, but it's entirely by accident. If they physically see the image the same way you do, if their eye moves more or less as yours does, if they identify as important the same things you think are important, if they see the same relationships that you do, then there's a reasonable chance that they will feel the same emotional impact you do, and perhaps think the same sort of things you do. If not, it's anybody's guess, and largely random, how the viewer will feel and what the viewer will think, looking at your photograph.

 

[runnah]

You are fighting the hardwiring of the human brain on this one. Our brains try to make make sense of the chaos by assigning order. That is why you get people who see Jesus in toast. Another principal is that our conscious brains are great at saving time by using past visual experiences to fill in the details of something we see all the time.

I think its a key part of any creative process to have someone who hasn't been involved in the design take a look at the work. 9 out of 10 times they will point of something you have missed because you have seen it so many time your brain doesn't pick of on a typo or graphical mistake.

 

[Derrel]

This sets, I believe, a pattern. It is quite difficult to "re-see" a picture, the second time. >>SNIP>>>they are too likely to "see it wrong" and then they'll never be able to see it "right">>SNIP>the people who saw it before will be unable to re-see the image >SNIP

visual perception + illusions - Google Search

The problem I see with your multiple assertions is that your position seems to credit the adult human being with roughly the cognitive abilities of a freaking bucket full of bolts...

 

[amolitor]

What, you're claiming that adult humans have more cognitive ability than a bucket of bolts? Who have YOU been hangin around with?!!

Anyways, I see what you're saying and I wasn't clear enough. We can intellectually grasp whatever, we can think our way through to understanding how someone else is seeing a picture. Indeed, if we couldn't, then we could never make a picture that anyone else liked, except by accident.

What I am grasping at is that low-level instinctive part of "looking", where that first impression is formed, and the way that first impression colors all impressions thereafter. If I show you a muddy picture of several things, and you happen to first notice the, I dunno, the bright red geranium on the windowsill behind the model, and your impression is "damn! That is JARRING and totally clashes with the model's muted clothing!" then it's going to take a lot of work to make you NOT see the damn geranium every time you look at the photo.

Suppose I subtly de-saturate the geranium, and burn it down a bit, and pull up the clothes and bring the model out. Now you, seeing it for the first time, might find the geranium inoffensive and look at the model and so on. Seeing it for the second time, after seeing the first version, you're gonna go to the damn geranium every time, and it's going to spoil the image for you all over again. I have to remove the geranium entirely, or radically change it or the model's clothes to make you "see" the picture anew, and to see it the way I meant it.

Of course you can mentally edit out the geranium and tear your attention away from the geranium, you can talk about the way the model is lit and enjoy the model and so on. But at a visceral level, you're not gonna like the photo until the geranium is just gone. Intellectually, you can be fine with the new photo. Viscerally, it's a lot harder.

Or at any rate, there is a strong effect which tends in that direction.

 

[runnah]

So I guess what are you asking?

Can you retrain your brain to not notice the first thing you noticed? No, that is like telling someone to not picture and apple. This first thing they do is picture an apple.

Even if you 'shop out the flower, the brain will force the eyes to go to the spot where it once was.

 

[amolitor]

I'm not asking anything I am making bare-faced assertions!

 

[runnah]

Well I agree with your assumptions.

How the brain inturpets visual information is an amazing subject.

http://barlab.mgh.harvard.edu/papers/RSBar.pdf

A good read.

 

[pgriz]

Runnah, thank you for that interesting link. It reflects the cognitive process of abstraction, categorization, labelling, which allows us to "skim" our experience of any moment, and extract from it the things that we feel may be threats or potential rewards. The method of blending perception, memory of real and imagined events, and projecting these (the predictive part) to an anticipated state, means that we operate with an internal map in the physical and emotional worlds. The author mentioned the ready-make scripts of behaviour that we run in most familiar situations. "Seeing" requires us to sidestep some of this "automatic" processing, and re-focus on the underlying elements. As for Andrew's thesis that what is seen (once) cannot be unseen, it appears that he is partly right - without an external motivation, the same pattern of seeing will persist. BUT, it is possible to see with fresh eyes: any new parent exploring the world with their child will know that they often see things from a fresh perspective when they are with their child. It is also well known the distortion of perception that occurs when one is madly in love, and nothing looks the same any more. Also, as is well known in the viewing of illusions such as http://www.grand-illusions.com/images/articles/opticalillusions/woman/mainimage.gif, once you see one version, it is hard to see the other possibilities, although if you work at it, you can get the mental flipping going. While I tend to agree with Andrew that our default approach is to revisit the stuff we see in the same way, I think part of our creativity is to force ourselves to try and imagine alternate views.

 

[runnah]

The human brain always amazes me I wish I R smart enough to make it my life's work, but alas I just make pretty things.

A study i would like to see is what makes a person have an eye for creativity. Is it utilizing a different part of the brain? Are these people more right brained? And so on.

If anyone has access to lots of federal funding PM me.

 

[pgriz]

It appears to me that creativity seems to be able to take an unexpected direction in doing, seeing, or presenting something. In my professional work, a way to get creativity working is to get away from the routine, and bring in people with very different viewpoints and backgrounds. Many of the ideas that come out of these sessions are completely unrealistic, but some are positively brilliant. Looking back at the process, you see that the breakthrough comes from seeing "what is" without the usual perceptual baggage, and in making new links and associations that "break the rules". It can be very uncomfortable for some participants when their favourite view of "this is how the world works" gets torn apart, but it seems to be a necessary step in making something new.