Project 6: Photography II Time Exercise 3: Panorama

The exercise asks us to stand somewhere relatively high up with a wide view and look deeply at what we can see, looking at the background, midddle ground, foreground and the image as a whole, including the sky. Having looked, we are then to take one photo which sums up our observation. Exercise 3 actually only wants one photo but I’m sharing four. This is why.

After having learned about the photographers with Parkinson’s turning their impairment into a technique, I considered the ways in which I would see the scene differently from people with full sight. There are two features of my sight which seem relevant. Firstly, as my eyes don’t work together (binocular vision) I have a limited depth of field. Secondly, I don’t see blur  I have nystagmus, and my eyes move constantly. One optician described it as being as if my focus is like a target. My eyes keep trying to hit the target but nine times out of ten they miss. My brain filters out the unfocused images so I only see the sharp ones. This is good because otherwise I’d be totally overwhelmed by all these unfocused attempts; however, I suppose that it also might filter out a ‘normal’ blur effect seen by people with full sight  I can’t see blur naturally, only in photographs.

I spent some time considering how I might try to get my camera to take a photo that is more akin to the way I see the world. For depth of field to be reduced, I could use zoom and/or a wide aperture. To eliminate blur I would need a fast shutter speed. I took some practice shots of a random view at home to see if I could set the camera up to do this. I met with dismal failure! The camera wanted to focus somewhere. If I didn’t focus on anything in particular then everything was blurred. If I focused on the foreground the background was blurry. This was predictable, given the exercises I’ve already completed. The one thing that did work out was that, when I used zoom, the depth of field was flattened. Standing and looking at the view alongside these two photos, I could clearly see that I have a shallow depth of field.

What to do about the blur? Wherever I focused the camera, the unfocused bits would blur. I resolved the puzzle by going back to basics and using auto. The first image is for context. This is the unzoomed image.

I’ve made the final image smaller than the one above. I used full zoom and that makes everything look bigger and closer. In order to replicate my own sight, I’ve scaled the image to roughy that of the one above. It’s not blurry, but it’s also not easy to see details. When people ask what I can see, I try to explain the difference between sharp and detailed. I see a sharp image, but once I try to focus beyond a couple of inches from my eyes, the details rapidly become harder to distinguish. 

I was happy to see some shadows on this cloudy day. Often, thick cloud makes for very ‘flat’ vision. I think I rely more than most do on patterns of light and shadow to indicate depth of field. I think the reason why many people don’t like cloudy days us that there are no shadows. It is dispiriting. But today there were shadows - yay! 

This process also shows my why I have a preference for tonal images rather than flat colour, such as is found in a lot of abstract art and also in graphic design. No shadows, which makes it harder for me to see! I have learned much about myself today, both about my sight and about myself as an artist.