Even though Dubrovnik, Croatia is a city of steps and stone, you find gardens springing up in all sorts of places, like this side “street” of steps leading to the top of the city. The light you find in narrow alleys, that filters down onto plants like this, is some of my favorite light for photographing.
For “Weekend Away,” I take a little blogging break and share random photos captured in my travels.
It’s no secret that one of my favorite subjects is windows. Since returning home from Italy, I’ve noticed that I gravitate toward images of windows as much or maybe more than before. Noticing this has caused me to look closer at how I use them, why they interest me so. For this installment of Exploring with a Camera, let’s dive in and see how and why windows are such an appealing subject.
Source of Light
Windows are important to our existence. The let in light and air, while protecting us from the elements. As photographers, windows are a fabulous source of light when we are indoors. Each window, each time of day will bring a different quality of light to our photos. How often have you captured something with your camera, because you saw it sitting next to a window, in the light?
But windows go well beyond a source of light, to become an integral part of the composition and subject of a photograph. The image below is a great example. The window is the source of light, illuminating the table, but also a critical design element balancing the composition and interacting with the other items in the frame to tell a whole story.
Design Elements
The shapes and lines of windows make them an amazing design element in our photographs. They are usually square or rectangle, and we can decide how we incorporate them inside the square or rectangle frame of our photograph.
In the image below, the shape of the window replicates the shape of the frame. The contrast in color of the window gives your eye a place to focus and rest, while taking in the texture and layers in the wall. I see the texture as the subject, but the window “grounds” the image, giving the texture something to hold on to.
The window in this image is mainly used as a design element. Not only the color contrast, but the shape provides a strong, ordered contrast with the curving and disordered elements of tree, sculpture fragment and uneven texture in the wall.
When you see windows as a shape or a design element, you can see interesting uses for them in your images. Windows become the perfect subject to explore the use of repeating shapes as a dominant element, as in this photograph from late night in Venice. The repeating pattern of the window through the frame provides a separation between the working gondolier at the right and the rest of the empty gondolas on the left. (Visit Exploring with a Camera: Repeating Patterns for more on using repeating patterns in your photos.)
In this photograph from Madrid, repeating shapes plus the point of view reveal the use of windows as a design element to create lines. The strong linear perspective is completely created by the lines of the windows. (See Exploring with a Camera: Linear Perspective for more.)
Backdrops, Frames and Shelves
I find my use of windows in my photographs goes way beyond simple design elements. Windows are an integral part of many of my photographs, interacting with the subject as backdrops, frames and shelves. In the photo shared at the top of this post, the window serves as a shelf that holds the main subject – the colorful flower pots. In addition, the window frames the subject, creating separation from the contrasting space, texture and color around the pots.
Here is another example of a window used as a shelf, to hold the cupcakes. You can’t see the whole window, but you can feel it is there. A second window becomes a backdrop and frame for the person inside the building.
The window in this image serves as a frame for my son, looking out at the world.
In this self-portrait, the window is a backdrop for me. The framing and brightness provided by the window brings your eye to where I am sitting first, making me the focal point.
Reflections
Since windows are usually made of glass, they provide an excellent source of reflections. My recent favorite photo of the window in Ashland is an example of using the window as a source of reflection, but the window also serves to frame and bound the reflection within the image.
Window reflections can also create complex interactions within the photographic frame. They can reveal things that are not visible otherwise; the reflections create layered images by showing both what is reflected in the window along with what is seen through the window. The window reflection in this image shows a slightly different perspective of my sons face, while also layering it with what is outside and providing a frame.
You can find more on using windows as a source of reflections in Exploring with a Camera: Reflections in Glass.
Psychological Barriers
Windows can have powerful emotional impact in our photos, by creating a strong feeling of being on the inside looking out, or on the outside looking in. There can be a sense of separateness, longing, mystery or even protection created by windows in our photos. They are a useful storytelling element, both to express our own feelings and to draw the viewer in. This image below captures a story. It makes me wonder who lives on the other side of that window, with the colorful pots.
In this image, I am both literally and figuratively on the outside. I want to experience the warmth and companionship felt through the window, not just the warmth of the lone candle that is immediately accessible outside.
Does Stevie the cat long to be part of the outdoors or is he protected from the dangers of the outdoors by the window? You can decide. Either way, the window provides a boundary to explore, along with providing a frame for Stevie to sit within and light to the image.
By writing this post I may have discovered why windows show up in my photographs so much… there are so many different ways to use them! Here’s a quick summary of what I’ve discovered, just by doing my own image review:
To view more of my window images, you can visit this set on Flickr.
What other uses of windows do you have? How do they show up in your photos? Share with us! The link up will remain open for two weeks. I look forward to seeing your interpretations of one of my favorite subjects!
Love, Framed
Curious? You’ll have to wait a day or two. First, tomorrow is a new Exploring with a Camera. See you then!
Sometimes, when you go out to photograph, instead of you finding an image, an image finds you. Unexpected, unbidden, it calls for you to capture it with the camera. It begs you to pin it down, within the frame.
This is one of the things I love about photography. This is why I like to wander around, camera in hand. I never know what I will find. I never know what will jump out at me. The scene that originally caught my eye usually gets transformed into something different. I get to see the world in new ways. The world begs me to see it in new ways, to frame and reframe it.
I wasn’t looking for this image, but it needed to be captured when I found it. I wonder why?
OK, here it is, the window that started off last week’s rainy photowalk. I was drawn to those window frames of wonderfully peeling paint in contrast with the shiny smooth metal of the building. It was interesting to find that the metal wasn’t as shiny smooth as it seemed from the car driving by. It had it’s own texture of rust and even writing on it, as you got closer. I like the shapes and lines in this image, and the contrast of not only textures but the silver-blue building against the warmer yellow and brown found in the windows and doors and repeated in the color of the curb.
I’ve been noticing lately how “straight on” many of my images are. That seems to be a favorite perspective. It’s not intentional, I often take many different angles and perspectives of one scene but come back to the “straight on” one as my favorite. Maybe it’s a reflection of my personality, I’m pretty direct and straightforward.
But the angles often show something that the straight on perspective cannot, and that’s depth. This is the window on the left. You can’t tell the depth of the texture, borne out through the paint and screen and screws and nails, in the image above. To show that, it took moving around the angle of the camera, the depth of field, capturing the layers and the details. Of the two images today, this second one is my favorite. It has more depth, it reveals more. It says more to me.
It’s just a reminder to continue looking from all different perspectives, to see which one connects with you the most. You never know!
[Over a year ago I wrote the original Lessons from Abroad series. Since moving back to the US, I’ve found the lessons from living abroad have not abated; just changed. I’ve decided to continue this series with a periodic post on the new lessons as they crystallize for me.]
Venice, Italy
What’s on your mind? Have you thought about where your thoughts are spent? Maybe this Monday morning it’s planning out your week, or revisiting some great moment of the weekend. Maybe you are already into your workday, and your thoughts are on the job. Wherever your thoughts are going, that’s your focus. And wherever you focus, that’s where your energy goes.
This important concept is not new or novel, but it’s one that has been brought home to me in new ways since living in Italy and moving back to the US. I discovered there is nothing like removing yourself from your regular routine for an extended period of time, and then putting yourself back into that routine, to show you where you’ve been spending your thoughts, and consequently, your energy. While in Italy, I had the opportunity to change my thought patterns in unexpected ways. I stopped worrying about some things that had filled my thoughts on (I realize now) a regular basis, such as my weight and money, and created space for new thoughts to arrive. Thoughts about creativity, and photography. Thoughts that have fundamentally shifted my approach to life, and consequently, my focus and energy.
I’ll give a very personal example, that perhaps many of you will identify with: my weight. Since my high school years, I have thought and worried, and at times obsessed, about my weight. Watching what I ate, comparing my body to some unrealistic ideal, always falling short. Dieting, exercising, always keeping my eye on that number on the scale, the size of the clothes. If it was high, I would berate myself. If it was low, I would be full of happiness. The happiness only lasted for the moment… maybe days or months, until the number crept up again.
Then I moved to Italy. My weight had slowly been increasing for years before the move, a stressful job at work, and then preparing for an international move had triggered my stressful eating behaviors. So as we moved to Italy, I packed my “skinny clothes” with the intent to focus on losing weight after the move. I can remember the moment, early on in my time in Italy, when I consciously decided to not worry about it. I looked at those skinny clothes, and said, “To hell with it.” I was not going to spend my time in Italy worrying about what I ate, or my weight. I instinctively knew this would adversely affect my experience. I wanted to experience my life and travels during my time in Italy unfettered. Without the stress and baggage that losing weight would represent. So I put the skinny clothes on a top, unreachable shelf in the wardrobe and put the scale away.
For the first time in over twenty years, I lived without the constant thoughts about my weight. For the first time, my self-worth was not affected by the number on the scale. Sure, my weight increased a bit over the two years but it eventually plateaued. What I gained was so much more than a few pounds though. I gained the space in my thoughts to think of other things… to explore my experience deeply, to discover the call of art and creativity and to see myself in a new way – as an artist. I discovered an almost limitless energy available to me when I focused my thoughts in alignment with my heart. I found an energetic creativity that has touched everything I do, since.
I did not clearly recognize this relationship between my thoughts and my energy until I moved back to the US. You see, in Italy, there was so much going on, it was hard to sort out all of the influences that led to my personal creative renaissance. I had held off the thoughts around weight and other topics by telling myself I would deal with them when I returned home. So guess what happened when I returned home… they came back. Funny thing about thoughts like this coming up after a long absence: you notice them. They are obvious and clear, and felt so out of place in my “new” self. For a time, I succumbed to them. It was easy, part of my “living in Oregon” routine. Then at some point, in those first few months back I stopped and faced those uncomfortable thoughts and said, “I don’t want you anymore. I’ve lived without you for two years, and now I see I don’t need you.” The problem was, I didn’t have the wonderful distraction of living abroad to keep them at bay. This time, I had to deal with them at a fundamental level.
So, I’ve slowly but surely been figuring out ways to deal with these topics as they come up. I’ve had to face each one and find strategies to change my thought patterns. My experience in Italy helped, because I knew the value of letting those thoughts go. I now recognized that these thoughts were draining my energy. It hasn’t been easy though, to define new ways to think while living back here in the old place and routine. Behavior and thought pattern change is hard.
It is also worth it. Because I have learned that were I focus my thoughts, my energy will follow. I want my energy focused on creative things. I want my energy focused on art and photography and empowerment and connection. Things that bring value to my life and to those around me. I imagine you want those same things too.
As with all of my Lessons from Abroad, I hope that you will be able to learn from this lesson along with me. Here are a few ideas, to help you along:
“>Intuitive Eating as a great fit for what I learned in Italy, so I’ve been reading and taking classes to consciously integrate a new approach to eating and weight.At the end of the day, all the matters is that each and everyone of us align our thoughts and our energy to our hearts. Imagine what our world would be like, if everyone did that. Right now, rather than changing the world, I’ll just settle for imagining my own life in this way.
