The meaning of photography for me.

Photography is everywhere. When I walk through the streets of Berlin on a saturday afternoon, I have the impression that half of the population owns a digital SLR and the other half some kind of point and shoot camera. And everyone is snapping happily away. You can see the results on flickr.

Most of these images don’t mean anything to me. They may mean something to the people that have been shooting them or that are involved in some form.

Then there are images, that mean something to many people. What is the difference?

In my opinion it is not some form of golden ratios or a specific set of rules that has been followed each and every time religously. It is not entirely a visual thing as well. For me a good image is the result of meaning + shape + colour. An image doesn’t need to include all three elements, but it might be easier to reach a high result of emotional connection to any given image, if it incorporates every one of the three qualities.

Meaning - Meaning is something that an image can transport by evoking feelings, memories or desires. This is because our brains associate, reflect and process the content of an image based on experiences, knowledge and values that are the core of every personality viewing an image. Every image can transport a message to some degree. Different people have different minds and perceive different meanings with different intensity. Nevertheless I would say that pictures involving humans evoke the strongest and most consistent emotions among most people.

Shape - Shape is all about geometry, vantage points, lines, angles and proportions. We perceive certain forms as harmonic, while others don’t please our eyes.

Colour - The colour of an image is the third important ingredient. Is it in balance throughout the entire image? Are there contrasts, that lead our eyes, that feel good or bad?

Let me give you some examples here (it doesn’t mean that the specific images lack one or the other quality, it does only mean that the mentioned qualities are so dominant, that I feel these are responsible for me beeing connected to the picture)

meaning + shape + color