Comments on: How an image plays a song http://alexwilsonphoto.com/blog/2008/03/27/how-an-image-plays-a-song/ figure · form · fine art Fri, 21 Nov 2008 16:40:57 +0000 By: Alex Wilson http://alexwilsonphoto.com/blog/2008/03/27/how-an-image-plays-a-song/#comment-18380 Alex Wilson Fri, 28 Mar 2008 17:45:06 +0000 http://alexwilsonphoto.com/blog/2008/03/27/how-an-image-plays-a-song/#comment-18380 First, the abstract level: To continue the analogy, I think you could say the image just provides the score, but the performance is up to the viewer -- how their eye moves over the image will determine how the song gets played. The eye tracking studies show that people look at the same image in very different ways if, say, they are given certain task when looking at the image. As that song plays out, the viewer ends up with that song playing -- it might be soothing and harmonious, or jarring and chaotic. As an image creator I can do try to make the score easier or harder to play, but the end performance is out of my hands. Analogy aside, as the eye tracks through the image, the brain must process the undulating changes in tone. The stronger the image hierarchy, the more viewers that will process it in a similar fashion and get a similar experience. But I think this happens at a very subconscious level, regardless of whether the viewer is trying to interact with the abstract layer. Certainly artists and photographers and savvy viewers may be a bit more aware of those elements, but I think the song is there for all viewers merely as part of the process of viewing. In addition to the narrative it provides, the object layer can force the viewer's mind into a particular context. Which will in turn skew the performance of the song -- both by changing the eye tracking, and providing an emotional context to associate it with. First, the abstract level:

To continue the analogy, I think you could say the image just provides the score, but the performance is up to the viewer — how their eye moves over the image will determine how the song gets played. The eye tracking studies show that people look at the same image in very different ways if, say, they are given certain task when looking at the image. As that song plays out, the viewer ends up with that song playing — it might be soothing and harmonious, or jarring and chaotic. As an image creator I can do try to make the score easier or harder to play, but the end performance is out of my hands. Analogy aside, as the eye tracks through the image, the brain must process the undulating changes in tone. The stronger the image hierarchy, the more viewers that will process it in a similar fashion and get a similar experience.

But I think this happens at a very subconscious level, regardless of whether the viewer is trying to interact with the abstract layer. Certainly artists and photographers and savvy viewers may be a bit more aware of those elements, but I think the song is there for all viewers merely as part of the process of viewing.

In addition to the narrative it provides, the object layer can force the viewer’s mind into a particular context. Which will in turn skew the performance of the song — both by changing the eye tracking, and providing an emotional context to associate it with.

]]> By: cklarock http://alexwilsonphoto.com/blog/2008/03/27/how-an-image-plays-a-song/#comment-18378 cklarock Fri, 28 Mar 2008 16:29:14 +0000 http://alexwilsonphoto.com/blog/2008/03/27/how-an-image-plays-a-song/#comment-18378 I like your analogy. It's always interesting to me that the vast majority of people are willing to enjoy the abstraction of music, but claim to be left at a loss by the abstraction of visual arts. Photographs (or representational paintings) exist on two levels -- the level of object, speaking to that part of the brain that recognizes and categorizes things; "that is a picture of a crack-pipe." If you put that object into other contexts, you get narrative. "why is it lying in a puddle in the street? Where is the crackhead who was smoking it?" At another level, c'est ne pas une crack pipe; it's a series of tones on a paper that form a composition -- this is the abstraction layer. Every artist or photographer spends most of his time dealing with this layer, and you could suggest that the most saavy viewers do as well. But most people refuse to interact with the abstraction layer in visual arts. Why is this? Because our eyes are our primary identifier? Because we want to use vision to organize and categorize our world? I like your analogy. It’s always interesting to me that the vast majority of people are willing to enjoy the abstraction of music, but claim to be left at a loss by the abstraction of visual arts.

Photographs (or representational paintings) exist on two levels — the level of object, speaking to that part of the brain that recognizes and categorizes things; “that is a picture of a crack-pipe.” If you put that object into other contexts, you get narrative. “why is it lying in a puddle in the street? Where is the crackhead who was smoking it?”

At another level, c’est ne pas une crack pipe; it’s a series of tones on a paper that form a composition — this is the abstraction layer. Every artist or photographer spends most of his time dealing with this layer, and you could suggest that the most saavy viewers do as well.

But most people refuse to interact with the abstraction layer in visual arts.

Why is this? Because our eyes are our primary identifier? Because we want to use vision to organize and categorize our world?

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