[MUSIC] Welcome back. Glad you're here and we're going to continue, this time talking about visual weight. Now before we get going here and I start talking about all these words that are up on the screen, let's take a little time out to reflect a bit. Your photographs are made up of many different components and your learning more about those things that we refer to as the visual elements in these lessons. In our module one journey we covered shape, and form, and texture, and tone, and pattern, and color, and so much more. Building the confidence to support your creativity through building your vocabulary is a phrase you recognize from past lessons I've shared. And certainly, if you were ever student of mine here at the Michigan State University Campus, you probably got kind of bored hearing me say that over and over again. But I'm pleased to pass that advice onto all of you in this bigger classroom that we call our world. As you gain an understanding of the terms of vocabulary that we're sharing, you'll gain in your ability to put them into action in pictures to the point where they become second nature to you. I've got confidence in all of you, even though we haven't met, because I'm a true believer in the amazing power of the human spirit, which is something we all share. That's true for all of you in this virtual classroom unless you are one of the many pets, who learners have written to tell me, enjoy listening to my voice and watching these lessons also. Let's get started with a new set of vocabulary terms, and I'll start of with visual weight. We all know what physical weight is. Especially if you're like me, and you get on the scale every morning, and sometimes you don't like what you see. Physical weight is measured in pounds, kilograms, and sometimes in gold. And relates to the force of gravity and how that force is exerted on any object. Visual weight is also related to the exertion of force. But instead of measuring it on a physical scale, we measure it on something much more complicated. The scale that measures all of the different things that can cause someone to be interested in something. Wow. That is a lot of things. For example, if you have ever visited New York City, you will be familiar with the push cart that is shown in this picture, and the brand name, Nathan's. It is a typical New York City hot dog cart, complete with the umbrella. And if you were like me and you find a Nathan's Hot Dog irresistible, then any photographer who creates a picture that has one of these carts in it is going to have to deal with the fact that many people will be attracted to that area in the picture because like me, they're interested in that cart. The photographer here did not choose to make an elaborate composition. In fact, the car and the houses and the empty space in the background could be seen as quite distracting. Unless of course, like me, you're so interested, so attracted to that hot dog cart, that you don't notice those distracting elements. My goodness. Even more attractive, to me, authentic New York City pizza. Well you may think that this and the last example are a bit silly, but I assure you that they are not. Just substitute your own favorite food vendor for the hot dog cart, or your own favorite food for the pizza. Well, if there really is anything better than New York style pizza, which I can't even imagine, and you'll quickly understand how much visual weight that vendor or that food would have. I bet your mouth is watering right now just thinking of it. Come on, you know it is true. It's that power of visual attractiveness and the many different reasons that people are interested in things, are attracted to them, that we need to assess, as artists, as photographers and make use of in our pictures. Whether a painter, printmaker, drawer or photographer working in two dimensional forms or a sculpture, or a or a mixed media artist working in three dimensions, the question for all artists is the same. How do I construct my work so that a viewer will be called to look more deeply and to look in the places that I want them to? What is the powerful and attractive thing that I'm going to ask them to view, to concentrate on? Well, right now for you viewing this lesson, that thing is me! Either where I am right here, or where I am in the picture. It's not because I'm a very attractive person, although I am often confused for Richard Gere. especially when I'm in New York City, and people are looking for stars on Fifth Avenue. No, I am attracted because like you, unless you're one of those pets watching this lesson, I am a human being. The number one most attractive element in any picture will be the human beings who are a part of the composition. Take a look at this image. Got it? Okay how long did it take before you realized that in that gray textured surface, there was a human face? I am 100% positive that it did not take very long at all. And that your mind's eye zoomed right in to examine this part of the picture. Isolating that human figure from everything else. Identifying it and weighing its importance. The visual elements come in to play in regard to visual weight in a very big way for two reasons. First, because it is the organization of those elements that in large part guide the viewer's gaze across the image. In another way, they're elements of visual weight themselves. Very powerful attractants all on their own. Here are some examples for you to consider, all of which you've seen before but might see with more emphasis now. Shape is our first visually native visual element. And you can easily see how your eyes immediately locked on to those two dimensionally rendered palm trees. Certainly color is a profoundly attractive element. When it presents two vibrantly contrasting aspects, and when it is coupled with the element of form, of three dimensionality. Colors that are warm, like a vibrant red and orange tend to be heavier. While colors that don't attract much attention,don't. You were probably immediately attracted to the textured cookie in the center, both for the fact that is something you want, like pizza, and that the element of texture is so strongly presented. Texture conveys a sense of three dimensionality in an object And that adds visual weight also. Tone has the visual weight to draw almost every viewer to the light areas in the picture, whether it's Hadrian's Arch, or the blur of headlights. Although, some studies tell us that it's darker values that have a lot of visual weight also. Well before you even grasp what this structure was, your eye was following that strong diagonal line from the lower left to the upper right. People in the arts, and in the sciences too who study such things, have identified further elements that affect the visual weight aspect in any picture and this one is related to a phrase that most of us are familiar with, size matters. As you might expect, large things tend to have more visual weight then small things. The orientation of an object is the visual weight determined as well. With those having more of a specific structure, such as the circle of this green foliage. No matter what the shape of the picture itself, being seen as more attractive and heavier. The placement of elements within the frame, can also affect their visual weight. Those that are placed higher are generally views as more attractive, but if the photograph is landscape in orientation, and in subject, as in this case, any elements that are large enough to be grasped in the foreground will outweigh background elements no matter how attractive they are. Now that we have all these weighty matters well in hand, you can start to look for such things as anchors for your pictures. Things that you balance as you create your compositions. Speaking of balance, that's the subject of the next lesson. [SOUND]
