discussion

Formal element, illustrated discussion.

The formal elements are elements that we walk past everyday without realising they are even there.
Things as simple as lines, colour and patterns, form, movement, tone, depth, reflection and shape, that we walk past everyday are taken into great consideration when it comes to taking a'good' photograph. These formal elements are very useful for photographers and artists when i comes to describing the pictures they have taken as everyone has different views and different perceptions of what they see, so it is useful as the photographer is able to explain what they are seeing.

In this picture we can see the lines that separate the road down the middle. These are an example of lines that we see everyday and pay almost know attention to, we only really notice these lines when they are photographed in examples like this one. Line are a very important formal element as they make up everything we see and there is a very wide variation of lines, such as straight, curved, thick or thin and they tend to go unnoticed by a lot of people.
Colour is an important formal element in photography as the colour of the picture can help dictate the way the person looking at it feels. For example if the photograph contained bright colours than i usually is meant to be a positive image and if the photograph used mainly dark colours or muted colours it seems quite sad. Of course this isn't always true but in some cases it is. For example in this picture, ignoring the two brightly coloured people in the foreground, the background seems quite dull and quite boring but with the brightly coloured people in the foreground it makes the picture look happier and more interesting.
A third formal element in photography is pattern. Like lines, pattern is another important element that cane found anywhere but often goes unnoticed. There are two types of patterns that can be found, natural and man-made. An example of a man-made pattern could be
a brick wall. The brick have been put together to form a stable
structure but to a photographer it forms a pattern, A natural example of a pattern could be the pattern on a fish. The patterns of animals are often repeated, for their own benefit but again, for a photographer it forms a pattern. Natural patterns are often random pattern, for example stones on a beach,these stone form a pattern as the stones a replicated, however as they have not been put there intentionally or in a specific order it is a natural pattern as people have had no input on how it should be set out or how it should look.
Form and shape are other examples of important formal element as they gives the photographer the ability to make an object in a two dimensional picture appear to be three dimensional. The

photographer does this through their use if light (be in natural light or not). By using light on they object being photographed, it created shadows in the hollows of the object of around the object, this means that the once two dimensional object will appear to be three dimensional as we can see that it is three dimensional in real life, but through a photograph.

Overall all of the Formal elements are equally important to a photographer as each of the elements require great attention to detail and can all be used together to take a really good photograph. Most of the formal element are everyday things that are often overlooked, which is why they are so important to a photographer because with the right combination of the formal elements the photograph can look how they photographer want it too as natural or unnatural as they want it to and can be used to help the photographer describe the picture they have taken in great detail.