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10/08/2010 01:40:02 AM · #51 |
Originally posted by posthumous:
I'm not a huge fan of Van Gogh, though I do appreciate some of his work. But his work is based on flatness. If you do love his work, it is because of the flatness of it. He put the stars at your fingertips. For some student to put those stars back into the unreachable night sky is just... well... ridiculous. |
No ridiculous is stopping with just those. Why not also fix his self-portraits to accurately reflect his response to those enhancements...
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10/08/2010 01:44:44 AM · #52 |
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10/08/2010 10:55:34 AM · #53 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
That's why I asked. Maybe he was obsessed with two-dimensions? (in which case one could then make the argument that making his art suddenly look three-dimensional is antithetical to what he stood for.) |
Thanks, Don. I had thought it sounded like you felt it was particularly egregious that the student had picked Van Gogh and now I understand why. Learned something...as long as you are right. ;) |
It's not about being right. Right or wrong, if my opinion generates a reaction from you, be it for or against, then learning occurs, possibly to both of us.
I appreciate your honest inquiry for more information very much. |
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10/08/2010 11:00:31 AM · #54 |
| I'm used to dealing with prickly individuals.... :D I'm also never afraid to ask questions out of fear of looking stupid. |
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10/08/2010 11:15:53 AM · #55 |
| I like Van Gogh's work for the vibrancy of his paintings, the colors, the textures, the flowing shapes. I don't think it has much to do with "flatness" at all for me. Maybe that's why none of this kind of "desecration" is offensive to me, mildly interesting at most, but nothing I'd get excited about one way or the other. |
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10/08/2010 11:35:46 AM · #56 |
Originally posted by posthumous:
Do you really think that it had not occurred to artists that you can make part of the canvas blurry and other parts sharp? |
When I was going to bed last night something kept turning over in the back of my brain. Why would the artists of the time use this technique to invoke a 3-D effect? The blurred background/foreground is a product of a camera lens with a shallow DOF and is not at all the way the human eye works (and brain interprets). The human eye essentially has an infinite DOF since it's constantly refocusing and the brain inteprets the scene as a whole.
Were artists really using this technique to invoke a 3-D effect at the time? Do we have any examples? |
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10/08/2010 12:47:36 PM · #57 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
Originally posted by posthumous:
Do you really think that it had not occurred to artists that you can make part of the canvas blurry and other parts sharp? |
When I was going to bed last night something kept turning over in the back of my brain. Why would the artists of the time use this technique to invoke a 3-D effect? The blurred background/foreground is a product of a camera lens with a shallow DOF and is not at all the way the human eye works (and brain interprets). The human eye essentially has an infinite DOF since it's constantly refocusing and the brain inteprets the scene as a whole.
Were artists really using this technique to invoke a 3-D effect at the time? Do we have any examples? |
Man, I really wish I knew the answer to this off the top of my head. Boy, would that make me look smart. I know it was tempting for an artist of the time to use a wide DOF because they had no reason not to. They certainly weren't using the exaggerated effect of Tilt-Shift. In fact, that effect might be appropriate for an Ingres. I would still find it a bore, but Ingres might have liked it. |
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10/08/2010 01:16:38 PM · #58 |
Originally posted by posthumous:
...The blurred background/foreground is a product of a camera lens with a shallow DOF and is not at all the way the human eye works (and brain interprets). The human eye essentially has an infinite DOF since it's constantly refocusing and the brain inteprets the scene as a whole.
Were artists really using this technique to invoke a 3-D effect at the time? Do we have any examples? |
The human eye has a focal length of about 22mm; the DoF is not infinite, so when we focus on a near object, much more distant objects will be OOF. But more importantly, when we focus on something near, the background can appear doubled because of parallax (the sight lines of our eyes are not parallel). Finally, the resolution of the retina falls off dramatically outside the central area, so things that are outside of your point of concentration will always look fuzzy, regardless of distance.
I have no idea if artists prior to the age of photography used DoF to produce a 3D effect. I'd love to know the answer to that question... |
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10/08/2010 01:28:42 PM · #59 |
Originally posted by kirbic:
Originally posted by posthumous:
...The blurred background/foreground is a product of a camera lens with a shallow DOF and is not at all the way the human eye works (and brain interprets). The human eye essentially has an infinite DOF since it's constantly refocusing and the brain inteprets the scene as a whole.
Were artists really using this technique to invoke a 3-D effect at the time? Do we have any examples? |
The human eye has a focal length of about 22mm; the DoF is not infinite, so when we focus on a near object, much more distant objects will be OOF. But more importantly, when we focus on something near, the background can appear doubled because of parallax (the sight lines of our eyes are not parallel). Finally, the resolution of the retina falls off dramatically outside the central area, so things that are outside of your point of concentration will always look fuzzy, regardless of distance.
I have no idea if artists prior to the age of photography used DoF to produce a 3D effect. I'd love to know the answer to that question... |
Also keep in mind that Van Gogh is *in* the age of photography, not prior. In fact, I believe it was photography that pushed artists toward abstraction. |
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10/08/2010 01:44:44 PM · #60 |
Originally posted by posthumous:
Originally posted by kirbic:
Originally posted by posthumous:
...The blurred background/foreground is a product of a camera lens with a shallow DOF and is not at all the way the human eye works (and brain interprets). The human eye essentially has an infinite DOF since it's constantly refocusing and the brain inteprets the scene as a whole.
Were artists really using this technique to invoke a 3-D effect at the time? Do we have any examples? |
The human eye has a focal length of about 22mm; the DoF is not infinite, so when we focus on a near object, much more distant objects will be OOF. But more importantly, when we focus on something near, the background can appear doubled because of parallax (the sight lines of our eyes are not parallel). Finally, the resolution of the retina falls off dramatically outside the central area, so things that are outside of your point of concentration will always look fuzzy, regardless of distance.
I have no idea if artists prior to the age of photography used DoF to produce a 3D effect. I'd love to know the answer to that question... |
Also keep in mind that Van Gogh is *in* the age of photography, not prior. In fact, I believe it was photography that pushed artists toward abstraction. |
I thought perhaps he was, BUT was he in the age where lenses had any sort of large aperture that would produce a blurred background? I don't know the answer to that.
Fritz, I am sure you are correct, but I think you miss one important point, how that all gets interpreted by the brain. The eye is constantly refocusing on near and far objects and the brain composites the two images to produce a much larger virtual DOF. We would never see the world in the way the art student transformed the pictures. The parallax cues that you mentioned are far more important.
In fact, I've wondered how a person who has never seen macro photography would interpret the images as the blurring probably is a better illusion for minaturization (because minatures are usually photographed with a macro lens which produces an image like this). |
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10/08/2010 02:01:35 PM · #61 |
Originally posted by kirbic:
The human eye has a focal length of about 22mm; the DoF is not infinite, so when we focus on a near object, much more distant objects will be OOF. |
I thought it was closer to 50-60mm, hence the common usage of a 50mm prime as a portrait lens ... as someone pointed out, we don't have an infinite DOF, but we (usually) re-focus so fast when shifting from FG to BG object the brain probably interprets it as if it were ... |
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10/08/2010 03:20:58 PM · #62 |
Originally posted by GeneralE:
I thought it was closer to 50-60mm, hence the common usage of a 50mm prime as a portrait lens ... |
Take a look at this page; there is a wealth of information about the properties of the human eye. Keep in mind these are the standardized or typical values, and individuals do vary from the standard.
Originally posted by GeneralE:
...as someone pointed out, we don't have an infinite DOF, but we (usually) re-focus so fast when shifting from FG to BG object the brain probably interprets it as if it were ... |
Actually, it's pretty easy to concentrate on a nearby object, say, two or three feet away, and still notice the appearance of the background (without re-focusing). It does in fact appear somewhat OOF, but more importantly it is doubled. Some folks *might* not perceive it as doubled, depending on their personal "dominance" of one eye over the other.
ETA: forgot link :-P
Message edited by author 2010-10-08 15:21:25. |
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10/08/2010 03:43:46 PM · #63 |
Originally posted by kirbic:
Originally posted by GeneralE:
I thought it was closer to 50-60mm, hence the common usage of a 50mm prime as a portrait lens ... |
Take a look at this page; there is a wealth of information about the properties of the human eye. Keep in mind these are the standardized or typical values, and individuals do vary from the standard. |
Nice link! So, most P&S cameras (usually about 24mm at the wide end) should take a picture with approximately the same properties as what you'd see standing at that location? |
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10/08/2010 03:48:19 PM · #64 |
I'd like to chime in once more to make it extremely clear that for me, and I'd imagine most, this has nothing at all to do with Van Gogh. He is not some sacred artist. He slopped around a brush like many others and I love his work, but that is not at all the point.
An art student has used a software program (honestly about three clicks) to alter existing works, and is publicizing the hell out of it to promote herself. If that isn't the most egregious stomping on shoulders I do not know what is. Yeah, yeah, it's all in good fun. So why is it all over the Internet? Is it really that new and interesting? No. I think what she's learning in art school is the manipulation of social media. |
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10/08/2010 04:03:22 PM · #65 |
Originally posted by kirbic:
Originally posted by GeneralE:
I thought it was closer to 50-60mm, hence the common usage of a 50mm prime as a portrait lens ... |
Take a look at this page; there is a wealth of information about the properties of the human eye. Keep in mind these are the standardized or typical values, and individuals do vary from the standard. |
I always thought of my eyes as more of a 24-50mm zoom. Especially when good looking gals are around... |
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10/08/2010 04:09:42 PM · #66 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
... Especially when good looking gals are around... |
Maybe you got that idea from seeing Who Framed Roger Rabbit ... ;-)
BTW: I thought lust was on the big no-no list ... ? |
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10/08/2010 04:46:11 PM · #67 |
Originally posted by GeneralE:
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
... Especially when good looking gals are around... |
Maybe you got that idea from seeing Who Framed Roger Rabbit ... ;-)
BTW: I thought lust was on the big no-no list ... ? |
Lust? No thanks. I'm just enjoying God's creation. To quote Bill Cosby, "God called Eve "woman" because when he made her He said, "wooo! Man!"" |
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10/08/2010 05:09:44 PM · #68 |
| I call first dibs on Ansel Adams works!!! |
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10/08/2010 05:21:44 PM · #69 |
Originally posted by rugman1969:
I call first dibs on Ansel Adams works!!! |
You should print one and make it into a diorama! |
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