Abstract

Abstract photography is a field that leaves many puzzled as to what exactly it includes. The definition varies so much by photographer and gallery, it seems like there is no common ground whatsoever. Probably the most common reaction is, What is this supposed to mean? most abstract photographs aren't supposed to carry any particular meaning. Many intend to create a certain mood. For instance, cool colors, smooth lines and a soft focus may be intended to create a calming effect on the viewer.

Abstract photography is a process of using colours and patterns combined to create an image, with no true meaning or no clear subject involved. Abstract photography is not necessarily going to mean the same thing to everyone. and helps us concentrate on texture and colour rather than the whole subject.

The most common reaction to abstract photographer is probably an incredulous, curious, What is that? Many abstract photos have no clear or discernible subject, while others try and make the subject appear like an entirely unlike object.

Most abstract photographers focus on the everyday objects around them, familiar things that they show us through their third eye to be less familiar than we like to think.

Special attention to color is paid by abstract photographers. The use of color filters is a very common technique.

Another factor that many abstract photos have in common is close attention to texture. Repeating patterns are a favorite of many abstract photographers.

Abstract photography, because of the sheer amount of imagination and creativity involved in the process, also serves as an excellent exercise for photographers of other fields to help improve their craft in general, building skills in attention to detail, color and texture, and stretch the boundaries of their own personal style with experimentation. It's a wonderful type of photography to explore—try it for yourself.

Mark Raymond has a great collections on Abstract Photography.
Mark Raymond Mason

Collections of Abstract photographs

Abstract Photo

Take the help of Histogram

Working digitally has a number of benefits, one of the most important being that the colour, brightness and tonal values of the individual pixels that make up the image are recorded as soon as the image is taken.
These values can be reviewed in two ways on the camera's LCD screen - firstly, as the image itself and secondly as a graphic tonal represenattion which is known as a histogram.Being able to interpret histogram will help you to assess whether or not your image has the acceptable tonal value that make for a well exposed shot.

A histogram can normally be called up on the LCD screen on the back of your camera when shooting or playing back images. It is the form of graph where the x-axis (horizontal) represents the entire digital tonal range from black to white (0 - 255), while the y - axis (vertical) represents the number of pixels with a specific tonal value. The right side represents the maximum white values your camera can capture. On either end of the histogram the light values contain no detail. They are either completely black, or completely white. The top of the histogram (top of mountain peak) represents the number of different colors, a value you cannot control, so it is for your information only. We are mostly concerned with the left and right side values of the histogram, since we do have much control over those. (Dark vs. Light). An ideally exposed image would generate a symmetrical,humped shape histogram that smoothes gently out to the black and white points at either end of the histogram.

Below are some of the examples which will help you to understand Histogram.

As it is obvious this picture is underexposed and you can see in the histogram on the right corner of the picture. The pixels are bunched up on the left side of the histogram and there are very few pixels on the right side. This picture can be corrected by increasing exposure. This is discussed in previous blogs.

Same picture was taken with increased exposure and you can see in the histogram that pixels are spread more as compared to previous one and picture contains more detail.

This picture is overexposed. There are very few pixels in the dark areas (left side) and the pixels on the white side (right side) are climbing up the right hand border. This picture can be corrected by decreasing exposure as discussed in previous blogs.

These pictures are correctly exposed as all the pixels falls within the histogram range.

Next I will be dicussing about Composition