Lesson 112 - Four ramens (Repetiotion of visual patterns is one of the ways how to achieve rhytm in photography. A small, odd number of objects, such as three, is usually recommended by experts.) [ see also Lesson 111 (rhytm of five) ]
Lesson 113 - Landscape ("I'm inviting the spirits into my photography." - Hiroshi Sugimoto)
Lesson 114 - My home town (Lead room is the space in front of moving subjects. Well-composed shots leave more space in the direction the subject is facing or moving, because that is what human eye expects to percieve the motion. [ see also Lesson 101 {negative space} ]
Lesson 115 - Le Gobelin (Michel Eugène Chevreul, a French chemist responsible for developing the colour wheel of primary and intermediary hues, worked as the director of the dye works at Les Gobelins tapestry works in Paris, where he noticed that the perceived colour of a particular thread was influenced by its surrounding threads.)
Lesson 116 - Eyes wide shut (Use polarizing filter to manage reflections, supress glare and darken the sky.)
Lesson 117 - Electrical engineering (Leading lines refers to a technique of composition where the viewer of your photos attention is drawn to lines that lead to the main subject of the image)
Lesson 118 - Landscape (Perspective in photography refers to the dimension of objects and the spatial relationship between them within an image.)
Lesson 119 - Fruit street vendor (A good street photo needs a clearly defined subject.)
Lesson 120 - Christmas time in Miami (Shooting from behind is a good way to avoid interactions in street photograhy. Except for cautious old ladies, they eventually notice everything.)
Lesson 121 - Punto Rojo (I landed on the Isla San Cristobal at noon and quickly hired a taxi to go to the mountain lake in west coast. The sky was dark, it was raining, and the taxi driver said the mountain will probably be all covered in clouds. Suddenly I saw a red building by the road. I yelled at the driver to stop, explaining him in my poor Spanish that I love the colors and I want to go there and take a picture. The driver shook his head in disapproval. “Of course, I can stop, senor, but it is not worth it. It’s too early, the ladies will only come after dark.” Sometimes it is the story behind a photo, that is more interesting, sometimes they both suck.)
Lesson 122 - Young forest (Depth of field (DOF) is the distance between the closest and farthest objects in a photo that appears acceptably sharp. It should be used consciously to support the mood and message of the photo. [ For better examples see also Lesson 7 - shallow DOF and Lesson 42 - large DOF ])
Lesson 123 - In the guitar store (Mixing two light sources and two hobbies together is just too much.)
Lesson 124 - Garden (Underexposed)
Lesson 125 - In the temple ruins (The period of time shortly before sunrise and shortly after sunset is called the magic hour. Magic hour occurs between the golden and the blue hour, and it usually takes minutes only.)
Lesson 126 - Unicorn (The choice of perspective can dramatically change the perception of the image. Many photographers fall into the trap of shooting at eye-level only, while others fall into the opposite trap.) [ See also Lesson 5 (low angle) ]
Lesson 127 - Raindrops (Using flash in severe weather causes flares.) [ Of course, see also Lesson 23 (snow) and Lesson 22 (glass) ]
Lesson 128 - Xenomorph ("I like elegance. I like art nouveau; a stretched line or curve. These things are very much in the foreground of my work." - H. R. Giger)
Lesson 129 - Terminal stop ("Art has no place in modern life. It will continue to exist as long as there is a mania for the romantic and so long as there are people who love beautiful lies and deception ... Every modern cultured man must wage war against art, as against opium ... Photograph and be photographed." - Alexander Rodchenko on constructivism in 1920s)
Lesson 130 - Work in progress ("As beautiful as the chance encounter of a sewing machine and an umbrella on an operating table." - Lautréamont, Les Chants de Maldoror) [ See also Lesson 19 (minimalistic surrealism) ]
Lesson 131 - Hard-key (“I can get - for me - a far greater sense of ‘color’ through a well-planned and executed black-and-white image than I have ever achieved with color photography.” - Ansel Adams)
Lesson 132 - Five levels (Pastel colors have a high white compoent mixed in and they look soft and pale. It is necessary to choose the right medium or filter in order to differentiate all the patel tones that our eye perceives well.)
Lesson 133 - Anchorage, Alaska (Achieving the right sense of scale is important in landscape photography. Technical components like focal length, reference point, composition and framing should be used to hint the right size and distance of objects.)
Lesson 134 - In the Bund (Photographs in a collection should be selected in a way that they convey a story, deliver the meaning surpassing individual pictures. Using mere visual similarity is not a good key to order any collection. [See also Lesson 133])
Lesson 135 - Pier 24, San Francisce ("Colour is descriptive, black and white is interpretive" - Elliott Erwitt.)
Lesson 136 - Dancers (Arrangement of people in group portrait deserves a special attention to interaction of poses and overlapping body parts such as arms and hands.)
Lesson 137 - Red Leaf (Disruptive shadows, especially in technical photography, can be avoided by choosing the right light angle and distant, monochormatic backgound.)
Lesson 138 - I remember you well in the Chelsea hotel (Shooting against the sun results in overblown sky and poorly lit main subject.)
Lesson 139 - Ljubljana (The nature of the light has a key influence on the atmosphere - a calm theme calls for a tranquil light, while a dramatic motif needs dynamic and sharp light.)
Lesson 140 - Galway (The main subject of the picture, be it a detail in the foreground or a distant background scene, should be properly focused to draw attention.)
Lesson 141 - Las Vegas 2000 (Pictures from early digital cameras with resolution as low as 1 megapixel, high level of digital noise, and muted matt colours, have a very distinctive retro-look today.)
Lesson 142 - Pink is the city (“Great art is the outward expression of an inner life in the artist, and this inner life will result in his personal vision of the world.” - Edward Hopper. Sometimes the inner life can be empty and dull.) [See also Lesson 97 (empty) and Lesson 41 (dull)]
Lesson 143 - Tokyo-Beijing-Hanoi-Paris-New York (Uninteresting sight. The reason why we take the shot can be reinforced by choosing an unusual point of view that can present an ordinary scene in a new perspective.)
Lesson 144 - Ghats (“The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new.” - Samuel Beckett, Murphy)
Lesson 145 - Acapulco (Spoiling Sugimoto seascapes. "Hiroshi has photographed many other seas over the years, but only when he has something new to say." - Jeffrey Fraenkel)
Lesson 146 - This is not my beatiful house (White sky without clouds. A neutral density filter, or yellow filter for black and white photography, can be used to get pronounced clouds.) [see also Lesson 91 (Clouds)]
Lesson 147 - Venice (A fear to approach the main motif directly.) [See also Lesson 59 (point of view)]
Lesson 148 - Colonia Tovar (Desenzitizing dyes added to developer, such as pinacryptol green or basic scarlet, cause coloured haze of the emulsion. It can be easily removed by a bath in two percent acetic acid solution.)
Lesson 149 - Fly me to the Moon (The theme is shot from a large distance, it is blurred and unclear.)
Lesson 150 - Close encounters (Getting a proper exposure is the main challenge of night photography.)
Lesson 151 - Eternity (The indecisive moment) [See also Lesson 2 (the decisive moment)]
Lesson 152 - Abandoned game ("Only describe, don't explain.”
― Ludwig Wittgenstein)
Lesson 153 - It's so cold in Alaska (“Landscape photography is the supreme test of the photographer - and often the supreme disappointment. ” - Ansel Adams)
Lesson 154 - Alms bowl maker (A photograph should connect with a viewer on an emotional level, but the border with emotional blackmail is thin.)
Lesson 155 - La Guardia ("A Coke is a Coke and no amount of money can get you a better Coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the Cokes are the same and all the Cokes are good.” - Andy Warhol)
Lesson 156 - Dos girasoles (Triadic colors are evenly spaced on the color wheel scheme creating harmonious but vibrant feeling. Supressing one or two of them is necessary to achieve tranquility.)
Lesson 157 - Memories of Hilo, Hawaii (The pictures vanish in time. Usually this is caused by insufficiently washed positives.)
Lesson 158 - Playground (“The difference between hope and despair is a different way of telling stories from the same facts.” ― Alain de Botton)
Lesson 159 - Yamaha Strašnice (In order to achieve mirroring effect from shiny surfaces, one should carefully align the angles.)
Lesson 160 - The knees ("I like the aestthetics of the Church." - Andres Serrano, author of Piss Christ)
Lesson 161 - Empire of light ("Everything we see hides another thing, we always want to see what is hidden by what we see." - Rene Magritte )
Lesson 162 - Geometry of the bridge (Pierced last frame - error of the counter or film transport mechanism.)
Lesson 163 - Experimental residence hall (Direct frontal light makes subject look flat.)
Lesson 164 - Film still (“People are so wonderful that a photographer has only to wait for that breathless moment to capture what he wants on film.” – Weegee)
Lesson 165 - Gala dinner back-room (Documentaty photography should tell a story through emotions. Emotions are in faces and gestures.) [See also Lesson 83 (emotions)]
Lesson 166 - Bus station (Framing is a compositional technique that draws attention to a subject using elements of the picture as a frame. It provides context, leads eye to the subject, creates sense of depth and layers, and can justify even a blunt shot.)
Lesson 167 - At the junction of South connecting road and Sterboholy radial road (Diagonal lines bring tension and motion to the picture. We enter the frame and leave it in one zig-zag swipe as quick as the steam in the pipeline.) [See also Lesson 34 (diagonal) and Lesson 117 (leading diagonal)]
