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Lloyd Godman
Perceptive
Vision - Developing a Personal Style
Photographic
Syntax
In literature, Syntax refers to the way in which words are put together
to form sentences and phrases, it relates to the way text is constructed
to give meaning.
For instance the
words Green Olive, might carry the meaning of an olive fruit which is
not yet ripe. Where as the words Olive Green might mean a colour.
The word Syntactics
refers to the branch of semiotics that deals with the formal properties
of signs and symbols.
Generic
Syntax
Images carry an integral connection with the medium by which they were
made. While the subtleties of the technique can lie buried, they can
also be used to make crucial connections with the ideas behind the image.
While there is a generic visual syntax that is common to painting, printmaking
and photography etc. ( like the tones - Black & white, or portrait
and landscape formats), there is a specific syntax that relates directly
to a specific medium like photography.
Learn how an audience
will read the syntax in your images.
Format
Framing
Process
Perspective
Depth of field
Lighting
Out put –
Silver prints Digital, collage etc.
Personal Syntax
Many
photographers often use an aspect of this syntax as a personal
signature to their work or for a series of works, much the same
way a painter might use a certain palette of colours, scale
or apply paint in a certain style.
For
the continuing series of Summer Solstice works ( 1988 -) I
developed the use of a square format shot on a diagonal as
a stylistic means of relating each series.
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So
when we talk about the syntax of photography we mean:
*characteristics
of the medium that are selected or enhanced to construct an image to
have a certain aesthetic or look a certain way
* the
characteristics of the medium that have certain predicable effects on
a general audience
* or the
subtleties that might lie embedded in the image as symbols for a more
sophisticated informed audience
