V Is For Vignetting

From The Ashes

From The Ashes, April 2016 (The sculpture’s name is Leafy Phoenix)

 

Before discussing this term, I just have to drool over this sculpture- it’s at the Springfield (MA) Museum and is very cool – the windmill piece on the left spins in the breeze as do all the extensions, and there’s just something amazing about it. The colors definitely stand out, especially against the backdrop of the beige marble building, and the artist’s interpretation of the shape of a bird is very graceful. I’m not especially fond of modern art, but I would totally put this one in my backyard (if I had one!).

Ok so vignetting is underexposure at the edges of a photograph, and like so many other things in art, it can either be a mistake or an artistic effect. If it’s unintentional it can be caused by an improperly sized lens hood or by using too many filters at one time. Vignetting can also be used purposefully to draw the viewer’s attention to the center of a photograph and gives a gauze-y almost ethereal quality to an image.