The Rule of Thirds… It is mostly used when cholesterol-free/low salt pizza — with whole wheat dough — is made. Three pieces of whole wheat flat bread are placed on a pizza pan (which is a dandy rule of thirds). Then the Golden Ratio takes effect, wherein (after the no-salt sauce is spread and non-fat cheese is sprinkled) golden canola oil is placed over each of the three circular sections. (Green olives are also added, in halves, in measured proportion.)
So many of us, as photographers, are concerned about proper proportion in our photos. That proportion deals with the relationship of visual elements to each other and to the whole. If we succeed in arranging the the contents of our photos through the usage of wise judgement, we may produce excellent photographic end products. The real tragedy as photographers, however, would be that our photographs have correct balance and relationship to the whole… while our minds do not. If one’s photographs are balanced, yet one’s mind is not, what is the point? Really!
So many minds are not balanced; and their relationship to the whole is distorted and askew. Where there is needless conflict, friction, and fragmentation — in terms of the mind — there is no deep balance, integrity, no real proportion; then there is needless separation. So many of us — just as we did in extremely primitive times — continue to think that we are separate from our thoughts, separate from our perceptions. We were taught that we are at some separate center that controls thought and thinking from a distance. It’s like one antenna of an insect maintaining that it is separate from the other antenna (and is its “controller.”) When one embraces antiquated, fragmentary teachings and adamantly remains with (and “as”) them in mental blindness for an entire lifetime, where is the beauty and balance in that?… where is the proportion and symmetry in that?
Moving to a sense of proportion. Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2015
