Edward Munch, The Scream(172kb)
When we look at an image our eye travels around the frame exploring the contents. Direction will play key role in our understanding the meaning of this image. The amount and type of motion created by various shapes and lines can convey different emotional states and the direction of that motion will contribute the intensity of the emotional response. For example in Edward Munch's painting, The Scream, the viewer not only responds to the grotesque and strong shapes and lines, but also the numerous directions in which those lines move.
Edward Munch, The Scream(172kb)
There is not a strong sense of movement in one direction so that the end result is chaos. Direction, perhaps more than any other point, demands an understanding of the other nine points in order to be fully understood. It may also be said that direction is simultaneously inherent in and an extension of at least line, shape, scale, dimension, and motion, in that each of these other points exhibits and makes possible the phenomenon of direction. Direction is primarily inherent in shapes, as a fundamental component of a shapes existence. The direction of a shape can be vertical, diagonal, or curved.
A viewer's primary scan of an image is along the vertical then horizontal axis. This is how the eye picks up the most basic information from an image. Now, if diagonal direction is substituted for horizontal and vertical direction the image will feel less stable. This is because the diagonal direction is one that conveys a feeling of movement, excitement, and change.
Diagonals are the most dynamic directions, for they can suggest a strong feeling of imbalance and motion. A left to right incline is associated with an ordinary graph, lower left indicating inferiority, upper right indicating superiority or dominance. This diagonal is commonly used in visual communication because it is so accessible to a viewer. On the other hand, a left to right decline will feel less stable to the viewer because it is perceived as "downhill". This is also a very suggestive visual manipulation.
Curved direction also has an element of instability in it, but unlike diagonals, it also has the ability to be reassuring and safe. The amount of reassurance we derive from the curved direction is dependent on how curved the direction is; a curve that makes a full circle is much more encompassing than a curve that is shallow. A circle is a virtual visual trap. Once the eye has picked up the curve of a circle, it will inevitably become trapped within the path of the circle and importance will be placed on anything inside.
--Press play to see 1.1 Mb animation.Whereas a curve has a definite beginning and end, thus leading the eye optionally in either direction. On the whole though, the curved direction adds an element of softness because of its lack of angles.
Triangles serve a similar function to circles in that they trap the eye within a specific sub- frame. Unlike the circle, the triangle is created by three different points in the image. In this photograph by Naomi Savage, the three points of the triangle are defined by the tulip, the hand, and the crook of the elbow. Savage is using this shape not only to make our eye travel around the frame but also to give it dynamic motion through the use of diagonal eye movement. A hierarchy is created by the highest point of the triangle and relationships between the separate items which may be defined by their respective angles.
Beyond these two dimensional manifestations of direction, there is also depth, which may be seen as an extension through the third dimension of any curve, diagonal, vertical, or horizontal. Most objects, after all, exist in three dimensions, not two, and move through three dimensions, not two. Certainly, the opening shot of Star Wars, in which a massive space craft zooms overhead and recedes into a distant field of stars, does not follow a strictly horizontal, vertical, curved, or diagonal direction. Similarly, the ship is not strictly made up of flat verticals, horizontals, diagonals, and cures, but verticals, horizontals, diagonals, and curves enhanced by the third dimension. Of course, in reality the ship does not penetrate the flat surface of the screen, but we perceive it to move away from us, in a direction that is more than simply two dimensional.
Introduction