Right(Write)Down the Line

A few years ago, I spent the summer working as a conversational English instructor in Sapporo, Japan. One day while preparing for class, I was stunned to see ubiquitous designated as a vocabulary word for that lesson--even I had to pull out the dictionary and look it up! I discovered it meant "everywhere, all the time", and lately when thinking of photography and its relationship to the 6 elements of design(which will be covered in detail in a future post), I've realized there's another word that embodies that definition. Whether they're powerful and strong(vertical), or peaceful and tranquil(horizontal), or dynamic and energetic(diagonal), your images wouldn't exist without the presence and qualities afforded by lines. Compositionally speaking, lines are the graphic unifier or building blocks of any photograph or work of art, for that matter. Good photographers see pictures everywhere they look, but they also notice the importance of lines--they're ubiquitous!