New Leaves, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
The image above may appear a mild abstraction on a natural scene, some curling leaves fringed in red and blue. But put on a pair of old-fashioned 3-D glasses, with a red filter over the left eye and a cyan filter over the right eye, and a window opens up in your monitor, offering a view down upon a sensuous early spring plant, reaching towards you from a vivid texture of dirt and twigs.
Last year’s post, Shapes of Things, featured stereoscopic photographs I took seventeen years ago, in 1993. This year I’ve been taking new ones, now using the Canon G11 that I usually carry with me as I move about the city going to jobs and visiting friends. To take a 3D or stereo photograph, I just take one shot, then move the camera a few inches to the right and take another. I use free software called Stereo Photo Maker to align them and to convert them to various viewing formats. For these samples on the blog, I’ve chosen to use the “gray anaglyph” format, for viewing with traditional anaglyphic 3D glasses. If you don’t have a pair, you can get one for free at this site. Ask for Red/Cyan Anaglyph 3D Glasses.
Snow Tree, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
Here, a snow-covered winter tree spreads elegantly in front of an apartment building, while below a bare tree adds its complexity to an otherwise geometrical landscape. The branching patterns of trees resemble the neurons in the brain, as well as the patterns formed by electrical discharges such as lightning. Although they form much more slowly, trees express the same motion of formation as these examples of instant impulse.
Treeburst, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
Old trees can express as much character in their trunks as in their branches or leaves. This one’s had the initials of generations carved into it.
Elder Tree, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
Below is an early, tripartite stage of something that might one day fuse into something as majestically bumpy as the one above.
Trunk Trio, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
Here’s an old tree that has been hollowed by rot into a sort of vertical canoe form.
Tree Shell, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
Rolling hills and trees reaching and leaning in all directions create a dynamic spatial environment that makes the experience of walking through woods invigorating in any season.
Downhill, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
Garden, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
Here you can see the form of a hedge in early spring. Last year’s leaves are broad and flat, dark and shiny. Newer leaves, lighter and much smaller, sprout in clusters from among the old leaves.
Sprouting Hedge, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
We’ll turn now to the shapes of man-made things, letting this shop window with potted plants behind a neon sign serve as a segue.
Qi Gong Tui-Na, 2010, photo by Fred Hatt
Shop windows are a natural subject for stereo photography, since we look through them into enclosed places where objects have been composed in spatial arrangement.
Pastry Shop, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
Lamp Store, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
The window below has been decorated with a huge transparent photographic image, which we look through to see a dress on display within the open space of the store.
Calvin Klein Store, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
This antique store has arranged a family of wooden manikins on a leather upholstered bench.
Manikins, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
Instead of looking through a glass window, we can look through a steel mesh gate to see the receding space of a narrow passageway.
Passageway, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
This chain-link fence slides on a track to let trucks in and out of a loading dock. The framework of the gate produces a beautiful geometric shadow.
Rolling Gate, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
This frame was put up to support multiple billboards. It’s now being a bit under-utilized.
Sign Frame, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
Here, a huge, mottled block supports a cast-iron bannister for a set of brownstone steps adorned with a ratty carpet.
Stoop Steps, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
A construction shovel is another rough form on a residential street.
Shovel, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
The rough form below reminded me of an aging roué with a young mistress.
Beauty and the Beast, 2010, stereo photo by Fred Hatt
I find that looking at 3D photographs makes me more aware of three dimensional form and texture, and the topological complexity of the landscape, aspects of the world we may often overlook.
