“Previsualization” And The Creative Process Of Photography

Note: I have written about the creative process in photography many times before. This is another take on how it can work.

 “Previsualization” And The Creative Process Of Photography

by William Lulow

I wrote an article a while ago about what we call “previsualization.” This simply means that a photographer or other visual artist has an idea about what a piece of artwork, be it a film, painted canvas, scupture or photograph will look like based on a sketch or other pre-conceived image. And this is not an uncommon thing. Even film makers like Sergei Eisenstein (Battleship Potemkin) way back in the 1920s made extensive drawings of what each scene would look like. I have also published pieces before about how photographers can bring their advertising images very close to what art directors’ sketches look like.

Here is that example:

As a note, whenever there is a concept presented by an art director as a sketch, the photographer then has to assemble the props, wardrobe and lighting to bring the drawing to reality in the form of an image.

There have been times when I have made sketches of what I wanted a particular image to look like. It happens when you have an image in mind and know enough about what you want to show from the beginning. It takes a strong, visual idea to make an equally strong picture in your mind before you can actually put something down on paper. In the advertising world, this is why there are art director’s sketches and concept pieces in the first place. Somebody has a vision and the artist is then called upon to bring that vision to a reality in one form or another. Sometimes it’s an illustration, sometimes it’s a photograph. Many artists make sketches before they actually begin a painting. They need to get a “feel” for the space of the canvas. Or in the case of a sculpture, they might need to start with an overall concept of the physical size of the piece. My dad was a sculptor and would often go to Vermont looking for pieces of marble from which he would eventually chisel away a form. Often, he would look for a particular size hunk of stone. This presupposed that he had some initial idea of the size of the piece he wished to create. I remember him telling me that Michaelangelo referred to sculpting in marble as “releasing a pent up form from the stone.”

In creating any piece of art, there is always the element of surprise, even for the artist. There are spontaneous happenings that simply occur by accident. There are epiphanies and creative bursts of energy that just seem to happen. Mostly, though, art is an intentional, deliberate creation by someone who has studied the particular craft and knows all the possibilities that can be made from previsualizing what the final outcome would be. That’s when the most success occurs.

I have also written before about the creative process even without sketches. An artist can often get an idea simply from seeing a subject under a specific lighting:

Sometimes inspiration can come from the subject material itself:

Other times, as a photographer you might just get an idea. This actually happened on a job this past week. I was photographing some people who were recently added to a law firm’s roster. I had photographed others in the company previously and one of the firm’s partners wanted another headshot. So, I got the idea to do a kind of different shot of him. This time, in addition to my regular headshot lighting, I decided (with his permission) to change the lighting and pose to reflect an idea I had of lawyers, in general, as fighters. The first image here is a regular headshot. The second was my idea:

The lighting used here was a modification of a CROSS-LIGHTING with my large umbrella as the main light and a fill-in softbox on the opposite side as the other light source. I have sometimes made images like this with just a main light and a white card placed on the opposite side as a fill-in light. I used the same background lighting as in the normal headshot.

Since these kinds of assignments require images in which the subjects are shown in their “best light,” it’s always better to do those first and then do your “pre-visualized” conceptions afterwards. In this case, having photographed this person previously, I wanted to make the kind of portrait that was more in line with some thoughts I had IN ADDITION to providing the shot that was needed. In other words, do the images for which you were assigned before attempting your own vision.

Your images will always be better when you have a basic idea and can see the image you wish to create in your “mind’s eye,” so to speak. If you approach much of your photography this way, you will, more often than not, achieve your intended results.