Compose styles
Rather than blending styles toward a middle, this gives them roles. The first one carries the structure, the next comes in as the accent, and anything after that shows up in a single detail. Where they fight each other, it says so before you start.
How to divide the work
- Composition
- Follow Mezzotint: Decide where light falls first and give darkness most of the plate
- Type
- Set in Mezzotint's manner (Keep lettering out of the shadows and small on the burnished side), and let New Objectivity Photography's lettering (No headlines, only the subject name and conditions in one fixed format) appear only where you want the eye to catch.
- Material
- Ground in Mezzotint's material (Rock the whole plate, burnish back the lights, watch black fade across the edition); bring in exactly one thing from New Objectivity Photography (Deep depth of field, even overcast light, fine grained printing).
- Colour
- Build on #d7d2c9, #5e5d60, #151516 and admit one accent from #e5e2da, #81817d, #242423.
Where they fight
- Mezzotint and New Objectivity Photography stand roughly 280 years apart. Keep one of them recognisably period rather than letting both drift into the middle.
Caution
- Mezzotint Opening too many lights starves the deep black the method depends on, so treat this as raising light out of a roughened plate rather than as a black gradient effect.
- New Objectivity Photography One frame is no typology, and without matched conditions it ends as a pile of expressionless pictures. Do not trust the pose of objectivity, and read the bias that classification and viewpoint produce.
Image prompt
Produce four original images that take their structure from Mezzotint (technique, 1640s–) and their accent from New Objectivity Photography (style, 1920s–1930s). ## What to make Make the kind of thing Mezzotint exists for: portraits and still lifes where the subject emerges out of deep darkness, or frontispieces and covers built around night and a single light source. Choose one subject and hold it across all four. ## Structure comes from Mezzotint - Velvet blacks - From dark to light - Soft gradation - Burnished light Composition: Decide where light falls first and give darkness most of the plate. Type and lettering: Keep lettering out of the shadows and small on the burnished side. ## Accent comes from New Objectivity Photography, used sparingly - Sharp focus - Frontality - Repetition and types - Material detail Let one material quality come from it: Deep depth of field, even overcast light, fine grained printing. ## Colour and feeling Build the ground on #d7d2c9, carry the structure in #5e5d60 and #151516, and let a single accent come from #81817d. These are read off real works, so a direction rather than a fixed palette. Feeling to carry: luxury, calm, nostalgia, trust, technique. ## Where they fight - Mezzotint and New Objectivity Photography stand roughly 280 years apart. Keep one of them recognisably period rather than letting both drift into the middle. ## What goes wrong - Mezzotint: Opening too many lights starves the deep black the method depends on, so treat this as raising light out of a roughened plate rather than as a black gradient effect. - New Objectivity Photography: One frame is no typology, and without matched conditions it ends as a pile of expressionless pictures. Do not trust the pose of objectivity, and read the bias that classification and viewpoint produce. ## Across the four Keep the roles fixed in all four. Vary the framing, the scale and the arrangement so the set shows what this pairing can do rather than four versions of one picture. ## Constraints - Do not imitate, reference or name any specific artist, studio, brand, character or copyrighted work. - Do not reproduce the composition of an existing work. - Produce original compositions in the general period languages described above.
Related entries
- Mezzotint 1640s– / Technique / Intaglio Printing
The whole plate is roughened to hold a deep black, then burnished back to raise the lights, so that the image emerges from soft velvet darkness instead of from lines.
- New Objectivity Photography 1920s–1930s / Style / Photography Movements
Steps back from sentiment and records the structure of people and things coolly: sharp focus, frontality, typology.
Share this composition:https://indexstyle.org/compose?ids=mezzotint+new-objectivity-photography