PHOTOGRAPHY 67 



after were tested from a different standpoint. The 

 apple design, an example, well, shows the attractive- 

 ness of size and simplicity ; and here is a point needing 

 to be well enforced upon the student. The constant 

 tendency in designing photographically is to overload 

 the detail, or to complicate with too many objects. It 

 is so easy to add another flower, another leaf, another 

 fruit, to fill a temptingly vacant" spot, and so difficult to 

 take away, that only failures teach the necessity for 

 reducing detail and complexity. It may be accepted as 

 an axiom that the fewest possible parts will almost 

 surely make the best design. 



Another feature in this form of deco- 

 (fD^'^^np r^tive photography is the combination 

 design, using part photography and part 

 pen or line work, each adapted to the end in view. 

 The daffodils gain in effectiveness by seeming to break 

 through the formal panels, in the case in evidence on 

 page 68. 



The dogwood " Country Calendar" cover on page 

 69 may be cited as an example of successful design- 

 ing, the photograph having been helped out by careful 

 drawing. At first, the controlling artist added a formal 

 border that diminished the real effectiveness of the 

 scheme. The publisher realized the need for breadth, 

 and changed it before issue, allowing the original 

 scheme to have effect by discarding the border and per- 

 mitting the design to cover all the paper surface. 



. In all this work, as before hinted, the 



uirec ion simple rules of design must be kept in 

 of Lme • J T r 1 ■..• 



mmd. In every successful composition 



there is an agreeable direction of line, not the result of 

 chance, by any means. Study any good example, and 

 this intentional trend, inward or outward, but always 

 harmonious, will appear. In using natural objects for 

 photographic designing, the branch or twig or stem will 

 itself often suggest to the eye open for direction the 

 agreeable line. Insensibly, it may be, the line leads 

 toward the object of attention or interest, but be sure 

 that confusing or cross lines, or inharmoniously oppos- 

 ing lines, will, if permitted to dominate, riiin the bc9% 

 decorative conception. 



