Posted By Olly / 15th March 2012
Nick Benson was inspired to create this beautiful Op Art photo whilst doing research for his 2D Colour Theory class. From Wikipedia: “Although being relatively mainstream, photographers have been slow to produce op art. In painting, Victor Vasarely and Bridget Riley were producing large amounts of art and the same can be said for many digital artists, such as Kitaoka. One of the primary reasons for the lack of photographers doing op art, is the difficulty in finding effective subject matter”
Limitless - Nick Benson Photography
Nick says: “I took that last sentence as a challenge. Here’s my first attempt at some Photographic Op Art, as well as the steps I took in creating this.
- I found a subject matter on the University of Hartford’s campus
- Took the photo using my Sigma 10-20mm lens to create more prominent vanishing points
- Processed the camera’s RAW image file in Adobe Lightroom 3
- Cropped the photo down to an 11×14 aspect ratio for a more effective compositon
- In Photoshop CS5 I inverted the colors and added a cooling filter, to create the three major classes of color interaction; simultaneous contrast, successive contrast, and reverse contrast.”
Nick says he is planning to take more Op Art inspired photos in the near future, so please keep an eye on the new Op Art Photography Gallery where we’re hoping to see more of Nick’s work soon. In the meanwhile, you can see more of Nick’s inspiring photos at Nick Benson Photography on Flickr.
A Flag for the Forgotten - Nick Benson
Posted By Olly / 4th March 2012
Meeta Panesar, a graphic designer from San Francisco in the US, has created a really interesting and well-executed concept design for Op Art Wine Packaging. You can see the full post on Meeta’s site here with the full image set.
Op Art Wine © Meeta Panesar 2011
“The design is inspired by the colors and designs of Joseph Albers and the Op Art movement. The usage of the rectangular elements reflects Alber’s “Homage to the Square,” a series of paintings begun in 1949.”
Posted By Olly / 14th February 2012
An html5 canvas Op Art experiment… Click on the different shapes in the left column to change the animation. Click on the coloured squares in the right column to control the colours. The ‘square’ is an attempt at a moving version of Vasarely’s ‘Vonal’ series.
Posted By Olly / 1st February 2012
Peter Kogler is widely acknoweledged as one of Austria’s leading contemporary artists. Over the past 20 years, Peter has worked towards a radical transformation of the exhibition space, making it an integral part of his work. He uses a comptuer to create digital patterns that he can then transform and adapt to the space he wishes to occupy. You can see two of his incredible and intricate Op Art influenced ‘labyrinths’ below. For more information on Peter and his Art, please visit his website, Kogler.net.
Dirimart gallery - Istanbul - 2011 - Peter Kogler
Galerie Johann Widauer - Innsbruck - 2011 - Peter Kogler
Thanks so much to Nathalie for kindly pointing me in the direction of Peter’s brilliant and original art.
Posted By Olly / 20th January 2012
A new extra-sized DC Comics special ‘Batman Incorporated: Leviathan Strikes’, written by Grant Morrison with art by Chris Burnham has recently gone on sale (21st December 2011). If you’re wondering what this has got to do with Op Art, it’s that the artist Chris has intensified the story by drawing beautiful and detailed Op Art backgrounds for the action.
When discussing his visual style for the comic, Chris says:
“I think it was more trying to have each scene have its own vibe. The whole issue has that weird circular structure where Batman goes into the same room over and over – or really four different rooms. But I wanted to have each time that he stepped in there have a bit of a different feel to make it easier on the reader and to give myself something interesting to draw… That’s where all the op art and style effects come from.”
You can read the full interview with Chris over at Comic Book Resources.
