Panoramic Photography - Redefining the Collage

A photograph has long been a great way to capture a cherished moment, admired person, or scenic place. But why are these subjects almost exclusively portrayed with just one picture? The limitations of film very much founded the photograph as a single entity. Pictures were separated on film and developed individually into prints not easily manipulated with any amount of intricacy. Photographers limited rolls to a few shots here and there to conserve film, or used them up entirely to perfect one composition. From the second the shutter was released, the destiny of a photograph seemed without avail to lie as an isolated, physical object in whatever form it may take, be it a negative, proof, or framed print. It might have been displayed in a series with other like minded photos, but as a separate entity nonetheless. Digital photography however, has changed all this.

Gone are the days of tedious developing and limited manipulation. Photographers can take thousands of high quality pictures in one outing, all of which can be quickly uploaded into as well as modified by computers. Why then, are photos still thought of as individual entities, windows providing a cropped view of the outside world? Just because the age old format of a photo is that of a bordered rectangle doesn’t mean its border can’t be crossed. Is it not natural to wonder what lies beyond that frame? Digital photography brings with it the opportunity for photos to become links, building blocks, pixels, all part of a larger reality or "surreality." If one photo can capture a moment, then ten can portray an experience, and with ten times the detail. Now what about a hundred photos, or a thousand?

Most great works of visual art start as a blank canvas, white sheet of paper, or empty screen, each with limitless potential. Much of their brilliance resides in the process; the slow emergence of the image as the product of the artist’s mind, conveyed by hand and subject at any moment to unique creativity or sheer spontaneity. The digital revolution brings this process, one of the joys of art-making, to the realm of photography, a medium that in its basic form is still dubiously qualified as a fine art in the minds of some critics. While digital manipulations within a photograph have the downside of damaging the credibility of the represented image, a panoramic collage retains truthfulness, especially when the borders of the source photos are left distinct. In this way, a piece can embrace the process, one that alludes both to the digital world of pixels and the photograph of times past, while still depicting a limitless array of imagery. The artist’s creative intentions and manipulations are evident to the viewer in this case, as what might be a brilliant collaged image from afar becomes individually layered photographs up close. These same qualities are what make the oil paintings of Van Gogh or Monet so distinguished in the art world.

James Balog takes an amazing approach to this photographic method in his book, "Tree: A New Vision of the American Forest." In it, he collages multiple photos together to depict trees with a sort of detail and clarity that would not be possible in just one shot. For instance, he documents a large redwood tree by capturing and collaging hundreds of images from varying heights relative to the enormous subject, the resulting image of which fuses art, science, and spirituality. The lack of a single vanishing point causes the distant horizon to duplicate many times, but in this way the entire tree is portrayed in incredible detail from top to bottom. It essentially combines the perspective of a telephoto shot, which would be impossible to take in the dense forest, with the detail of a close-up. Tally in the collage of the surrounding forest and horizon, and you’ve got a work of art that’s just as beautiful as it is difficult to create, and that’s just one person’s inspired take on a process with infinite potential.

Try to imagine a spectacular image of a distant town nestled in a mountain valley. Since the image is a 360° panoramic, the snaking river opposite to the town is also visible. Furthermore, as the entire piece is composed of hundreds of individual photos, the river’s details are revealed at night by the full moon, while the town is displayed over several hours under the sun’s arc from rise to set. Finally, thanks to the limitless possibilities of the process, the sky is a brilliant collage of images taken over the course of several weeks, capturing a distant storm as well as both starry skies and billowing, sun-painted clouds above. For centuries painters and graphic artists have sought to represent imagery that visualize dreams and defy the limits of human perception. With the emergence of digital tools comes a more accessible and flexible opportunity for photography to do the same. Only in this case, in the manner that makes the medium so remarkable, it can be done with real images, gleaned from the light that so persistently reveals the breathtaking wonders of our universe.

I've been working with this process for a few years now, and have only just begun to realize the full potential of what it allows. The image here shows a fairly recent example, but anyone interested can see more of my panoramic photography on my online Etsy store.