The Science of Beauty

Beauty appears to be something so subjective that it seems odd there is an actual science behind it. Is it not just taste? Or can the feeling of attractiveness be triggered by one or several characteristics and we could answer the question for what we consider beautiful with some mathematical formulas and rational explanations?

“It's a famine of beauty, honey. My eyes are starving for beauty.”

André Leon Talley editor at large (Vogue)

The reason why we find certain things aesthetically pleasing is sometimes not as random or subjective as it seems: in nature & architecture, 1.618 (golden ratio also known as phi ratio) is a prevalent number and there is a good reason why we like the harmonies in western music; scales are generally equal tempered and thus the relationship of a song's notes (their frequencies) all follow the same ratios.

It is then not surprising that there has been research to find out if and how attractiveness of the human face can be measured.

There is a common conception that we're attracted to the archetype of a human being as it indicates fertility. If it is not human looking we're experiencing a healthy repulsion. Human is good as it tells us "Hey this (I mean he or she) is suitable for reproduction".

Creating an an intermediate face by morphing two faces into one, Courtesy of Beautycheck Project, University of Regensburg

1990, psychologists Langlois and Roggman conducted a study about Averageness in order to show that a composite image of many overlaid faces (= the average) is in most cases more attractive than each individual face. There are also studies that suggest that it does not even matter if the faces used to create the composite are from allegedly attractive or unattractive subjects. The more faces are being used to create a composite face, the less pronounced an irregular feature or flaw would show up; so as a result of blending many faces into one individual blemishes and undesired skin complexions disappear. Further, any other irregularity such as asymmetries and large features would blend into a homogenous flawless (as in there is nothing unattractive about it) face.

Beautycheck, a study conducted by the University of Regensburg took this idea further and not only created average faces through digital composites but also tested other characteristics of beauty, body shapes and social perception. Turns out that a characteristic such as symmetry does have a slight impact but not a big one like previous literature suggested. However, childlike features had a fairly strong impact with both genders preferring faces that had at least some degree of "babyfaceness" features mixed in.

Different magnitudes of childlike features, Courtesy of Beautycheck Project, University of Regensburg

One of the concluding results showed that artificial faces scored better than the natural ones they derived from (for both male and female faces). When a number of faces were shown to a modeling agency, 88% of the selected faces (14 out of 16) for potentially being interesting were artificial.

Of course the experiment did not factor in personality which I believe plays an important part when judging beauty. It does however, give us an interesting insight on what we consider beautiful and how much our taste is seemingly influenced by our surrounding and subconscious ideas of evolutionary benefits. Price question: "if you grew up with chimps and would not be in contact with any other human beings for your whole life, what would you be attracted to?"

Brave New Website

It was time to give my online portfolio some attention and you can see the new shiny bigger better version at www.danielweinand.com.

With that change I also decided it's time to move on from my old blogging engine Mephisto and now enjoy all the smooth publishing tools that Squarespace offers.

My old site troubleseeker.com should soon point to danielweinand.com. If you were so kind in the past to link to my page (which makes you totally awesome) it would rock if you could change that link from troubleseeker.com to danielweinand.com :)

Why Film?

I grew up in the 80ies. That time, people would listen to crappy music photographers would only shoot film, but I never seized the opportunity to learn how to use a camera back then. It does not mean I never had a chance to. Several people I knew where super passionate about photography and I'd hang out with them at some photo shoots. And then there was a time when I used to live with a photographer. She would even run some of her shoots by me and more than once could I contribute some ideas. It just happened that I wasn't really interested myself in taking pictures at that time.

So this former roommate used to throw all kinds of parties at our place inviting a dozen photography students at a time. That was when I met my dear friend Caro, a terrific portrait photographer who is an incredible source of wisdom and opinions. So a year ago I asked her "You're shooting a film Mamiya. How come?". And she looked at me and said "People react to you differently when you are using a camera that is not a digital small format camera. They get more excited about having their picture taken, but most importantly (since shots are limited and every frame costs you) you are much more conscious about what you are taking a picture of"

Ilana (Sutherland/Models International) on 120 Fuji Provia 100 Slide

With SLR cameras being cheaper than ever, everyone is a photographer these days. Many people claim to be professional photographers since they are having a few pictures on iStockphoto and making a dollar or two. There is nothing wrong with that. Trying to summarize what this majority of newborn photographers do, is in my eyes a craft. "What lens do I need? What is this piece of equipment? Where is the latest and best photoshop action/filter/plugin?" You name it! There is a great desire to learn how to take a great photograph - on a very technical level. And with that billions and trillions of photos are taken, filling up our machines "dogs, cats, flowers, keyboards, friends, trees,..."

In all this brouhaha I came to realize what I love about photography. Sure, I love to geek out about photography and I am fascinated by its technical aspect. But I don't care how to get the perfect HDR technique. I don't care about foolproof lighting setup books (I know because I read a couple and they all sucked). What I most profoundly care about is to create a marvelous image. An image that, when people are looking at it can't help but keep staring at it. I want my photographs to trigger thoughts, emotions, or really anything (like peeing in pants).

So what does this have to do with shooting film now? If i only care about the result, wouldn't it be more pragmatic if I exclusively shot digital? Rational answer: yes.

Medium format users generally argue that the subjective quality of the film is higher (i am not talking about mindless "megapixel versus megapixel" charts) and that film has a higher dynamic range (yes it allows for more errors if you're shooting negative film but i am shooting slides for several reasons so screw that!). No, to me there is something meditative about slowing down and using a cumbersome large and heavy film camera. The polaroids I have to take for testing lights make perfect souvenirs. Little things, like pushing the shutter makes this pleasant sound: it is the drum I play in a song that the people present can hear in their heads while the shoot develops its own flow. I can be composer and conductor at the same time. And sometimes when I hear the klack and know that was a good frame, I feel illuminated.

Polaroids

Raw instant film: Penelope (Sutherland, MIM)
make-up: Sommer Mbonu, hair: Anne-Marie Rooney, 120mm Hasselblad on Fuji 100cMy friend Pete Forde had brought a polaroid camera with him on his last visit to Ottawa. I really liked the raw quality and the fact that you can "touch" the picture immediately (something that you don't get from a picture on a LCD screen).

And just a few months after Polaroid has stopped producing instant film, their legacy has become more important to me than ever. Thankfully, Fuji still continues to produce Polaroid 100 film for medium and large format cameras. Using proof polaroids (like the ones seen above) are extremely useful to make sure the light, settings and everything else is alright before wasting a roll of film.