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What in the world
is an "Optical Jump"?
When you boil down the essence of advertising,
marketing, graphic design, photography, etc., it comes down to seeing
something and the response that follows. In advertising, you want the
customer to see the ad or commercial
and take action in response. As a graphic designer or photographer, you
want people to look at your work and have a response of some kind; joy,
introspection, awe, etc.
Recently there was an Ansel Adams exhibit at a local museum. My exposure
to Ansel Adams' photography prior to this day had been photographs that
I had seen online, and a tribute site that I put together as a class assignment.
I had been amazed and moved by his work, but I was not prepared for my
reaction when I saw his work live and large. I experienced an incredible
"Optical Jump". The first photograph I saw was "Mt. Williamson,
Sierra Nevada, from Manzanar, California, 1944". I stood in front
of that photograph for a long, long time. I was awestruck. The texture,
the depth, the highlights and shadows, it was absolutely, incredibly amazing.
I had never seen anything like it in my life. As a graphic designer, I aspire to cause some degree of Optical Jump with
everything I create. We've often heard the term "Jump for Joy".
So to make it short, Optical Jump is seeing something and experiencing
joy, or other positive emotion in response.
Now that you know what the term means to
me, you should also know that optical jump is actually a technical term
that refers to an optical illusion that occurs in printing-
Optical Jump: when a photograph is printed
as a half-tone, there will be areas that are exactly 50% dark and 50%
light. Your eyes will see the 50% dark as more than 50%. It will be
perceived as around 52% dark and 48% white.
So, now you know the technical meaning
as well as the "inspirational" meaning!
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