Question

John has enrolled in an art class and is learning how to convey depth perception in his drawings. John had thought about Gestalt principles of vision perception. He claims that these principles are applicable only to textbook illustrations and therefore are not very useful.

Describe the three things John can do in his drawings to convey depth convincingly.

Explain how Gestalt principles can be applied to everyday and real-life vision perceptions.

Answer 1

John can use the principles of Gestalt, namely the use of monocular cues, in order to create depth in his two dimensional drawing.

Firstly, he can use the knowledge about the various monocular cues to create depth perception. For instance, he can use the cues of linear perspective by drawing objects closer to the horizon as relatively smaller in size and converging with each other. At the same time, he can show that the images which are larger and are horizontally distant from each, are closer to the viewer and therefore more clearer.

Secondly, he can use the principle of similarity by manipulating how and which objects look similar to one another. According to the law of similarity, viewers will perceive see the individual elements as part of a pattern or group. And thus, objects which are similar in shape, size or colour can be made to create a sense of depth and he viewer may perceive that there is a relatively shorter distance between similar objects which occur on the same plane compared to the dissimilar ones.

Thirdly, John can incorporate the monocular cue of texture gradient by portraying the nearby objects in finer details such as rough texture, vibrant and clear colour hues, whereas minimising such details on faraway objects. Texture gradients are grains of an item. and it regulate s the eye movement in such a way that one sees the pattern nearer to the eye level more clearly than objects or images that are farthermost away.

Thus, in these subtle ways, John can indeed utilise the knowledge of Gestalt theorists within his own creative works.