Side-By-Side Comparisons - the White Background, Can You Cut It?
January 13, 2011
A white background in a photographic image has some very practical advantages. The pure white background (#000000) works very well to embed the photo across a variety of other media such as text documents, line sheets, combining images in print or creating a cohesive presentation on a website. Here are examples in the illustrations below:
The white background in a photo image allows text to move around the image eliminating the grid format. Using In Design or Illustrator the text can be placed around the image in an interesting format. It allows a little more creativity and interest in the layout of the page as in the example to the left from Departures Magazine.
With this idea, you can create great Artist Statements. To see an example of one of my Artist Statements with embedded images, click here.
On a similar level, the white background allows artists and makers to create attractive line sheets with a clean professional layout. (Learn more about a line sheet in a future post, but essentially this is a list of your "line" or the production items that you sell.)
The white photographic background also provides a consistent look in groups of photos on websites, juried applications, and on the printed page.
An example of a beautiful website with images on white backgrounds is photographer Steven Brian Samuels. A diverse group of works blends well into a cohesive, dramatic, and up-to-date presentation.
Adorn © 2008
Book by Amanda Mansell
Photo Credit: Philip Cohen
The white background has been used very effectively in the jewelry book Adorn. If you enjoy looking through a beautiful book, this is perhaps one of my favorites in part because of the immaculate white background layout.
Adorn © 2008
Book by Amanda Mansell
Page 151
Artwork by Harriete Estel Berman
All of the jewelry in the book is on a white background. It makes the images (from a wide variety of makers) look incredibly cohesive. There is NO patchwork of the photographic background grid since all the backgrounds are removed.
In this book, I know all the work didn't arrive at the author or publisher with white backgrounds. Many of the images were cut from their photographic backgrounds (including mine) to create this very attractive layout.
Adorn © 2008
Book by Amanda Mansell
Page 85 Red Orbit Necklace (left)
by Harriete Estel Berman, (right) by
Dougehum Lee titled Draw
The amount of effort involved to cut out the images must have been really challenging. Can you imagine cutting out all those fine lines in my work? I've included my original photo (below) just so you can see the comparison. I think they did a fabulous job on the shadows. They don't look fake.
I can see real advantages to the white background. What do you think?
Adorn © 2008 by Amanda Mansell Page 136-137. Left: Kiroki Iwata, Wishes of leaves & Expression of Plants. Left Center Andrea Wagner, House with a White Picket Fence. Center Top Right:Castello Hansen, Untitled. Far Right: Lucy Sarneel, Untitled. Right Center Bottom: Lesley Strickland, Metal.
Previous posts in the series Side-By-Side Comparisons of Different Photos::
Side-By-Side Photos - Website Backgrounds Should be Consistent
Side-By-Side Photos - Clean or Complex Backgrounds?
Side-By-Side Photo Comparisons - Backgrounds with Texture or Pattern?
Side-By-Side Photo Comparisons: Colorful or Discordant?
Side-By-Side Comparisons of Different Photos: Black Hole or Super Sophisticated?
Side-By-Side Comparisons of Different photos - the graduated background. Stunning or stupefying?
Side-By-Side Comparisons of Different Photos - the white background. Trendy or Technique?
Are You Being Judged by the Style of Your Images?
The photographers are revealed!
This post was updated on January 26, 2022.