The 52-week photography project: geometric shapes

The theme for week 23 of the 52-week photography project is geometric shapes. Triangles, circles, squares, and rectangles are strong compositional elements in an image. When I draw a picture, I start by drawing a shape. If I’m drawing a flower, I might draw a circle for the flower and a long, narrow cylinder for the stem and ovals or heart shapes for the leaves. After I’ve drawn the basic shapes, I will start adding the details, to give definition to the flower. 


This past week, I have spent a lot of time, both outside and inside, looking at living and at manmade objects, trying to discern what sort of shapes I was seeing. In the process of looking for the shapes, I realized that, everywhere I went, I saw geometric shapes.

stained glass window at Saint Timothy Lutheran Church in Grand Island.

Several rectangles in one object

The bricks and the lamp are all about the rectangles

This, too, is a rectangular shape

This daisy is composed of two circles.

There’s a lot of detail to distract the eye; this rose, however, is basically just one big circle.

There are circles galore in this rusty old lawnmower.

A tree stump is a circle, with lots of rings that are also circles.

Mmmm, circles topped with chocolate or purple frosting. I could enjoy eating circles. OK, they are cupcake circles. Yum.

This circle was designed to be spun.

Queen Anne’s Lace.

This is cool because there are so many geometric shapes here. Circles, triangles, rectangles. It is a goldmine of shapes.

circle, oval, rectangle…

Circles and rectangles, mostly.

This is the straw bale house at Riverside-Salem Environmental Chapel. It features circles, rectangles, and cylinders. Well, that’s all about geometric shape. Come back next week for a recap of week number 24 in the 52-week photography project. Go look for some geometric shapes in your everyday life and feel free to describe those shapes in the comments below.