I'm not specially looking out for these images, the basic principles of alignmetn are mostly always there.
|  | I. The spectator has to see the boat latest moment the
boat, so the artist divides the image into 2 parts. The viewer looks at all the
distraction in the upper part, this chaos creates slows down the
viewers perception, but the artist guides him all the way to the tip of
the boat that he previously didn't see. Then from the tip of the boat
the image is clear and the viewers view is shot like an arrow to the
back, creating the motion of the speed of the boat. Also in contrast to
westerners, the birds on the boat aren't a hold so they don't slow down
but create a tik tik rythm, a westerner would start to look at the
detail of each bird. | |  | | | II. Here also the image is divided in 2 parts, to create a hold
on and to distract the viewer from the bird this is something that
should be seen at last the maintain the dynamics and emotion of the
image. The flower on the left creates so much action and rhythm and
life, catching the eye of the viewer all the way down to the bottom
than it is guided up towards the 'falling' bird, that has so little
grip because of the vertical lines even in detail, who focus eventually
on the eye. Westerners would have grip on the horizontal lines of the
birds holding up the speed not for the japanese, these lines speed up
the action. | | 
| | III. Same thing in manga's horizontal elements to divide, vertical create speed … someone who also has a strong vertical alignment doesn't get the dynamics as powerful as asians.
| |  | | IV. Horizontal Alignment (Hiroshige): The viewer is attracted to the red bar on top, follows the birds, than the leaves, on between the 2 boats and on to the white spot of foam at the bottom and this at a steady rhythm, then suddenly the attention is drawn to the upper right giving the wave all of it's dynamics onto boat with the sail and it's sailor, on calm waters. note: if the painter would have used vertical alignment or other ways to draw attention their would never be as much power, head-movement in the right direction. As I note on my site to try this look trough your fingers in a horizontal way, so you create horizontal alignment and block each time upper or lower parts of the image.
| |  | | | V. Vertical Alignment (John Constable): The viewer is drawn trough the clouds by the more gray line, next to the corner of the trees on by the oblique white line in to clouds to the left onto the trees, onto the right that creates a rhythm to tree at the first corner of the river, to a second tree creating a swinging flow, like a slalom marked by flags for skiers, on to the cathedral and to end with the boat on the lake. Note: If one would look at this image with 'vertical alignment' as described above, there would be to quickly drawn to the white dot losing the dynamics. With the 'Vertical hold on elements' the viewer is drawn to the back, uphill, and flow's all the way to the boat on the lake. | |  | | | | | |
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The
purpose of this site is to present questions and new ideas about
the above subjects.
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