Balance

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Basic material for this image was a 360 degree spherical pano of a quiet street in Hollum, Ameland, The Netherlands. The street has a peaceful, quite balanced atmosphere.

To expand on this felt atmosphere I applied a double stereographic projection to the spherical image, taking pains to place the trees at the outside and the sky at the inside for a more closed composition (as opposed to a single little planet projection). The intentional curvature of the street on top and bottom tries to suggest the mathematical infinity sign. Finding the result balanced but boring I decided to add an equally balanced central focal point; for that I applied a "mirror sphere" projection to the original spherical pano (not the warped one) and formed a big sphere by fusing two instances of the upper half of the projected image - the one with trees, houses and the sky. I finally added two smaller versions of the original mirror sphere - pointing up and downwards alternatively in a yin and yang way.

For me it's a picture about balance - that's why I added the caption; it's of course an artificial balance, man-made and in constant conflict with man himself and nature ...

Equally possible is that this just reflects my really quite disturbed state of mind. Hmmm. Even then it's probably cheaper than therapy. ;-)