As I go along making things, I am able to overlook a lot of visual clutter. My desk is almost always a mess, my floor is often being used as extra space. My knitting tends to have yarn tails hanging, pins seemingly randomly attached, and just a lot of visual clutter. I can work this way, but it isn’t always a good way to go. I do this because I am always rushing to the next step, that is more interesting to me than what I am just finishing. Or because it is inconvenient.
When I began doing photos and videos, it finally hit me what it looks like from the other side. I do not notice the visual clutter when I am focused on a project, and I was always surprised to realize my foot, a shadow, some other thing, was in the shot and I hadn’t even noticed. I just mentally edit out visual clutter.
Thankfully, this is not the case in the final result of my work where I am an excellent editor. I can see from someone else’s point of view, all this visual clutter is, well, distracting.
Taming Visual Clutter
A couple of weeks ago I was getting ready to return stitches from waste yarn to needles so I could shoot a video. I looked at my rather large and complex swatch and actually saw how much visual clutter there was. It also occurred to me that we all get into this position, and that showing how to tame it might be a good video! I ended up shooting that video in addition to the technique.
I doubt at this point that I will ever quit working in the midst of visual clutter. Clearly it hasn’t bothered me much, but it is useful to stop and assess your work and how you can make it easier to proceed. Sometimes I stop to work in ends when I just need to quit knitting or I need to think about something else.
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