talkmagic.co.uk

http://goldennumber.net/creditcard.htm

i remember a programme about this on BBC ages ago, to do with beauty and measurements (not in a cup-size way) but proportionally...

anyway, this ratio can also be found on lots of things, credit cards, train travel-cards, and (just about) playing cards too...

those these objects get re-designed every now and again, they dont seem to get re-sized...why?

...because somehow (possibly on a subconcious level) they 'feel' right to us...

apparently it's even been used to 'predict' the stock market with good results...

More specifically, Elliott Waves tend to run through stock graphs and are used to predict the end of rallies and so forth. Over time and size, they tend to conform to the fibonacci ratios. Now that's a bit too weird.

Phi, or the 'Divine Proportion' is found repeatedly in nature, and since discovery of this fact the proportion has been used for many man made things as well, as yes, I't does make thing 'look' right to us for some reason.

i wonder if this could be used for an effect? hmmm

perhaps getting someone to pick a photo out of three, one is marked "i knew you'd pick this one"...

DaVinci worked to the 'golden ratio' or 'golden section'.

At college, we learned to use the golden section (basically the proportions of a rectangle) for all sorts of quick tests as to whether or not something works visually.

Nature, art and mathematics are all related by the golden section. Many famous art works use it as a base. Which is why design and art follows and mimics nature through science and maths—although many of you possibly don't realise it.

Simple rectangles have a 'proper' proportion at which they are not too squat, not too thin.

Even picture framing uses the golden section. And simple man-made things like computer/tv screens, magazines, telephones, doors, clocks.

As does the growth of certain crustaceans!

Houses, faces, bodies, etc. all have a related proportion. I guarantee you'll look at the world differently now.

For more info, see: http://www.geocities.com/jyce3/index.htm

phi...
i remember that from the book, 'the divinci code' by Dan Brown. It is refered as the Divine proportion and explains how its used in things like art and music. Leonardo Divinci used it in his work. I think phi is the number 1.618. Some examples of how this works in life are in the link contained in the first post.

Pyro Ellvelin wrote:phi...
I think phi is the number 1.618

Nearly, its a proportion of 1:1.618...

There's another interesting ratio, that of root 2. Most people think the square root of 2 is 1, but it's not. It's ~1.4142. Measure the size of a piece of A4 and a piece of A3. The ratio is root 2.

abraxus wrote:i wonder if this could be used for an effect? hmmm

perhaps getting someone to pick a photo out of three, one is marked "i knew you'd pick this one"...

That sounds very interesting indeed!

[and in walks the mathematics student]
right then......
where do i start? should i start with Phi being derived from the Fibonacci sequence, 1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21.... and perhaps that even the fibonacci sequence was an accident and was originally designed to estimate the number of rabbits in a population.
just another great example of mathematics in nature. and of course, the relationship between phi and nature was only noticed after someone had come up with it for other reasons. no one sits down and mathematically analyses nature, you just notice one day that your sine waves look ah so similar to the waves on the river, or something!
anyway, i'll stop now befor i spend all day typing this

maybe it could work two different ways, either the image itself being that ratio with two others that aren't...

or the size of the card its printed on, one being that ratio, two that aren't...either way, might be worth experimenting...

and maybe after handling a deck of cards might condition them a tiny bit to 'feel' that one of the three is more 'pleasing' or 'right' than the rest after a little time lapse...

EDIT - go for it Lawrence...