I recently attended a lecture by a photographer who specializes in art jewelry and other art photography. Someone asked him about the graded backgrounds popular in the US. When he pointed out that the dark part of the graded background is always at the top of the picture, I began to wonder if I’d ever taken a picture with the light part of the background at the top.
Unable to find an example of this, I deliberately took pictures of the same sterling silver jewelry components with the background in both orientations.
The photographer mentioned that the reason for the dark part being at the top of the photos is that the eyes will ‘travel’ off the top of the photo if the top portion of the photo is lighter than the rest.
As I was sorting through photographs from a trip to Point Reyes Lighthouse, I noticed that the sky behind one of the building photos did indeed seem to entice my eyes to look at and then travel off the top of the photo more so than when the sky was not in the frame.