My tutor had mentioned monitor calibration on one of my earlier assignment reports, and although I tried to do it manually (on my previous monitor), it just resulted in turning the brightness down to a level that was uncomfortable for every day use. I gave up on the idea, and gave it no more thought until I received the feedback for my final assignment, where my tutor again mentioned monitor calibration, as the images I was sending to him were darker than they ideally should have been, and he thought it was probably a calibration issue.
With the final assignment done, it is time to start preparing for assessment, which will include making prints. I realised that if I didn't tackle this monitor calibration issue once and for all, my prints were not going to come back from the printer looking how I expected.
Doing some research on calibration, it transpired that there were devices available that could assess the output of my monitor, then automatically calibrate it to the international standard. Although not cheap, these devices seemed to be the way to go for best accuracy and ease of use. I bought the Spyder 5 Pro device, with which I was successfully able to calibrate my monitor.
Upon further research I found that although my monitor was now calibrated, due to the differences in monitors and paper in terms of the type of medium and the gamut of colours they can both display, what I saw on my screen was not entirely what would exit the printer. I then learned about soft proofing; a way to replicate in imaging software (such as Lightroom) what the printed image would look like on a particular paper. I then found out that for each type of paper a colour profile could be downloaded, and used in the software for soft proofing purposes. The idea is that after your initial post-processing, in the soft proofing view you can make further adjustments to get the printed version to look as close to the screen version of the image as possible. As I intend to get my images printed at Peak Imaging, I downloaded a profile from their website.
A video I found helpful to learn about soft proofing, colour space, and Lightroom's print module can be found here: https://youtu.be/4c-Bu8St3L8?list=PL9AWoB63rwxY7AHhQv64VJrjfhQppyiZm
Showing posts with label Research. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Research. Show all posts
Tuesday, 1 March 2016
Monday, 29 February 2016
The Genius of Photography: Episode One
I have obtained the DVD series of The Genius of Photography and also the accompanying book. I will be watching first, then writing brief notes on each episode along with my own response to what I have seen. I will enjoy reading the book after watching the series, as I expect it will go into further detail on the issues that arise on the tv series.
Talbot's process was paper-based, and produces a negative. Talbot realised the value in being able to reproduce prints for the masses. Daguerre's process used a mirrored metal plate. This created a one-off image, and was coined 'The Mirror with a Memory'. The determinates of which process would triumph ultimately came down to how quickly, cheaply, and accurately images could be made, and how widely they could be distributed. Talbot process of producing a negative had clear advantages.
Photography was part of a group of technologies being developed at the time, such as the telegraph and railroad, which was speeding up the world.
Eadweard Muybridge created a series of photographic motion studies; the precursor to cinema. Businessman and racehorse owner Leland Stanford hired Muybridge to settle the popular debate on whether all four of a horses hooves left the ground when trotting. He used an array of 12 cameras to take a sequence of shots of a galloping horse, proving that all four hooves are in the air at a given time; something that cannot be established by the human eye. Muybridge realised he could utilise this concept to create an encyclopedia of zoological motion.
By the 1850's commerce had taken over. For the next half century or more, the overwhelming majority of photographs were taken for commercial reasons.
In 1854 André Adolphe Eugène Disdéri patented the carte-de-visite, thin paper photographs mounted onto thicker cards. He used a camera with 8 lenses on it which was able to produce 8 different poses in only a few minutes. These small cards proved immensily popular, and millions flowed back and forth between the united states and europe. It was a true industry.
Photographers could make money out of all different aspects of photography, such as war, documentary, portraiture and architecture. It was a global phenomenom; almost since the day Daguerre announced his invention, cameras were being shipped around the world.
In its first decades photography had proven itself to be able to do almost anything, but one doubt remained then as now - is it art? 'Photography is the easiest medium in which to be compentent, but the hardest in which to have personal vision'. 'When someone nails down a vision to the extent that they own that vision, you know they've really done something'. - Chuck Close.
As photographers had turned to painting for inspiration and reassurance, putting their tripods where easels had previously stood, photography was also making an impression on painters. They were inspired by the view captured within a photo frame, and the influence is evident in paintings by artists such as Edgar Degas. Large-scale photographs of street scenes recorded people's natural postures, which then infused in artist's paintings, such as Degas' The Dance Class.
George Eastman revolutionised photography by degrees. First he produced what is now familiar as a 'roll of film'. He then took this concept and remarketed it in 1900 as an amateur camera called the Kodak Brownie, with the slogan 'You Press The Button, We Do The Rest'. The user simply had to press the button to take images, post it to Kodak, who would then develop the images and mail back the camera with a new roll of film loaded. The camera cost only $1, and caused a 'Kodak Revolution'. It produced the distinctive circular prints of the first generation of amateurs. Snapshots were in abundance - for the first time people looked the camera in the eye and said 'cheese', encouraged by Kodak advertisements. In the hands of amateurs, photography revealed its true nature as an open-ended, unruly medium. People were finding things out by trial and error; there are no accidental masterpieces in painting, but there is in photography.
The snapshot is a subcategory in a genre of photography known as the vernacular. This means photography for any use except for art. This genre contains some of photography's greatest naturally occuring riches. The camera has the ability to produce unintentional but attractive styles, that is more a gift of the medium than a product of the photographer.
Jacques Henri Lartigue is hailed as one of the founders of modern art photography; in reality he was the ultimate amateur. As a young boy in a wealthy family, he had access to all the best photography equipment, and a father who was passionate about photography. He recorded his friends and family at play; doing what everyone else was doing but with more flair and daring.
Pictorialism as a genre is mean, moody, occasionally magnificent - but photography at its most po-faced. Recoiling from the vernacular explosion, it tried to establish photography as a branch of the fine arts. The pictorialism elites withdrew into a very narrow world that was imitating print-making, drawing, whistler etc.
Speaking of vernacular photography, I found the discussion on 'accidental masterpieces' interesting. Presumable due to the sheer volume of images being taken around the world, there were bound to be many times when all the right elements came together in an image; not necessarily on purpose.
The section that dealt with photographers and painters inspiring each other was intriguing. I already knew that inevitably photographers would have looked at what the painters were doing, but seeing that the reverse also happened was very interesting.
The Genius of Photography: Episode One
Photography as we know it was invented in 1839 by William Fox Talbot and Louis Daguerre, who created rival processes. The general process of photography was known well before, however; the camera obscura, where light enters a darkened room through a pinhole and projects the outside scene onto the inside wall, upside down, was known for centuries. Experiments with light-sensitive chemicals such as silver salts had also been taking place for a long time; in 1802 'momentary' photography was being accomplished with silver salts where an image was temporarily created before turning to black. This problem, solved by Talbot and Daguerre, was how to 'freeze' the exposure at the correct time.Talbot's process was paper-based, and produces a negative. Talbot realised the value in being able to reproduce prints for the masses. Daguerre's process used a mirrored metal plate. This created a one-off image, and was coined 'The Mirror with a Memory'. The determinates of which process would triumph ultimately came down to how quickly, cheaply, and accurately images could be made, and how widely they could be distributed. Talbot process of producing a negative had clear advantages.
Photography was part of a group of technologies being developed at the time, such as the telegraph and railroad, which was speeding up the world.
Eadweard Muybridge created a series of photographic motion studies; the precursor to cinema. Businessman and racehorse owner Leland Stanford hired Muybridge to settle the popular debate on whether all four of a horses hooves left the ground when trotting. He used an array of 12 cameras to take a sequence of shots of a galloping horse, proving that all four hooves are in the air at a given time; something that cannot be established by the human eye. Muybridge realised he could utilise this concept to create an encyclopedia of zoological motion.
By the 1850's commerce had taken over. For the next half century or more, the overwhelming majority of photographs were taken for commercial reasons.
In 1854 André Adolphe Eugène Disdéri patented the carte-de-visite, thin paper photographs mounted onto thicker cards. He used a camera with 8 lenses on it which was able to produce 8 different poses in only a few minutes. These small cards proved immensily popular, and millions flowed back and forth between the united states and europe. It was a true industry.
Photographers could make money out of all different aspects of photography, such as war, documentary, portraiture and architecture. It was a global phenomenom; almost since the day Daguerre announced his invention, cameras were being shipped around the world.
In its first decades photography had proven itself to be able to do almost anything, but one doubt remained then as now - is it art? 'Photography is the easiest medium in which to be compentent, but the hardest in which to have personal vision'. 'When someone nails down a vision to the extent that they own that vision, you know they've really done something'. - Chuck Close.
As photographers had turned to painting for inspiration and reassurance, putting their tripods where easels had previously stood, photography was also making an impression on painters. They were inspired by the view captured within a photo frame, and the influence is evident in paintings by artists such as Edgar Degas. Large-scale photographs of street scenes recorded people's natural postures, which then infused in artist's paintings, such as Degas' The Dance Class.
George Eastman revolutionised photography by degrees. First he produced what is now familiar as a 'roll of film'. He then took this concept and remarketed it in 1900 as an amateur camera called the Kodak Brownie, with the slogan 'You Press The Button, We Do The Rest'. The user simply had to press the button to take images, post it to Kodak, who would then develop the images and mail back the camera with a new roll of film loaded. The camera cost only $1, and caused a 'Kodak Revolution'. It produced the distinctive circular prints of the first generation of amateurs. Snapshots were in abundance - for the first time people looked the camera in the eye and said 'cheese', encouraged by Kodak advertisements. In the hands of amateurs, photography revealed its true nature as an open-ended, unruly medium. People were finding things out by trial and error; there are no accidental masterpieces in painting, but there is in photography.
The snapshot is a subcategory in a genre of photography known as the vernacular. This means photography for any use except for art. This genre contains some of photography's greatest naturally occuring riches. The camera has the ability to produce unintentional but attractive styles, that is more a gift of the medium than a product of the photographer.
Jacques Henri Lartigue is hailed as one of the founders of modern art photography; in reality he was the ultimate amateur. As a young boy in a wealthy family, he had access to all the best photography equipment, and a father who was passionate about photography. He recorded his friends and family at play; doing what everyone else was doing but with more flair and daring.
Pictorialism as a genre is mean, moody, occasionally magnificent - but photography at its most po-faced. Recoiling from the vernacular explosion, it tried to establish photography as a branch of the fine arts. The pictorialism elites withdrew into a very narrow world that was imitating print-making, drawing, whistler etc.
My Response
Much of this episode was a history of the origins of photography. It is a very interesting and formative look over its inception and development, and I particular enjoyed seeing how Pictorialism developed as a reaction to how everyone was now able to attempt photography. The pictoralists were worried that if everyone could do it, it would not be regarded as art. The episode suggests in strong terms however that it was actually vernacular photography that was the 'great creative achievement' of the period.Speaking of vernacular photography, I found the discussion on 'accidental masterpieces' interesting. Presumable due to the sheer volume of images being taken around the world, there were bound to be many times when all the right elements came together in an image; not necessarily on purpose.
The section that dealt with photographers and painters inspiring each other was intriguing. I already knew that inevitably photographers would have looked at what the painters were doing, but seeing that the reverse also happened was very interesting.
The Genius of Photography: Episode Two
The Genius of Photography: Episode Two
Photography became an organ of propoganda, and in troubled times documented what it meant to be human.One of the best sellers of 1925, Art Forms in Nature revealed in detail the precision engineering that underpinned the vegetable world. A compulsion to make an encyclopedic record. Systematic and accurate records of places, people, and things had been one of photographys trump cards from the outset. Anna Atkins catalogue of algie - just four years after photography's invention. Within a decade used to record the criminal underworld - police mugshots. Photographic typologies. Typology is about comparisons - you only get to know something if you can compare it to something else. Record each object at the exactly the same viewpoint. Typologies discipline photography's unruly tendencies, in order to create 'pure' documents; just the facts and nothing else. Bernd & Hilla Becher- Blast Furnaces and water towers.
Germany 1920 August Sander - human typologies. Commercial portrait photographer working since the turn of the century. In 1929 put down his stamp as a modernist with his collection 'Face of the Times'. An obsessive collector. All occupied same space within the frame; you were invited to look at the differences between everybody. He organised into 7 types, such as farmers, then subcategorised - young farmers, farmer's child and mother. The unspoken behind sanders pictures is the chaotic condition of germany in the 1920's. The Weimar Rupublic - a society in meltdown. Hyper-inflation, mass unemployment, political violence on the streets. All of Sander's subjects would have lived with the consequences of that chaos. The notary stands erect in his once-elegant overcoat. Its begun to lose its shape but he fills it out as if it has not changed in any way. A man who attempts to preserve his position, at least for the camera - as if to say I'm no less than I always was.
Alexander Rodchenko - When the Bolsheviks came to power he declared painting to be dead, and instead turned to photography. Not content with traditional approaches to photography. A new society demanded new ways of seeing. Compact, handheld, lightweight cameras like the legendary leica. The leica was so light it opened up a new freedom - you could shoot upwards, downwards, sideways - suddenly freed from the tripod. Rodchenko - the need to reject 'belly-button' photography - most amateur cameras were held at waist level with a viewfinder into which you look down (such as Kodak Brownie). Instead, make very apparent that you are photographing the world very differently, so that the viewer would be encouraged to take part in a revolution of perception. Radical photographic style was combined with cutting-edge graphics in a magazine called 'USSR in Construction' - designed by Rodchenko. A showcase of political propaganda, glorifying the achievements of the soviet system. The magazine displays Rodchenko's mastery of photographic montage, a graphic technique that took its cue from cinematic montage. Rodchenko's montages treated photographs as 'raw footage', suppressing their individuality, collectivising their energies, cutting, pasting, retouching and rephotographing them, to conjure up dizzing visions of the future. Photo montage also shows up photographs for what they really are - mute documents whose meaning remains fluid. Photography's functional record can be harnessed in one way or another. Rodchenko harnessed photography to greatest effect in an issue of USSR in Construction devoted to the white sea canal. Trumpeted at home and abroad as a triumph of soviet engineering and enlightened soviet penal policies. The canal would be built by criminals and other social undesirables, who would be rehabilitated through labour. Rodchenko travelled to the canal to take the photographs that would provide the raw material for this masterpiece of political propaganda. Photo montage changes the original intention and meaning. Rodchenkos expert post-production - doesn't look like a montage until you see the originals - made the unsmiling workers appear to be smiling.
Paris - Attempting to preserve a society about to disappear. Eugine Atget. Spent 30 years recording backstreet to shopfront before it was swept away to redevelopment. By the 1920s had compiled a unique typology of old Paris, consisting of 10,000 images. His equipment and technique was archaic by the 1920s. Still making albumen prints (which you can make in sunshine). Behind the times, but still a commercial photographer, outside his studio he advertised documents for artists, reference material for illustrations and cartoons. However modest their intentions, Atget's photographs achieved something far greater. Atget moved into documents of a different range of reality. Cautiously explored the borderline between one kind of reality and another.
Man Ray - Pushing deep into the territory of the unreal. Studio on same street at Atget. He thought the camera was not a machine for making documents, but an instrument for displaying dreams, desire and the medium's unconcious mind. A natural maverik - thought of all different ways to be a photographer that no-one had thought of before. In tune with dadaism and surrealism. Placed objects on photographic paper in a darkroom, then briefly turned the light on. No camera involved to make these images. Late 1920's solarisation process - makes people look as though their faces are aluminium. They become as sleek and metallic super-people; slightly inhuman and robotic. Man Ray got in at the ground floor of the surrealist enterprise thanks to his friendship with artist Marcel Duchamps and an early encounter with one of his most seminal works. Dust Breeding delights in photography's infinite capacity for ambiguity and mocks its obligations as a sober recorder of reality. No sense of scale or reference to anything we'd be familiar with. We're up perhaps above clouds; we're looking at some bleak terrain, but its being offered to us as something between an art work and a document. If it's an artwork it's haunted by the idea of the document; if it's a document it's haunted by the idea of the artwork.
In 1926 the surrealist (Man Ray) and the maker of documents (Atget) met. An encounter between photography's past and present which would have a profound influence on its future. Man Ray bought about 50 of Atget's photographs and sparked something of a fashion for Atget's work in avant-garde circles in Paris. The surrealists were interested in the idea of found objects - something ordinary taken out of context so that it would appear very strange and project you into another conciousness and another understanding. Old photographs were terrific found objects for the surrealists. Full of things people didn't know what or who they were. Atget died a few months after his discovery.
By then, his documents had been appropriated by Europe's avante-garde. At the influencial film and photo show in Stuttgart 1929 Atget's prints were shown alongside works by Man Ray and others. Britain was photographically 'asleep' during the 20's. All the action was in Germany and Russia. In Russia and Germany the 'action' was about to take a sinister turn. Stalin's great terror, unleashed in 1934, had created a legion of the damned; heroes of the soviet union now declared enemies of the people. First they were liquidated, then removed from history. Propaganda publications had to be kept up to date, as arrest followed arrest. Rodchenko, the master of montage, was now forced to doctor books that he himself had created, using black ink to turn apparatchiks into 'unpeople'. In Germany, humanity was facing obliteration of another kind. August Sander, who could give a black circus performer the same human dignity as a burgermaster inevitably fell foul of those who were planning a master race. The Nazis had their own ideas of what photographic typologies were for. Cataloging racial types, for example. A government that prized sameness and a highly idealised version of what its people ought to be simply could not stand all of the idiosyncrasy you see in Sander's pictures. The Nazis banned Sander's book, and the printing plates were destroyed. But the further Germany descended into its collective madness, the harder Sander clung to his typology. The Nazis may have had no use for him in their system, but he made a place for them in his. In 1933 when the Nazis came to power he documented them too. He photographed them with the same clarity as anybody else, as he did the Jewish people who came to him. Sander's son was a communist, and when he was arrested in 1934 Sander arranged to take his picture in his prison cell. He died, still a prisoner, 10 years later. Sander photographed his death mask. It appears in the category called The Last People.
America in the 1930s was in the grip of its own crisis. Walker Evans used his camera to lay them bare. Penny Picture Display, Savannah 1936. - An image of American identity, of democracy, each individual the same size, therefore each individual having the same importance - The positive interpretation. A rigid structure, each person in their individual little cell - The negative interpretation. That's the genius of Walker Evans; he's pretending that he's just giving you the facts, but he's, by the choice of the facts, influencing how you understand the world. The straightforwardness of his photographs is deceptive. He spent time in Paris exploring the latest trends in avante-garde photography. When he returned home he started photographing in a style straight from the pages of the film and photo catalogue, but he found his own distinctive voice thanks to an Old Master - Eugine Atget. He had seen some of Atget's negatives that had been taken to America, and after seeing these put away his handheld camera and started working like Atget with an old large-format view camera. It slowed him down, but made him look more closely. Like Atget, he understand that objects are hugely evocative of the lives of the people to whom they are attached.
In 1935 Walker Evans, along with other leading photographers, was commissioned to produce propaganda images for the Farm Securities Agency, set up to ease the effects of the depression in rural America. The images were taken at the behest of the government to support government relief efforts; there's an obvious strategy to portray the government in a very positive light - not only the government, but also the recipients of relief. The most famous examples occur with the idealisation of the Dust Bowl Refugees in the photography of Dorothea Lange, in which in the six photographs in the series she proceeds to reduce the size of the family which she identified in her captions as seven people, down to three young children, one of whom is an infant, and thereby the family suddenly conforms to middle class standards on family size. One of Evan's classic images shows the gulf that seperated him from mainstream FSA photography. Allie Mae Burroughs - a sharecropper's wife in Alabama in 1936. She's shown against the weatherboarded house that she lived in, and her face is as weathered as the wood. You can see that her eyes are screwed up against fairly fierce southern light, and it's the same fierceness of the camera lens; it's just sheer direct fact. She has equal human presence as the person behind the camera.
Though he aspired to the directness of an Atget or a Sander, Evan's understanding of documentary photography was more complex. For him, there was nothing simple about a photographic document. Documentary had come to mean two things; firstly that it was delivering the truth, and that it was a social agent that was going to make life better for everybody. Evans hated both of these ideas; the reason he insisted on calling it documentary style or documentary asthetic was precisely to make the point that it just looks like the facts; it isn't objective.
When Evans photographed the Burrough's house, the complexities and contradictions of this documentary style were revealed. Evans didn't simply record what was in front of him; he rearranged the scene to minimise the squalor, elevating simple objects into iconic symbols of domesticity. As he worked, the photograph crossed the line from document into artwork. Evans readily molded reality to fit his personal vision, but couldn't make that vision conform to FSA propaganda requirements. In 1937 he was sacked.
By then, the high hopes of the 1920s had given way to the low dishonesty of the 1930s, and after that came total war. British photographer Bill Brandt had made his name working within the documentary discipline of photo magazines like Picture Post but also walked on photography's wild side in the Paris studio of Man Ray. Late in life, Brandt and Man Ray were reintroduced to each other, and at one point Man Ray asked Brandt what he had learnt while he had been his assistant. Brandt replied 'Not so much when you were present, but you used to go out so much, so I rifled through you drawers, and I learnt a great deal while you weren't in the studio'. What he did learn from Man Ray was the surrealist pleasure in quirky juxtaposition, but also understanding that a picture can be like a sculpture; it can represent nothing more than the artist's desire to represent something.
In his documentary work Brandt would ask people to participate - such as pretending to be asleep - as well as honestly recording what he found there; Brandt is the inventor of that strange halfway house between truth and fiction. Brandt sees this new social dislocation is surrealist terms; surrealist events unfolding in London during the blackout and the blitz. Suddenly this is a dream city, where there is no illumination except the moon, and suddenly there are all these railway stations packed with people, but they're asleep.
In an age of machines, and machine-like ideologys, photography had found its own future by reaching back into its 19th century past. And by preserving the human in inhuman times, photography had apparently proved it was a humanistic rather than a mechanistic medium; a claim that would be tested in the years immediately ahead.
My Response
A very interesting episode, from what I can gather the two main threads of discussion being photographs as 'documents' and as 'propaganda'. One type of document is the typology - a cataloguing of similar subjects with the exact same framing and viewpoint. This allows comparisons to be drawn between the subjects, and the differences as well as the similarities to be noted.It is interesting how August Sander's typology of the German people catalogued individuals, but also made a record of the condition of Germany at the time, which was etched onto each person. Also evident on the person was the way they tried to shed this record, and preserve their old self. Sander's depiction of all and sundry irked the Nazis - his book was banned and the glass plates destroyed.
I found Brandt's treatment of documents intriguing. Rather than just photograph people surviving in war-time Britain by sleeping in the underground stations, which would be compelling in itself, he took the photographic opportunity one step further by incorporating surrealist elements; creating a strange surreal/document hybrid. This blurring of genres is something I'd like to explore in my own work.
Photography's manipulation by the government in the form of propaganda was intriguing but at the same time alarming. From the subtle, careful choices of including just the right number of people in an image depicting 'family' in the work of Lange, to Rodchenko's post-production where he turned a frown upside-down, and later destruction of his own work by Stalin.
I enjoyed the two contrasting interpretations of Walker Evans' Penny Picture Display. This image to me sums up the ambiguity of a photographic document, and how your own experiences might influence the way you view and compare the individual frames.
Tuesday, 2 February 2016
Graham Clarke: The Photograph
Graham Clarke's book 'The Photograph' came included with the course materials. I found it a difficult read, due to the dense manner of describing things, but I managed to glean some information to a greater or lesser extent from each chapter which I have briefly documented below. Most of the text is quoted or paraphrased from the book, comments in brackets are usually my own. This was an interesting but as mentioned difficult read, mostly I expect due to my limited knowledge and experience of 'art' in general, and sometimes the language is difficult to decode. Further exposure to these kinds of materials, will make a future re-read of the book easier, I expect.
The camera lucida was used an as aid to drawing.
Functionally, the photograph is dependent on its context; differences between colour and black and white, circular and square images, small and large. Also, in a newspaper or magazine, in a frame, on a document, in a gallery etc.
Initially there were technical limitations; the long exposure time limited choice of subject.
Art photography describes the medium's capacity to express something beyond the surface appearance of things.
When we enlarge photographs contrary to the mass produced size we underscore their differences and value. (This pertains to selecting particular images to be blown up and displayed).
We read a photograph, not as an image, but as text (I interprate this as the image telling a story/narrative).
Studium - A passive response to a photograph's appeal (on a surface level).
Punctum - A detail within the photograph that disturbs the surface unity and stability and opens up the space to critical analysis.
I found the concept of Studium/Punctum intriguing, and is helpful to begin to understand how to 'read' an art photograph.
Combination photographs - A series of negative combined to contruct the image gives a false appearance. (Manipulating images began from the inception of the photograph, and is dealt with further in chapter 10).
In a period of limited travel and communication, photography offered wonderous images of otherwise only imagined cultures. (I surmise that this idea of showing people places they wouldn't ordinarily see is related to a similar idea mentioned in chapter 5).
Landscape photography remains encoded within the language of academic painting and traditions of 18th and 19th century landscape art.
Roger Fenton was a photographer who showed the idealized and touristic; there is no sign of work, poverty or hardship, and the people are posed; this offers a highly edited version of rural england. This contrasts with documentary photography of rural life. There is nothing in the frame to disturb the pleasure of the eye.
The camera negotiates between two poles, the vertical and the horizontal, which suggests part of a larger dialect on how the city has been seen: the public and private, the detail and general, the exterior and interior, the historial and modern, the permanent and the temporary. (Photography in the city provides infinite scope).
Photographers responded early on to the variety of the streets and their ambience.
Images for an assumed middle-class audience allowed them to see what they would otherwise not see. (Related to 19th century travel photography).
In the 19th Century photography increased demand for portraiture. Daguerreotype was the most popular form; it produced a unique image as it had no positive/negative process. (This gives added value to the image, as it a one-off, like an original painting).
Victorian photographer Julia Margaret Cameron, like others, had different depictions of men and women. Her image of a man, showing the head only, implying intelligence and individualism, and looking into the camera. This reinforces the myth of male dominance. Her image of the woman shows the subject being looked at sideways-on. This implies she is being looked at, rather than looking herself; this underlines the passive nature of the image. (In contrast to the image of the man). There is also an exaggerated depiction of the woman's neck and hair; the sense of the woman as an individual is deferred to a larger, passive female ideal based on assumed sexual difference and social significance. It is not a portrait advertising a self as much as a general idea to be consumed (by men). (I found this different way of posing males and females by photographers of the time to be very intriguing, and shows how the camera can record social phenomenon).
The image of the heir to the throne and the prime minister. This is a whole body shot giving weight to their status. Each is given equal space within the frame, suggestive of a sharing of power and influence. The camera however has established differences between the two: contrasting faces; bullish vs hesitant, different tie, collar, waistcoat. Left hand clenched, relaxed. (To me, this image was reminiscent of Diane Arbus' image of the twins, where closer inspection reveals differences between the two figures).
Since its inception the photograph has delighted in the depiction of nude bodies within a private space - implying a sense of the hidden, illicit and secret. It makes the private space of the body open to the public eye; this eye being traditionally male.
In comparison to nude painting, photography gives the promise of the actual.
Soft-focus and passive poses - female stereotypes are depicted in relation to male fantasy and expectation. The subjects rarely look at the camera, designating them as 'objects' to be looked at.
In Alfred Stieglitz's image of Georgia O Keeffe, there is the absence of her face, hands and feet (all of which are arbiters of her individual self). This allows her to remain absent from the image.
The image of the body-part mobile - This allows the viewer to create an individual hierachy of significance. (I found this concept intriguing, and it highlighted how each individual viewer would 'read' the image differently, depending on their own preferences).
In many ways this genre dominated the photographic history of the 20th century.
It is a truthful and objective account (or representation) of what has happened.
Photography is able to record an objective image in a way painting and drawing can't.
Makes available images of an otherwise unknown world. (Again, see chapters 3 and 5)
There is a debate whether certain images are real or fake. (Which perhaps undermines the genre).
Photography is distinguished from painting as a unique medium in its own right with its own unique possibilities.
Changing the ordinary to the extraordinary is basic to the aesthetics of art photography. (And which I get the feeling this whole book is about).
Textures of walls, stones, doors and fences - Paul Strand makes what would otherwise be part of the detrius of the urban scene yield something signficant and unique - takes the most marginal of subject-matter and turn it into a hierophany of potential meaning.
Debate between black and white, and colour. The Photographic world still retains an elitist view of B&W; still the dominant medium, as in documentary. B&W lays stress on the photograph as a medium in its own right, rather than to reproduce the world 'as is'. Colour insists on a 'thereness' of the world.
Art photography is not intended for the casual glance.
The banal is boosted to a new frame of meaning.
The irony of the art photograph: everything can be a photograph, and, in Egglestons terms, can be art. (This photographer's job as far as I can tell is to develop a 'way of looking' that allows you to see the art in everything.
Beginning in the 1900's we see a series of photographers who begin to both question photographic practice and relate their concerns to the modernist aesthetic beginning to make itself felt in painting and literature. The need for a new visual vocabulary that many photographers sought to take account of in relation to developments in other media at the time. (At this time there was a big shakeup in Western art music; it seems that practitioners of all media were looking to leave behind the old way of doing things and do something new).
How was the camera to equate itself with new ways of seeing, such as the terms of reference found in cubism; a series of multiple views and perspectives.One response was the Vortograph - projecting the lens into a series of mirrors, resulting in something akin to cubist portraiture. 'Vortograph, the first completely abstract kind of photograph, it is composed of kaleidoscopic repetitions of forms achieved by photographing objects through a triangular arrangement of three mirrors.' (A very interesting concept that I will learn more about and try myself!).
Photographic collage and montage in the 19th century - Photographs were manipulated since their inception.
'Defamiliarization or ostranenie (остранение) is the artistic technique of presenting to audiences common things in an unfamiliar or strange way in order to enhance perception of the familiar.'
Soon Man Ray was making photographs of objects not unlike Marcel Duchamp's "readymades," ordinary objects elevated to the status of art because so designated by the artist, and "assisted readymades," objects that the artist "assisted," or altered, by combining them with others.
Manipulate the image and the photographic space: constructing, deconstructing, cutting-up and fragmenting the primary terms of the photographic space in order to suggest other levels of meaning and significance. (I think this is a good explanation of why people would want to manipulate photographs; especially those of a banal nature).
Merely placing two objects or images together (as with any two words) creates the potential for meaning and a new relationship between reader and image. Everything in an individual state can be recognised, and yet in the pattern in which they are presented they demand a new form of recognition and a new kind of attention. (This is especially pertinent to Assignment Five. Two images can mean one thing when viewed individually, but open up a whole new narrative when viewed side-by-side).
Chapter 1 - What is a Photograph?
This chapter gives a history of early photographic procedures. William Henry Fox Talbot produced the first negative/positive process to be able to produce multiple copies.The camera lucida was used an as aid to drawing.
Functionally, the photograph is dependent on its context; differences between colour and black and white, circular and square images, small and large. Also, in a newspaper or magazine, in a frame, on a document, in a gallery etc.
Initially there were technical limitations; the long exposure time limited choice of subject.
Art photography describes the medium's capacity to express something beyond the surface appearance of things.
When we enlarge photographs contrary to the mass produced size we underscore their differences and value. (This pertains to selecting particular images to be blown up and displayed).
Chapter 2 - How do we Read a Photograph?
We read a photograph, not as an image, but as text (I interprate this as the image telling a story/narrative).
Studium - A passive response to a photograph's appeal (on a surface level).
Punctum - A detail within the photograph that disturbs the surface unity and stability and opens up the space to critical analysis.
I found the concept of Studium/Punctum intriguing, and is helpful to begin to understand how to 'read' an art photograph.
Chapter 3 - Photography and the Nineteenth Century.
Combination photographs - A series of negative combined to contruct the image gives a false appearance. (Manipulating images began from the inception of the photograph, and is dealt with further in chapter 10).
In a period of limited travel and communication, photography offered wonderous images of otherwise only imagined cultures. (I surmise that this idea of showing people places they wouldn't ordinarily see is related to a similar idea mentioned in chapter 5).
Chapter 4 - Landscape in Photography.
Landscape photography remains encoded within the language of academic painting and traditions of 18th and 19th century landscape art.
Roger Fenton was a photographer who showed the idealized and touristic; there is no sign of work, poverty or hardship, and the people are posed; this offers a highly edited version of rural england. This contrasts with documentary photography of rural life. There is nothing in the frame to disturb the pleasure of the eye.
Chapter 5 - The City in Photography.
The camera negotiates between two poles, the vertical and the horizontal, which suggests part of a larger dialect on how the city has been seen: the public and private, the detail and general, the exterior and interior, the historial and modern, the permanent and the temporary. (Photography in the city provides infinite scope).
Photographers responded early on to the variety of the streets and their ambience.
Images for an assumed middle-class audience allowed them to see what they would otherwise not see. (Related to 19th century travel photography).
Chapter 6 - The Portrait in Photography
In the 19th Century photography increased demand for portraiture. Daguerreotype was the most popular form; it produced a unique image as it had no positive/negative process. (This gives added value to the image, as it a one-off, like an original painting).
Victorian photographer Julia Margaret Cameron, like others, had different depictions of men and women. Her image of a man, showing the head only, implying intelligence and individualism, and looking into the camera. This reinforces the myth of male dominance. Her image of the woman shows the subject being looked at sideways-on. This implies she is being looked at, rather than looking herself; this underlines the passive nature of the image. (In contrast to the image of the man). There is also an exaggerated depiction of the woman's neck and hair; the sense of the woman as an individual is deferred to a larger, passive female ideal based on assumed sexual difference and social significance. It is not a portrait advertising a self as much as a general idea to be consumed (by men). (I found this different way of posing males and females by photographers of the time to be very intriguing, and shows how the camera can record social phenomenon).
The image of the heir to the throne and the prime minister. This is a whole body shot giving weight to their status. Each is given equal space within the frame, suggestive of a sharing of power and influence. The camera however has established differences between the two: contrasting faces; bullish vs hesitant, different tie, collar, waistcoat. Left hand clenched, relaxed. (To me, this image was reminiscent of Diane Arbus' image of the twins, where closer inspection reveals differences between the two figures).
Chapter 7 - The Body in Photography
Since its inception the photograph has delighted in the depiction of nude bodies within a private space - implying a sense of the hidden, illicit and secret. It makes the private space of the body open to the public eye; this eye being traditionally male.
In comparison to nude painting, photography gives the promise of the actual.
Soft-focus and passive poses - female stereotypes are depicted in relation to male fantasy and expectation. The subjects rarely look at the camera, designating them as 'objects' to be looked at.
In Alfred Stieglitz's image of Georgia O Keeffe, there is the absence of her face, hands and feet (all of which are arbiters of her individual self). This allows her to remain absent from the image.
The image of the body-part mobile - This allows the viewer to create an individual hierachy of significance. (I found this concept intriguing, and it highlighted how each individual viewer would 'read' the image differently, depending on their own preferences).
Chapter 8 - Documentary Photography
In many ways this genre dominated the photographic history of the 20th century.
It is a truthful and objective account (or representation) of what has happened.
Photography is able to record an objective image in a way painting and drawing can't.
Makes available images of an otherwise unknown world. (Again, see chapters 3 and 5)
There is a debate whether certain images are real or fake. (Which perhaps undermines the genre).
Chapter 9 - The Photograph as Fine Art
Photography is distinguished from painting as a unique medium in its own right with its own unique possibilities.
Changing the ordinary to the extraordinary is basic to the aesthetics of art photography. (And which I get the feeling this whole book is about).
Textures of walls, stones, doors and fences - Paul Strand makes what would otherwise be part of the detrius of the urban scene yield something signficant and unique - takes the most marginal of subject-matter and turn it into a hierophany of potential meaning.
Debate between black and white, and colour. The Photographic world still retains an elitist view of B&W; still the dominant medium, as in documentary. B&W lays stress on the photograph as a medium in its own right, rather than to reproduce the world 'as is'. Colour insists on a 'thereness' of the world.
Art photography is not intended for the casual glance.
The banal is boosted to a new frame of meaning.
The irony of the art photograph: everything can be a photograph, and, in Egglestons terms, can be art. (This photographer's job as far as I can tell is to develop a 'way of looking' that allows you to see the art in everything.
Chapter 10 - The Photograph Manipulated
Beginning in the 1900's we see a series of photographers who begin to both question photographic practice and relate their concerns to the modernist aesthetic beginning to make itself felt in painting and literature. The need for a new visual vocabulary that many photographers sought to take account of in relation to developments in other media at the time. (At this time there was a big shakeup in Western art music; it seems that practitioners of all media were looking to leave behind the old way of doing things and do something new).
How was the camera to equate itself with new ways of seeing, such as the terms of reference found in cubism; a series of multiple views and perspectives.One response was the Vortograph - projecting the lens into a series of mirrors, resulting in something akin to cubist portraiture. 'Vortograph, the first completely abstract kind of photograph, it is composed of kaleidoscopic repetitions of forms achieved by photographing objects through a triangular arrangement of three mirrors.' (A very interesting concept that I will learn more about and try myself!).
Photographic collage and montage in the 19th century - Photographs were manipulated since their inception.
'Defamiliarization or ostranenie (остранение) is the artistic technique of presenting to audiences common things in an unfamiliar or strange way in order to enhance perception of the familiar.'
Soon Man Ray was making photographs of objects not unlike Marcel Duchamp's "readymades," ordinary objects elevated to the status of art because so designated by the artist, and "assisted readymades," objects that the artist "assisted," or altered, by combining them with others.
Manipulate the image and the photographic space: constructing, deconstructing, cutting-up and fragmenting the primary terms of the photographic space in order to suggest other levels of meaning and significance. (I think this is a good explanation of why people would want to manipulate photographs; especially those of a banal nature).
Merely placing two objects or images together (as with any two words) creates the potential for meaning and a new relationship between reader and image. Everything in an individual state can be recognised, and yet in the pattern in which they are presented they demand a new form of recognition and a new kind of attention. (This is especially pertinent to Assignment Five. Two images can mean one thing when viewed individually, but open up a whole new narrative when viewed side-by-side).
Chapter 11 - The Cabinet of Infinite Curiosities
This appears to sum up the book in its entirety. I really like the phrase 'The Cabinet of Infinite Curiosities', as I think that is what the photographer opens up when they turn on their camera. It is up to each individual photographer which curiosities to display in any given situation.Monday, 24 August 2015
Nikon School - Guide to Creative Lighting
I have just finished watching a DVD by Nikon School called Guide to Creative Lighting. The current exercises on artificial lighting in the course has piqued my interest in these tools, and I thought this DVD would inform me on how the Nikon Creative Lighting System (a Nikon term for its range of lighting equipment, accessories and software) works and what can be achieved with it, along with general tips on the use of light in various types of scenes.
The DVD starts in a studio setting, using a single speedlight mounted on-camera. This gives unsatisfactory results due to the hard, specular and frontal light hitting the model; so there is then a progression of improvement utilising the three facets of light management:
Direction - The angle at which the light strikes the subject.
Quality - Hard specular light, or soft diffused light.
Colour - Often modified using colour gels attached to the speedlights, and changing colour balance.
Deciding on which form of each of these facets is used is dependent on the subject and the environment, although this DVD dealt mainly with environmental portraiture - studio, ballet class, bride, and fisherman.
In terms of direction, the flash was mostly used off-camera, at a high 45 degree angle to the subject. This causes an interplay between light and shadow creating a 3D effect on a 2D medium (paper or screen). Other speedlights and reflectors were then used to fill in the light on the shadow side of key areas such as the model's face. This gave multidirectional light that could be adjusted to create the effect the photographer had in mind.
The quality of the light was usually diffused through a white, translucent material. There are many tools available to do this, from a simple small diffuser that fits over the head of the speedlight, to umbrellas, handheld diffusers, large stand-mounted diffusers and even large bedsheets. Diffusers work by making the original light source bigger, and the bigger a light source is in comparison to the subject, the softer the light. The sun, although a huge entity in space, appears as only a small disc in the sky from our perspective. This therefore makes it a small, hard light source. On a cloudy day, the clouds make this small light source into a very large one, which is why overcast days produce such soft shadowless light.
With available light, the colour changes with the time of day, which means waiting for the light that you need. With artificial lighting you can change the colour of your light instantly with coloured gels that fit over the speedlights. Light picks up the colour of the material it passes through, or reflects from. There was an interesting example of this in the DVD where a macro shot of a small pocket watch was being taken. The photographer was using a second small speedlight to light the background due to the quick falloff of the main flash making the background dark. It was decided to use this second light to change the colour of the background to create a more interesting separation from the subject. A blue gel fitted over the front of the speedlight achieved this. Another interesting example of changing the colour of the light is when a reflector with a golden surface is used, often from a low angle, to bounce fill light into the subject's face. This serves to fill shadows under the eyes, nose etc caused by the main, high, speedlight, and the gold of the reflector makes the light warmer which is very desirable for a lot of portraiture.
On the DVD there was a big emphasis on supplementing the available light with speedlights, but also modifying this light in terms of direction, quality and colour as per the examples above. I think bearing these three fundamentals in mind, and manipulating them acccordingly, whether using available or artificial light will make huge improvements to my future photographs.
The DVD starts in a studio setting, using a single speedlight mounted on-camera. This gives unsatisfactory results due to the hard, specular and frontal light hitting the model; so there is then a progression of improvement utilising the three facets of light management:
Direction - The angle at which the light strikes the subject.
Quality - Hard specular light, or soft diffused light.
Colour - Often modified using colour gels attached to the speedlights, and changing colour balance.
Deciding on which form of each of these facets is used is dependent on the subject and the environment, although this DVD dealt mainly with environmental portraiture - studio, ballet class, bride, and fisherman.
In terms of direction, the flash was mostly used off-camera, at a high 45 degree angle to the subject. This causes an interplay between light and shadow creating a 3D effect on a 2D medium (paper or screen). Other speedlights and reflectors were then used to fill in the light on the shadow side of key areas such as the model's face. This gave multidirectional light that could be adjusted to create the effect the photographer had in mind.
The quality of the light was usually diffused through a white, translucent material. There are many tools available to do this, from a simple small diffuser that fits over the head of the speedlight, to umbrellas, handheld diffusers, large stand-mounted diffusers and even large bedsheets. Diffusers work by making the original light source bigger, and the bigger a light source is in comparison to the subject, the softer the light. The sun, although a huge entity in space, appears as only a small disc in the sky from our perspective. This therefore makes it a small, hard light source. On a cloudy day, the clouds make this small light source into a very large one, which is why overcast days produce such soft shadowless light.
With available light, the colour changes with the time of day, which means waiting for the light that you need. With artificial lighting you can change the colour of your light instantly with coloured gels that fit over the speedlights. Light picks up the colour of the material it passes through, or reflects from. There was an interesting example of this in the DVD where a macro shot of a small pocket watch was being taken. The photographer was using a second small speedlight to light the background due to the quick falloff of the main flash making the background dark. It was decided to use this second light to change the colour of the background to create a more interesting separation from the subject. A blue gel fitted over the front of the speedlight achieved this. Another interesting example of changing the colour of the light is when a reflector with a golden surface is used, often from a low angle, to bounce fill light into the subject's face. This serves to fill shadows under the eyes, nose etc caused by the main, high, speedlight, and the gold of the reflector makes the light warmer which is very desirable for a lot of portraiture.
On the DVD there was a big emphasis on supplementing the available light with speedlights, but also modifying this light in terms of direction, quality and colour as per the examples above. I think bearing these three fundamentals in mind, and manipulating them acccordingly, whether using available or artificial light will make huge improvements to my future photographs.
Monday, 6 April 2015
Learning to See Creatively - Light Chapter
Another Bryan Peterson book I have access to is called 'Learning to See Creatively'. There's several pages on the subject of light, which I've made brief notes on for my research for this part of the course.
Light has three important characteristics: brightness, colour, and direction. All three undergo varying degrees of intensity depending on the time of day and each affects the mood created by the available light in any given scene.
It's useful to get your bearings at a location, N E S W, in order to best utilise the direction of the available light.
Midday hours with bright, overhead sun can be used for planning and scouting locations to be used later in better light.
Use postcards and souvenir picture books for location ideas, then explore fresh viewpoints of those subjects.
Just before dawn and just after sunset, in good weather and with a clear sky, the light produces cool blue and magenta hues or rosy pinks and vivid reds.
At sunrise this is replaced by warm, orange light that bathes front and sidelit subjects in orange and gold. Beginning about one hour before sunset, this colour change happens in reverse. This time is referred to as the 'golden hour'.
Available Light
The time of day and your own position relative to the sun affect how the subject appears in the image; hard or soft-edged, in warm or cool tones, and displaying vivid details or glaring contrasts.Light has three important characteristics: brightness, colour, and direction. All three undergo varying degrees of intensity depending on the time of day and each affects the mood created by the available light in any given scene.
It's useful to get your bearings at a location, N E S W, in order to best utilise the direction of the available light.
Midday hours with bright, overhead sun can be used for planning and scouting locations to be used later in better light.
Use postcards and souvenir picture books for location ideas, then explore fresh viewpoints of those subjects.
The Colour of Light
The midday sun is often a harsh, white light. Due to its colourless quality and overhead position, you are unlikely to get emotion-filled and dramatic lighting.Just before dawn and just after sunset, in good weather and with a clear sky, the light produces cool blue and magenta hues or rosy pinks and vivid reds.
At sunrise this is replaced by warm, orange light that bathes front and sidelit subjects in orange and gold. Beginning about one hour before sunset, this colour change happens in reverse. This time is referred to as the 'golden hour'.
Overcast and Rainy Days
Overcast clouds diffuse the sunlight, making it very soft and even. This makes colours 'pop' and is excellent for portraits.Friday, 27 March 2015
Understanding Exposure: Light Chapter
I bought Bryan Peterson's book 'Understanding Exposure' years ago when I first got into digital photography. It was helpful at the time to improve my understanding of the exposure triangle (aperture, shutter speed and ISO). There is a chapter in the book devoted to the subject of light, and I thought this would be a good starting point for my research in this part of the course. I made brief notes on useful information in this chapter, starting with an interesting quote:
In other words, the lighting in an image is an extremely important feature of an already creatively correct image; light enhances the photo which you have already planned with a creative exposure.
Exposures in the midday sunlight are harsh and contrasty without any real warmth. The best natural light is in the early-morning and late-afternoon; both reveal textures, shadows, and depth in warm and vivid tones. This light combined with a change of weather such as an incoming storm or rain shower is also great.
The colour of light varies: early morning light is golden, but cooler than the stronger golden-orange light an hour before sunset. Weather, especially inclement weather, can change the colour of light.
Light is considered as coming from three directions:
Overcast front light also illuminates evenly. The light is very soft, good for natural looking portraits, and richer colour flowers. Also eliminates contrasts problems that occur on a sunny day. A very suitable light for auto-exposure modes; aperture or shutter priority can easily be used depending on the creative requirements.
Back-lighting offers a variety of exposure options:
1) Meter for the strong back light to create a silhouette.
2) Meter for the light falling on the subject, excluding the back light - good for portraits.
3) Meter for the light that's illuminating a somewhat transparent subject, such as leaves and dew-covered spider webs. Semi-transparent subjects don't silhouette in back light - they appear to glow.
Like many exposure options, successful back-lit scenes result from a conscious and deliberate metering decision.
The light is the best frosting for the cake, but it isn't the cake.
In other words, the lighting in an image is an extremely important feature of an already creatively correct image; light enhances the photo which you have already planned with a creative exposure.
Exposures in the midday sunlight are harsh and contrasty without any real warmth. The best natural light is in the early-morning and late-afternoon; both reveal textures, shadows, and depth in warm and vivid tones. This light combined with a change of weather such as an incoming storm or rain shower is also great.
The colour of light varies: early morning light is golden, but cooler than the stronger golden-orange light an hour before sunset. Weather, especially inclement weather, can change the colour of light.
Light is considered as coming from three directions:
low-angled front light provides even illumination
side light provides a three dimensional effect
strong back light provides silhouettes
Front Light
The quality and colour of front light is best in the first hour after sunrise, and during the last few hours of daylight. Frontlight evenly illuminates, making for a straightforward exposure.Overcast front light also illuminates evenly. The light is very soft, good for natural looking portraits, and richer colour flowers. Also eliminates contrasts problems that occur on a sunny day. A very suitable light for auto-exposure modes; aperture or shutter priority can easily be used depending on the creative requirements.
Side Light
Front-lit subjects often appear two-dimensional, even though your eyes tell you the subject has depth. Highlights and shadows produce an illusion of three-dimensionality, and this can be achieved with side light. For several hours after sunrise and several hours before sunset you will get side light if you shoot towards the north or south. You should consider underexposing by one stop to further darken the shadows. Side-lit subjects elicit a much stronger response from viewers than front-lit or back-lit because it better simulates the three-dimensional world they see with their own eyes.Back Light
With back-lighting it is easy to make silhouettes. Exposing for the whole scene will render a silhouette; if you want to properly expose for the subject, then fill the frame with subject then exposure lock before backing away and recomposing the image.Back-lighting offers a variety of exposure options:
1) Meter for the strong back light to create a silhouette.
2) Meter for the light falling on the subject, excluding the back light - good for portraits.
3) Meter for the light that's illuminating a somewhat transparent subject, such as leaves and dew-covered spider webs. Semi-transparent subjects don't silhouette in back light - they appear to glow.
Like many exposure options, successful back-lit scenes result from a conscious and deliberate metering decision.
Tuesday, 15 July 2014
Street Photography Now
The latest book I've researched for assignment three is called Street Photography Now by Sophie Howarth and Stephen McLaren. The focus of this book is not colour per se, but knowing that I plan on shooting my forthcoming assignment as street photography, I felt that I could glean plenty of interesting ideas when dealing with the genre, and also see how long-standing and up-and-coming street photographers use colour to enhance the narrative in their images. I studied the book mostly from a colour perspective, and my brief notes reflect that approach. Firstly though, I'd like to share some of my favourite quotes from photographers featured in the book:
'If you can smell the street by looking at the photo, it's a street photograph'. -Bruce Gilden
'Like members of a secret society, teeming pedestrians march in a parade of broken cadence to countless tunes, in all directions, for every reason'. - Gus Powell
'... trying to find the unseen within the everyday'. - Munem Wasif
And from the introduction to the book:
'a good street photograph is remarkable because it makes something very ordinary seem extraordinary.'
Unfortunately, like the McCurry book, I'm unable to reproduce the images I've made notes on due to copyright restrictions, but my notes do reflect my thought process even without seeing their relative images:
pg.24 blood red shed - three horizontal colours, like a colour triptych
pg.30 the red of the coca cola uniforms contrasts against the green foliage
pg.36 multitude of colours - reds, blues, yellows
pg.44 although both colours are muted, the 'warm' yellow of the building contrasts with the 'cool' grey/blues of the mountain and sky.
pg.46 colourful tower blocks, contrasting with each other and also the bland foreground. The blue cart is particularly prominent.
pg.49 the green foliage, red bus shelter, yellow posters and red tiles give a brightness to the image which seems at odds with the dreariness of the weather.
pg.69 the three primary colours are visible, while the rest of the scene is an ethereal green/grey
pg.81 the vivid red dress is juxtaposed with its complimentary colour in the green grass. The brightness of her straw-coloured hair also catches the eye.
pg.89 the bright yellow curved line against the black tarmac and understated tones in the rest of the scene really animates the image.
pg.110 an interesting colour combination, the red barrier acts as an accented colour against the yellows, blues and greens which are all closer to each other than to red on the colour wheel.
pg.119 the blue of the shawl is mirrored in the barrier tape, creating a striking and dynamic composition.
pg.134 the warm colours of the woman's clothes seem to radiate, while the cool and neutral colours in the rest of the scene recede feeling almost 3D.
pg.193 the red turban matches the hue of the fry box, drawing attention to both ends of the frame.
pg.211 the ball is hard not to notice due to its size, but especially its colour. Would it 'pop' so much if it were for example a white ball?
'If you can smell the street by looking at the photo, it's a street photograph'. -Bruce Gilden
'Like members of a secret society, teeming pedestrians march in a parade of broken cadence to countless tunes, in all directions, for every reason'. - Gus Powell
'... trying to find the unseen within the everyday'. - Munem Wasif
And from the introduction to the book:
'a good street photograph is remarkable because it makes something very ordinary seem extraordinary.'
Unfortunately, like the McCurry book, I'm unable to reproduce the images I've made notes on due to copyright restrictions, but my notes do reflect my thought process even without seeing their relative images:
pg.24 blood red shed - three horizontal colours, like a colour triptych
pg.30 the red of the coca cola uniforms contrasts against the green foliage
pg.36 multitude of colours - reds, blues, yellows
pg.44 although both colours are muted, the 'warm' yellow of the building contrasts with the 'cool' grey/blues of the mountain and sky.
pg.46 colourful tower blocks, contrasting with each other and also the bland foreground. The blue cart is particularly prominent.
pg.49 the green foliage, red bus shelter, yellow posters and red tiles give a brightness to the image which seems at odds with the dreariness of the weather.
pg.69 the three primary colours are visible, while the rest of the scene is an ethereal green/grey
pg.81 the vivid red dress is juxtaposed with its complimentary colour in the green grass. The brightness of her straw-coloured hair also catches the eye.
pg.89 the bright yellow curved line against the black tarmac and understated tones in the rest of the scene really animates the image.
pg.110 an interesting colour combination, the red barrier acts as an accented colour against the yellows, blues and greens which are all closer to each other than to red on the colour wheel.
pg.119 the blue of the shawl is mirrored in the barrier tape, creating a striking and dynamic composition.
pg.134 the warm colours of the woman's clothes seem to radiate, while the cool and neutral colours in the rest of the scene recede feeling almost 3D.
pg.193 the red turban matches the hue of the fry box, drawing attention to both ends of the frame.
pg.211 the ball is hard not to notice due to its size, but especially its colour. Would it 'pop' so much if it were for example a white ball?
Thursday, 10 July 2014
The Photograph as Contemporary Art
I recently finished reading a book from the course reading list, titled 'The Photograph as Contemporary Art' by Charlotte Cotton. Overall, the book was helpful as a primer in how photography functions in the context of fine art, and introduced me to a lot of photographers working in fine art (over 200 in fact). As such, it was a very broad look at the subject as a whole, which although provided food for thought on occasion I felt was hard work digging through the over-complicated writing style.
As I often found the narrative quite confusing, I didn't fully grasp every concept discussed, especially the images of scenes that were (in the words of the author) banal. What makes a snapshot of someone's dinner fine art by one particular photographer, and not by the millions of people who post 'food' pictures to social media sites every day? Many of the images certainly didn't look 'professional', and look like they could have been taken by the average person on the street with a cheap disposable. I think this highlights the different between 'beautiful' photography, taken by a photographer, who's main object is a professional and attractive image, and photography taken by artists. As I'm not an expert or enthusiast of fine art, this is where my understanding of the concepts broke down, although I can generalise that for the artist the photograph is not the end goal, it is often simply a way of portraying an artistic concept.
The book did introduce me to new genres and techniques of which I was previously unaware, and also put a name to genres which I recognised, such as deadpan (in a portraiture sense, not in architecture), seen in many of Steve McCurrie's images in his book In The Shadow of Mountains. The various images often made more sense when presented with the back-story, and so the artistic concept was made apparent, although I'm unsure how a lot of the images would stand on their own without the support of textual narrative.
Some ideas really resonated with the imagination, such as Sophie Calle's project where she secretly followed a man from Paris to Venice, documenting his journey. If anything, this has been the book's main draw for me; exciting the imagination and encouraging a 'think outside the box' mentality, along with making me aware of the multitude of possibilities within the photography as fine art genre.
As I often found the narrative quite confusing, I didn't fully grasp every concept discussed, especially the images of scenes that were (in the words of the author) banal. What makes a snapshot of someone's dinner fine art by one particular photographer, and not by the millions of people who post 'food' pictures to social media sites every day? Many of the images certainly didn't look 'professional', and look like they could have been taken by the average person on the street with a cheap disposable. I think this highlights the different between 'beautiful' photography, taken by a photographer, who's main object is a professional and attractive image, and photography taken by artists. As I'm not an expert or enthusiast of fine art, this is where my understanding of the concepts broke down, although I can generalise that for the artist the photograph is not the end goal, it is often simply a way of portraying an artistic concept.
The book did introduce me to new genres and techniques of which I was previously unaware, and also put a name to genres which I recognised, such as deadpan (in a portraiture sense, not in architecture), seen in many of Steve McCurrie's images in his book In The Shadow of Mountains. The various images often made more sense when presented with the back-story, and so the artistic concept was made apparent, although I'm unsure how a lot of the images would stand on their own without the support of textual narrative.
Some ideas really resonated with the imagination, such as Sophie Calle's project where she secretly followed a man from Paris to Venice, documenting his journey. If anything, this has been the book's main draw for me; exciting the imagination and encouraging a 'think outside the box' mentality, along with making me aware of the multitude of possibilities within the photography as fine art genre.
Sunday, 6 July 2014
Colour Street Photography - In the Shadow of Mountains
My tutor advised me to research colour street photography in preparation for assignment three. Although assignment three doesn't specifically request the street photography genre, I get the impression that my tutor thinks this offers the best opportunity in this instance for using colour to enhance narrative. I do like to get out and about as my second assignment demonstrates, so that may have also had some bearing on the suggestion.
So where to start? In all my time as a hobbyist photographer, I have never taken the time to look at others' work, except on an informal basis such as flickr. In order to begin my research I needed to find some renown street photographers whose work I could study. A google search for street photography gave me the following blog article:
http://erickimphotography.com/blog/2013/11/26/street-photography-composition-lesson-12-color-theory/
Many of the photographs used to demonstrate colour as a compositional tool in the article are by photographer Steve McCurry. I decided to investigate his work further, as I was drawn to the images in the article, and I also recognised one of them, the ultra-famous image Afghan Girl.
I visited a library I often frequent and picked up the book 'In the Shadow of Mountains' which is a cross-section of McCurry's work when visiting Afghanistan (which he has done more than 30 times over several decades). The images in this book could be analysed and discussed on many different levels, but I focused my own interpretation primarily on the use of colour, and made notes on images that I could identify, even with my limited knowledge, as making strong use of colour to enhance the narrative. In the 'background information' section at the end of the book, explanations are given for each image, and occasional they mention the use of colour, which of course I found very helpful. With that in mind, some of my brief notes are taken from the book, but mostly they are my own.
'Colour, light and composition are just the building blocks for telling a story' - Steve McCurry
'Teeth Maker' - The golden light from the sinking or rising sun illuminates the wooden outline of the stall, and contrasts heavily with the blackened interior, framing the subject. The primary colour yellow and the secondary colour green compliment each other here (not in a heavily contrasting way).
'Portrait Photographer' - The red of the boxy camera body contrasts strongly with the green/grey shutter behind it and the generally muted colours in the rest of the scene. Perhaps an example of 'accented' colour.
'Women at a Jewellery Shop' - A green window frame, blue shutter and red object near the top of the image serve to frame the vivid white burkhas worn by the women.
'Women Outside a Mosque' - The soft blue of the burkha at the forefront of the image leads the eye up to the green window frame through which can be seen men at prayer.
'Sikh Schoolboys' - Although yellow and green are not opposites on the colour wheel (in fact that are closely related), the yellow patkas on the boy's heads really illuminates against the dark green background. The purple/blue sleeve and blue pencils also give sparks of colour to the image creating energy.
'Village Girl' - The blue of the clothing and the orange of the background are complimentary colours - opposites on the colour wheel. This provides a heavy contrast and the colours reinforce each other.
'Afghan Girl' - If ever colour theory could be powerfully demonstrated in an image, surely this is it. The green of the background, eyes and patches of clothing is contrasted with its complimentary colour - the red of the headscarf. In my view, the colours in this image create a new dimension, wherein the green in the background 'seeps' through the subject, coming out of the eyes and the ragged holes in the headscarf.
'Schoolboy' - The scene is awash with a very neutral grey/brown colour, but the bright blue benches create an effective counterpoint.
'Widow Receiving Alms from a Restaurant' - At closer inspection of this image there are certain colours that are reflected in different areas of the scene creating a sense of cohesion. The yellow curtain matches the yellow curtain, the blue door frame matches the blue watertank, and the muted brown of the walls and basin are also a match.
'Man with a Horse' - The top quarter of the image comprises the warm golden colour of the setting sun, while the rest of the image is very cool blues.
'Bamiyan Valley' - The dark green of the vegetation frames the yellow of the wheat field, which is made brighter (and hence generates more of a contrast) by the low sun. Although the colours are close on the colour wheel, it is the relative brightness that I think creates the bigger contrast here.
'School Room in a Ruined Building' - The complimentary colours of blue and orange of the rug represents the ray of hope offered by education amongst the dreary colours of the ruined buildings.
'TV Mountain' - The yellow taxi-cabs driving through this grand scene act as accented colours against the muted colours in the rest of the scene, and the grey/blue road in particular. This bright colour is echoed in the sky at the top left of the image almost making it look like that is where the yellow cabs are originating from.
'Brick Kilns' - Similar to the image 'Man with a Horse' in the sense that large areas of a warm colour is juxtaposed with large areas of cool. The contrasting colours reinforce each other, making the warm seem warmer, and the cool cooler. The colours represented in the image aren't pure as in the colour wheel, and aren't exactly opposite, but this is often the case in the real world, with pure colours very rare, but many varieties of broken colours very frequent.
'Boy Selling Oranges' - Colour is used to great effect in this image, where the meagre but bright selection of oranges seem to radiate energy in contrast to the dreary greys of the boys clothing and the ruined car and building. This brightness is also a metaphor for the oranges significance in the boy's day-to-day survival.
'Afghan Fighter' - The stark red of the sofa immediately draws the eye, then the complimentary colour green of the man's shirt and socks stands out, quickly identifying the subject of the image.
'Chicken Seller' - In a similar way to 'Widow Receiving Alms from a Restaurant', this image contains elements of colour mirrored elsewhere in the scene. In this case the cool white/blue of the window frame on the far right balances the mud-splattered wall at the far left. The green doors mirror each other, and the flesh colour of the chickens mirrors the man's face.
'Boy Selling Flatbreads' - The flatbreads in the window, bathed in red/orange light portrays extreme warmth, which heavily contrasts with the coolness of the blues in the window frame and clothing.
So where to start? In all my time as a hobbyist photographer, I have never taken the time to look at others' work, except on an informal basis such as flickr. In order to begin my research I needed to find some renown street photographers whose work I could study. A google search for street photography gave me the following blog article:
http://erickimphotography.com/blog/2013/11/26/street-photography-composition-lesson-12-color-theory/
Many of the photographs used to demonstrate colour as a compositional tool in the article are by photographer Steve McCurry. I decided to investigate his work further, as I was drawn to the images in the article, and I also recognised one of them, the ultra-famous image Afghan Girl.
I visited a library I often frequent and picked up the book 'In the Shadow of Mountains' which is a cross-section of McCurry's work when visiting Afghanistan (which he has done more than 30 times over several decades). The images in this book could be analysed and discussed on many different levels, but I focused my own interpretation primarily on the use of colour, and made notes on images that I could identify, even with my limited knowledge, as making strong use of colour to enhance the narrative. In the 'background information' section at the end of the book, explanations are given for each image, and occasional they mention the use of colour, which of course I found very helpful. With that in mind, some of my brief notes are taken from the book, but mostly they are my own.
'Colour, light and composition are just the building blocks for telling a story' - Steve McCurry
'Teeth Maker' - The golden light from the sinking or rising sun illuminates the wooden outline of the stall, and contrasts heavily with the blackened interior, framing the subject. The primary colour yellow and the secondary colour green compliment each other here (not in a heavily contrasting way).
'Portrait Photographer' - The red of the boxy camera body contrasts strongly with the green/grey shutter behind it and the generally muted colours in the rest of the scene. Perhaps an example of 'accented' colour.
'Women at a Jewellery Shop' - A green window frame, blue shutter and red object near the top of the image serve to frame the vivid white burkhas worn by the women.
'Women Outside a Mosque' - The soft blue of the burkha at the forefront of the image leads the eye up to the green window frame through which can be seen men at prayer.
'Sikh Schoolboys' - Although yellow and green are not opposites on the colour wheel (in fact that are closely related), the yellow patkas on the boy's heads really illuminates against the dark green background. The purple/blue sleeve and blue pencils also give sparks of colour to the image creating energy.
'Village Girl' - The blue of the clothing and the orange of the background are complimentary colours - opposites on the colour wheel. This provides a heavy contrast and the colours reinforce each other.
'Afghan Girl' - If ever colour theory could be powerfully demonstrated in an image, surely this is it. The green of the background, eyes and patches of clothing is contrasted with its complimentary colour - the red of the headscarf. In my view, the colours in this image create a new dimension, wherein the green in the background 'seeps' through the subject, coming out of the eyes and the ragged holes in the headscarf.
'Schoolboy' - The scene is awash with a very neutral grey/brown colour, but the bright blue benches create an effective counterpoint.
'Widow Receiving Alms from a Restaurant' - At closer inspection of this image there are certain colours that are reflected in different areas of the scene creating a sense of cohesion. The yellow curtain matches the yellow curtain, the blue door frame matches the blue watertank, and the muted brown of the walls and basin are also a match.
'Man with a Horse' - The top quarter of the image comprises the warm golden colour of the setting sun, while the rest of the image is very cool blues.
'Bamiyan Valley' - The dark green of the vegetation frames the yellow of the wheat field, which is made brighter (and hence generates more of a contrast) by the low sun. Although the colours are close on the colour wheel, it is the relative brightness that I think creates the bigger contrast here.
'School Room in a Ruined Building' - The complimentary colours of blue and orange of the rug represents the ray of hope offered by education amongst the dreary colours of the ruined buildings.
'TV Mountain' - The yellow taxi-cabs driving through this grand scene act as accented colours against the muted colours in the rest of the scene, and the grey/blue road in particular. This bright colour is echoed in the sky at the top left of the image almost making it look like that is where the yellow cabs are originating from.
'Brick Kilns' - Similar to the image 'Man with a Horse' in the sense that large areas of a warm colour is juxtaposed with large areas of cool. The contrasting colours reinforce each other, making the warm seem warmer, and the cool cooler. The colours represented in the image aren't pure as in the colour wheel, and aren't exactly opposite, but this is often the case in the real world, with pure colours very rare, but many varieties of broken colours very frequent.
'Boy Selling Oranges' - Colour is used to great effect in this image, where the meagre but bright selection of oranges seem to radiate energy in contrast to the dreary greys of the boys clothing and the ruined car and building. This brightness is also a metaphor for the oranges significance in the boy's day-to-day survival.
'Afghan Fighter' - The stark red of the sofa immediately draws the eye, then the complimentary colour green of the man's shirt and socks stands out, quickly identifying the subject of the image.
'Chicken Seller' - In a similar way to 'Widow Receiving Alms from a Restaurant', this image contains elements of colour mirrored elsewhere in the scene. In this case the cool white/blue of the window frame on the far right balances the mud-splattered wall at the far left. The green doors mirror each other, and the flesh colour of the chickens mirrors the man's face.
'Boy Selling Flatbreads' - The flatbreads in the window, bathed in red/orange light portrays extreme warmth, which heavily contrasts with the coolness of the blues in the window frame and clothing.
Tuesday, 13 May 2014
Research on Colour Theory
Researching colour relationships has been a very interesting exercise, and I now feel much better informed on how colour is created and behaves in different mediums. It is interesting to know that the primary colours for light and pigment are different, and mixing those primary colours gives different results. Also interesting is how, as photographers, from a technical viewpoint we are concerned with RGB, but from a creative viewpoint we deal with RBY. My research is garnered from several sources, the details of which can be found at the bottom of the page.
Secondary colours - formed by mixing two adjacent primary colours
Complimentary colours - A primary colour and the secondary colour directly opposite on the wheel (or two opposite tertiary colours). When placed next to each other, they create the strongest contrast and reinforce each other.
Similar (tertiary) colours - A combination of a primary colour and adjacent secondary colour.
Accented colour - 'The accenting colour should be a strong contrast or complement to the principle area of the image and by occupying only a small but significant spot can create a spark of colour, which acts as a catalyst to create energy in the composition'.
Tones - Black through shades of grey to white are not colours, and should not play a principle role in colour relationships.
'a colour has many faces, and one colour can be made to appear as two different colours':
Pigment and light have different primary colours, and mix together differently.
Pigment - Reflected system
Light - Transmitted system
RGB (red, green, blue) is the technical process of recording and displaying colour (this is how digital cameras, monitor screens, our retinas, and colour film work). We use the painter's primaries of red, yellow and blue as this is the way we perceive colour.
Hue, Saturation, Brightness - The three qualities that define a colour. Most people only consider the hue.
Colours evoke emotions at an emotional, subjective level.
Colour works on 3 levels: Visual (the immediately obvious level), Expressive (emotional, evoking subjective sensations), Symbolic (certain colours and combinations are associated with things we have been brought up with).
Photographers can't mix colours as such, but can rearrange the colours of an image by changing viewpoint and/or framing, moving the subject, changing the lighting or a careful choice of filters.
The hue is the prime quality of a colour, and is what gives its uniqueness. Two ways you can influence the hue are by using a different colour of light (as at different times of the day), or by using a coloured filter. Both of these methods affect the whole image, not individual objects.
Brightness is the lightness or darkness of a colour; white and black are the extremes.
Brightness and saturation can be difficult to distinguish between, but in varieties of brilliance the colour remains pure and unadulterated.
The range of lightness and darkness differs between hues. Blue covers the whole range, but there is no such thing as a dark pure yellow for example. Red also turns to pink when very light, so loses its main qualities.
Saturation is a variation in the purity of a colour. The pure, intense colours become more grey, dirty, and less colourful when they become less saturated. This desaturation happens when pure colours are mixed with white, black, grey or their opposite colours on the colour circle.
Primary Colours
Yellow
The lightest and brightest of all colours. Does not exist in a dark form unless degraded.
Radiates light in a picture.
Matching its brilliance with other colours is difficult; a similar blue for example would have to be quite pale.
To be pure it must be an exact hue; there is very little latitude in yellow.
It is most intense against black, and most insipid against white. It is strong when seen against violet and blue.
Expressively, yellow is vigorous and sharp, the opposite of placid and restful.
Blue
Much quieter and less active than red.
The darkest of the three primaries; is at its greatest strength when deep.
It has a transparency that contrasts with red's opacity.
Expressively, blue is, above all, cool. It has associations of intangibility and passivity, and suggests a withdrawn, reflective mood.
Red
A complete contrast to the restrained blue, red is visually one of the most insistent, powerful and attention attracting colours.
It has considerable kinetic energy when set against cooler colours, green in particular.
It is relatively dense and solid.
Secondary Colours
Orange
The mixture of yellow and red, and absorbs some of the qualities of both.
Brilliant and powerful when pure.
When light it tends towards beige, when dark towards brown. It has neutral warmth.
Violet
Pure violet is the darkest colour.
Has rich and sumptuous associations, but can also create and impression of mystery and immensity.
Green
Medium brightness.
The most visible of colours to the human eye.
The colour of growth.
Yellow-green has spring time associations with youth.
Broken Colours
Painters are encouraged to construct hues from the dominant and pure primary and secondary colours.
Photography, by contrast, deals with broken colours found in the real world; pure colours are not common.
Broken colours are seen as a mixture of hues that given a deadened, unsaturated effect.
Black is known as D-Max (maximum density). Weaknesses can be caused in the D-Max by over-exposure, fogging, or altered processing.
White is the complete absence of any tone. Photographically, white needs care in exposure; slight under-exposure makes it appear muddy, slight over-exposure destroyed fine details and gives a washed-out look.
Blending Colours / Basic Colour Combinations
Each colour has an intrinsic brightness, so for complete balance, combinations have to be seen in different proportions.
Goethe's light values: yellow 9, orange 8, red and green 6, blue 4, violet 3. The brightness or darkness of the hue also affects these values.
Red and green: Have the same luminosity, produce a special colour effect called vibration; the edge between the two colours seems to be optically unstable. Pure red and green combinations are unsettling or even annoying to look at for long. Nethertheless the effect is eye-catching and dynamic.
Blue and orange: Orange (8) is twice as luminous as blue (4), so for best balance blue should be twice as large as orange in the image.
Yellow and violet: A combination of the brightest and darkest hues. The constrast is extreme, so the proportions need to be 1:3. At these proportions the sense of relationship between the two is correspondingly weak.
Multi-Colour Combinations
Red/yellow/blue is the most powerful mixture of pure hues.
Other combinations of unbalanced colours can have similarly impressive effects.
Pure hues fight intensely for attention, and the strongest combinations are that of three colours; a fourth introduces excess competition, and the colours dissipate the contrast.
Groups of pure colours make easy, attention grabbing shots. They fit well into a selection of less intense pictures as strong punctuation, but it should not be overdone.
Soft Colours
Diminishing the range of colour intensity has the interesting effect of refining the eye's discrimination. The differences in hue between unsaturated colours are less obvious than with fully saturated colours, and the eye pays more attention in assessing the differences and relationships.
Colour Contrast
The colour circle can be divided in half between cold and warm.
These two halves always have temperature associations, but the strength of the effect depends on context.
Distance
Cool colours recede, warm colours advance.
If the colour of a subject is warm, and that of the background cool, then the impression of depth will be heightened.
Coolness and Warmth
Cool colours suggest transparency and airiness, warm colours opacity and earthiness.
Cool colours suggest wetness, while warm colours suggest dryness.
'(colour) plays a vital part in composition, perspective and atmosphere. It creates spatial awareness, affects mood and provokes strong emotional responses in the viewer'.
The mixing of light is called additive mixing - the more colours that are added together, the closer the result gets to white.
The mixing of pigment is called subtractive mixing - the more colours that are added together, the closer the result gets to black.
Complimentary colours next to each other are strengthened and enriched.
Using colours that are close to one another on the colour wheel is known as analogous colour. This can achieve 'colour harmony', but can also look oppressive and monotonous.
Bibliography
OCA Colour Theory and Relationships
Extract from Interaction of color - Josef Albers
OCA Basic Colour Theory Supplementary
Colour Mixing Bible - Ian Sidaway
The Photographer's Eye - Michael Freeman
Monday, 14 April 2014
Working in Black and White
For this part of the course, as suggested in the course materials, I have decided to present my work in black and white (greyscale). I watched some short videos presented by photographer Ben Long as part of the video course Foundations of Photography: Black and White. I didn't want to get too involved with the completely different subject of black and white photography at this stage, but I did want to see how working in black and white at this stage of the course could help me with elements of design in photography. Ben Long makes the following points regarding black and white photography that are relevant to this part of the course:
Elements of design is about dissecting a scene into its constituent parts, and certainly in terms of the exercises it is about subordinating the subject to its geometry. With all this in mind, I thought that thinking in black and white, then converting my images to black in white in photoshop would be the best approach at this time.
- Black and white simplifies an image, taking away colour that in itself can be very distracting, and as such is a good choice of working for student photographers.
- Black and white accentuates form, shape, texture, highlights and shadows.
- Can create interesting images from subjects and scenes that would potentially be dull in colour.
- When thinking of B&W, you find yourself paying more attention to contrast, tone, geometry and line.
Elements of design is about dissecting a scene into its constituent parts, and certainly in terms of the exercises it is about subordinating the subject to its geometry. With all this in mind, I thought that thinking in black and white, then converting my images to black in white in photoshop would be the best approach at this time.
Tuesday, 26 November 2013
Visit to the Barber Institute of Fine Arts
On Sunday I traveled to Birmingham to visit the Barber Institute of Fine Arts, a (relatively) small but critically-acclaimed art gallery, often touted as one of the best in the country. The primary reason for my visit was to view and learn about the amazing works on display there, as fine art is something I'd like to learn more about. Additionally however I found myself studying the composition of the pieces, from a photography perspective; works of art after all were often the 'photographs' of the past. Usually when visiting galleries or museums I seem to be in a hurry, but this time I had plenty of time, and spent around three hours there in total.
What I noticed was that many of the principles of composition I have learnt about or naturally discovered during my years as an amateur were already being put into practice by painters even many hundreds of years ago. Artists of bygone eras then have directly influenced or even 'instructed' not only painters and drawers of today, but also photographers.
Johann Christian Dahl's A Mother and Child by the Sea (1840) shows the 'rule of thirds' in action. Although this 'rule' is often broken to great effect, it is useful for giving prominence in a landscape image to either the ground or the sky. In this oil on canvas, Dahl gives greater focus to the stormy-looking sky. He also places the partially-obscured moon in the centre, and the mother and child balance the ship left to right. To me as a viewer, the three objects (people, moon and ship) create a visual triangle, and it is this geometry that leads my eye around the whole scene. As well as appearing balanced geometrically, the dark clouds at the top of the frame balance the dark foreground at the bottom of the frame.
In Richard Wilson's The River Dee Near Eaton Hall (1760), the painter uses two prominent techniques that I have used in my own photographs. The first is the perspective of the river Dee, which flows vertically from the bottom of the frame towards the middle, giving the 2D image a sense of depth, and acting as a leading line to guide the viewers eye into the image. The second is the use of the tree on the right hand side, which 'frames' the image. I am a big fan of using natural frames in my photographs, and I do use trees or other foliage a lot, but other things can be used as well, including man-made structures such as doorways.
What I noticed was that many of the principles of composition I have learnt about or naturally discovered during my years as an amateur were already being put into practice by painters even many hundreds of years ago. Artists of bygone eras then have directly influenced or even 'instructed' not only painters and drawers of today, but also photographers.
Johann Christian Dahl's A Mother and Child by the Sea (1840) shows the 'rule of thirds' in action. Although this 'rule' is often broken to great effect, it is useful for giving prominence in a landscape image to either the ground or the sky. In this oil on canvas, Dahl gives greater focus to the stormy-looking sky. He also places the partially-obscured moon in the centre, and the mother and child balance the ship left to right. To me as a viewer, the three objects (people, moon and ship) create a visual triangle, and it is this geometry that leads my eye around the whole scene. As well as appearing balanced geometrically, the dark clouds at the top of the frame balance the dark foreground at the bottom of the frame.
In Richard Wilson's The River Dee Near Eaton Hall (1760), the painter uses two prominent techniques that I have used in my own photographs. The first is the perspective of the river Dee, which flows vertically from the bottom of the frame towards the middle, giving the 2D image a sense of depth, and acting as a leading line to guide the viewers eye into the image. The second is the use of the tree on the right hand side, which 'frames' the image. I am a big fan of using natural frames in my photographs, and I do use trees or other foliage a lot, but other things can be used as well, including man-made structures such as doorways.
Composition aside, several artworks gave me thematic ideas, elements I may want to use in my own future work:
Matthias Stom's Isaac Blessing Jacob (1635) portrays an interesting concept; at first it appears as if you, the viewer, are completely detached from the scene you are looking at, as the men on the right and left are engaging with each other. You then notice the lady in the middle of the frame is actually looking directly at the viewer, and is holding up her finger to instruct silence, indicating a deception taking place between the two men. I found this idea particularly exciting, as usually you are taking images of people either aware, or unaware. This is a combination of the two, and something I'd definitely like to explore from a photography point of view in my future studies.
Two still-life works - Jan Davidsz De Heem's A Still Life with a Nautilus Cup (1632) and Evaristo Baschenis' A Still Life with Musical Instruments (1660) I found very inspiring, as I've found still-life subjects to be very challenging to work with in photography, the challenge being to make it an interesting image. There is less difficulty when the objects themselves are inherently interesting, or have great colours, but otherwise I have found the subject a bit of a stumbling block. After seeing these two paintings, I realised that I should be thinking less about the objects themselves, and more about their 'condition'. In Heem's work, he uses light to great effect, and it is the condition of the silverware being bathed in what appears to be natural light, that gives the work interest. It is less the objects and more the light itself which is the subject of the image, at least in my eyes. In Baschenis' painting, I was particularly struck by the layer of dust coating the lute in the bottom right-hand corner. If I were to photograph that same scene, natural instinct would be to give the instrument a wipe over, to make it clean. Instead, in future I think I would take great consideration in keeping the lute in its dusty condition, giving extra character, context and meaning to an otherwise mundane scene.
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