Assignment 1 & 2 research

For this assignment we have to take portrait photos in a studio and on location. They both need to be for the front cover of a magazine for people between the age of 16 to 24 to make them feel inspired and want to look like that. The photos have to be different to what is already out there and has been done before. To start we need to research what people have already done and so that we can make ours different. We also need to find inspiration for our photos.

What is already out there:

The three photos above show the simple poses for women where they just look pretty and are side on to the camera so that they can make the model look more elegant. This is normal and basic so it’s something that need to stay away from doing.

The five photos above are more adventurous and not something that you would normally find. They are bizarre and not something you would feel inspired by so it’s still not something that I want to copy for my photos.

Inspiration for my photos:

I really like the idea of working with steam and water to give an unusual look to the photos so that they aren’t easy to understand at first. The photos above are really interesting and give a weird look to the person. They are taken by David Ryle in a serious of photos called Trifecta.

This photo above is another example where the photo is made interesting due to a layer being in the way making it easier to manipulate the photo with it.

Here is a drawing of eyes with the makeup and paint running down. I feel this could be interesting to make the face have imperfections like makeup.

The photo above is of the Rolling Stones by David Bailey and it’s interesting due to the material that is on their face and being blown around. You can still see their faces still which means that it’s still something that could be used on a magazine.

I really like the makeup in the photo above and how it is all similar colours and the flowers make the photos pop with colour and make it interesting.

I like the background idea for this photo above as its pretty and simple. Could be something to think about.

I’m really interesting in this one for my studio photo as it’s really different and not something that is normally on the front cover of a magazine. I like the blanket in the background and how they are lying down and not all of them are showing as they are sort of writhing around.

My Final Piece Ideas

For this project we need to take photos showing the stages of the exhibition in Northampton of our last final piece photos going up and being taken down. We also need to display it so that it tells the story of the exhibition stages easily. The photos can’t just be simply of the exhibition, they need to be creative. I’ve thought of two different ways of taking the photos and how to display them and so I’ll explain them below:

 

Photo Style 1: 

I could take all my photos of the people working in the exhibition so that the whole stages are shown by the students and how their work is going. This way you’ll be able to know what stage you are at as if their work is up then you know that the exhibition is nearly open or is open but if their work is still going up then it is either not open yet or is being taken down. This also gives the viewers of the photos get to know more about the people and their work. I feel this links the Robert Doisneau as I’m capturing peoples lives just naturally and showing what they are doing without positioning them myself. I like how Doisneau can take photos and nobody notices so I want to try and make the photos like that too.

 

Photo Style 2:

I could take the photos all from floor level so that you can see what stage the exhibition is at by the shoes people are wearing and the things on the floor such as equipment. This will be a really interesting thing to view as the floor tells a lot about a situation as people won’t be wearing their best shoes to work but will wear their best to look around an exhibition. You can’t normally see everything from floor level but I think that everything could be way more interesting when you have to think about what you’re looking at the know what stage the exhibition is. I feel this links to the photos that Henri Cartier-Bresson took as he takes photos in interesting ways and angles and also captures people when they aren’t expecting it and they also don’t know they are having their photos taken. I’m inspired by his photos and I think my photos will be slightly like his but mine will be by the floor level.

 

Framing Idea 1:

I could hang them all under each other via string that’s invisible so that they go down in order. This way they can go on a wall and be easy to follow as narrative photos. I also wanted to hang them from each other as a story can’t be a story without the other parts just like the photos hanging from each other as the photo are dependant on hanging from the next one. This framing idea is both practical and attractive.

Framing Idea 2:

I could put them in a frame going sideways with two lines with one under the other. This gives the photos a simple display and makes them easy to follow. This idea could also look good on the wall, instead of only being practical. There would have to be an equal amount of photos so that the photo lines can be the same length.

Setting up the exhibition

For this project we have three weeks to put up an exhibition and take it down again whilst taking photos to make a narrative story. We need to create pages in our sketchbooks like normal and show our research and ideas growing.

What is narrative photography?

Narrative photography is where photographs (or a photograph) can be used to tell a story even if the story isn’t actually true. Many people believe that you must be able to do narrative photography if you want to be able to take exceptional photos. This is because you want people to be interested in it and be able to find a story within it.

Well known photographers who have done narrative photography:

>Robert Doisneau

Doisneau was around in the 1930’s and was mostly taking street photography with a Lieca camera. He won many awards for his photos throughout his life and his most famous photo was of a couple kissing in Paris in the 1950’s. His photos are narrative due to the stories he shows of the people on the street. When you look at his photos you can tell a lot about the people in them and what they are up to. He goes out onto the street to take narrative photos of people that are just out and about, giving us an idea of their stories and the way they’re living. This gave me some ideas for my images, showing me I could take them without being seen.

>Sebastiao Salgado

Salgado was a documentary photographer who traveled all over the world to take photos. He captured life as it really was in other countries and it normally wasn’t a pretty sight. Salgado got many rewards for his photos and even became an ambassador for UNICEF. These photos are narrative as they tell you about the people that live in those countries and that they are poor and/or suffering. He takes them by going around the countries and living within the people and capturing their everyday lives. He captures so many things in each picture, and I would like to do something similar within my photos. I want each one to tell their own part of the story. I would also like to travel round the room to take photos from all of the different parts.

>Henri Cartier-Bresson

Cartier-Bresson is a French photographer well known for his street photography. He’s well know for developing street photography and he also captured (or created) the decisive moment which is shown in his most famous photo of a person jumping off something into water, but his foot hasn’t met the water yet. He was also a painter, meaning he had a superb eye for photos and getting the correct angle. He also had knowledge of the rule of 3. His photos are narrative as they capture everyday life of people on the street without it being posed. He is capturing peoples lives which is a story on it’s own.

>Robert Capa

Capa was a very well known Hungarian war photographer and photo journalist. His war photographs were said to be some of the best, but sadly some of his most famous photos such as the falling soldier were said to be faked so that Capa didn’t have to go to the actual war ground. Sadly, Capa died out at war taking photographs. His photos are narrative as they capture the soldiers at war fighting, allowing people at home to witness it and so they knew how bad it actually was. Capa would’ve had to actually go to these war grounds to take the photographs. His photos tell us a deep story about the life of the soldiers who are fighting for their country and how it isn’t all happy.

>Don McCullin

McCullin is an English photojournalist mostly famous for his war photography.  He first started taking photos in 1959 and is still taking them at the age of 80. His photos mostly showed the underside of society such as the poor, unemployed and less fortunate people. His work is narrative as it shows peoples lives and people at war so that people at home can witness the horrible side we wouldn’t normally be able to see. His photos tell the story of the less fortunate people in this world so that we don’t think that everything is happy go lucky. Just like the others, McCullin actually had to travel the world to take the narrative photos shown above.

>Steve McCurry

McCurry is an American photojournalist who traveled around taking photos of people in different countries. His most famous photo was of a 12 year old Afghan girl who had piecing green eyes and had a red headdress which was put on the front page of the Nation Geographic magazine. McCurry took photos of people who weren’t well off and his photos were mostly bright colours. His photos are narrative as they show peoples lives to others who normally wouldn’t have the chance to see it. He transports the story of these people over to places where they can easily be seen so that they can be known about. McCurry also travelled the world in order to take photos of people, however most people in his narrative photographs are posing for the camera.

>Tim Hetherington

Hetherington is an English photojournalist that did war photography. Sadly, he died in the 2011 Libyan civil war whilst taking photographs. He won many awards including the World Press photo of the year which he won in 2007. His photos are narrative as they give you the story of war and what the people go through whilst fighting for their country. He captures peoples lives and the suffering they go through because of the war. I don’t feel like I can incorporate this in my work, however you can tell what the people in the photo are doing from what they have, and I could show this in my photos.

About the artists I looked at

Maria Slough:

Slough’s photos are taken to tell stories and for them to have meanings. I feel this links to  my piece of work perfectly as this is the point of the photos I need to take. Her work is mostly with water which interests me due to my liking to water in my photos too. Her photos also have a surreal feeling to them which is the theme for most of my photos so I feel I could take some tips from her photographs.

 

Jacob Sutton:

Sutton’s work contains a lot of movement from clothes or the models half way through moving. This gives a really nice effect and this inspires me to have some movement in my photos to make them more lifelike and maybe to show distress. Also in some of his photos a girl is under water and there are air bubbles which I would like to capture in my photos as it makes it more real.

 

Lydia Lingenfeld:

Lingenfeld isn’t a famous photographer and only has one of her photos on the internet but that does stop that photo being really inspiring. Looking at her photo you can tell a lot about the person and give them a story. Lingenfeld also includes water in her photos which gives me more possibilities for my photos.

Diptych of Jorgie

Here is my first attempt of making a diptych with one of the photos being a portrait and the other being something that something about the photo in the other photo. I took the photos so that you can’t see the persons face but you get to know something about the person via the other photo.

I did this by taking a photo of Jorgie sat on the stairs near the front of college so that there was good lighting. I took her with her hands in between her legs which could show that she’s shy. I then took a photo of her hair with a camera strap over it which shows she likes camera and also that she’s a fun person as she has the ends of her hair green.

After taking these photos and creating this diptych I feel I have a better idea of what I want to do for my final piece photos and how I want them to be laid out. I now know that the object photography should always be the main thing in the shot so that you know what to look at straight away. I also know that the colours in both pictures should be similar so you can connect the photos easily together.

 

 

Focal Lengths

In this lesson we went outside with Nikon cameras and reflectors to take photos using different focal lengths to show the difference it makes. We used reflectors to make the photos more interesting and to use different techniques we’d already used with them. We took two photos for all three different focal lengths, 18mm, 35mm & 55mm. We explored the ways that 18mm could give a fish eye effect and that for the Nikon the 55mm was more portrait.

Then for the last part of the lesson we had to take a portrait of someone with 55mm and an item about them with 18mm. We also needed to make them a diptych and use unusual angles in the photos. I used Ellie for my photos and took her in front of a lovely blossoming tree as the pinks of her cheeks went well with the blossom. I then took a photo of a concert bracelet which Ellie has loads of. I took this at an angle which made the hands look bigger closer to the camera.

Richard Avedon

Avedon is a fashion and portrait photographer who was born to a Jewish family in 1923. He lived in New York and at the age of 12 he became interested in photography after going to a Young Men’s Hebrew Association Camera Club. He used his family’s Kodak Box Brownie to take photos which he used as a way to escape from his life at home. He got his artistic style from his younger sister (Louise) who struggled with  psychiatric treatment which made her very ill and not fully with it. This gave him the love for tragic beauty in his photos.

Once he’d fully got into photography he began creating photos that were sometimes measuring over three feet in height. He used a large format camera and went around taking photos of cowboys, miners, drifters and of other people in The United States of America. These photos were in a book called ‘In the American West’ which became popular and even made it to being a best selling book.

In 1974 Avedon became ill due to him suffering a serious heart inflammation which encouraged him to take more photos from a different perspective. This led him to being commissioned by Mitchell A, who was the director of the Amon Carter Museum.

Fill in flash

In this lesson we used two soft boxes to create lovely photos. We placed one light in front and one to the side and swapped between the two of them to be the key light. For boys it is normal for them to have a more light difference whilst for girls it’s normally seen better to have one level of light across the whole face and sculpt it with makeup instead of the lights doing it. Here are some photos we took to show this using different levels of light of a male model and female model:

Ideas for Final piece

Since I’ve enjoyed taking photographs, the love for water has always interested me too. So for this term I’m excited to try and put the two together. There are many photos including water but I would like to try and create my own unusual photo. I think I’m going to carry on the subject of surrealism as I love the creativity that goes with it. I have a few ideas which I would like to use for my final piece which I’ll adapt as I get closer to the end of the term to make them better. 

First idea: Person in a lake with it up to their waist. They are surrounded by things in the water but the person is acting like nothing is happening that is weird. I would like for it to be a bright day with clear blue sky. This is unusual and gives a unreal setting. I could manipulate the colours to make them more florescent than they actually are giving a fake feeling. The other photo could be of their finger print. This could say that the person wants to drift away like balloons but they are being held down by things in life.

Second idea: Person in a lovely floaty dress on a windy day and they are leaning sideways and there’s water pouring from their ear. I would like this to be in a woods with studio lighting but I don’t see how I would get a power source out there to power them. Prefreably I would like natural lighting to be sun rays streaming through the trees where the person is. The other image could be of her ring or necklace. This could say something about the person having too much to think about it becomes too much and it starts to leak out their ears as water.

Third idea: Photo taken from the top over water of a person underwater with a piece of glass on the top of the water. The person under the water is pressed against the glass with their face sideways and releasing air bubbles so that they can be captured in the photo. The person would preferably be a girl as the rest of the photograph would be filled with hair in the water from the person. I feel this could be taken on a light day using reflectors to bounce the light onto the glass and water nicely. I could take it in my hot tub so that it’s nicer for the person as it’d be warm and also I could turn the lights on so that the water could be red. I would take them at night so that the lights change the water colour a lot. The other photo could be of their eyes. This could show that person feels trapped and that they might have anxiety. 

 

Final Piece write up:

How I did it:

I used a little lamp at the end of my bed and used drawing pins to hold things up e.g. clothing, braid and duvet. I projected shadows onto the wall behind the bed by putting hands in front of the lamp. I took them at night time so it was dark everywhere other than where the lamp was projecting. I took it on a bed as it needed to be about sleeping so i used my bed as it is a loft bed meaning it is lifted off the floor. This meant good angles could be used for the photos but this also meant that ladders had to be used to reach onto the bed. Two people stood at the end of the bed under the lamp on a step ladder and projected hands onto the wall over the bed. One person had to hold the thing that was pinned up so it looked like they were being held up whilst the other person made hands that creeped in over top. I had it so I was the girl that was asleep in the bed as I knew what I wanted it to look like. I had another person taking the photos with my instructions. I wore white clothes as I want this to show I’m pure and the dark shadows are evil. I Photoshopped them by getting rid of any blemishes, things on the walls and bed, making it black and white with a tiny amount of colour as this is what would be seen if it was dark as you can only see a tiny amounts of colour in the dark. I also made the photos loads darker and brought the darkness around the subject so that it makes this the only thing you look at.

How I feel they turned out:

I really like the outcome of the photos and how they make people feel when they look at them. When showing the photos people said they felt uneasy looking at them and that they didn’t like them. They said they were amazing photos but they made them worry about it when they never had before. The photos took around 3 hours to set up, to take and then photoshop. Just the photoshopping took up around an hour of those three as lots had to be changed. The shadows were taken in the same shot as the girl asleep in the bed and the things being lifted. Nothing was added after, the only thing that was done was me taking things away like stickers on my bed. I really like how the photos turned out and how they make people feel and how dark and evil they feel. If I was to do this again I would possibly make sure that the person sleeping is more in the photo and that the white of the top doesn’t blend in with the wall as much. Also maybe have really long nail extensions on the people making the shadow hands to make it seem more evil.

My inspiration:

The Shadows in Notsferato:

I feel like my photos were inspired by how the shadows in Notsferato create fear without actually showing something scary. They show that Dracula is approaching without you actually see him. This also lets you think what you want as you can’t actually see all details of what it is so your brain can decide and if you’re scared then it might be worse than it actually is. In my photos the fear is brought on by the looming hands but they are shadows meaning this lets your mind wonder and make it worse than it actually is.