Friday, 26 February 2016

Visual Communications Research Blog 1

Sebastiao Salgado
Sebastiao Salgado is a photographer who was born on February the 8th, 1944 in Brazil. He became a photographer in the 1970's, he is well known for his photographs including poverty, famine, industrialization and political oppression, his main experty and the thing he is most famous for is photojournalism in which he has won many different awards, he was influenced by other photojournalists such as Lewis Hine, W. Eugene Smith and Walker Evans. Aside from being a photographer Sebastiao Salgado is also a UNICEF ambassador.


A book Sebastiao Salgado is well known for is a book called Workers: archaeology of the Industrial age, in this book Sebastiao Salgado focuses on work from the Stone Age up to the industrial age to the present day; it is mixed up into 6 parts Agriculture, Food, Mining, Industry, Oil and Construction. The books main focus is the carelessness and the poor working conditions all types of civilization worked/work in. He also hasn't just focused on one part of the world he has focused on many different places such as Sahel and South America. All of his photos are in black and white I think he has done this because it exaggerates the poor working conditions and the dullness of the jobs that were being shown. Even though the photos are in black and white i feel the shade and contrast are very important for example in the first photo on the left there eyes and lips have a light shade on them I feel Sebastiao Salgado has done this because the eyes and mouth are usually associated with life (the breath and the twinkle in the eye) and the light shade stands out against the grey which could represent the danger and dullness of the job.

  
 
 
 

Another book he has produced and is very well known is a book called Migrations, this book was published in the year 2000 and is simply what it says in the title, the book includes 7 years of photographs which focus on migrants moving from one place to another, it includes 35 and people migrating from many different places he hasn’t just focused on one group of migrants. Like workers all the photos are taken in black and white i think this is because like the books workers it exaggerates the dullness if the conditions they were in were positive then I feel there would be a use of colour. I feel he has also just used black and white because it shows the simplicity and tell the viewer that the things you can see the migrants with is all they have. in both these books he has taken his photographs in a lot of different angles and styles, although in works there are a lot more close up shots compared to the book migrants I think this is because he wants there to be a bond between the viewer and the worker but with the migrants there are a lot of wide angle shots and longs shots which produce a very noise photo, I think this is because he wants to show how small the migrants are and how nobody is noticing them enough to help.

 
 
 
 
















Thursday, 11 February 2016

Final Studio Practice Portfolio influences

Potential inspirations

Ellen O'Connell
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Ellen O'Connell is a photographer who was born in Pennsylvania. She is most well known for her work with fine art photography. The work from her I like particularly was a project called detail which is the first 8 photos you can see above, I liked it because even though the view was very up close there was a lot going on in the photo and there is a lot of information for the viewer to take in. this is one of the pieces of work I got inspired by and decided to do my own variation of.

Ellen O'Connell - Inspiration
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My Attempts




When first trying to create photos in the style of Ellen O'Connell I wanted to photograph a similar item to grapes, I chose a chain because like grapes there are many of the same shapes being repeated, at first I tried it with just the chain in different positions, while this looked good and showed off a lot of detail like the original Ellen O'Connell photos I found that it was very dull and boring to view, to change this I decided to just simply add a filter but felt that it took the artistic and serious view away from it.





After deciding that the coloured filter wasn’t very effective I decided change the settings to black and white but I also decided to add something to the chain, I decided to add something that was natural to link back to the original idea but also to create a contrast between the man made object which was the chain and a natural object which was the leaves.




After I added the natural things to the chain I decided that I wanted it to stand out more and create more contrast, to do this I decided to take my settings off of black and white which I thought was very effective, not just because I wanted the leaves to contrast the chain but also because it showed off the light more and how it bounced off the chain and created shadows with the leaves.










Once I was sure and happy with what I was doing I decided to change the set up and layout of the chains and leaves, I also decided to move the light closer and further to see what the effect was, I also changed the angle of the light to see what shadows were created, although I didn’t use any of these for my final photos I liked the ones where there is a lot of light because it reflects a lot off of the chain and also shows a lot of detail in the leaves.










After id finished see what worked well with the direction and distance of the light I though that the photo needed something else to help it stand out and create interest at first I decided to add berries, I added these because I felt that it matched the natural theme of the leaves which meant like the leaves they created contrast in the photo, I thought that berries such as raspberries have a interesting texture which would make the view interact more with the photo and lastly because I though I would add a bit more colour while keeping with the artistic theme off things.








Like before once I was happy with what I was working with I decide to change the shape and layout of the chain, berries and leaves. I was really happy with my attempts to create some photos in the style of Ellen O'Connell and even though I’m happy because its done in the style of my chosen photographer I also am happy with the fact that they have their own certain feel and have turned out exactly how i wanted them to and expected them to.


Michael Bosanko
Image result for michael bosanko bottle    
    
    

Michael Bosanko is a photographer most well-known for his work in light art, he started in Greece in 2004, he picked up the technique by chance when he was taking a photo of a moonlit landscape and it went wrong. Bosanko like other photographers has many inspirations such as William Eggleston, Michael Kenna, Peter Howsen and Banksy, although he says he is firstly inspired by his "forever active imagination" and goes on to say "if it’s in my head, it needs to be sketched, voice recorded and then explored". During his time as a photographer he has produced things for clients, TV commercials, film, company profiles, billboards, animation, global campaigns, tabloid and magazines, private commissions, viral animation, album covers and workshops. even though he is most well-known for his light painting Michael Bosanko isn't just a photographer who photographs with light he is also famous for his street photography, he has done a number of street project for example projects called 'Switzerland', 'vehicles', 'Greece' and many more.

Michael Bosanko - Inspiration
Image result for michael bosanko bottle  

My Attempts 










When looking at Michael Bosanko's work there was a lot of things I liked but something that stood out was the panting with light where there was another object as the main focus, because I liked this I decided to try and recreate some photos using light painting and other objects. I decided to use the same object but instead of having it as a silhouette I wanted to have something that the light could pass though, because of this I chose a bottle three quarters full of olive oil, I chose this because the olive oil give the photo an interesting coloured tint and because I wanted to see how the light would be effected by a liquid in the bottle. In Michael Bosanko’s photos he’s kept the background dark so that the colour stands out more, I chose not to do this and use a bright blue background, I chose this because it also adds another focus to the photo almost like when a viewer is looking at it they see the light, then the bottle and finally are lead onto the textures of the background.

After this I chose to look at other light painting techniques, I looked at a technique where instead of using lights to make lines, I looked at a technique where light is shone onto the object and moved around which creates a very surreal effect in the final photo. A photographer who is well known for this technique is Harold Ross, who is a photographer who was born in America and is well known for specializing in fine art photography.

Harold Ross  
  
  

My Attempts 
















Even though usually when doing this technique the final photo looks like it’s been painted I wanted the final outcome to be more unusual for example colour which wouldn’t usually be there, shades and shadows which usually would show up in a certain area and just the final outcome to be unusual and make the view take a second look. To do this I used four different colours gels, set the camera on a shutter speed which lasted 25 seconds and moved the lights around creating a lot of different effects.

Matt Molloy
  
     
  
 
   
 


Matt Molloy is a Canadian photographer he is most famous for his time-lapse photography and is known for creating a photographic technique he calls Timestacks, these are the pieces of work which inspired me to try and recreate them. Matt Molloy creates the Timestacks by taking multiple photos were most is still but only one piece is moving and will overlap them causing an effect that almost looks like it’s been painted. While trying to recreate some of his photos I didn’t do it in the same way I did it on Photoshop, although I didn’t want an exact replica of his photo I wanted to do my own style.

Matt Molloy - Inspiration
  
  
My Attempts













When I first started trying to recreate Matt Molloys photos i saw that he used a lot of colour, even though I was inspired by his work I wanted to test what it was like if the effect was done with a dull dark sky. Instead of waiting for a dull day I decided to take a photo of the sky with my camera on the fastest shutter speed so that it would make the final image very dull, because of this it made the foreground into a silhouette which is exactly what I wanted for when I started editing my photos.


When I first put a photo into Photoshop before I decided to do what I was going to do id decided to see what would look like it just blurred out the sky enough to make it look like a painting and make it look surreal, this was good but I felt that that foreground didn't standout as much as I wanted it to, but I didn’t get rid of this idea completely I decided to use this as an unedited photo and build what I was going to do in the first place.



To create this effect i put the original photo in Photoshop, firstly I selected the foreground which the magic wand tool and added all the selected things onto a new layer, once this was done I selected a piece of the original sky and decided to stretch till it filled up the whole of the background, this effect made it look like the camera had captured movement in the sky making it very similar to Matt Molloys photos but at the same time the photos feature a completely different effect.

My Final Photos

1.

Camera Settings:
Aperture - F/8
Shutter Speed - 1/20
ISO - 200


When I took this photo I had the camera on an aperture of F/8 because I didn't want to pick up a lot of light in the photo, if I would have picked up a lot of light I would have got a noisy background and the focus would have been taken off of the chain and berries. I set the shutter speed to 1/20 because I felt it was a fast enough speed to not get any camera shake and it was the right shutter speed for the amount of light I wanted. I light I used was just a normal light with a reflector and an umbrella on it, I used these because I just wanted a soft light shinning onto the main focus and if I wanted a harsher light I would have fitted it with a snoot. I placed one light in this position because I wanted there to be a lot of darkness contrasting the light.

 2.

Camera Settings:
Aperture - F/8
Shutter speed - 1/20
ISO - 200


Like the first photo I used the same settings because I wanted pretty much the same effect, instead I wanted to change the setup of the main focus to create different effects, for example I left a deep hole in the middle where the chain meets the lock I did this because I knew with the settings I was using it would create a very dark shadow effect. Like the one before I placed a light with a reflector on in this position to soften the light and create shadows and expose certain positions.

 3.

Camera Settings:
Aperture - F/8
Shutter speed - 1/15
ISO - 200


In this photo I position the main focus in the photo (the berries and the leaves) were placed at the side of the photo with the chains taking up the rest of the photo, I positioned them like this because I wanted to do it similar to Ellen O'Connell's photo, she’s has placed the grapes is the bottoms left away from the center with the stalks of the grapes filling up the rest of the space. Like the photos before the aperture is sat at F/8 because I dint want any of the background to be shown, even though Ellen O’Conner shows the background in this photo I didn’t want to because I felt it would take the focus away from the main focus.

 4.

Camera Settings:
Aperture - F/8
Shutter speed - 1/30
ISO - 200


In this photo Ellen O'Connell has a large dark patch right in the middle of the photo, with a bunch of other things surrounding it, I chose to instead of have a piece of darkness in the middle I chose to have a bright main focus in and I surrounded it by chains, I also tilted the light up so that a bright bit was shining on the top of the chain this was to create contrast between light a shade. Ellen O'Connell also in this photo shows the background but again I felt that it would have made the photo to noisy.

 5.

Camera Settings:
Aperture - F/8
Shutter speed - 15sec
ISO - 100


In this photo I set up the camera on a tripod with the main focus directly in front with a blue wall at the back. I have done this because unlike the original photo I wanted there to be more to focus on instead of silhouettes and shapes, I also wanted the light from the trails to shine on the background enhancing the main focus and the colour this is why I placed it so close. I set the camera up on a tripod because it would have caused way too much camera shake if I had to hold it. The cameras aperture was set at F/8 like the photos before but because I was using a long shutter speed I knew there would be a lot of the background visible to the viewer.

 6.

Camera Settings:
Aperture - F/8
Shutter speed - 15sec
ISO - 100



This photo is very similar to the one before but this time I wanted to create more like the original one which Michael Bosanko created, even though it very simple I think it’s very effective, I chose to just use two colours because I felt if I used more than the photo would become way to noisy, like Michael Bosanko I had lines behind the photo and I had pure block colours on the ground, all of the setting were the same as the one before for the same reasons.

 7.

Camera Settings:
Aperture - F/11
Shutter speed - 15sec
ISO - 100




















In this photo after I tried the traditional thing with light (the light trails) I looked at other light painting, while looking I stumbled across Harold Ross and tried to create a photo with his influence. like the photos before I set the camera on a tripod and place the main focus in front of it, like last time the shutter speed was on 15sec, but this time instead of creating light trails I painted the object with light from lights off the camera, this time I didn't want much background so I set my aperture to F/11.



8.

Camera Settings:
Aperture - F/11
Shutter speed - 1/3200
ISO - 200




 9.

Camera Settings:
Aperture - F/11
Shutter speed - 1/3200
ISO - 200



 10.


Camera Settings:
Aperture - F/11
Shutter speed - 1/3200

ISO - 200


With all these photos it was just a plain photo of the sky with something in the foreground, the inspiration I used were photos by Matt Molloy but whereas he took multiple photos I didn't I just took one and did my effects on photo shop, first what I did was open up the photo in Photoshop and selected all of the foreground with the magic wand tool, once selected I put all the foreground on a separate layer, after it was put on a separate layer I turned it off so I couldn't see it, now I was working with the original photo I selected a small part of the sky and decided to stretch it out so it covered the whole of the background, this made it look like there was an illusion of movement like the original photos, once it was covering the background I chose to see both layers at once and it made the foreground stand out a lot against the stretched background.