task 4photoshop editing

colour gradient

 Liquify

 vignette effect

 

cling film effect

sepia vignette effect

cut out effect

stars effect

added colour plus pencil drawn effect

  Liquify

http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/41-nicest-photoshop-photo-effects-photoshop-tutorials/

task 3 (In The Style of...)

 Steve McCurry
Steve McCurrry most commonly uses strong colour in his pictures, which is what I have chosen to copy from his work. Almost all of his work has a human element in them, where as I prefer the colour element of his work; the human side of his work makes his work more evocative and connects to the audience more.

The two pictures are most similar in the lighting (although the reverse of each other) - blue light one side, yellow light on the faces. They very clearly have completely different subjects - the first was taken in a Emerald mine, the second while shopping at twighlight. The picture was taken (while looking for images similar to original pictures by McCurry) for the colour, rather than making the aesthetic and composition the same as the original.

 Henri Cartier-Bresson
Cartier-Bresson was a post-war photographer in France in the 1940's and '50's. His work is often said to be very down to earth - capturing life, as well as events. Many people see composition as his works greatest feature, his delight in showing every thing and nothing in a single frame. His picture below of a young woman reading a paper tells you (roughly) when it was taken from the clothes, the general opinion of the new fashion from an older generation, and there are (from the reflection in the glass - showing a lot of people) quite a few people out - it is busy; but you don't know what she's reading, where she works - if she works, or if 'young woman' means 15 or 30.

Both subjects in the pictures are being given new information, the first with a newspaper, the second on the phone to a friend. When I took the picture of my brother, I was aiming to copy, or recreate, the composition. In the picture with the girl, she is outside, and there is an old woman at the other end of the bench she is sitting on looking very disapprovingly at her; the second recreated picture is inside and modernised, it was taken also a lot closer to the subject than the original which looses the depth the original picture has.

The composition is similar in both photos, in the original the main focus is on the lamp pointed to the left, in my version the focus is on the girl taking the photo, who is also pointed in the same way as the lamp in Cartier-Bressons photo. The original photo was taken during the day, while the second was after dark; the first was taken on the set of a film, the second on the set of an amateur photography shoot. There are less people in the second photograph to the first, from their stances, they are unlikely to be aware of the second camera.

Larry Fink
For all the photographs by Larry Fink I have chosen to copy I have chosen to use flash, as, for his later work, it was a signature method.
Finks work has ranged from political satire, to fashion and event photography. What I like is his use of flash and black-and-white - for modern events etc it creates an eerily 1950's style picture.

In the original picture (below) the 3 women in the focal point of the picture are taking an interest in the same thing - unfortunately, in the picture I took, which I didn't notice at the time, the girl on the left is looking at her phone, instead of where the other two girls are looking; although the general stance of the 3 subjects is very similar in both pictures.
There are more people in the original to the version I made, which changes the feel behind the picture - the original with more people (all dancing) is blatantly a party of some kind, the remake, with its darker background and lack of people is quieter, and slightly sadder without them.

Making the photo for this turned into fun, so instead of looking tired and a little upset, like in the original with the young girl, the shorter model is in fact smiling and looks very awake. The angle I had my camera at when I took the picture is very different to Finks picture of a girl, where only the back and bottom of the (mother?) taller figure can be seen, while in my picture the front and head are both integral parts of the picture. This changes the feel just as much as the expressions do - you know more about the taller person, her expression, her features, etc. 

Evaluation

The project so far has been a mixture of hard and easy. Some of the research was hard to come by - either because books were not owned by the college libraries or some of the information had not been added to the internet. Researching can be a very dull activity, often made harder when it is a necessity, researching is not a natural talent of mine, which made the first part of the project quite hard. Initially the project made very little sense, after it had been explained again in more detail, it was very easy to follow and understand. I have enjoyed analysing the photographs and trying to work out why they were taken, what of, and why. The third task was far more interesting than the first, second and fourth. I dont think I did the third task in exactly the right order; I had found picture I liked, but for the fact that all the photographers I chose to research and copy mostly worked showing moments, I tried to capture what came my way, rather than setting up the images to recreate what I’d found excatly. This means that the images are possibly too loose, too different to the original and I will have to take them again at some point.

Bibliography

http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?q=larry+fink&um=1&hl=en&client=safari&sa=N&rls=en&biw=1223&bih=895&tbm=isch&tbnid=Y5dJTpGLql8QDM:&imgrefurl=http://tablettalk.com/2011/02/22/larry-fink-hollywood-at-lacma/&docid=2ePnQtCvyI4ngM&imgurl=http://tablettalk.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/larry-fink-lohan.jpg&w=810&h=400&ei=vozTTuKMBJDTsgbg-YDMDA&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=226&sig=103364501929718450216&page=3&tbnh=145&tbnw=266&start=47&ndsp=22&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:47&tx=234&ty=66


http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?q=larry+fink&start=300&um=1&hl=en&client=safari&sa=N&rls=en&biw=1223&bih=895&tbm=isch&tbnid=RDgNdqPsLvPFUM:&imgrefurl=http://blog.photoshelter.com/2008/05/pdn-photo-annual-2008/&docid=1Arfwt-Sp6Fy-M&imgurl=http://blog.photoshelter.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/mt-old/pdn_fink.jpg&w=522&h=419&ei=jI7TToqcF4bCtAb7heCFDQ&zoom=1&chk=sbg&iact=hc&vpx=119&vpy=277&dur=2456&hovh=201&hovw=251&tx=121&ty=130&sig=103364501929718450216&page=14&tbnh=149&tbnw=186&ndsp=21&ved=1t:429,r:5,s:300

task 2: Bokeh

Bokeh
I like the effect bokeh produces, making dots of light into shapes. It hasnt worked very well using my camera, but I borrowed someone else's and it produced much more realised shapes.

triangles

stick man (can see this properly)










hearts

stars (looks like the stick men)










squares - look more like circles

I really like the funnel effect I played around with, I dont think it necessarily worked in the way it was supposed to, as the foil was crinkled. That it made one small part of the picture so prominent, I think could be very useful in some circumstances.

Using the cling film was less successful, using it left large translucent patches on the camera. or created a spiderweb effect across the lens, which is not what I was after.

I did get 2 photos that were fairly effective, but they still had an uneven finish, with only a small bit in focus

I also tried tearing up the foil and holding it to the lens of the camera with cling film, the first attempt at this didnt really work as the camera focused on the film and foil, when (with Tim's help) the automatic focus was found and turned off, the results were much more what I'd been aiming for, small sections of the picture blacked out.

research

typical techniques include high key, low key and using a white or black background
studio essentials are a tripod, camera, lights,

High key is a lighting style that uses lots of bright light to reduce shadows so that the subject looks almost 2D, but it is also used to convey happiness, honesty, or innocence (the technique is used for small children and babies very often). Low key uses very few lights and a dark background, it revels in shadow; in a film (movie) photography etc context it is usually used to suggest sadness, fear and horror; for a photo in itself, it can just be far more intriguing than a High key photo. Soft and hard lights refer to the shadow the lights cast - for soft lighting there would normally be several lights with some type of umbrella and cast gradual shadows, while a hard light will have nothing in front of it to soften the light, so will cast abrupt shadows which pick out the features in detail.
A white background is an essential, even if it is not needed in every photo shoot, it a basic, like a tripod, you need it there in case you do need/want to use it. 

All studios have and use backgrounds - whether black, white or colour - they are essential to a studio photograph as there will always be some kind of background. A plain green, blue or white background can be changed to a different colour or more complicated background than one plain colour - such as scenery - digitally using Photoshop or another similar program. A plain background distracts from the subject far less than a busy background.



I have 2 ideas for my project, but given the time constraints, only one is feasible. The first, and favorite idea, is a masks based projects.

The second, slightly harder to carry out idea, is a picture that's all one colour; the subjects skin, hair, dress, background etc

http://photo.net/learn/studio/primer
http://www.software-cinema.com/page/13/tinkertubes
http://www.illustratedphotography.com/basic-photography/hard-and-soft-light