Monday 28 October 2013

Baby Shoot - Rubie

Within this shoot, I have photographed my neighbours little baby and her older brother within their home environment. I have used the available lighting with one umbrella light which I bounced off the ceiling. I feel that it was successful for my first shoot at home. 


























Friday 25 October 2013

Photographs for College Prospectus

Within this session, we were split into groups whereby we had to travel around the college creating images that complied to the brief in order to create a college prospectus. The area of college that we worked with was Landbase (Animal Care). 

To begin with we photographed the microscope shot by first working out the settings on the camera and placing the lights where they were needed. For all of the shots we needed to turn the room lights off. For the microscope image we set the equipment up to be in the image, arranged the softbox to the right of the camera (power 3) and an umbrella light to the left hand side of the camera (1/4 power).

Here is our groups final image that we took using students from landbase. 


The next image was within the X-ray area where we used the X-ray to create the next image. For this image below the settings we used were ISO 400, F-10, and 1/150. We used the light box that is used to view the X-rays and natural lighting. 

We then tried to photographing the X-ray up against the window, to see the skeleton. The camera settings we used were ISO 200, F-10 and 1/150. We also used a soft box (power 1) to the left hand side of the camera.



The next shoot was to photograph the lizard with a student alongside the cages of various other creatures. We made sure that the room lights were all turned off. We used three lights in total; a soft box for the subject (power 4), and two standard lights pointing at the ceiling corners (full power) this was to bounce the light around the room to light it. 


The last shoot was to capture the two donkeys together but it was difficult to get them together so we concentrated on one of them. 



Overall, I feel that I have learnt a lot by doing lighting on location and with more practice I will be able to do it naturally. It was a great session and I had great fun. 

Thursday 24 October 2013

Witley Court

In today's session, the group travelled to Witley Court and Gardens. I love this place as it is extremely beautiful and allows for some beautiful images of the historical place. The weather was brilliant for us.
These are a selection of my images from the days shoot;

















Friday 18 October 2013

Typography

In today's session, I was introduced to typography which is using typefaces within photography. There are certain typefaces that are used within different aspects. Photographers that I looked at were David Carson and Johnny Hardstaff.
Within this session, I completed two tasks using typography. The first task was to create a landscape A4 document within Photoshop and by using the word "typography" I had to fill the page as best as I could making it readable, creative and pleasing to the viewers eye.
The brief stated that the letters could only be 90ยบ (not various angles), I had to use San Serif type, the colours used should be red, black and 50% grey.

This is my image below;




For the second task, involved us going out and taking images that fitted the brief he gave us. This is  the brief below;
 
When capturing the images, we were asked to try to capture them with a witty humour to them. Before leaving for the location, I had a few ideas in my mind but it wasn't until I was out shooting that I realised more ideas.
When I had captured the ideas, I went back to the college and edited the images by adding the headings into the images. He wanted a more artistic heading rather than just writing it onto the image. 

These are my images below;






I feel that I was able to capture some good images that fit the description of the brief, I found it a really good task that combined two elements together. Overall, it was really good to experiment with and I would definitely do it again. 

Thursday 17 October 2013

Video Portfolio

Portfolio


This is a selection of portraits that I have took which I have created into a portfolio. I used iMovie which was relatively simple and I feel that the portfolio was successful. 





Tuesday 15 October 2013

Thursday 10 October 2013

Foyer exhibition

Foyer Exhibition

Within today's session, as a group we created an exhibition space whereby we all had a space to display one image that we liked and felt was strong. The exhibition was held in the foyer in our college. In preparation we chose the image and then made any edits accordingly. The image was printed on to an A3 piece of paper. My image was a landmark from my holiday in Zakynthos, which was a shipwreck, I chose this image as I thought it was strong and a beautiful landscape from the high cliffs of Zakynthos.
Once the images were ready to be displayed, we made sure we knew what measurements we needed so everyone's image was the same level. The images were then stuck to the walls with double sided sticky pads and made sure that they were level. 
This was my first exhibition within my HND second year which is only just the start, this therefore prepares me for the professional world. I found that it was successful and looked great. It allows for other people to view our work and have critical feedback from them. It also gives us good practice setting the exhibition up and giving us more confidence in this area. I feel that it looks extremely well and really professional.

The images below show the set up of our exhibition.



Friday 4 October 2013

Hollywood Lighting

Hollywood Lighting

After the 1930's this type of photography used hard lighting therefore the actors and actresses had to be beautiful and good looking due to the harsh lighting. The brows of a face needs to be lit well as well as capturing some shadows of the eye lashes for a female. When photographing a women you need to use diffused lighting. As well as the main light a fill light can be used.

Film Noir;

This particular lighting started by telling a story to the viewers. It is generally set up within a studio setting rather than the actors homes. The lighting used is created so that it looks natural, most of the time two lights will be used which are hard lights. If a light is being used for the back of the subject it needs to be reduced so it isn't as powerful as the one in the foreground.

Research; 

James Cagney; I have looked at this actor and his particular appearance. He comes across as one of the lads in a gang due to the relaxed posture and his facial expressions.  He is the type of guy that gets his way. I feel that his expression and the lighting helps to present this. The right hand side image looks a really aggressive facial expression towards the camera.


 Errol Flynn; Within this image, it presents a heroic person as he is looking away from the camera as if he has something better to look at. The camera angle is also slightly looking up towards the subject rather than being straight on at the same level as him.





Lauren Bacall; I feel that she looks devious and seductive due to her facial expressions especially in the second image. The way she looks makes you think that she will have a man eating out of the palm of her hands. I have researched more poses within this actress to explore how the subject presents themselves. The lighting within the images really helps to emphasize the subjects beauty.
 



 Audrey Hepburn; When I look at these images, the subject looks really innocent due to her beautiful wide eyes. Within the right hand image, the photographer has been able to capture the shadow of her eye lashes which helps to emphasize the beauty.






 Common stylist techniques throughout these actors/actresses photographs are the hard lighting used to create shadows within certain parts of the face. The majority of the lighting is really dim due to the characteristics of the technique. Another common technique is capturing high lighting ratios. The subjects also tend to look away from the camera suggesting that they have something better to look at. The camera angle is also shot from a lower angle than them which shows a more of an importance.


Test Shots;

Before heading into the studio, I needed to experiment so that I could get the correct framing of the subject. I found that to get the correct angle and positioning of the subject was hard to begin with but within the studio I was able to do it. In the end I used a chair within the studio where the subject was able to lean on and create the pose needed. I asked my model to cross her arms, lean her head onto her arm and make sure her face was square onto the camera.

Test Shot;


Lighting Setup

My studio setup contained two lights which was a snoot and a main light. I used the main light in the front of the subject to light their face from quite high looking down. I then placed a snoot behind the subject to the right hand side which was also quite high, this light was a hair light therefore used to capture the detail within the models hair. Within this shoot, I had to get the model and the camera into position and then sort the lighting out.

This was the image that I took within the studio. I then had to alter it within photoshop. Within photoshop, I created a black and white adjustment layer, cropping, altered the brightness and contrast, burnt some of the background in, removed some skin blemishes and darkened her lips. I felt that I needed to make these changes so that it looked more like the image I was replicating. 


Replicate of Lauren Bacall

The right image above is my final image which I was able to replicate within the studio using the film noir style lighting after editing. The settings that I used for this shoot were;
ISO - 200
Shutter Speed - 1/160
Aperture - F13

After recieving feedback off peers, I decided to re-edit the image. I feel that this helped the final appearance of the image as I had gained more experience and knowledge of how to edit portraits, especially with the skin tone.
This is my final image of the Hollywood Lighting Workshop.


Evaluation;

I feel that this shoot was really successful and that I was able to create a image that I was aiming for. The lighting I used worked to create the effect I needed and I feel the post production helped to finish the image to the stage it needed to be. I am happy with the final image and I feel that it went really well, this could be due to the preparation I completed beforehand. I would like to experiment more with this technique.