Chris' year 1 photography

With the the home project being up to us with what we chose I believe I can put some of my own creative freedom on my pictures. My first picture is of my computer.  Before i went off to take photos I looked some photographers that i thought would be particularly help full in this project, as a point of reference.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Picture taken by Steve Tague i thought i could maybe recreate something similar within my own home.  (http://taguephoto.com/album/homes/)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This picture was taken by Steve Kelley I thought i could do something similar to this with the Humber bridge photo (http://fineartamerica.com/featured/brooklyn-bridge-new-york-city-photography-by-steve-kelley-aka-mudpig.html)

My computer is one thing I would class as home to me, Its a symbol of relaxation for me. when i walk in from university, the first thing I do is turn on my computer and play my games, or listen to music. I have added some a filter on it, so the image isn’t just a boring image of a computer, its more bright vibrant.

This is a picture of the Humber bridge, I took this picture while on my way down back down from Lincoln, this bridge is iconic to me because its always been a symbol to me that i am almost home, its been a landmark for me for quite a while. I added a filter to the image to contrast with the brightness, the original was a little over exposed but with the filter on it makes out for a great picture.

 

Another thing id class as home is my flat mates nothing is like home with out some one to greet you. This photo was taken with a Polaroid camera back when we first moved in I thought this photo didn’t really need editing I think it works quiet well as it is.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a photo of my flat where I am currently residing this is very much a home away from home for me. I’ve added another filter to this to try and take out some of the over exposure in the sky, it also brightens up makes the bricks look rather pinkish which I thought was a nice touch.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A cup of tea is usually symbolic for home, comfort and relaxation,  I am inclined to agree that’s why i choose a cup of tea as my 5th picture. i have done little to change the picture except redden the image slightly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My final picture I chose to take a picture of my puppy, There’s nothing more homely to me then having a puppy at the house. no grading added to this picture, as I believe the photo is fine as it is.

 

This is my stranger photo, unfortunately the camera quality is not as good as the others because I took this photo while I was away on my Easter break so i only had my phone camera on handy. From my over all evaluation of this picture alone I think it could have been better produced if i had the equipment. The back ground is over exposed and way to bright, luckily it doesn’t obscure the person in the photo i believe there is an acceptable amount of light on the person. I think theres a certain awkwardness to the photo that gives it this authenticity, that I like. I think the best way I could improved this photo was if I took them to a better location with a little less light. Much to be improved if I ever came to do this in the future.

I love the quality of the shot, the contrast of light on His face is perfect and really brings him out. His expression is that of a pondering man very solemn look to it but i believe it works very well. The lens is focused on the subject and not the fore ground, if you looks closely there’s a slight blur between the subject and back ground, subtly differentiating between the two. this photo is rather similar to paintings, much like Michael Gaskell’s portrait of his niece Eliza.

 

I think the photo share some similarities, in terms of facial expression and that subtle lighting on the face that makes the pigment of the skin glow. I believe I have achieved a similar photo through the use of natural light this portrait i believe was achieved through lighting in a studio. To have the same effect as a studio taken photo I think is a great feat. (http://www.michaelgaskell.net/)

 

The last photo is a self portrait aka selfie, this photo isn’t a traditional selfie like the ones you see across Facebook, I chose to do both types of selfies one thats the more common selfie and one that was a more professional look to it. The first photo was my attempt at going for a more professional look although not quite as professional looking as the previous photo, it does have that back ground blur as well as the subtle lighting. although its a bit darker on the right side of my face, I think this is due to my hair blocking some of the light. the second photo I decided to go with the more common selfie but i applied a black and white grading to the photo, to give a bit more of a contrast in the photo so its not just another generic selfie.

As a reference I looked at some selfie examples, here is a few images I have looked at.

Photo taken by Adam Penny (https://www.flickr.com/photos/adampenney/)

Photo taken by Jen B (https://www.flickr.com/photos/evoljennifer/)

Photo Taken by Greenpin Chang (https://www.flickr.com/photos/greenpin/)

This was a simple experiment with Photoshop to test my abilities. Fault with this image would be if you look closely you can see the split in the photo, may need polishing up in photo shop.

 

After the last idea didn’t turn out the way i had imagined i went back to the drawing board. With just coming off from valentines day i had the idea that i wanted to do something that tied in with the valentines day theme. I thought the perfect object to use would be roses since they are iconic with valentines and are usually relate-able to it. I first looked at some other works of triptych that involved roses. There was a lot of visual inspiration i could use for roses, like the examples below.

 Iborissova (2015) Pink flower. available from http://www.xrest.ru/original/Triptych%20with%20Rose-140139/

The pink rose was created by a user called Iborissova and can be found on xrest.com, I liked the way it showed the stages of the rose opening, from closed bud to its blossoming form. I think the image gives the viewer a sense of happiness and kindness, a light hearted feel, i wanted to be able to convey an emotion like this through the use of colour also. I also liked the way it was laid out the rose was center and lit properly.

 

 Griffin, B. (2011-16) There were roses Triptych. available from http://fineartamerica.com/featured/there-were-roses-triptych-barbara-griffin.html

 

Another photographer I looked at was Barbara Griffin, who did this wonderful triptych rose artwork. I like the way the mix of colours gives a different emotion  for each image, and the colours clash and contrast with each other to make a eye catching piece of art.

With a clear idea of what i wanted to do i started work on my new project, this time with more consideration for lighting and placement of camera and such for the best quality possible, i played around with some of the photos below, these are just a few of the pictures i had taken.

These were just a few of the pictures I had taken for my project, to be used in the triptych I had applied certain filters to see what kind of effect I could get get with each shot. I think the final results were far better and far more creative, then my old project that I had planned to do. Below is my finished triptych project.

 

This is the final design for my triptych project, I had chosen the best quality images and edited them in photoshop. I love how this has turned out the contrast of colours work well with each other and it feels vibrant and lively inviting to me. the lighting complements the dark tone of the petals I believe and really makes it vibrant. there’s an array of different angled shots that I believe are quiet well done for my low budget environment, although i think the environment might be over exposed slightly.

In photoshop I had used various tools like selective colour, hue and saturation, brightness and contrast. all these tools helped me to create the image above, by altering the colour of the petals, dimming the back ground, exposing and under exposing the image. I’ve used some of the basic photoshop skills and have applied it to the key areas of this project and it has worked magnificently.

 

During one of the lectures, i had remembered seeing a photo with this wonderful piece of art made from gears and other various parts, and i had decided i wanted to make something similar to it, i had researched junk like art on the internet looking at various ways in which to make something new out of scrap or recycled material the image below is an example of the art i was looking at.

 

I wanted to try something similar with my triptych project. these pieces are much more intricate in design but it inspired me to at least try something similar. I had the idea to try and make town out of recycled material, i wanted it to show the stage and evolution of a town as it expands of time in the triptych format. This was much harder then i originally thought and didn’t work out exactly how i had planned. ( Junk flower original owner http://tumblropenarts.tumblr.com/post/36883063789/junk-art)

This was the project i had been preparing, the Pepsi  was supposed to represent a river separating the two side and the cans representing houses, in the later pictures i add a few more boxes and to show growth in the recycled town as it expanded. the final picture was the joining of the town via the bridge. I had used receipts as a bridge and the pringles cans to symbolize the bridge. I soon realized that no matter how much i looked at it it just looked like junk, there was now real creativity to it no life or spark, it felt rushed and was rather ugly to look at, I didn’t bother to edit the images because no matter how i changed the colour or contrast it just didn’t look how i imagined it. I had the idea that i wanted to do but i just couldn’t visualize it with the materials i had, so i had no choice but to think of a new idea something that had a more creative spark to it.