Project 3 - Third Shoot

Project 3 - New Precedent

Jamie the tutor gave me some advice and suggested that I should choose an architecture photographer as my precedent. I thought it was a great idea and so I searched for some photographers online. I found Sven Fennema to be my favourite and here is his online portfolio. Here are some images of his:

Sven Fennema plays around with contrast and lighting to create an evocative image. This is my favourite one of his and I am hoping to achieve the same level of elegance with the colour shades:

He also sometimes plays around with the angle of his shot, creating an intriguing picture from the patterns. This is a good technique and is very relevant to the objectives of this project.



Project 3 - Tutorial Work

I couldn't make it for the full session of the studio and so I went to the model photography room and did my best with an ornament I brought to school.

I decided to choose these images for these genres:

Horror

Science Fiction

Musical

Romance

Action

Film Noir

Documentary Realism


These are just raw pictures. A lot of them unfortunately look similar but if I change the colour balance in Photoshop slightly, it would definitely improve the look and feel of each picture to suit the genre more. (i.e. creating a warmer sepia-like tone for the romance one, or adding a colourful effect to the musical one)

Project 3 - Initial Shoot

I collected several objects that I thought would be nice to photograph. There is a theme for each object I shot and I have yet to decide which I should go along with for my second shoot.

Glasses - "Through the Looking Glass", the change of one's point of view.

 Tin Whistle - Musical instruments.

Pikachu Plushie - ...just something interesting.

Project 3 - Precedent

I found it hard to choose a particular style or precedent to follow, but for the moment my precedent this time would be Thom O'Connor. Unfortunately I cannot find any of his photographs online but here is his online portfolio. Click on 'The Color Portfolio' to look for the images that I wish to use as my precedent.

Project 3 - Research

I looked online for some images of objects that had lighting etc played around with to create an interesting view or perception of the object:

This picture is interesting because the apparent size of the mini elephant has been made to look bigger. Instead of the common way of ‘zooming up’ and macro shooting the small object to make it seem larger, the use of lighting and the camera angle (that does not allow the appearance of any other objects to ruin the illusion of the elephant’s largeness) is a clever approach to photographing small objects like this.

The shot was taken extremely quickly, and the extreme close-up that reveals details that we don’t see in water drops everyday makes the image more interesting. The shapes formed by the water droplets create an attractive quality similar to a digitally-produced abstract image; a feature difficult to attain in photography.

Close-ups are common shots used in object photography as they provide a different view on objects we commonly see. It is especially interesting here because the objects chosen are tiny in real life but in this picture viewers get to see details in the object through the contours of light illuminance from the object and niches that show division etc. The striking red colour of the pills against the white background shows these very easily especially under suitable lighting.

 

The angle chosen works very effectively here and it just shows that the positioning of the camera when shooting photos of still-life important. The ‘sloppiness’ in the setting of this shot (it does not seem like it was planned like in a studio under proper lighting etc) shows that sometimes spontaneous shots can be just as successful as arranged ones. The distance of the camera from the objects in this picture is perfect because the shoes look like it is directly under the dress, when it is actually closer to the camera than the dress itself. This image cleverly plays around with perspective and optical illusion; a good concept for object photography.

This is just another interesting picture found online, it is a Lego ‘re-enactment’ of a famous photo (click here to see it). Although the photography and concept is not exceptional, the use of interesting objects drastically changes the image into a more attractive one.

Project 2 - Finals

4 images were chosen out of the list from before and each explores certain 'domains' of modern living in an urban environment.

First Image

In the first image of the sequence, the idea of 'rush' is conveyed through the dramatic motion of the lady running by and the other passers-by who are walking straight ahead. It is a common notion that city lifestyle involves a higher pace and busyness, which is highlighted in this picture well. Compared to the previous pictures of similar ideas (the ones with blurred motion of people walking), compositionally this image works better because the frozen running motion seems to be more effective in communicating speed. 

The fact that the woman's face is not shown all the more heightens the lack of individuality and community spirit of society in a modern environment.

Second Image 

The second image is of a set of windows of an apartment building. 'Home' is no more an image of a warm suburbian house with a vegetable garden, but is now a box among the vertical stack of mirror-patterned apartment units. This idea is slowly manifesting around the world as technology rapidly grows with resources diminishing, yielding the likely future of sustainable living conditions.

In this picture, the number of lit windows are random for each row. This ambiguity seems to act as a hint to its occupants' lives and each one's uniqueness; the essentials of a living being. 

Third Image 

Although this was not a candid shot, a scene like this is actually quite common in libraries (especially at university). Cellphones were considered to be a luxury item around only one decade ago but now it has been rendered a necessity. Electronic mails, calls and texts are now the most common means of communication even for official business. Whether for good or for worse, technology is taking over the world and very often the possession of this industry and its products end up defining an individual; from the categorising of first/third world countries to whimsical trends among teenagers at school. We are all slowly letting ourselves depend on machines and artificial intelligence of this age.

Fourth Image

This picture works well symbolically; the lone walking figure among the rows and rows of cars communicates the issue of the increasing usage of automobiles in an urban environment and the consequences of economical as well as technological growth. It just shows the ratio of people who walk around or use public transport instead of a car for every individual. It also shows how increasingly common it is to own a car now.

Project 2 - Possible Finals

I picked out the images that I thought were the most successful in terms of communicating my theme through.
The images were all converted into grayscale because my precedent, Ted Szukalski, often edits his images to be black and white. This is also suitable for the urbanism theme that I'm wanting to explore as the monotonous colour scheme reflects the typical concrete/harsh environments in a city and the routine-based lifestyle its dwellers live in.
Linking to this theme is also the square shape all of these images have been cropped into. The equal sides of a square often makes it a shape that conveys an idea of uniformity, order and consistency; which are all concepts associated with the modern society of today.