Blog Prompt 19 & 20

Can you think of anything that:

1. Should not be photographed? No. Unless someone is photographed agaisnt their will then anything is open to be photographed. ANYTHING.
2. Cannot be photographed? If one sticks to the confines of the earth and where a camera would be operational and without getting "artsy"...than no.
3. You do not want to photograph? Fantasy, fiction, fake, etc.

Las Vegas: I would get right in the middle of main street at night with a long exposure. Simple enough, right?
Fantasy: Didn't I just say I didn't want to photograph fantasy. So, if I HAD to it would be an empty space.
Place-less Space: I would photograph a road in the desert which looked as if it would never end.
Public Space: A classroom with the lights off but with a projector projecting something on the screen.
Private Space: I would photograph the shower at an high angle as if the camera was a human (you asked for private so that's what I am doing)
In-between Space: I would photograph the inside of an elevator and it's buttons. You have to go somewhere...

Blog Prompts: 16-18

“Photography, as we all know, is not real at all. It is an illusion of reality with which we create our own private world.” Arnold Newman 

 

Photography can be executed many different ways. Viewers may not see eye to eye on the same photo. We as humans look at a photo can make it what we want. The photographer may have a specific goal or intention, but how does one know if it is real? One never truly knows what a photograph reveals. Photography is acting at it's finest. 

 

“Landscape photography is the supreme test of the photographer—and often the supreme disappointment.” ~Ansel Adams 

 

Adams is considered one of the greatest black and white landscape photographers of all time by many professional photographers. Doing landscape photography isn't as easy as it looks. In fact, I would argue it is difficult. There are many tips, tricks and guidelines to follow. Sure, many of us can capture a beautiful place, but is it truly a GREAT photograph. Does the photograph lead the viewer around the photo and to an end? Is there good lighting and detail? Was there appropriate depth of field used? Landscape photography is picky. But I suppose it depends what ones standards are... 

 

“Photography can only represent the present. Once photographed, the subject becomes part of the past.” Berenice Abbott 

 

I feel this quote is rather obvious and somewhat immature. Nothing can represent the future because no situation in the world can be predicted. In fact I have no idea if this is sentence is actually going to be typed. Well, it just was and it is now part of the past. After anything is photograph it automatically becomes the past. This goes for anything in life. However, the present only exists for the quickest time can be calculated. So, is photography only representative of the past...?  

Contemporary Photographer: Richard Misrach

Born: 1949
Lives: California
Education: B.A. in Psychology; Berkeley
Date of Creation: 1999

Significance: Richard is known for his photographs of human intervention in landscapes.In fact, Richard is one of the most influential and prolific artists of his generation. During the 70's, he helped pioneer the renaissance of color photography and large scale presentation that are widespread practice today.

Composition: Most of his photos tend to have low contrast with shapes or lines leading the viewer around the photo. In almost every photo the view is from straight on.

About: In this particular series, it looks as if he was trying to capture the beauty of these landscapes. However, there are a few which drive on the issue of social change.

Method: Richard used 35mm cameras and also used 8x10 cameras along with color film. Other than that, nothing out of the ordinary.

Motivations: Richard wanted to express social-change through photography. This is why he captured human intervention in landscapes.

Opinion: I am a fan of his work which involves only landscapes. They are simple, beautiful and colorful. I like simple and beautiful work. I would frame his work if I had copies. Simple as that.   

Some of his work: http://www.edelmangallery.com/misrach.htm

Historical Photographer: William Henry Jackson

Born: April 4th, 1843
Lived: New York, Vermont and Washington, D.C.
Education: None
Date of Creation: 1871

Significance: In 1869 William was a commission from the Union Pacific Railroad to document the scenery along the various railroad routes for promotional purposes. Because of this, Jackson got an invitation to join the 1870 U.S. government survey of the Yellowstone River and Rocky Mountains. Since much of the West was unexplored, Jackson was the main photographer to capture all the landmarks of the West. His photographs played a tremendous role in convincing congress to create the Yellowstone National Park in 1872. Jackson is considered one of the most accomplished explorers of the American continent for his involvement of the West. If not for Jackson, who knows how history could have been changed.


Techniques: Jackson worked with several different kinds of equipment. His worked used the collodion process which was invented in 1848 by Fredrick Scoot Archer (I encourage you to look up more about the collodion process). Jackson usually carried a stereographic camera, an 8x10 plate size camera and one as large as 18x22. These cameras required fragile, heavy glass plates which had to be coated, exposed, and developed on-site, before the wet-collodion emulsion dried. Without lighting equipment, exposure times were very difficult to figure out. Depending on the lighting conditions, five seconds and twenty minutes were not uncommon. It could take up to an hour to get a final image. 

Motivations: I think Jackson sums up his motivations with his work and with his own words: "Portrait photography never had any charms for me, so I sought my subjects from the house-tops, and finally from the hill-tops and about the surrounding country; the taste strengthening as my successes became greater in proportion to the failures."

Recreation 3

When I was really young my father took a self-portrait of me. I was sitting in a chair and had a pose exactly what I have in the photo above. I don't remember him ever taking the photo but every time I look at it I am reminded of my childhood  I absolutely love the photo.

Composition: I wanted low contrast and lighting very similar to the original. There were very minimal items in the background and nothing which distracted from the overall photo in the original.

Concept: My image is a recreation of the original because it has very similar contrast and lighting. I am also posing  exactly the same in the chair. In the recreation all I did was get a bigger chair. I wanted to keep the simplicity of the original. This image shows a change in time by the use of the 4 images of myself. Starting from the left the opacity of each portrait gets stronger. This emphasizes I am becoming more of an adult and more human. I am becoming a better human being. The far right shows who I am now but with the comparison of who I was.

Assignment 2: Final Images

 

 

Composition: I wanted a straight on angle with high contrast between the words and myself with lighting focused on myself as well. I believe this helped emphasize what or who I truly am.

Concept, Method & Motivation: Since this was a portrait series I wanted to portray who I really was. However, I didn’t want to convey who I truly was. I wanted the viewer to figure it out. I wanted a slow shutter to capture two bodies which would represent differences. I wanted to do this because a photograph can reveal who or what someone is. However, a photograph may not always be telling the truth.

Context: I’m not sure if my work relates to other photographers work but my main goal was to reveal a photograph, if taken at the right moment and framed correctly, can give false information or information which one truly does not know about.

Interpretation: Students saw this as a questions of who I am or who someone really is in self portraits. The play with two of me and the text helped emphasize this idea. 

Evaluation: Students mentioned everything was working well together in the photograph. Some who had seen the photo before its final state suggested the wood grain took away from the photo, but decided in the final it was working. I would choose a different background if shot again. 

Extension: Since this a mini-series itself, it would be interesting to expand it to a larger project. Maybe incorporate other people. Maybe try to find truth in people.

Composition: I wanted to get an extreme close-up of the eyes with a look of uncertainty and lighting which looked natural.  These elements, along with high contrast helped convey who I am or who I am not.

Concept, Method & Motivation: The idea behind this photo was to have the viewer feel closer to me which would result in a better understanding of who I am or who I am not. I knew I wanted a look of uncertainty and also knew I didn’t want the whole face lit. Again, I wanted to find a little about myself but also reveal to the viewer a photograph can reveal truths or lies.

Context: Since this a little mini-series of photos the context of this photo is the same as all the others.

Interpretation: One student saw this as an original and unusual pose or look. It's a look we make everyday but one in which is never or rarely captured. This pose/look helped emphasize my overall theme.

Evaluation: Students gave positive feedback overall, but one student suggested to lighten the left eye a little more. They felt it was a little dark and took away from the closeness. I agree.

Extension: Working off the students comments, it would be interesting to try and capture people up close and personal with poses/looks that are rarely captured or seen in photos but are displayed on a daily basis.

 

 

Composition: I wanted to use a high angle to convey a struggle of power and an expression of little emotion.

Concept, Method & Motivation: In this particular image I wanted to convey a sense of simplicity.  But I wanted the expression to reveal something more. Again, I wanted to use natural lighting and also wanted to keep the clothing and background simple so the focus stayed on my face. Photographs can reveal a struggle in power if taken at a high angle. I wanted to convey this to show I and everyone can and will struggle with power.

Context: Again, this photo reveals false or true information.

Interpretation: Most saw this photo having a different emotion or feeling which added to the overall theme.

Evaluation: One student mentioned either having a dramatic change from the light to dark or vise-versa. I believe this would take away from the rest of the images. I would crop or get closer to the subject to be more similar to the other photos.

Extension: I'm not sure what I could do as larger project but I would still go in the direction of using other people.    

Composition: I wanted this photo to be centered with most of the light on the face to emphasize the expression.

Concept, Method & Motivation: The idea here was to reveal a sense of anger or a sense of the subject not being listened to. It is open for interpretation. As with all the others I wanted to use natural lighting to help convey the truth or lies. Again, with this expression the viewer can take several things from it. However, whether or not what the take from it is the truth is unknown.

Context: True or false?

Interpretation: Others saw this as intense and emotional. An "in your face" feeling. They believed it added to the overall theme very well.

Evaluation: No one had anything negative or improvements to be made but I would make it so the lighting was balanced throughout the face and have the lighting around the edge of my face balanced as well.

Extension: I would attempt to capture close-ups of facial expressions which are unsettling or difficult to look at. 

Blog Prompts 11-15

11: Albee elementary is where I spent my first 5 years of school. It wasn't colorful. It was very small. The class were small. The hallways were narrow. The joys were outside on the playground. It is still standing but is no longer in use. I would go back and put myself in front of the building and capture the whole building. I would do this to show the effects of education in the last 15-20 years. I was young then. I had fun. No one will ever have fun again.

12:  First photo that came to mind was a simple one: I was very young, 7 or eight and I was on the computer. My dad has always worked on computers and has been an IT guy for quite some time. So, naturally I became interested in computers as well. It makes me feel great because without my dad's interest in computers I wouldn't know much about computers or technology. Since that time I haven't changed. I live on my computer. The place is still there. The computer has changed though. A reenactment of the photograph would reveal newer technology and an older me. I would still act the same. Much has changed, but yet so little.

13:  I would (with help) gather up a ton of garbage and then put it on a busy street. I would do this to show what will happen to this world someday when we become overridden by garbage.

14: My familiar place would consist of close-ups to strengthen familiarity and closeness. A faraway place would consist of wide shots with little detail. With a familiar place one can remember small details, but not in a faraway place. I can't imagine any place that has been touched very little by humans. However, the moon comes to mind. If I were actually ever able to go there I would photograph the smallest details. Hell, I would photograph everything possible if I were on the moon.

15:  Middle school and Michigan state university. During middle school I was extremely shy and usually kept to myself. Sure, I played sports and hung with a few friends but I definitely was not in the "cool" crowd. I would photograph myself in this school, in a classroom sitting in a chair in the distance with little to no expression. I would then photograph myself in a very similar setting at MSU but have it be a close up of myself and with a smile. I would double expose the photos to compare how I have changed.

Prompts 8, 9, 10

“My portraits are more about me than they are about the people I photograph.” ~Richard Avedon

The person behind the camera can change the feel of a photograph with many different trechniques. What one photographs is what one feels. Therefore, it's always more about the photographer.

 

“You don't take a photograph, you make it.” ~Ansel Adams



Photography is an art. Art is a creation. Therefore, photography is a creation.
 

“All photographs are there to remind us of what we forget. In this - as in other ways - they are the opposite of paintings. Paintings record what the painter remembers. Because each one of us forgets different things, a photo more than a painting may change its meaning according to who is looking at it.” ~John Berger


Photographs capture a time that will forever be history. But that history can be viewed differently from one person to the next. People can come together to from a story which has many parts.

Latest Wedding Video...

Here is my latest wedding video...I tried some new things...some worked...some didn't. I learned a good deal from this one though...back to the drawing board for the next one.

http://www.vimeo.com/19173454

In Class Assignment

Bryce - Take 1

Bryce - Take 2

 

Contemporary Photographer: Dawoud Bey

Biography

Birthdate: 1953 in New York City’s Jamaica, Queens

Current Residency: Chicago, Illinois

Education: B.F.A. in Photography from Empire State College, M.F.A. from Yale University School of Art

Creation: Unknown

Significance

Dawoud Bey’s “Class Pictures” is a significant series because it reveals the inner workings of teenagers. One can decide what happens in one’s life during teenage years. Teenage life can be hectic, scary, unsettling and any emotion imaginable.  Bey wanted to convey the complexity of a high school teenager, which is something almost all people go through. Each student was asked to reveal something about themselves for the photo. The texts and photos juxtaposed create quite the expressions.

Composition

All of Bey’s photos from this particular series tend to have similar framing, lighting, contrast and balance. Bey didn’t want to make drastic changes from one photo to the next. He wanted to keep certain aspects consistent. However, the posing of the subjects is what differs the most between the photos. The different poses help identify the student’s personalities.

Concept

The concept is quite simple: Bey took portraits of high school teenagers paired with self-written statements by each student.  However, it is very complex. Bey wanted to reveal something unknown to others about each subject. But how much can a portrait actually reveal?

Method

There weren’t any special techniques or processes employed for this series.

Goal

This is simple: to showcase the inner complex workings of a teenager’s world.

Opinion

I’m not one to write smart articulate coherent opinions about ones work. In fact, I don’t care to write my thoughts about ones work at all. So, when I do, I keep my statements simple and to the point.

Bey’s work in this series is magnificent. He has taken a range of teenagers and captured them in their simplest form. One can look at the photos and see the range of personalities and life styles present.  However, since each subject was asked to write a statement about themselves it suddenly becomes complex and personal. One may feel suddenly close to them, even though one has never met them. One is transported into their world and once you step out of their world you compare it to yours. One realizes how different one’s life can be at such an important age. But in the end, how much can a photo reveal about one’s self?

For this series and all of his work please visit his web page at:

http://work.colum.edu/~jkeats/bey/

Recreation 2

Alexander Rodchenko: Portrait of my Mother

Aaron Young: Self Portrait

Alexander Rodchenko:

Born: December 5th 1891 in St. Petersburg, Russia

Education: Kazan School of Art & Stroganov Institute in Moscow

Portraitof my Mother Created 1924

(Wikipedia) Rodchenko was an artist, sculptor, photographer and graphic designer. He was one of the founders of constructivism and Russian design. His photography was socially engaged, formally innovative and opposed to a painterly aesthetic. He took photos from odd angles to shock the viewer. Rodchenko was quoted saying "One has to take several different shots of a subject, from different points of view and in different situations, as if one examined it in the round rather than looked through the same key-hole again and again."

Rodchenko self portrait of his mother is slightly different than his other work. It's a little more straight forward for the angle and it looks more natural. For being an older photo the contrast is quite high and the lighting is seems more natural. 

For this particular photo I am not sure what Rodchenko was attempting. I'm not sure he was trying to shock the viewer. I believe he was merely taking a self portrait of his mother from a slightly above angle. He did capture what many older Russian women of that time period looked like.

Honestly, it is a very simple photo and I like it. It's of his own mother and he captured her in a simple way. I'm sure it spoke to her personality. It feels honest and I like honesty.

Recreation:

I was attempting to mimic much of what Rodchenko did in his photo. I was attempting to get similar lighting, contrast and balance. I wanted to change the perspective a little to be slightly more straight on so as not to copy his work exactly. I was attempting to bring out the shapes of my face a little more than his photo. I wear glasses/contacts myself and wanted to show I did. However, I wanted the viewer to look for it and make it unclear if I really did or not. His photo is simple and I wanted to keep mine simple as well. So, I borrowed his elements and applied it to my photo. Simple as that.