Greg Sand

Greg Sand is an artist and photographer who "explores the issues of existence, time and death". He works mainly with digital photography. I think that this style of art is creative and effective - the use of weaving two images together to create one, however it is not my favourite. I created my own version using two photos that I found on google :

Here is the version I created:

I don't think that it turned out too well, as perhaps I should've chosen pictures that were similar, rather than the completely contrasting pictures. I think it looks interesting, but isn't something that I would do again.

Amy Friend

Amy Friend is a Canadian artist best know for her art that involves creating many tiny little dots so that when the picture is held up to the light, you can see it shining through the holes, creating an interesting effect. I like this idea as I feel it creates a 'fairy-like' effect, which I think would work well of my chosen theme of fashion.

I think that this specific picture looks quite ghostly and haunting, as the picture appears old, and is in black and white. I feel like the dots on the water look like little fairies, or something giving a mystical feel to the picture, which is very inspiring. Below I used the same technique on one of my pictures. I held it up to the light at two different angles to show you how it looks :

William Hatch Crosby

William Hatch Crosby is an artist/illustrator currently based in Brookyn, NY. He is also known for doing Art Department work in the Film and Television industry. As you can see from the image above, William designs often include intricate patterns in bright colours. I personally really like his work as I find it interesting as well as unique. I like how in the picture above, the original photograph has darker colours, and not a lot going on, but then the vibrancy of the pink really makes it stand out. I decided to create my own version by using an advert from a fashion magazine (helping me to relate the work of William Hatch Crosby to my fashion theme!)

To create this, I used several different colours of acrylic paint, and also used different paint brushes to create slightly different shapes and lines, which I found created an interesting and unique effect. I particularly like this type of art as I feel like you could transform any photograph into something completely new. I plan to use this technique in some of my work later on in the year.

Summer Photographs

Recently, I asked my friends (Camilla, Laura and Stella) to help me out with my photography project by being the 'models' in my pictures. As my chosen theme is fashion, I wanted to capture their personality through their outfits. I didn't ask them to wear anything crazy, just to dress how they normally would. I didn't just want a plain white wall as a background, so I decided to use the fields by the aerodrome near to where I live. I also used natural lighting, with no flash or anything (if I had taken the pictures at home I would have used professional studio lighting, but I wanted to see how the images would turn out when taken with natural light). When I got home, I also edited them on photoshop.

This is the original version of the photograph. I like the background in this, but there is too much space above Camilla's head, so when I edited it in photoshop, I cropped it down to a better size. I also added some blue tones to the picture as I felt like it intensified the image that way.

This is the edited version.

This picture I decided not to edit. I quite like how it looked without being edited, I also like how there is a lot of space around the picture, with not much going on in it as it draws your attention to them.

This picture I decided to edit as there was slightly more space on the right hand side of the picture. I also added some blue tones again to this picture, but not as much as the one from earlier.

This is the edited version.

I edited this picture as I felt that the colours could be brighter and more vibrant, so I added some blue tones (I feel like adding blue tones in photoshop can really make a picture look better!)

Here is the edited version.

I decided to crop this picture as again I felt there was too much space surrounding the image. I also added blue tones.

Here is the edited verison.

I didn't want all of the grass or clouds to be in the picture so I cropped it, and also added blue tones.

Here is the edited version.

Thanks to Camilla, Laura and Stella for helping me out!

Quentin Jones

Quentin Jones is an artist that uses different medias to create images. Below is an image that she created that I think relates well to my chosen theme of fashion :

 

I particularly like this image because of all the different colours in the bag. You can see at some parts of the picture how the images aren't in line with each other, but I like that because it draws your attention to it, and it makes you think why the artist created the image as she did. 

Here is another one of her pieces :

I think that this also relates well with my chosen theme of fashion. I like how they are all completely different images that work together effectively in one picture. I also like how the cup is overly large compared to the model, as I think that this creates an interesting effect. 

 

I had a go at creating my own version of the second picture above by cutting out images from fashion magazines and sticking them on the same piece of paper. Although my version isn't similar to Quentin's, I think that it works well because the images are all of a similar size, when in real life they wouldn't be. My version is shown below :

 Above is the unedited version. I wanted there to be some space between the images so that I could later edit it on photoshop if I wanted to, as I did with the picture below. I found some galaxy style brushes and decided to put them on the image, and changed the layer type so they were more subtle.

AS-A2 PROJECT

Click here to see my AS-A2 project page.

New Project : Exam Theme

Exam Theme is here. The theme is Encounters, meetings and experiences.

New Project : Life Cycles

My new project on Life Cycles can be found here.

End of Project Evaluation.

Throughout this 'Light' project, I have discovered interesting photographers during my research behind the theme. I have really enjoyed experimenting with light, especially light painting. I like the fact that this project really gave me a chance to properly experiment with both film and digital SLRs. This project also gave me a chance to make my photographs even better on photoshop, and I think that I created some really great effects on it, such as this piece :

I also learnt how to perfect light painting, working out which shutter speeds work best on my two cameras : Olympus OM 10 Film SLR camera, as well as my Canon EOS 600D digital SLR camera. When working with both, I found that the B setting worked best on my Olympus camera, which meant that I could keep the shutter open for as long as possible, although sometimes I kept it open for too long and the picture became over-exposed and not as detailed. With the Canon, I found that using the shutter speed of 10/1 second worked the best for that camera, and what I wanted to do with the shot. I used a red laser pen for my shots, and one of my favourites was this one :

However, I found that it didn't give me enough time to perfect my writing in the shot! I think that it gave a great effect, especially as I shot it in pitch black light. 

Throughout the project, the artists that I looked at various artists that inspired me; Janne Parviainen, Pablo Picasso and Patrick Rochon. I found there work interesting to research and helped me to experiment more in my own photographs. My favourite artist that I looked at this project was probably Janne Parvianinen, as I found the light paintings of the skeletons among a 'family gathering' really inspirational. 

Some things during this project didn't work, I sometimes found that my pictures weren't focused properly, so they came out blurry when developing them. I also found that working out the shutter speed for my light paintings was tricky - trying them at 5 seconds, 10 seconds and 20 seconds to see which worked best. I found that a different time worked best for each separate photograph, so it was difficult to work out which time worked with which photograph, and this took time, but for quite a few of my photographs, the timings worked well. For example, these ones didn't turn out quite right:

Using GlowDoodle

Using the digital SLRs. 

For the next project, I think that I will try and experiment a bit more with my work, and try and improve on the things that don't go so well, instead of just focusing on the photographs that have worked. I will also try and take a variety of different photos, including different locations, and light settings etc...

Photoshop Editing. Film to Digital.

These photos were taken using an Olympus OM 10 SLR film camera. I then scanned them in and edited them on photoshop, adding layers of pictures of Christmas trees that I took recently. The Christmas tree photographs were taken out of focus so that they created the 'twinkle' effect. I like how it looks over the top of these photographs. I chose the layer 'screen' to create this effect. Without the effects, the pictures weren't as interesting or defined. For example, in the top picture, it came out quite out of focus, but I did like the lighting in it, so I wanted to keep the photograph to use in my project. By adding the texture on top, it made the photograph more unique, and you don't focus as much on the blurriness of the picture. In the bottom photograph, the lighting doesn't appear very good. I thought that by adding the texture on top, it would make the lighting of it more interesting. The lines are from the windows that were lit up by the Christmas tree, and I think that they create an unusual yet interesting effect. I am happy with how the photographs came out in photoshop.

Get photoshop here!

Light Painting : Digital

The following pictures were taken on a Nikon D3000. The Shutter speed used was 8/1 second. The Aperture was set to F/3.8 and the Focal Length was 22mm. The ISO speed was 400.

This picture was taken on a Canon EOS 600D. The Shutter Speed was 10/1 seconds and the Aperture was F/4.5. The Focal Length was 30mm and the ISO speed was 320. I used a EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS II lens.

I really enjoyed taking these photographs as I liked having the freedom to experiment. All of them except the last one were taken at College, but the last one was taken at home. I liked trying the different effects and I found that writing with a laser pen on the wall worked really well. I found out that on a film SLR camera, you don't want to keep the shutter speed open too long as it could over-expose the film, however on a digital SLR camera you can keep it open as long as you want, as there is no film to over-expose. I also liked how on the last one, the red laser pen appeared pink, which was due to changing some of the settings on the camera, which happened by me experimenting. I found, however, that sometimes I should have made the shutter speed longer as I rushed to get all of the writing in, so that could be an area to improve. 

This one above, for example, didn't work particularly well. I think the reason that it didn't work as well is because there was too much light source, therefore not showing the full effect of the laser pen drawing. I think that if it had been darker, the effect would have been much better. I do however like the effect of how the face has been blanked out which makes her seem emotionless, which I think is interesting.

2012 Targets.

Here are my New Year Resolutions to help me with my course :

1. Spend more of my free time dedicated to taking pictures and working on my blog and in my sketchbook. 
2. Be more experimental in my photographs and try out different effects.
3. Learn how to use my cameras better so that I can change the settings on them and create better photographs.

The season of lights.

Make:Canon
Model:Canon EOS 600D
Shutter Speed:1/49 second
Aperture:F/4.0
Focal Length:28 mm
ISO Speed:2500
Date Taken:Dec 25, 2011, 6:25:01 PM
Lens:EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS II
Sensor Size:22mm

Make:Canon
Model:Canon EOS 600D
Shutter Speed:1/41 second
Aperture:F/4.0
Focal Length:25 mm
ISO Speed:2000
Date Taken:Dec 25, 2011, 4:52:04 PM
Lens:EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS II
Software:QuickTime 7.7
Sensor Size:22mm

Make:Canon
Model:Canon EOS 600D
Shutter Speed:1/49 second
Aperture:F/4.5
Focal Length:29 mm
ISO Speed:1600
Date Taken:Dec 29, 2011, 4:20:40 PM
Lens:EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS II
Sensor Size:22mm

Make:Canon
Model:Canon EOS 600D
Shutter Speed:1/25 second
Aperture:F/5.6
Focal Length:55 mm
ISO Speed:3200
Date Taken:Dec 29, 2011, 4:22:40 PM
Lens:EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS II
Software:QuickTime 7.7
Sensor Size:22mm

Make:Canon
Model:Canon EOS 600D
Shutter Speed:1/49 second
Aperture:F/4.5
Focal Length:35 mm
ISO Speed:1600
Date Taken:Dec 26, 2011, 10:51:30 AM
Lens:EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS II
Sensor Size:22mm

Christmas is one of my favourite times of the year, especially because there are lots of great photographic opportunities. This year, I really enjoyed taking purposely out of focus pictures of the lights (for example, on a Christmas tree) as I think that it created a particularly effective soft blur which I thought looked interesting. I also really liked taking pictures of candles, as the flickering light created a warm glow to the picture, which I thought worked well with the theme of light. 

Light Painting : GlowDoodle

The following images were made using GlowDoodle.

This photograph was taken using CDs to create the technicolour effect, which I think worked really well 

and I like how it came out.

For this photograph, I used a red laser pen to draw lines on my face. You can pick up parts of my face (it also creates an interesting effect) as well as the light catching on my hair.

For this one, I used a blue UV light (which looks purple in the photographs). I placed the light under my face so it created an almost 'spooky' effect with the shadows, and I moved along the picture to create it 3 times. I then moved again with the light which creates the blurred light, which I personally really like.

For this one, I did the same as the one above, I just decided not to blur it to see how it came out. I like how the two left ones overlap slightly.

For this photograph, I used the same blue UV light as before, and quickly drew around my face, which brought with the line this interesting effect on my face. It makes my eyes look quite effective as well as how the light sits on my face. 

This photograph, however didn't work as well. The problem was that as I was taking the picture, someone else was taking one at the same time with a torch, which ended up overpowering the light I was  using, therefore not creating the effect that I wanted. 

Looking at artists: Patrick Rochon

Patrick Rochon

'Usher Tour Visual Light Painting' 

(part of a series)

CONTEXT

Patrick Rochon is a well known photographer best known for his light paintings. This series of photographs of a Jaguar XKR car were taken between 2010 and 2011, and were used to create visuals for the Usher tour.  However, these photographs were unfortunately not used, but they still remain as a collaborative collection of photographs. This technique of photography has been around for a while, but the bright colours that are lighting up the car make it look like a fairly modern technique. Rochon has been doing light painting photography since 1992.

AESTHETICS

In this series of photographs, blue and purple neon lights were used to create the dramatic effects. This was made by having the studio pitch black so that no other light would ruin or affect the picture. There were several cameras on the car each taking pictures from different angles and views as the light was painted (below there is a video on exactly how this series was made). The camera(s) were set to a very slow shutter speed (it might even have been on the B setting, where you can keep the shutter open for as long as you want), and as the shutter was open, people moved around the car with the purple and blue lights to create this effect. I think that it is really effective as the light shows the silhouette of the car, for example the curves of the car, and the rest of the photograph is pitch black, which draws attention to the car and the lights rather than anything that was in the background (if you could see it, that is). The composition has been structured well - there is a sense of a good use of the space, as the car takes up the majority of the photograph. There isn't too much black space, but the car isn't taking up all of the space, which works perfectly well.

MEANING

I'm not sure that there is any specific meaning to this collection of photographs. They were originally made for a tour, so that I think that they were created to draw attention, but nothing more. The car could symbolise something, but from the photographs or the artists comments about the series, it is not entirely clear if and what the message behind the series are.

PERSONAL RESPONSE

I personally really like this series of photographs. I like all of Patrick Rochon's work, as I am interested in learning more about light painting, as I think that it is a simple yet very effective way to approach photography. I think that the colours work well for this, and that the use of light has not been 'over used' in this photograph, as I think that that would spoil the simplistic theme of this. 

Click here to view the video on how this series was made.