Shoot Six
When preparing this shoot I wanted to change the location, and vary it from my other shoots so I took an outdoor shoot in the family wood which is a forest and this linked in with my idea because I wanted to base this shoot on the idea of the distortion of memories, so the model in the woods represents an old woman's memories of her childhood and family days out. I used a Nixon 3100 camera to take these images, I also used the manual settings to develop my camera skills, adjusted the aperture and the shutter speed to get the images to the right brightness and focus. When taking the shoot, I tried a variation of techniques including different angles, different apertures and various themes. Within the shoot, I used the theme of still life when focusing on the camera and I used snapshot in most of the images when taking images of the model.
These images show my experimentation of the manual settings before the shoot was taken. The first image is how the manual settings were originally set when the camera was turned on, the rest of the images are illustrations of my experimentation to get the aperture and shutter speed correct for the shoot. I had to change the aperture to get the lighting in the images right, the I had to change the shutter speed to make sure the images were as sharp as possible to suit the needs of the shoot.
Whilst shooting portraits with natural lighting, I also thought that I would take some still life images as this is the genre of photography that I enjoy doing the most. I also took some still life images in this shoot because I thought that it would be good for experimental side of my project to change the location of my images. I think that this image is a good example of the use of location in this shoot as it gives the image more composition and allows more texture to the image. I think this image is successful because of the natural lighting in the image and I also like this image as it shows a reflection through the lens of the camera which was being photographed.
This image has been manipulated so that the image is inverted with black and white effect, making the image look unique to the rest. The idea of this image is that someone has recalled a memory by looking at a photo from their childhood, which is linked the main subject of the image – the model looking into a camera, and the inverted effect shows that the memory does not make sense the the individual. To influence the idea that the main subject of the image is the model, I have used the aperture (with a size of 2) to create the depth of field in the image, which has blurred out the background and has focused the model in the foreground. To progress with this image, I am going to print it with the darkroom and use this procedure to develop the image. I am also going scratch into the image to influence the idea of the depth of field.
Leading on from the previous image, I decided to progress with the manipulate of the image and physically scratch into it to create an illusionistic effect. The idea of scratching into the background of the image was to enhance the idea of the depth of field and to show other ways of memory distortion. By scratching into the background, it can be shown that the memory of this event is very limited and the individual can only familiarize themselves with the photos that they have from this occasion.
The idea of this image reflects the idea of this shoot, which is the distortion of memories, this image reflects a childhood memory and by scratching into the image I think that it creates mystery to the image and I think that it creates a negative atmosphere for the viewer. By scratching over the face of the model I have used inspiration and shown that the memory is not as clear as it could be and the individuals identity is not clear to the person whose memory it is. Furthermore, I think that by scratching ‘tea time’ into the image, it gives the viewer more of an idea what the image is about, however at the same time it gives the image more mystery for the viewer and makes them want to know more about the image. I think that the composition of this image is quite successful as the location enhances the quality of the image and by changing the exposure and the colours of the image, it gives image more of a vintage look.
After scratching into the image, I decided that I would try to present the image in a different way to the previous images that I have created so I decided to cut up the image and put it into teabags – recreating the image in a different way. I think that by using the teabags, it has created a new and more mature image. This image is of the teabags before they had been sewed together. I think that by using the teabags, it gave the image a more vintage look which was what I was aiming for. The idea of this image was to illustrate a negative childhood memory which has been distorted over time and the teabags enhance this idea as the image is broken up and the teabags create a sort of jigsaw with the parts of the image, creating a type of mystery for the viewer.
Second part of the shoot:
This part of the shoot was taken in the studio to ensure that the lighting would compliment the details of the object that I was shooting. I needed this part of the shoot to manipulate the images I already had in the first part of the shoot. The idea behind these images is that I am going to erase the background from these images so that just the camera is left and create a new layer on one of the previous images to put the camera into the image and create the effect of a distorted memory. These images were took on a Nikon D3100 camera which was in automatic setting because the images were simple and just an add on to the shoot.
When substituting the camera into this image, the lighting of the original image and the lighting from the second image did not merge together so I decided to change the colours to black and white and then invert the image, I think that this helped the new image become more natural and realistic in the best possible way. The idea of this image is that the model in the image is thinking back to a memory which is distorted because it was so long ago and the oversized camera represents the distortion of the memory, rather than blurring things out I have added unusual objects to make the memory seem strange.
Once inverting this image, I decided that it may look better if I demonstrated darkroom work on the image, by changing the image to a darkroom image I think that it gives the image even more of a realistic look. Furthermore, it makes the image look vintage and therefore relates more to the idea of the image and of the shoot.
This image is part of the experimentation that I tried when manipulating the images in this shoot. As it can be seen from the image, part of the experimentation was to manipulate the images with paint. In this image, i have covered up the model with paint so she is still the main point of focus in the image however parts of her cannot be seen. This links in with the idea of the image, which is that by covering up the model, it represents that the individual who's memory it is, cannot fully remember what they looked like when they were younger - hence why she is covered up. When taking the image I used manual settings on the camera and adjusted the aperture to 2 so that I could get the appropriate depth of field for the image, which is that only the model is in focus and the background is blurred out. I would say that the main contrast in
This image is the fact that it is in black and white. However the other contrast could be the outstanding white paint against the dark background.
I think that this image is effective because of all the ideas going on within it, however I would say that this image is quite busy as there is a lot going on within in so I would not take the image any further. This image is a further edited version of the previous image were the camera was inserted to look oversized. From that photo, I have further edited the image but physically cutting out the various parts of the model and replacing them with words in which the model is feeling about her memory in which she is thinking back too. I think that by taking away the models face and inserting words, it gives the image mystery and gives the viewer more to think about. It also adds to the composition of the image, making it a better image overall. In the image, I have also inserted the eyes of the model, where they have been cut out and duplicated them all over the background. I think that this works well because the eyes blend in quite well with the image and once again add more mystery for the viewer. Furthermore, after duplicating the eyes, i printed the image and scratched into the eyes making the image seen eerie to the viewer. If I was to produce this image again, I would not have included the camera in the image as I think this is what makes the image look to busy and have too much in.
Initially, this image was the first attempt of inserting words into my images by cutting out holes and backing it up with words. I do not think this image was a success however, it shows how my ideas have progressed and illustrates that my ideas get better with the more recent images. I do not think this image works well because the words are focused and the background which they are on top of is not. However I like the idea of the image, which is about a childhood memory of a picnic, which has a mysterious twist which can be illustrated and recognized by the words surrounding the model.
I have linked this image to the idea of what I would like my final image to be like, I have decided to include a word within the image to give the image more enthusiasm and it will attract the viewer more because there is a mystery behind the image. By covering up some of the models face with the word, it illustrates the idea that there is something missing in the memory of what the model is looking back on. If I was to create this image again, I would insert the word and the box further to the right on the model so that it covers up more of the model.
I think that the composition of this image is of a high standard as the model is wearing appropriate clothing and the background has been taken into consideration. The idea of this image is for it to look retro and it is set to be about 60/70 years ago, I think that by using the old Coronet camera, this adds to the retro effect of the image. When taking this photo, I wanted only the model to be in focus, so I changed the aperture to 2 so that I would have the correct depth of field in which I wanted, this gives more effect to the model as she is the only one in focus. When manipulating the image on Photoshop, I changed the contrast and brightness, and also the exposure before making the image black and white. Once I had done this, I decided that I would follow a similar pattern for all of my final piece images so that they would be a set, in order to do this I decided to include writing in some way on each of my final images that I will be presenting. For this image, I thought that it would be a good idea to burn a hole (an appropriate size had to be taken into consideration) in the bottom right had corner of the image, which I would then back up with word which would link in with the idea of the image. Once I did this, I scanned in the image so that it could be displayed and viewed digitally. The idea behind this image is that the model is an old woman, who is looking back on her childhood memories – hence the young model in the image. She is looking back on the memories when looking through childhood pictures of her when she was younger and is amazed at the details in which she cannot remember. The word ‘fascination’ illustrates how the model is feeling when looking back at these memories of herself and is fascinated by what she can and cannot remember. Also, the word ‘fascination’ gives the image mystery for the viewer.
The idea behind this image is that someone is looking back on memories from when they were younger (like the other image) hence the younger model, however in this image, the models face has been burned out and has been replaced with lots of words, which is a metaphor for the story of the memory in which the individual is looking back on. They sentences have been placed at various angles on the images which illustrates that the memory is distorted and cannot be fully remembered just like the story cannot be properly read on the image. When creating the image, I firstly manipulated the image on Photoshop by changed the contract, brightness and exposure, then I turned the image black and white, I then used a lighter to burn a hole where the models face was on the image. Once I had done this, I shredded a few pages of an old book to get the strips of words which I then stuck onto a separate piece of paper in all different directions. Once the glue had dried, I put the two pieces together to create the new image, after this I scanned the image and then went back onto Photoshop and manipulated the image so that the words merged together with the already existing image.
The lighting in the image is natural lighting and so the image is not underexposed because it was outside were the image was taken as so there was lots of light on the subject. Also, because of the natural lighting in the image, there are no shadows to be created, also, if there were they would have been eliminated because of the black and white manipulation of the image. The location at which this image was taken, was in family wood just near the college location so it was easy to get to, therefore more time could be spent on the shoot, I think that the location of the image helps the idea of the image and adds to the quality because the idea of this image is about an old woman who is recalling childhood memories of family days out. A woodland would be a good example of this and makes the background look attractive. The angle of view in this image is straight on facing the model so that the full body shot of the model and the woodland background could be in the image. I think that the composition of this image makes the image high quality because of were the image has been taken and the fact that the model is wearing appropriate clothing for the idea of the image and the shoot. Also, because I have scratched into the image, it has made the composition stronger, and adds more meaning to the photo, the words ‘tea time’ will also make the reader think more about what the image is about, and because the writing has been scratched on it creates more of an eerie atmosphere for the viewer when looking at the image.
Ideas to Progress
I think that this shoot has been very successful and has allowed me to express my ideas as well as enhance them. I think that this shoot is a good demonstration of memories and is a strong shoot in terms of expressing my ideas in the images. Also, I think that this shoot is successful because it has allowed a lot of experimentation with techniques and ideas. I have physically experimented with the images, for example, by cutting the images up and putting them into teabags, which enhanced my idea of the particular image. I have also experimented more in the darkroom in this shoot and I have experimented with Photoshop within the various images that I have edited.
To improve this shoot, I could have taken more images at a closer angle so that I could have used them further on in my project when it came to editing the images, this would have given me more variety within the shoot. If I was to do this shoot again, I would try and make the image with the oversized camera look more realistic by using more skills from Photoshop, I think that this would have enhanced the image.
When moving onto my next shoot, I am going to go back to still life images as this is what I feel more comfortable with and I am going to still use the idea of distorted memories to illustrate the shoot. I am going to do this shoot in the studio so that the lighting will bring out the details in the objects in the images.