Tuesday, 27 January 2015

Final Evaluation

My initial intentions were to explore the way that I could use the camera and the features that a camera can use. I think that I worked well and was able to achieve my intentions. I started with the use of flash, linking in my artist Heather Buckley. She used the idea of lighting up the area using flash which gave a bright and vibrant setting to her pictures.  Then I found a different technique called time stacking and linked the artist Matt Molloy with my work which produced some wonderful sky line pictures which showed the passage of time excellently. This took time to get the pictures for time stacking. As you had to use an evening to get the all the pictures you needed , which could have been from 10-100 pictures. After using film as my influence which helped me look at another view point of a camera. This helped me compose better due to the functions of the film camera slowing my thought process for taking pictures which I applied to another time stack shoot. The difference between my 2 artists are how they take the pictures, as both are very bight and colourful oh whole. With Buckley her work is very candid while Molloy is very planned and thought out. I could have done some of my shoots initially better and used their influence later on which I tried to do later on but not to the extent I wanted. I also would have liked to spend less of my shoots on time stacks and used another technique to show off the view point of the camera. Although saying that I would have preferred to have more opportunities to do time stacks because I enjoyed making them and using the influence of Matt Molloy which I have linked to my final piece. 

Monday, 26 January 2015

Final Piece

My Final piece I wanted to show the view point of the camera by using the time stacks that I have created. I wanted to have a verity of pictures that show

This is the final idea, It shows the time stacks in the centre with the first and last frame of the stack ether side. In this lay out it show the passage of time reading from left to right. Further more the first line is a sun rise and the second is a sun set.  This shows the passage of time from morning to night. There is also a contrast in colours which adds a divide between the morning and the evening.

Friday, 23 January 2015

Development of timestacks- faces

This was an experiment to see if I could develop my time stacks with something other than sky. I did this a while back with myself and a timer to experiment with how time stacking worked and how to achieve it in photoshop. I got another student to help with this experiment.
This was taken when my subject was rotating on a spinning chair. I have edited it similarly to how I edit the sky time stacks. I used flash due to the lack of light which had the effect of illuminating the subjects nose. Consequently you can see a trail of noses slide across the subjects face.


This was taken when the subject was rotating his head in a circular motion without moving his body much. This resulted in a complex view of the subjects face. He has many eyes dotted around his face. Using flash again, this added a bright glint in the subjects eyes.It also looks like the glare in glasses in his eyes, but he didn't have glasses on. This made his eyes more predominant in the picture which made it so the eyes more visible when they were blended . I also can see many other face. Such as the subject himself, and old man, a bold man. Which is a different effect to the other picture. 

I think that this is a very obscure use of time stacking. I won't do a whole shoot on it but it has been a useful development in the use of time stacking.

Friday, 16 January 2015

sixth shoot edits

For the 6th shoot I used time stacks for a 3rd time, so I could use the influence and what I had learnt from using film cameras added to my previous shoots at looking at Matt Molloy.

The picture was taken in the middle of the day, I saw a gap in the cloud and wondered if it would have a different effect with how the sky would have the illusion of being dragged across the sky. This effect is different from the rest as even though its blended to lighten it kept all the dark clouds around it. This isn't one of the best pictures that I took but it was an experiment. I took the pictures every second, this shows how the clouds are moving fast. Even though it didn't have the effect I wanted it showed that even when there wasn't a lot of light in the sky there are bits that will show up, which helped to identify potential pictures from the rest of this shoot

This picture was taken in the morning and as a result it produced a different type of colour which was a different experience due to all the other time stack shoots have been taken at sun set. The original pictures had more dark clouds in but due to the blending they have disappeared and reviled the colours. This picture looks very painted which is the effect Matt Molloy uses. I think that this has been one of my best shoots as I have improved how I compose and take pictures. 
This was a sun set from a bedroom window, the sky ranged from brilliant red sky to  dark sky. I tried to section the horizon and the sky into thirds to make it more aesthetically pleasing. The foreground is darkened as they its blended to darken. It was taken over an hour, just before the time of sunset. It was on a timer of 15 seconds which I should have changed to a smaller number as in this picture I didn't capture the motion as much as I thought it would.
This is a picture of the needles on the isle of wight, It was just after sun set as my timing was off for how long it would take me to walk, the needles are out of focus but the time stack was only 7 pictures as I have gave up, you can sort of see a motion in the clouds.

This is another time stack where I saw gaps in the clouds, this one worked a lot better due to the direction of the clouds going over my head, rather than across, This was possible as I changed my location. To somewhere completely different and was able to get pictures without lots of houses and buildings in the foreground, This is very similar to how Matt Molloy does it but I was always unable to find a location with cloud going over instead of in the distance.
This is also one of the better pictures i have taken due to the range of colours, the direction of the clouds and how its been composed. The film influence helped me to notice and recognise a potential good shot from a bad one. This encouraged me to plan ahead, This was an earl morning shot, I had to get up early to capture the pictures and this produced a wide range of colours and a strange trails to the clouds which I should have continued on for longer but i was unaware that i would create this effect from the clouds I was taking a picture of
This was taken from a window, this is evident from the reflection in the bottom left corner. It consists of 100 pictures taken through the day. The day I chose had a very slow moving sky, this is why it has some elements of sun burn on the top right. I composed it to be in thirds with the sky taking up the majority of the picture. As this was taken during the day there are not as many interesting colours or features in the picture.








Sixth contact sheet


This is my 6th shoot, after my adventure with using a film camera I decided to use the skills of composing and thinking before I shoot to use in a time stack, which is an influence from Matt Molloy. 
This shoot I had my final piece in mind, to combine with some other shoots to produce my final response. Due to this I wanted more impressive sky shots. Most the pictures were taken on a hill on the isle of wight. This is a totally new location than all my other shoots, and some were out of my bedroom window to experiment with using a timer and what different times will do.  I also experimented with different times of day, such as on the bottom row It show pictures from sunrise , middle of the day, and sun set retrospectively. The pictures from the morning turned out to work well but with less colour in the sky. A lot of the pictures are very dark with a bright sky which is how the time stack effects what I am trying to achieve, the time stack. 
I also developed a few into time lapses, which gave a different view on the passage of time. This is something Matt Molloy has done too, which can be found on Youtube.
The film influence has encouraged me to plan and think about the shot I am composing before I start. I think it has improved my work massively, As my planning has improved and I have optimised my time to getting the best pictures, such as how long it will take, etc. I have also improved my composition and how I think about where the ground is in relation to the picture.
For my final piece I might do a re-shoot, or just use the pictures from my project so far. To make a piece with an array of sky. 





Thursday, 15 January 2015

Smoke - development


Time stack of smoke with levels edited
Gif of the smoke in a time laps


Instead of using the sky I thought about using an incense burner with a flash in a dark room. This defines the smoke as it came out of the tip of the incense. I made it into a time laps and a time stack, where I think it turned out differently to the sky time stacks. I prefer the sky due to the range of colours and textures but doing this has linked in the flash which I used in the 1st and 2nd shoot. The picture on the left is not using a flash and from what I see, I prefer the use of flash. Although a different use of flash, not the technique fill flash. 




Fifth Contact sheet and edits




My fifth shoot was influenced by using a film camera. I took all my pictures using a Cannon T70. I took my time while taking pictures. I tried to compose my shots more by slowing down the shooting process which is easy with a film camera as you have to adjust the settings more and think before you shoot. This has encouraged me to improve my skill.
Best edit - Picture of girl walking in the woods taken in film.
A lot of the developing of my contact sheet and pictures has taken time. First I had to learn how to use the dark room which was a very enlightening experience in understanding how getting pictures in a right exposure to begin with help a lot when developing a picture to get the right exposure on the projector. It also gives you a sense of how hard it is to create pictures in a dark room, it is almost and art form in itself.
Tests in dark room, experimenting with exposures
with the projector
I found that while developing the contact sheet a lot of it came out over exposed, I'm not sure if it was the developing process or the actual exposure of the pictures. I think that I will eventually redo some of the pictures.
The best edit is of a group of trees and in the distance is a subject, a girl. It's a candid shot and Is one of he pictures that has a very large range of gradients of grey. It is slightly out of focus and is very over exposed and not developed enough so a lot of detail didn't get into the picture.
The other print I enlarged was a group shot of 4 people from inside a gap in the hedge so I got the branches in the picture encroaching on the group. This picture again was over exposed in the enlargement process and needed more time in the developer as if i hadn't taken it out it would have gone black.
My time in the dark room has been a lot of trial and error. I have learnt a great deal towards how important post-production is in both film and digital, but use of a different medium do so. I think that further more I have learnt that the more time you spend taking the picture the less post-production you will need. This will improve my digital in taking more time in my shoots.
For my next step I will return to taking time stacks taking the skills from film and apply it to digital which will develop my ideas further.

Tuesday, 13 January 2015

Experimenting with time laps



With my time stacks I decided to Develop them into time laps.
 To do this you need to go to file --> open and open the file ,with all the pictures you need to do a time laps with and tick Image sequence. Which will open a window that lets you select the frame rate. I used 24 fps. And saved it to web.
 I like the first one due to the range of colours although the resolution is not as good as the second Gif.  But the second one is a larger file and doesn't play through all the pictures that it should play through which can be fixed but at the cost of the resolution.
I think that the time stacks have a more striking effect on the audience than just moving clouds, Although its a different medium I can portray my work.

Wednesday, 7 January 2015

Matt Molloy Youtube help

The way I learnt how to make a time stack was a helpful video by Matt Molloy, where he demonstrates what he does and other ways of doing it which are less time consuming. Here
This was very helpful as it showed me that I was able to do more than 20 pictures before I would get bored of inserting pictures, this enabled me to use 100s of pictures instead. Enabling me to create more motion in the sky due to the less time between pictures I could achieve.

Sunday, 4 January 2015

Film Influence

My influence for the final leg of my journey at the view point of the camera is film. I was always intrigued with learning how to use film and develop it. And even when experimenting with film things have not always gone to plan. I am using film to improve my skills of composing and thinking about what I take before I shoot. This will help me improve my time stacks which I intend to continue with due to how much I enjoyed making them, with the added bonus of creating an incredible view point of the sly/world from my camera.


Alexander Rodchenko 
-Working with an orchestra
1933
Alexander Rodchenko is a Russian photographer in the 1920s . But before that he was and artist and sculptor which would have had a big influence to how he saw the world, which can be seen in how he composes his photography. A lot of his pictures have got political view behind them as well. 
This picture has been taken of people working from a roof top. It is landscape, It has been taken using film, due to the year there wasn't much choice in what he could have used. I think the black and white shows that it this work is from another time. His pictures are taken in Russia He has composed the picture to have the roof line going diagonally across the picture, which splits the picture up nicely with whats going on, on the roof and down on the ground. The workers on the ground level and the people sitting down playing musical instruments on the roof. This gives a contrast in the different types of work going on. Further more with the orchestra there you can just imagine the sounds that Rodchenko would have heard.

Barbra and Michael Leisgen- work from nemesis 1970


This is a picture by Barbra and Michael Leisgen they were trying to achieve "the recording of a natural imprint, research into the body theme and experiments with Land art." I like the way that they have composed the pictures with the horizon in the middle, and the person and a feature in a cross in the centre.They took this with film and it's slightly tinted a different colour to normal black and white which I am not sure how that has been achieved but it adds a sense that it is an old print. They set out with a purpose to capture how man can imitate the land and leave marks on the land which show that they planned out what they were going to take. This is evident in all there pictures cause of the arms of the person is lined up with the lines on the horizon. This is what I am taking from film is that I will improve my use of spending time on composing my shots.
Bill Owens - suburbia series 1972


His pictures of this time shows a typical middle class household in California in the 1970s, unlike Barbra and Michael Leisgen ,a lot of Owens pictures in the suburbia series looks like every day life, They have the sense that he was there and just took the pictures, much how I have already experimented with a film camera, He would have had to anticipate what was going to happen with all the settings on the camera.  The pictures in the series use film and is all in black and white, which gives it a more simplistic look. I think that the picture above shows what Owen was trying to capture with this section of his work. It shows a normal family in front of there car about to go on holiday with their boat. I think that using film gives pictures a more raw feel to them as , yes you can edit the pictures but it's a lot easier to get things right before you take the picture. There is a lot more thinking before you shoot not shoot 100s of pictures and end up with a few good ones that you can edit later.

I will take from film the way in which I think about taking pictures and how I will compose my shots, I will do this by doing a shoot in film first before taking the skills onto digital to improve my digital work.