Guernsey with Georgina

I was asked to go with Georgina for a day trip during the half term back in june. I took a roll and a half of pictures, black and white and a colour roll. I have since finished the second roll but both sat there on my shelf waitng to be sent off to a company to develop it. I found that I didnt have the time to develop the pictures over the summer and during exams as I was too busy.
I sent them off earltier this week so I could get them just in time for uni. This nearly dident happen they came on the day I was leaving.

I only brought my 120 Lubitel 166 camera and used a roll of 400 iso black and white film and a 800 iso lomography colour roll. This was the second time I had used this film, the first being on a ski trip where I had to keep my settings low, which Is what I did this time too.

all in all had a brilliant day with my freind and would go back there, altho I now have £2 in guernsey curencey in my wallet that I wont be able to get rid of!!

Of to Uni !!!

From the time I stopped my photography course back in june, I alwasy planned on continuing my blog and I wanted to let my blog grow from what I started. I still plan on using simular formats to how I did my cource, although maybe less resecrch and art history.

I am heading off to leeds to do audio engenering, Im super lucky to have 2 passions that I have been super involved in, music and photography, and the school subjects allowed me to explore both sides of my creative and artistic views. I plan to put both photographs and music up here but really I have no idea how it will go but as I continue my photogrpahy and music creation im sure to post it here.

Im glad I went to a school that alowed me to explorer different ideas and points of view and will continue to try new things.

Here starts a new era of my life!

Final Piece

This is my Fianl Piece , I think it relates back to my intital starting point of , distroting the truth though post production, as this selection has a range how damaged a film can become by simply boiling it or soaking it in an acid. Im using the rule of 3 and desplaying them very simply on a faom board so I dont take from the pictures.

Evaluation

My intentions for this unit was to explore the different post production techniques I could use to distort or manipulate the image to change the truth. Looking at the phrase, 'the camera doesn't lie" where I was trying to change what the truth in the camera was saying. I did this by using film destruction and messing with the emulsion before I shot the film. How none of the colours are true to real life as they colour emulsion created different tints at random on the film.

 My influences for this unit has a large range, from how I shot the film looking at Henri Cartier-Bresson and using his decisive moment when using film, and always being ready to take a picture that interested me, to the many users at lomography who were my influences in the technical ability to create the surreal aspect of the film. Furthermore giving me the guide lines in how to change and manipulate the image before I shoot and everything film based in todays digital age. 

All my shoots worked, they were all very risky in the fact that it wasn't guaranteed to work, were very random and my methods at times where questionable. The main problems I came across was the time management and he reliability of other companies to develop and print my colour film on time or at all, due to my obscure methods wasting my time taking 2 weeks to tell me they cant do it.

I chose my final piece as I think it reflects a wide range of how manipulated in pre production an image can become. From the simple stain to gaps and cuts in the emulation where something went wrong during processing. I think that it also refers to my intentions well as I have changed the truth of the image, not just in the colours but also the overall feel. 

I will mount and display this as 3 pictures in a row, mounted simply on foam board so that nothing is taken away from the pictures.

Shoot 6 - Kodachrome into black and white

This was my sixth shoot where originally I was going to be doing double exposures with boiling, to finish off that part of my work although I was unable to proses the film due to the boiling of it which I hadn't come across before with my previous 2 shoots. In this shoot I looked into expired film, more importantly I looked into Kodachome. Which is a film that was discontinued back in 2010 and no one has found a way recreate the development proses.The film normally would be a colour positive slide, but a user at lomogrpaphy showed a way of developing it in black and white, which was just the same proses as black and white with some added time for washing.  Which is what did, I washed the film first and then did the normal back and white proses, but at each stage had to pour way the chemicals due to how dirty the water got from the colour emulsion layer. At first I was unable to see any pictures on the negatives, but when if you looked closer you could see very thin images, I attempted to make a contact sheet and print pictures in the dark room, but was unable to get anything more than a muddy and washed out picture. I then decided to use our scanner which has a 35mm film clip in it. This worked far better as I got to see a detailed picture from the negative.

I think this shoot worked very well for what I was working with and how unpredictable expired film is. I don't think I worked out my exposures correctly as it started out as a 200 ISO film but I shot it as if it was a 100 ISO but I think I should have gone lower to a 50 or 25 ISO as it was a 30 year old film which would have got me stronger negatives.

The final picture were improved in photoshop which is post production, but in this case it was required due to how badly exposed and developed the film was.

The shots were very much in the style of Henri Cartier-Bresson and Vivian Maier where I was using old film and shooting street photography, working on Bressons "Decisive moment" theory to shoot. But not all my pictures of people came out so most are close ups and landscapes.

I think this shoot went well, there are many different things that could and did go wrong but to get this out of a 30 year old film that wasn't designed to be developed in black and white, it worked out..

This was taken very over exposed but the comntrast beteween the black and the white sign is very luring, especibly when the words "no entery private" are on the sign. which gives it a ghostly and ery feel to the picture. Where infact it is jut the entrance to a block of fllats.

With a lot of my cameras, clouds are always on point. There always vibran and fluffy. Where the deoth of  field is at infinate it can do landscapes very well and the clouds always look difined, the contrast beween the dark land and the white clouds add a nice split between the pitures top and bottom hald.

This is coulds again but with no land or refrence point, so this could be upsidedown. I like this one as it shows how bad the kodachome can be to the picturre if you dont wipe off all the black emultion on the film. as it has left streaks on the film. In this shot you can clearly see the grain of the film, but it could aslo be the water streak marks on the negative.

Art History- Kodachrome film

Kodachome is an old film that was discontinued in 2010. It has a very odd development proses where its black and white and during the development you add colour this film was used for slides as it was used for slides as it was a positive and the cost of development was included in the price of the film Sadly the chemicals were discontinued . You can according to some lomogrpahy users develop it in black and white, by washing the film and adding dye to it after to bring out the contrast. Although I have seen other examples where they didn't use a dye and it still worked. The pictures here have been scanned in and were not processed in the dark room.

AURATUS- untitled- 2012

AURATUS -untitled-2012

This was the instructions I used that was written in the article I found, and the results are above.

My film with the some backing still to
be wiped off

The blue dye gives it a destroyed film a destroyed look to it. I like that the film is also very thin in the exposure as you can tell it hasn't been done to how it was designed to be done and looks very hand made. Auratus lomogrpahy user wrote the article on this proces and he described how he did this and showed hos results. The results look like it was from trip. I like how he jumped into the unknown of developing the film, and took him a few attempts to get it right, and even know I have a fair guess at to what he has done to guide me, my film is older and more expired than the one he uses and will have to try different exposures and different iso's for the film as the emulsion would have degraded.

I cant see any pictures

When I did mine, at first glance it hadnt worked, but the next day I looked closer to find that the negatives were super faint and thought if I went for a high contrast in the darkroom, I would be able to get an image out of it, although I managed one, I scaned them in to get some better results.

Although this isn't pre-production, I would have chosen to use an expired and outdated film, and would have to deal with the proces that came after.

Shoot 6 that never was

I initially shot a roll of film for my 6th shoot was going to be boiled and double exposed, but after going to 3 different places inluding the lomogrpahy labs I was unable to get it developed as I am unable to do so by hand.. I have therefore cut my losses and explore a different manipulation method such as using expired film and what differences that can make to the film and the difucluties it can bring when developing.

This is the emaiL I recived form lomography

I see why they didnt want to do this one, I thought that as the last film was 15 min of boiling and his and the first boiling one was 8 min one of the 3 would have developed it.

Digital Code Manipulation

Digital code manipulation is a post production method of changing the code at random to alter the image. I was shown this by a friend when I was talking about destroying my film before I took the picture. He mentioned that you can change an image into a BMP file and import it as in audio into Audacity where you can add different effect to the sound then export it back into a bmp file and the image will have changed. 

Although there will always be a gap at the bottom as you cant edit the first 30-60 seconds on the track as that hold the I'm a picture data and if changed wont open afterwards.

I used my images for my 4th shoot to experiment with the this technique

This picture I added an echo to it of 3 seconds at a factor of 0.4, which created this 3 image overlap look, altho looks nothing like my film did when I boiled it.

I used reverb on this image, where it looks like the colours have been slightly altered in the petals of the flowers, which is very similar to the film destruction.

This picture has had noise reduction and a phaser put on it, it came out with a grain on the image , or something that looks like static, I like that it has also brightened the colours a bit, making the white on the dog brighter.

I added a fade out and a repeat onto this image, it looks like it  has been cut and sewn together as it has been halted and moved around.

I like how this turned out, I found that it's not just the film that can have random manipulation added to the picture. Although not exactly the effect of the boiling or the lemon juice, it was a good way to compare the 2 different mediums of film vs digital.

Shoot 5 - Film Destruction and Fish Eye

This is my 5th shoot. I used my cannot T70 which is a automatic film camera with manual focus, I chose the camera as I didn't have to think about the numbers and take time to get the speed and aperture right. I also used it due to how it had a lens that could work with the fish eye attachment which I chose after looking into different lenses and out of the specturm of different lenses I chose the fisheye. This shoot was taken on a trip to Reading over a weekend.As usual I had no theme to my pictures but they were all taken in the same location and with the same camera and method, which can be utterly random.
 I also boiled this film for a lot longer,  which was a bad idea, as I forgot that the film would be effected by heat in the way it was, It had crinkled, which when the film was developed they were unable/refused to print them off as they had been damaged. So I was given the film back and got it scanned. After this long winded prices I got the pictures back, one-half the film was damaged but was still able to be scanned. I think this was the start of the film as it would have been closer to the start of the film.
This shoot went very well despite the problems that came up. The images had 2 types of manipulation on it. The lens and boiling which was all done before I started shooting. So far this shoot has been the most manipulated of them all as the pictures were scratched accidentally when handling mixed with the boiling it produced some holes in the pictures which add to the effect.
There are some green and yellows in the shoot which indicates the boiling water had gone down onto the layers of the film to the point of nearly removing the colour from the picture. The mix of unusual colours in the pictures creates a surreal atmosphere to the pictures.
My best shots are the ones that really show the perks of both the lens and the boiling, the best example is the top right on the contact sheet, as there are marks created by the boiling but there was a diagonal line made by the gutter on the building, but due to the lens it has bends with the lens distorting the image.
For my next shoot I want to explore double exposures again and also use cola to destroy my film, to see if that will have any different effects on the film and how much it will change the colours.

Shoot planning

This is how I planned my shoots, and how I linked them together.
And how I atempted to draw, whcih isn't my strongest skill.

Art History-Looking at Different lenses

Both pictures by Katie Hunt on flicker link  - 2010

Fisheye lens 8-16mm are different from standard lenses which cause the image to bend/bowl around the edges. I think this lens can produce more of arty look due to how you have to look at the world in a different way and how with most the picture is framed by the rim of the lens. you can see 180 degrees in one direction with most types of fisheye
I used a fisheye attachment to a standard lens whcih you have to keep at 18mm for it to work effectivly as a fisheye.
The example pictures I showed have been taken by the loomogrpahy fisheye lens, which is a film camera witha built in fisheye. I like how they realy show the fisheye lens as she uses a subject and it is framed by the border and then the background can be freely effected by the bending in the lens.

Shoji Kawabate-wide angle Link 2014

Wide angle lenses are usual between 10-30 mm and takes a wide shot, usually 180 degrees but sometimes less. This allows you to get very close to a subject and still get them all in, which gives the pictures a more personal feel.
This picture was taken with a Lomo  lc-a+ which is a 35mm camera with a wide angle lens attatchment. you can see the edges of the lens in the top left corner but is not as obviouse as the fisheye lens.

Haether Buckley, Zombies in Brighton, 2012

Heather Buckley uses a fish eye in her zombies in Brighton series, where she takes portraits n the streets of Brighton. she uses the lens to bend the image creating an angle that you could not achieve with a standard lens. I like this image as the bend of the zombies head matches the angle she has orientated the camera which then gets bent by the fisheye, the track would have also been straight but due to the lens has been bent around. The image as also been fill flashed where she as used a flash on the person to lighten them up and in the daylight creates this cinematic look to the picture. I find her photography very bright and she uses a wide range of lenses and cameras around Brighton where she gets the opportunity to photograph the wide range of events in Brighton.

I would like to use the influcene of different lenses to extend the distortion and the manipulation of the truth.

Shoot 4- Fish Eye lens

This is my fourth shoot, where I was looking at using different lenses and wanting to experiment with different lenses, So I got my hands on a fish eye lens. Which I thought would distort the truth more than a 50mm or a wide angle would, due to how this lens bends the edges and exaggerates the curves of the lens which produce a different view that we see.Using the fish eye looks like there is a vienet around the lens but this was because the lens was an attachment not a dedicated lens.

I was looking into Henri Cartier-Bresson as he has been an influence for a lot of my work due to his use of film and his candid photogrpahy in the 1940s and using the "desisive moment" which if not all my shoots have taken some influence from.

I did this shoot in digital as It was easier than using film and I hadn't managed to find a lens that the fish eye could attach to. I found that the fish eye only worked when you were fully zoomed out at 18mm. This wasnt a problem but sometimes I forgot and it just took normal pictutres. Due to th 180 degree angle you got from the lens you had to be very close to the subject to get them fully in frame and somtimes you couldnt get as close as you wanted as you would be removing a lot of light from the pictures. I took the pictutrs over a weeked and tryed to shoot anything that I thought would beifit from the egageration on the edges of the pictutres.

The fish eye is interesting due to how it bends the sides of the pictutre so staight things such as trees and lamp posts are bent with the curve of the lens which changes the truth of the picture as its not what is infront of me as I am taking the picture.

There are some long exposures in this shoot. The first 5 were with a group of us taking star photos and I took some of them taking star picures which turned out pretty well as it was some of my first star pictures I have taken, but thelimiting factor was that the wide angle of the fish eye picked up a lot of light polution. 

In my next shoot I would like to combine the fish eye and the film destruction, whcih will change how the picture can desplay the truth even more.

Art History - Henri Cartier-Bresson Candid

Henri Cartier-Bresson was a french photographer, he was also an early adopter of 35mm film and only shot in black and white, although some colour pictures exist they are considered not as good by Bresson. He started taking pictures in the 1930s after being inspired by Martin Munkacsi pictures.His first camera was a 35mm letica rangefinder with a 50mm lens which was idea for shooting street. He became a photojournalist but this career was later put on hold as he joined the film and photography unit in the second world war and was eventually captured and escaped a labour camp and joined the french underground where he made a documentary about returning the french to home , called "The Return"

After the war he became a leading influence in street photography and coined the phrase the "decisive moment" referring to when you take you image and how, of candid events.  which was also the title of his book in 1952, "To me, photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event as well as of a precise organisation of forms which give that event its proper expression." which is a quote from the book about what the decisive moment is, How you have to recognise the moment and have the skill to take the picture quick enough that you don't miss is.

Bresson wouldn't have been able to achieve this without the 35mm black and white film becoming a standard in 1924 by lettica, which is also the brand of camera he first got. If he wasn't influenced by Martin Munkacsi with his pictures of 3 African children, he might have stayed with painting ans sketching which he returned to after retired from photography instead of becoming a photojournalist

He didn't care much for developing the film and printing it himself, and he didn't like to crop images, he did all the composing in the camera, and stayed away from dark room manipulation.

Hyères, 1932

This is a picture taken by Bresson in the early years of his career as a photographer. He was in Hyères on holiday in 1932 when he was just starting his career, He shoots only in black and white as he prefers the contrast in the pictures. There is the black rail drawing a diagonal like across the frame. He has also taken this from a high vantage point the main subject of the picture is in the top left of the image with a cyclist which has some motion blur on it. There is also the iconic look of the streets.

I would like to think that we was walking down the steps as he heard the bike bell sounds and he quickly moved his camera to his eye to shoot the camera, but after some research he was on a walk and sat at the top of the stairs waiting for an event, if not the cyclist, it could have been people walking, or something similar. 

The work was later published in "The Decisive Moment", and from what I have found from this the decisive moment isn't just one picture, it can be many pictures in a single event, but Bresson only shows the best moment from the event giving the impression he takes one picture.

Behind The Gare Saint-Lazare 1932

This picture was taken outside of Saint-Lazar train station in 1932, It is a black and white film taken with his letica in his early days as a photogrpaher. the picture is widely split by the fence win the mid ground where everything is reflected my the water on the floor, from the fence to the man standing behind it. This gives a big contrast in the black and white image. This is also one the decisive moment pictures where he waited until the right moment where the commuter was jumping of the ladder to take the picture and caught him mid jump. 

This is one of his most iconic images, and it is also the most controversial to how he works, as I have said before her doesn't normally edit his pictures in the dark room but this one he has cropped out a wooden fence post on the left of the picture as in the moment he couldn't fit the lens through the gap. This is only 1 of 2 pictures he has ever cropped.

Shoot 3 - Boiled Film

This shoot was taken in Bournemouth on a trip. I boiled the film then took the shots. I used a agfa super silette which is a rangefinder and it is fully manual and I find it easy to focus quickly so I use it for street photogrpahy, although I have to worry about the settings as its manual. I used an old film I found with a 200 ISO. I was looking at Mathew Cetta and another technique he had used to destroy his film, boiling. I did this before I shot the roll, I found that this was not as sticky as the lemon juice shoot which as a consequence didn't stick, so I got no double exposures this time. I boiled the film for 8 minutes, This came out with great effect. The range of colours go from purple tinge to blue to yellow. Which is the first 2 layers of the colour film, and would like to see if I can break the green layer next time. I used this time due to a lomogrpahy post by the user Dopa  which showed how to get the effect he got, although all his shots were blue and mine had a range of colours.
I liked the shoot due to the randomness of the the boiling, as it adds a sense of excitement to the shoot. I think that my favourite picture is of the girl on a train with a purple tinge and smudge on it. I like it as its a portrait, and I don't to them often and her head if framed by the smudge, which is going on a diagonal across the page.
This shoot went well as it really distorts the images enough that the colours look like they bleed into the reality of the image. I would like to experiment with other lenses which exaggerate the image such as fish eyes and wide angle lenses to extend my idea of changing the truth through post production techniques I can do

This picture was one of the first ones I took, but was right next to where I opened the back of the camera.

This is blurry picture but the colours on the top look like they are bleading through. And I was walking while I took the shot.

This is my best endit, only the first layer was destroyed as it has only gon purple.

Shoot 2-Double Exposure

The second shoot I took when in the alps skiing. I was looking at Miki Takahashi who created self portraits using double exposure, altho using a digital camera and post production. To make mine pre-production I looked into film cameras and I used a Lubitel-166 which doesn't have a double exposure lock so I was able to create double exposures without having to manually wind back the film, which can be inaccurate. In some picutres I forgot to lower the settings on the camera so one of the picutres looks more dominant than the other, but this makes it looks more dreamlike. 

I found that it is very hard to plan for double exposures when you are constantly walking around, as you forget where you framed a Person in relation to the landscape.

The idea was to take pictures of people and link them to the land around them and what they were doing, also making it look very ethereal and dream like. I think I achieved this. My best edit is one of the ones in the snow or the girl at the station as it was framed well and doesn't look out of place like some of the others that were framed differently. I found that the limitation of the 120 film only having 12 pictures hindered the number of pictures I could take with double exposure so next time I would like to try with 35mm but work out a way to keep the double exposure without winding back and guessing where the frame is.

For my next shoot I would like to look into more film destruction with different chemicals.