Now that I have completed my travels and have collected my images, I am tasked with creating some original final images. On this post, I am going to be documenting and experimenting with an idea I had whilst on my travels. As discussed in a previous post, I felt the urge to incorporate some external art within my photography, in order to avoid generic tourist responses.The genre of Travel Photography is now very crowded due to its accessibility and ease of involvement and there is little originality in documenting the landscapes and atmospheres of foreign locations as it can essentially be done by anyone. I left on my vacation having looked at Carlos Spottorno, planting concepts in my head surrounding illustration, but no solid ideas that could be experimented with. Nevertheless, I began investigating contemporary illustration given that this is my chosen course at my future university. I looked at the work of Michael Craig Martin, studying crisp, clean line work and if I could perhaps implement this within my work. After experimenting in Photoshop, I finally found an idea that has the potential to produce distinctive results. Here, I will be outlining the process of creation and my thoughts on the prospects of the concept.
I start by selecting an image that is very open for further adjustment and reconstruction. I wanted something basic and simple in order to avoid complex compositions that will crowd the photographs. This photograph that I took in Knossos, Greece seemed appropriate. A large portion of the image is cloudy sky, which provides a blank canvas for digital drawing. In addition to this, I was attracted to the way in which that the building is partially destroyed, which will enable me to reconstruct the structure that is missing. I am essentially re-building this ancient temple in the way that I please. Its important to note the way this all links back to the exam brief of ‘environment’. In this case, I am manually manipulating this landscape, adapting and changing the environment into something different. The first thing I do, is import the image into Photoshop and make it black and white. For the piece I am planning, the linework created is going to be colourful. With a desaturated background, these colours will be perceived a lot more vividly, popping into the foreground. With a blue-grey sky, the tones begin to combine and merge together which ruins the crisp, clean aesthetic I am searching for. I turn the contrast up a bit, ensuring some dark shadows that will serve as effective backdrop.
With the image prepped, I now select the Pen tool. The Pen is an excellent tool that allows me to draw lines in a very controlled and manual manner. The key feature of the Pen is its adaptability. Click once to add a single point and create an angle to the next, or alternatively click, hold and drag to create a curve. It enables me to create any shape I want, straight or rounded. In addition to this, every point is completely editable after you’ve finished the shape, and you can add new points if you want to add an extra curve into the shape. This means I can come back to my illustrations at any point and make further adjustments to improve the piece. In the image above, you can see that I have started reconstructing the base of the building, drawing in the collapsed pillar and first floor. On the top tool bar, you can also spot an array of options that are available regarding the visuals of the lines being created. For example, I can change the weight of the line for thicker strokes and manually select a colour of my choice. For this piece, I have selected a mid-tonal purple. It works effectively due to its ability to stand out upon both shadows and highlights.
With the building complete, I decided to implement a large sign upon the roof. Currently, the illustration lacks personality and individuality. I would like to incorporate a sense of fun within the piece in order to rectify the bland visuals. As you can see above, I wanted to create a sign that labels the building as ‘ Tourism Office’. I thought this was a witty way of enforcing a theme of visual satire, almost mocking this ancient city and essentially labelling it as just a tourist attraction. It forces the audience to think which creates discussion. Nonetheless, I cannot simply rotate the text and slot it within the sign margins. The piece sustains a sense of perspective, as the construction gets smaller as it moves further away from the audience. Consequently, the text must share the same qualities. I select a font that enforces this fun, satirical attitude as suggested by the rounded edges and capital letters. In order to make proportional adjustments to this piece of text, I must convert it into a pixels as oppose to a text layer. With this complete, all I have to do is Transform the layer and select ‘Perspective’. This option permits me to manually adjust the positioning and perspective of the text, meaning I can make it larger in the foreground and smaller in the back. The final result can be seen below.
I think this is an idea worth pursuing as it demonstrates a form of originality that is currently missing from my work. Illustration is something that I am passionate about, and I think I possess the keen eye required to impose imaginative ideas upon standard environmental photographs. With this experimentation complete, I will continue to produce more responses.
In response to Bill Henson and Todd Hido’s portraits, I wanted to explore the use of interior scenes and the use of natural lighting to build narrative and add emotion and feeling. In relation to my starting point, the natural light contrasts the dark spaces created by the walls and small light sources. I took over 50 photographs, each experimenting with different ISO’s and exposures and I also left it on auto focus, this evoked a sense of depth without creating overly blurry photographs, I also tested long exposures to give the photos a ghostly effect. I did not use a tripod and in hindsight this would have been more beneficial for creating a sharper image especially when working with longer exposures. I decided to not use multiple exposures or HDR techniques unlike many of my previous landscape photographs as I wanted to keep the strong contrasts of dark space with the warm light. The composition of the photographs features closeups as well as shots that feature more of the open space which reflects a bigger sense of environment. I have also made the compositions to work with a book layout so they could possibly work with a double page spread but also just on a single page, complimented with a text on the opposite side.
