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Minimalism

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Minimalism

Minimalism is a style used by many 20th century artists and photographers. It focuses on having a minimum amount of concepts in an image for example texture, shape and color. In the 20th century the style became popular within art and photography and it is still considered a modern style. Frank Stella and Piet Mondrian are two of the first artists that made minimalist art where both used color blocking in their work. Keld Helmer Peterson and  Mirko Nahmijas were two influential photographers who took minimalist photographs in the 20th century, they both focused on architecture as their subject.

Analysis, AO1 Develop Ideas, AO2 Explore Ideas, AO3 Record Ideas, AO4 Present Ideas, Homework Assignment

Textures and Surfaces homework 4

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Frank Hallam Day

Washington, D.C. based photographer Frank Hallam Day’s work explores the impact of humanity’s footprint on the natural world. Day, who was trained as a painter, says his photographs owe more to the history of painting than photography. Day prefers digital photography to film because it allows him to adjust the image, both on the spot and on the computer. He is a self taught fine art photographer and his interest and methods revolve around culture and history. I am very intrigued by his work as he creates real and moving stories which i believe can impact people upon viewing the images. Not only can he do this threw the use of people and how they are living their lives, which are different to ours in the first world countries, but threw the use of both wide and close up shots of the pure destruction that we are creating to the world. I believe there is a strong contrast within Day’s photos from the portrait pictures in Africa to the landscapes of urban areas in cities which have been destroyed. I believe that this contrast is purposely showing us that despite we have all these luxuries and strongly built buildings we take it for granted and therefore do not look after them, allowing graffiti and tear to occur. I also like the work of Day’s due to the highly saturated and vibrant colours used, bringing a dull telephone box to life for example. Also, the use of great composition and natural lines within his photographs allows him to take a boring boat and turn it into something which makes us appreciate and intake the whole photograph.

Image result for frank hallam day

Image analysis

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Clearly this photo shows the inside of a telephone box. What usually would have and should’ve been quite a boring image is actually, in my opinion, a very interesting and eye catching photograph. I believe this photograph would have been taken with a relatively slow shutter speed in order to capture the high light which is seen in the photo, possibly a shutter speed of approximately 1/10 of a second. an ISO of about 400/800 seems to of been used due to the brightness yet sharpness of the photo. The rule of thirds has most definitely been used within this photograph, with the telephone itself being placed on the top left focal point and on the left hand vertical line. The use of this draws the human eye to this point and makes the viewer aware that it is the main subject of the photo. Furthermore, this image uses leading lines to draw us into the subject. The metal panels are natural lines which makes us instantly view the phone. This photo is highly saturated using vibrant colours to intrigue the viewer. The use of strong and bright lighting is contrasted with the shadows on the left of the picture and the outside area on the right. This creates a sinister and scary feeling as it gives an impression of isolation as it is only inside the phone box that is overly bright. The use of reflection on the glass of the phone box creates a feeling of confusion, creating a real mood and story to the photograph. At the top of the phone box we can see how it has been destroyed by graffiti which relates to the photographers intentions of capturing human footprints.

Photoshoot

Edits

AO2 Explore Ideas, Coursework

High Contrast Imagery (Threshold)

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Keld Helmer-Petersen was born in 1920 and had died in 2013. He was a Danish photographer famous for his coloured photography work, he also created images in purely black & white that are included in his book “Black Noise”. Petersen used a very high contrast to achieve the unusual look. Often, the photos are so highly contrasted that the subject was hard to make out.

Below are some photos from Petersen’s “Black Noise” and “Back To Black”:

The photos are very minimal but are still able to capture the viewer’s attention; overall, they are highly successful in my opinion. The ability to tell what the subjects is differs in each photo; it’s a lot easier to guess what the original photo is of in the last image than the first. They are all pleasing to eye due to their simplistic nature and the lack of chaos creates an almost serene atmosphere.

Experimenting with High Contrast Black & White Photography:
Start off by importing the photo into Photoshop and unlocking the layers.
Go into image< adjustment< treshold
Adjust the sliders until you get the desired effect!
*OPTIONAL* Use the eraser tool to clean up edges or erase parts of the image that you feel are unnecessary.

Side By Side Before vs After Image 

AO2 Explore Ideas

Robert Frank

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Robert Frank  is a Swiss -American photographer and documentary filmmaker born November 9, 1924. His most notable work, the 1958 book titled The Americans,  is considered the most influential photography book of the 20th century. It features images that Robert took whilst traveling around states such as Detroit, Georgia, Florida, Houston and Los Angeles. Many of his photographs can be analysed to reveal the true intentions behind them.

We analysed this image titled ‘Trolley’ that was taken in New Orleans in 1955.

 

Analysis, AO2 Explore Ideas, AO3 Record Ideas, AO4 Present Ideas, Uncategorized

Rule Of Thirds

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What is the rule of thirds?

The rule of thirds is basically breaking an image down into thirds (both horizontally and vertically), so that you have 9 parts. As follows.

Image result for rule of thirds
As you’re taking an image, you would have done this through your viewfinder or in the LCD display, that you use to frame your shot. With this grid in mind the ‘rule of thirds’ now identifies four important parts of the image that you should consider, placing points of interest in as you frame your image. Not only this, but it also gives you four ‘lines’, that are also useful positions for elements in your photo.

The rule of thirds 2

The theory is, that if you place points of interest in the intersections or along the lines, your photo becomes more balanced and will enable a viewer of the image to interact with it more naturally. Studies have shown that when viewing images, people’s eyes usually go to one of the intersection points most naturally, rather than the center of the shot – using the rule of thirds works with this natural way of viewing an image, rather than working against it.
 The rule of thirds in photography

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In addition to the above picture of the bee, where the bee’s eye becomes the point of focus. The next time I went out I decided to try this within my photos, to really get the viewers attention to the object of my choice, these were my results:
For the people, I decided to use the head of my friend and statue as the area I wanted the reader to instantly look too, where as the flower the seeds as the focus, and the rib-cage in the carcass.
AO2 Explore Ideas

White Balance Photography

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Different sources of light have a different ‘colour’ (or temperature) to them which can change the overall colour of an image. White Balance helps to get rid of of this and replace it with its more accurate temperature.

Here are some of the basic White Balance settings you’ll find on cameras:

  • Auto – this is where the camera makes a best guess on a shot by shot basis. You’ll find it works in many situations but it’s worth venturing out of it for trickier lighting.
  • Tungsten – this mode is usually symbolized with a little bulb and is for shooting indoors, especially under tungsten (incandescent) lighting (such as bulb lighting). It generally cools down the colors in photos.
  • Fluorescent – this compensates for the ‘cool’ light of fluorescent light and will warm up your shots.
  • Daylight/Sunny – not all cameras have this setting because it sets things as fairly ‘normal’ white balance settings.
  • Cloudy – this setting generally warms things up a touch more than ‘daylight’ mode.
  • Flash – the flash of a camera can be quite a cool light so in Flash WB mode you’ll find it warms up your shots a touch.
  • Shade – the light in shade is generally cooler (bluer) than shooting in direct sunlight so this mode will warm things up a little.

 

 

Analysis, AO1 Develop Ideas, AO2 Explore Ideas, Extension, Threshold Concepts

Minimalism

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what is minimalism?

 Minimalism is a modern idea within the 20th century,it is about specific components such as color,shape,line and texture.It is highly subjective as artwork itself. leaving interpretation and meaning up to the viewers perception of the work.Some photographers use this in order to tell a story of a act of photojournalism but in a easily presented manner to the audience. 

the best aspects are surrounding  the openness and embracing the freedom of interpretation.There is no real direction to minimalism but photographers can still focus on issues or a specific subject matter. Some other photographers would argue it is about simplicity and the audience creating their own feel or interpretation of the image itself. Some techniques are consistently used to employ and enhance the impact of the work.There should be  a consistent notion that is wanting to be captured.

It can be seen within this piece in order to direct attention to a specific point of view,possibly because this kids the most detail or it is aimed to promote a certain aim of development within the image itself. The images are developed through a certain line within the mage,a certain single aspect of the image,or a texture.

My experiment within minimalism:

within these photos I simply wanted to capture the lines and highlights within the piece itself. I then decided to further edit these images to create more of a colour impact to the piece itself.

here you can see the final  edited image that I have lowered the saturation for and also developed the thickness and how dark the lines are to give a greater focus on the minimalist dimensions of the piece itself.

 

 

 

AO2 Explore Ideas

Minimalism

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Minimalism is a style used by many 20th century artists and photographers, it focuses on having a minimum amount of concepts in an image such as colour texture and shape. The style became popular within architecture,art and photography in the 20th century and is still considered a modern style. two of the first artist to make minimalist art where Frank Stella and Piet Mondrian who both used colour blocking in their work. Keld Helmer Peterson and  Mirko Nahmijas were two influential photographers who took minimalist photographs in the 20th century, they both focused on architecture as their subject.

AO2 Explore Ideas

Keld Helmer Peterson

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Keld Helmer Peterson was a Danish photographer who took pictures of industrial structures and edited them so that they were completely black and white, this meant there was no grey tones in the images. A more dramatic image is created with his method and it helps individual shaped stand out. he took photographs of everyday and mundane objects creating interesting geometric shapes. These images show a style called reductionism which is where something which was originally very complicated is extremely simplified. Some of his best known  work focuses on the style of minimalism as seen in his book ‘122 colour photography’ which he released in 1948. the book was very simple and included many abstract and minimal photographs often incorporating his interest in architecture. The book was innovative at the time because colour photography was no being used for artistic purposes. unlike other photographers in the 1940’s he made art out of mundane and everyday objects.