Where: I will be taking photos along my house off of Beaumont road.
What: I will be photographing various barriers including fences, stop signs, no entry signs etc. I will attempt to include an aspect of Paul Graham’s style into these photos.
When: I will be taking these photos at mid-day in order to produce a flat lighting which will allow for more options when editing the photos.
Mood board of The Boyle Family’s road and line pieces:
Road works
To respond to journeys and pathways I decided to photograph the sky throughout the day every hour so I would be able to capture the different positions of the sun as well as the movement of the clouds and the colours of the sky. I set my camera onto a tripod and placed it near a window so I could capture several images of the sky from inside my house. The viewer can then see the gradual progression from day to night from one viewpoint.
This project relates to the theme since it’s the journey of the day from sunrise to sunset. I started taking images at 11:00 am and finished around 7:00pm. Once the time got closer to 5pm, I decided to capture more images frequently since this time of the day is when the sky changes the most in terms of colour.
I decided to create a gif with these images on the website GIPHY to show how the sky changes throughout the day in a quick video that continues in a loop. I decided to have each image show up for 0.2 seconds to create a slideshow.
Creating a gif to present these images was a good idea since the viewer can rapidly see the movement of the sun and the clouds. The gif also turned out smooth when played since the images were all taken from one angle. Taking images through the window helped to frame the sky.
An idea for a future photo shoot is to take several images throughout the day of the tides so the viewer can see the extreme change from low tide to high tide in Jersey. Jersey may be a small island, but it can boast some of the biggest tides in the world. When it recedes, the immense body of water seems to melt into the horizon, only to surge back to shore with alarming speed.
The photography work of the Boyle Family that I’m responding to typically examines the surface of the earth, road markings and manhole covers.
I walked around the urban area of St. Helier. I wanted my images to have the same style as the Boyle’s photographs by capturing pictures of the ground from my viewpoint. This displays the view that everyone sees on a day to day basis but never looks at twice.
When taking pictures, I made sure to show the various different qualities on the ground. Like the Boyle family, I wanted to capture images of street corners, roads with yellow markings, different textures of tarmac and cobbles.
Once I had enough photos, I made a contact sheet to help me select the best images. There is no editing on their images so I kept it minimalistic by slightly adjusting the contrast, brightness etc. I also cropped the images into a square since they had unwanted space around them.
For my shoot I will be in the French alps, I plan to find high points on mountains that have large views with clear skies. I plan to take mostly photos with my digital camera and then exaggerating the colours in Photoshop afterwards then making it black and white but I will be taking my film camera with black and white film and I will be trying to use colour filters to get the result I want. However, where as Adams could look at his images straight after as he was using a field camera if I try and take the images in black and white on my film camera I will not be able to instantly see how my images have turned out.
Comparison:
The main similarity between both images is that they are capturing the same subject, bunkers which where used during the war, which informs us that the two images share the same contextual factors (How the bunkers have been neglected and isolated since the war). Needless to say the way they have gone about capturing the subject is very different to one another, which showcases their artistic style and preference. This is clearly shown as Andrew’s work is presented in color, which makes the bunker more appealing. An affordance of having the image in color is that it allows the environment to clearly be showcased allowing us to understand how the bunker seems to be in the middle of nowhere and how the time (night time) at which it was taken allows the setting to portray the contextual factor of bunker isolation. Where as Virilio’s work is in black and white which creates an eerie tone towards the image and showcases isolation in a more visual way. An affordance of having the image black and white allows a high tonal contrast, making all the lines, texture showcase how the bunker has been worn and torn during it’s time of isolation. Another similarity is that both images use a narrow depth of field, the subject of the images is the main focus point and the backgrounds a slightly out of focus, allowing viewers attention to be solely focused on the bunkers which showcases the images purpose. This is reinforced as the background of both images are plain making our eyes focus on the bunkers. Both images showcase the formal elements of shape, texture, line and form, which are all presented through the bunkers and the position of them in the frame. Technically speaking the two artists have used similar camera settings to capture their subject. They both have used a quick shutter speed, as there is no intended blur visible in the images. As mentioned before they both have a narrow depth of field, and have similar focus point. The ISO of both is likely to be similar (low) as there is no noise being presented within the images. Another similarity is that both photographs have used artificial lighting as the subject is located outside. However, Andrew’s work has the bunker more lit up compared to Virilio work which could suggest that he used a form of artificial lighting to capture his image. In addition, as it is night time in Andrew’s work there is less light in the background compared to Virilio’s image which seems to be taken during the day, allowing the sun to light up the whole image. Another way the two images are similar is that they share the same conceptual factors. This is they both wanted to showcase the aftermath of the war and how we are left with the bunkers which is constantly reminding us of what occured in the war. Moreover, both images nicely link into the project of the Journey of Jersey through the Second World War. In my opinion I prefer Andrew’s work, due to the way he lit up the front of the bunker, leaving the background dark as it illuminates the idea that the bunkers have been isolated. Needless to say, I do really like the way Virilio showcases the isolation of the Bunkers.
Looking into the United States in World War II and specifically the representations of women in the propaganda
http://oberlinlibstaff.com/omeka_hist244/exhibits/show/homefront/propaganda
Although the war crisis led to new realms of autonomy for women on the home front, women also became targets of propaganda that emphasized women’s sexual and domestic roles in ways that limited their sense of agency during the war years. Through different and, often, contradictory avenues of propaganda women were presented as victims, domestic beings, and as threats. Wartime propaganda portrayed women as sexually vulnerable victims in danger of the hyper-sexual desires of the enemy. This cannot however be said the same for all women in propaganda as in some cases they were shown as strong or taking on man’s roles such as Rosie the Riveter.
The examples below show and discuss the representations of women I feel should be questioned and are wrong and it all shows how women were used as an object in the wartime propaganda.
More so than at any previous time in the US history women were breaking out of their traditional gendered roles by participating in the labour force, join the military, wartime propaganda helped to limit them to the classic roles of mothers, faithful girlfriends who contributed to the war effort solely through domestic means.
Unlike the infamous ‘Rosie the Riveter’ posters generated during the war, much of propaganda posters became tools to emphasize the significance of women’s war effort in the domestic realm. The trope of the mother-daughter duo illustrated in posters such as ‘Even a little can help a lot -NOW’ and ‘We’ll have lots to eat this winter, won’t we Mother?” emphasize the significance of women both as domestic beings canning foods and pasting stamps and as mothers reproducing children who will become assets to society. This branch of propaganda maintains traditional femininity and domesticity, thus suggesting that when men return home from the war they will be returning to a normal life where women raise children and tend to the house while men earn money.
One way in which women’s sexual and domestic roles became defined by propaganda was through propaganda designed to encourage enlistment and the purchase of war bonds by depicting the outcome on the home-front if the US were to lose. The main theme that the propaganda campaign chose to focus on was the effects of the war on women. The majority of this propaganda portrayed women in one of two ways. First, and more frequently, women were depicted as young, innocent victims of sexual violence inflicted by hyper-sexual enemy soldiers. The other way in which women were illustrated was as helpless mothers clinging to their children as enemy violence threatens to annihilate them and their homes. Both of these depictions reduce women’s agency as passive participants in the war effort and illustrate them solely as vulnerable victims of enemy violence.
Not only does the war bonds campaign provoke fears about mother and, thus, family vulnerability in the face of the enemy, but it also emphasizes the susceptibility of young American women to the hypersexual desires of enemy men. Once again, the narrative of American men needing to defend and preserve the honor and morality of American women is used to benefit the war effort.
In contrast to posters of women as the weak, vulnerable victims of sexual desires, an entire campaign designed to fight venereal diseases (VD’s) recast women’s sexuality as a threat to soldiers the nuclear family, and, thus, the nation. This poster campaign often illustrated women as “bad girls”—dangerous and “loose,” in contrast with other campaigns depicting the “good girl” image of smiley mothers and housewives. The venereal disease propaganda is particularly gendered both in who appears on posters and who the targeted audience is.
The fact that women are demonized based on their sexual behaviors illustrates the larger societal need to control women’s morality and sexuality. Instead of being liberating, women gaining more autonomy over their bodies became a threat to the fundamental values of the American nuclear family. Women who were sexually active did not fulfill their traditional gender role and became outcasts who were looked down upon for having ‘loose’ morality.
Above shows my chosen response to edit and enhance in response to my chosen advert. I have chosen this photograph as I feel my model is placed in one of the best positions and it is also one of my clearer images. As well as being clear I feel even though this photograph is slightly bright it gives me room to adjust this and experiment with it.
My aims for editing this photograph is to generate a response that clearly shows a resemblance and a link towards the original photograph and to also show some suggested inspiration towards Cindy Sherman.
To being with I started by adjusting the brightness and the contrast of the photograph, the photograph I was recreating had quite dark tones and wasn’t too bright so I was trying to recreate and generate this.
Next, still keeping in mind the style of the original photograph I was recreating I decided to add ‘noise’ to the photograph to create a more believable recreation to create an almost blurred image without loosing any sharpness on the features.
Finally I went back in with the brightness and the contrast editing for the final touches to create it more similar to the original I was recreating.
This shows my final edited outcome, overall I feel happy with the way the photograph turned out in resemblance to the original. I feel I have created a successful photograph with what my aims were and that I have personally met them.
Romanticism (also known as the Romantic era) was an artistic, literary, musical and intellectual movement that originated in Europe toward the end of the 18th century, and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate period from 1800 to 1850. Romanticism was characterized by its emphasis on emotion and individualism as well as glorification of all the past and nature, preferring the medieval rather than the classical.
Caspar David Friedrich was an influential artist from the Romanticism era, his work was based on grand landscapes and making the scene that was in front of him more beautiful than it actually was by adding more vibrant colours.
an example is one of his paintings called Wanderlust.
