Depth of Field:

In photography, depth of field determines the closest and farthest objects in an image. This can involve the entire image being focus or something in the foreground or background being sharp while the rest of the image appears unfocused. This is useful in highlighting a certain aspect of a frame and can enhance the importance and effect of an object.

Three main factors that affect a photographer’s control over depth of field are the aperture, proximity to the image being photographed and the focal length of the camera lens.

Large aperture = shallow DOF

Small aperture = deep DOF

My Examples:

As visible in the frames above the depth of field greatly affects the appearance of an image. The first two images are focused on the furthest away section of the plant in relation to the position of the camera and create a relatively bland image while the bottom two images are focused on the section of plant in the foreground highlighting the stem in the centre of the image, giving the composition much more life and dimension with different colours and shapes making the image more interesting.

Further Examples:

This is another example of how depth of field reveals different layers of an image, creating different focal areas. This creates a more dramatic image as aspects of the frame are much sharper and bolder.

Keld Helmer-Petersen:

Helmer-Petersen was born and raised in the Osterbro quarter of Copenhagen (Denmark). His interest in photography began in 1938 when he received a Leica camera as a graduation present. He became aware of international photography trends early on in his photography career. Helmer-Petersen’s interest in contemporary art and architecture heavily influenced his work, as he became one of the first Danish photographers to begin working on abstract photography.

Helmer-Petersen used high thresholds to give his work a dramatic finish. The frames below are examples of my response to the work of Helmer Peterson.

My Response:

Tonality: Colour

A curve, in image editing, is a remapping of image tonality, as a way to emphasise colours or tone in an picture. Changing the black point, grey point or white point of an image can dramatically affect the colours shown in an image. Below I have included some examples of where I have changed these points in different areas of the image to create different colour schemes in each image. I used an image of fire as it had many tones running through it that I thought may give good results.

As shown in these images, changing the black point, grey point or white point of an image can massively change the appearance of an image. The original colours of the fire (white, yellow and orange) were changed as I changed the tone points of each image.

I was less subtle with the editing process of these images, resulting in them looking highly unrealistic and obviously manipulated, however in doing so I produced some dramatic very images.

Some Examples:

ISO:

ISO simply stand for International Organisation of Standardisation. Changing the ISO of a camera controls its sensitivity to light, helping to manage the exposure of an image and prevent under and over-exposure of frames.

Changing the ISO changes the cameras sensitivity to light and can therefore allow for clean frames in lighter and darker places. The lower the ISO the lower the sensitivity to light, and vice versa to higher the ISO the higher the sensitivity to light will be. One downside to ISO is the higher the ISO the noisier or grainier an image becomes, as displayed below.

http://www.digitaltrends.com/phtotgraphy/what-is-iso/

Examples of my experiment in indoor lighting:

Settings: 200, 5.6 ISO 100-6400

Examples of my experiment in outdoor lighting:

Settings: 200, 5.6 ISO 100-6400

As shown in these frames as the ISO increases with each image the quality of the picture is reduced and seems more pixelated, this is often referred to as ‘noise’.  Changes in ISO can allow photos to look more natural and visible, however the negative effect of a high ISO can sometimes defeat the object of changing the ISO.

However many photographers have used a high ISO  to their images on purpose, in order to create the grainy effect.