Category Archives: Unit 2 Portrait

Filters

Author:
Category:
AO1 Develop Ideas, AO2 Explore Ideas, Uncategorized, Unit 2 Portrait

Lighting and Portrait Experimentation

Leave a comment

Looking at experimentation with in portraiture 

I have decided to focus again on studio work because i find it is easy to control the variables that effect my final image out come.
When using a full studio lighting set, I was working on looking at the contrast of light and Dark and over exposure and under exposure. Also how different lights give different effects and meanings behind photos. Also I was looking at creating shadows and trying to make alive shadow with a second figure behind.
This is working on traditional portraits and lighting with a plane white or black back ground. My aim was to draw attention to the faces and make them the focal point of the picture. Worked with different angle making the focal point more to the right or left to offset the image and give it more visual interest and intrigue.

All of these images are playing upon the ideas of light and dark making the image actually contrast itself through the characters. This contrast of light and dark characters plays on the ideology of good and bad. These images are completely unedited, when I edit them I feel  like the images are going to be more effective and have more of a visual impact.

Also of these images are playing upon the concepts of doubles and shadows. Looking at using color filters over the Red head/ spot lights. This creates a creepy underwater kind of theme to the image. The last image of this set is my favorite creating a ghostly double exposure feel to the image. This image was not actually a double exposure it was just done with two models and a low sutter speed to create movement with the surrounding outsides of the images while keeping the faces in focus.

  

These images were taken using a ring light to create a brighter  more ghostly light. Where as the soft box lights create more of a over all surrounding light which is warmer and has less of a directed focus. That why I chose to use a ring light because it works more on the light that is already preset and brightening it up . Also the ring light gives more of a crisp bright contract from the background.

AO1 Develop Ideas, Unit 2 Portrait

Francesca Woodman

1 Comment

Francesca Woodman is best known for photographing herself. She is usually seen half hidden; sometimes by furniture or by slow exposures that blur her figure into a ghostly presence. She photographed herself in empty interiors. The images convey an underlying sense of human fragility. The fragility is exaggerated by the fact that the photographs are printed on a very small scale;  they seem personal and intimate.

Francesca Woodman’s entire body of work was produced as a young person and created over eight years. Her photographs explore many themes that affect young people such as relationships, sexuality, questions of self, body image, alienation, isolation and confusion or uncertainty about personal identity.

Francesca distorts reality into a surreal fantasy by squeezing herself behind mantelpieces or into small cupboards. She hides herself by pulling wallpaper over herself like a blanket. She often seems to be retreating into the material of the building. This makes her seem vulnerable, isolated and alienated.

She  continuously explored and tested what she could do with photography. She manipulated light, movement and photographic effects and used carefully selected props, clothing and decaying interiors to add a mysterious and gothic atmosphere to the work.

Unit 2 Portrait

Joachim Schmidt – Case Study (MOCK EXAM)

Leave a comment

Joachim Schmidt is a Berlin based critic and conceptual Artist. Schmidt collects and re-purposes photographs that other people have thrown away. Schmidt takes these discarded, ripped, and mundane photographs, and creates artwork that is thought provoking and captivating. Joachim is extremely passionate for his art/photography work, Schmid has stated himself that he is “completely obsessed with photography”, He suspects that “few people in the world have looked at more photographs” than he has. At one point he counted: he had looked at 10,000 photographs in one day alone. And he has maintained his manic pace since embarking on his career as a “professional looker” in the 1980s.

One of Schmidt’s first projects was ‘Pictures from the Street’ (Bilder von der Straße, in German) which ranged from the years 1982-2012. For this one, he would keep and classify each and every photograph (or fragment of a photograph) that he found in a public space. (The collection had more than 900 pieces at one time). If a photograph had been ripped to pieces, he re-assembled what he could and mounted it as a scientist would. All pieces of this collection are arranged and displayed on identical sheets of archival paper, in chronological order, noting the date and place where each was found. It is almost impossible to look at this collection and not try to imagine stories about who is pictured, and who owned the photo, and why the photos were thrown away.

A7d6f9db 2a33 4d78 bdaf 0f9f72b14bf3

No. 217, Los Angeles, March 1994, from Bilder von der Straße © Joachim Schmid5d2206a0 edbd 4aad b878 100237f025b4
No. 885, New York, February 2007, from Bilder von der Straße © Joachim Schmid068e3b45 9aa4 4ce2 94c8 3028b8951f42

No. 460, Rio de Janeiro, December 1996, from Bilder von der Straße © Joachim Schmid

Another of Schmidt’s ingenious art projects was developed in 1990, out of a prank, which he started by posting what looked like a serious notice in a public newspaper about the ecological dangers of unwanted photographs and negatives. He had created an “institute” that offered to safely recycle or re-use dangerous film and photos. ‘The Institute for the Reprocessing of Used Photographs’ (Erste allgemeine Altfotosammlung, In German). What started out as a prank, had become publicized worldwide and Schmidt was soon being overwhelmed by packages of people’s negatives and photos they wanted disposed of safely.

One of his packages contained a large amount of high quality negatives, from a photography or film studio. However they had been sliced in half, in order to decrease their value. Schmidt then came up with the idea of putting one half of an image with another, which do not match. He had created bizarre composites that were uniformly lit and fit together in an uncanny way. This was made easily possible as the photo studio seemed to always position its lights exactly the same way for years, and never moved the camera closer or further away from each model. This project was then named ‘Photogenic Drafts’.

62472206 e696 44b4 b54e 40d5fa581ebb

Photogenetic Draft No. 32, 1991 © Joachim Schmid

91926429 0fd4 4529 a0f5 e06382584b55

Photogenetic Draft No. 4, 1991 © Joachim Schmid

7bd170d5 996a 4e50 9862 e9edab46ef00

Photogenetic Draft No. 8, 1991 © Joachim Schmid

AO1 Develop Ideas, AO2 Explore Ideas, AO3 Record Ideas, AO4 Present Ideas, Component 1 Personal Investigation, Unit 2 Portrait

Identity

Leave a comment

Identity – In psychology, identity is the qualities, beliefs, personality, looks and/or expressions that make a person (self-identity) or group (particular social category or social group). Categorizing identity can be positive or destructive. A psychological identity relates to self-image (one’s mental model of oneself), self-esteem, and individuality -Wikipedia

  • Gender Identity – Gender identity is the personal sense of one’s own gender. Gender identity can correlate with assigned sex at birth, or can differ from it. All societies have a set of gender categories that can serve as the basis of the formation of a person’s social identity in relation to other members of society.     – Wikipedia

  • Cultural Identity – Cultural identity is the identity or feeling of belonging to a group. It is part of a person’s self-conception and self-perception and is related to nationality, ethnicity, religion, social class, generation, locality or any kind of social group that has its own distinct culture.                                                                                    -Wikipedia

  • Social Identity – Social identity is the portion of an individual’s self-concept derived from perceived membership in a relevant social group.                                                                                                                                   -Wikipedia

  • Geographical Identity – An individual or group’s sense of attachment to the country, region, city, or village in which they live. The key characteristics with which a particular country, region, city, or village is associated.                                                                     -Oxford Reference

  • Political Identity –  Political positions based on the interests and perspectives of social groups with which people identify.                     -Wikipedia

  • Lack of / Loss of Identity – Loss of identity may follow all sorts of change; changes in the workplace, loss of a job or profession, loss of a role that once defined us, as a child, as a parent, as a spouse. This leaves a gap, an abyss, an empty space. Such loss of identity can result in increased levels of generalised anxiety, low self-esteem, depression, a loss of self-confidence, social anxiety, isolation, chronic loneliness, all of which threaten our ability to connect with other people.                                                                                            -https://www.counselling-directory.org.uk/counsellor-articles/i-dont-know-who-i-am-anymore-losing-my-identity

My initial instinct thoughts about identity and place are very varied. Personally, I am being drawn to lack of/loss of identity, due to the nature of being able to heavily experiment with props and photoshop. I feel that I would be able to express clear view points about loosing an identity through my photography. Moreover, I am also liking the idea of social identity as I would be able to explore more serious topics which are relevant to todays society. Although this would provide many opportunity’s, I feel I would be able to produce a stronger outcome and more in-depth if I went down the loss of identity root.

Loss of Identity:

Mood Board
Initial Thoughts and Ideas
AO1 Develop Ideas, Unit 2 Portrait

Identity and place

Leave a comment

The identity of a person is the characteristics they have that distinguish them from others. One’s identity can be influenced by many factors such as place, belonging, environment or upbringing. Identity can be explored through multiple forms, especially through photography, and many photographers have expressed their identity through their work.

Types of identity

Gender identity: how a person sees themselves. Only the individual can determine their own gender identity. Many people have a gender identity of a man or woman, but some people do not. People who do not identify as a man or a woman may identify as both genders, neither, between genders, or not gendered at all.

Cultural identity: the identity or feeling of belonging to a group. It is part of a person’s self conception and self perception and is related to nationality, ethnicity, religion, social class, generation, locality or any kind of social group that has its own distinct culture.

Social identity: how we identify ourselves in relation to others according to what we have in common.

Geographical identity: An individual or group’s sense of attachment to the country, region, city or village in which they live.

Political identity: a specific political party affiliation or partisan identity. Political identity can be shaped by race. Another possible factor that shapes political identity can be economic class.

Lack of / loss of identity: People who have no idea who they are or what they believe in. Sometimes they say that they simply feel non existent

AO1 Develop Ideas, AO2 Explore Ideas, AO3 Record Ideas, AO4 Present Ideas, Unit 2 Portrait

My attempt at photo montages

Leave a comment

After looking at the work of Peter Kennard, I was inspired to also make montages that express my opinions and views on political matters that are currently happening in the world.

All images used are not mine.

This photo montage about Brexit. In the background I put an image of anti-brexit protesters, and covered it with an image of Theresa May, a faded EU flag and newspaper headlines. The fact that the protesters are being covered by the other layers, symbolises how their views are being neglected and not particularly cared about. The faded EU flag is symbolic in showing how, little by little, Britain is no longer fully part of the European Union and continues to make plans to leave. The particular image of May that I chose, displays her looking rather confused and not particularly sure in what shes doing as this represents that fact that some people view her as not being a good enough leader to take Britain out of the EU on successful terms as the the UK’s economy and social stability may be effected by the decision for Britain to leave the EU. The newspaper headings contrast hugely with the expression on May’s face, as 2 of them show quotes where she sounds like a strong, and capable leader. This contrast represents the fact that many people are divided on whether or not Brexit is a positive thing or not. The third newspaper headline is a negative one showing the other side of the argument.

 

For this next photo montage I wanted to do something more creative and fun. For this montage I used an image i took of someone sitting down, and i also used a picture I took of the same model’s arm. I duplicated the arm several times and changed the colours. I then used a galaxy background from google. There is no specific underlying concept within this image, but i think its a very interesting montage just because it looks very unusual and unrealistic.

AO1 Develop Ideas, AO2 Explore Ideas, AO3 Record Ideas, AO4 Present Ideas, Component 1 Personal Investigation, Unit 2 Portrait

Identity and Place

1 Comment

In psychology, identity is the qualities, beliefs, personality, looks and/or expressions that make a person (self-identity) or group (particular social category or social group). A psychological identity relates to self-image (one’s mental model of oneself), self-esteem, and individuality.

For this topic of interest, identity and place of a person is to be explored. They can be explored through the ideas of gender identity, cultural identity, social identity, geographical identity, political identity
lack of,  loss of identity. 

 

AO1 Develop Ideas, Unit 2 Portrait

Identity and Place Stimulus and Response

1 Comment 
A psychological identity relates to self image (one's mental model of oneself), self-esteem, and individuality.

In psychology, identity is the qualities, beliefs, personality, looks and/or expressions that make a person (self identity) or group (particular social category or social group).  Categorizing identity can be positive or destructive.

Gender identity is the personal sense of one’s own gender. Gender identity can correlate with assigned sex at birth, or can differ from it.

Social identity is the portion of an individual’s self-concept derived from perceived membership in a relevant social group.

Cultural identity is the identity or feeling of belonging to a group.  For example religion, class, ethnicity etc.

loss of identity  can sometimes be accompanied by a loss of self-worth.  Not having a part of individuality.

Geographical identity is an individual or group’s sense of attachment to the country, region, city, or village in which they live.

Mood Board of Identity Portraits

Cultural identity is the identity or feeling of belonging to a group. It is part of a person’s self-conception and self-perception and is related to nationality, ethnicity, religion, social class, generation, locality or any kind of social group that has its own distinct culture.

Social Identity is the portion of an individual’s self-concept derived from perceived membership in a relevant social group.  Social identity theory is described as a theory that predicts certain inter-group behaviors on the basis of perceived group status differences, the perceived legitimacy and stability of those status differences, and the perceived ability to move from one group to another.

These are the two identities I feel I would like to explore into a bit more depth into the mock exam and for my final prints.  Photographers that I have enjoyed exploring and researching which I feel I would like to find my inspiration from have been Philip-Lorca diCorcia.

Philip-Lorca diCorica’s work has a cinematic feel to it which I enjoy and would like to bring through, it looks like they could be screenshots from films which I enjoy and is something I would like to try and create and would need the work of Tableaux.

My initial ideas are to have a series of photographs in a collective group around the theme of Identity and then work back into the photographs with writing or initially writing on the persons hands or a visible feature in the photograph relating to their identity.

My Previous Case Study on Philip-Lorca diCorcia

Philip-Lorca diCorcia