In photography and cinematography, a multiple exposure is the superimposition of two or more exposures to create a single image, and double exposure has a corresponding meaning in respect of two images. The exposure values may or may not be identical to each other.
Some examples of double or multi exposure-Looking at Man Ray
Man Ray was an American visual artist who spent most of his career in Paris. He was a significant contributor to the Dada and Surrealist movements, although his ties to each were informal. He produced major works in a variety of media but considered himself a painter above all
Turning my headshots into double exposure images through photoshop-
Procedure-
I opened 3 to 4 images of my model that I took for the ‘headshot’ blog post and I copied and pasted them over on top of each other in the area that I wanted it to be in. Once I was happy with where all the images were placed I used the ‘overlay’and the ‘opacity’ option to alter how strong I wanted them to over lap each other and how visible each image was. I changed all my images to black and white for a much clearer effect as I didn’t want different colours to clash with another when I overlay them. Using black and white also creates a more sad and mysterious effect which I wanted as using double exposure makes images look abstract and changes the way you see objects or people. Overall I really like how my images turned out and how I edited them because it makes you analyse the image in more depth a lot is going on and makes you focus on different areas of the image.
FINAL IMAGE-
This is the final image I have edited. Once I got comfortable with the overlaying tools and did a few edits prior to this one I knew how I wanted my final image to look like. I selected three of my favourite photos of my friend and turned them black and white as well as decreasing the brightness and increasing the contrast as I wanted all 3 images to be a lot more darker and have sharp contrasts between the white and black tones. By using the overlay option this makes the image look a lot more abstract and using 3 images instead of 1 shows you every side of the model which creates this idea of multiple personalities. Using double exposure is very useful when you try to show a model expressing loads of different emotions on their face and then creating and merging it all into one image however I didn’t do that as I wanted to create a simple image for my first try.
the collection of his photographs are owned by the Jersiaise Society, many guards arranged on the island were willing to pay half a guinea to have their portrait taken by him . His specialty was business cards . He was popular with officers of the Royal Militia Island of Jersey, at the time it was very popular to take portraits, He made portraits of their wives and children, for older and richer officers. In these photos we can notice the fashion at that time: long hair, whiskers and beards … Indeed the appearance was very similar.
In this folder here you can find texts to read in relation to a number of subjects and themes below. Some of these files are too large to upload to the blog here so go to the folder below.
Bate, David (2016) ‘The Art of the Document’ in Art Photography. London: Tate Gallerie How documentary photography now is considered within a fine-art context
Max Pinckers Interview: On Speculative Documentary How fact and fiction today in documentary photography is blurred
Solomon-Godeau, Abigail (1994), ‘Inside/ Out’ in Photography At The Dock: Essays on Photographic History, Institutions, and Practices. Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press
Judith Butler is an academic and writer who is an authority on feminism and gender studies, incl queer theory. Her seminal book is: Gender Trouble which we do have a copy of in the Library LRC and in Media. Here is a good overview of her work – make sure you read it all and watch video as well.
Frames of Mind: Photography, Memory and Identity by Anwandter, Patricia Marcella In Frames of Mind, I have sought to explore the themes concerning the dynamic construction of memory. What do we choose to remember and how do we reinforce it? Who are we in relationship to who we were? Working with a collection of over five hundred images accumulated throughout my life, I have reinvestigated the images and their interrelationship with one another
Overview of Barthes book Camera Lucida in Photo Pedagogy The first half of this article talks about Barthes theory of a studium and punctum. The latter part about a photograph of his dead mother which allows him to think about memory. Commentary on Barthes book
Rereading: Camera Lucida by Roland Barthes Article by Brian Dillon in the Guardian, 26 March 2011 Grieving for his mother, Roland Barthes looked for her in old photos – and wrote a curious, moving book that became one of the most influential studies of photography
DEATH IN THE PHOTOGRAPH – critical article in response to Roland Barthes seminal book ‘Camera Lucida’ reflecting on photography.
We set up the studio with 2 barn door lights set up at 45 degree angles and put a blue colour gel on the key light and red on the backlight. After taking my first set of photos I switched the colour gels around to create an opposite colour effect.
FIRST SHOOT CONTACT SHEET
SECOND SHOOT CONTACT SHEET
Using photoshop I cut out my subject on my favourite photo of him and then superimposed it on top of a similar but accidentally blurred photo of him. Using the eraser tool i got rid of imperfections in the background such as residual blue from the in focus background
In conclusion, this task started off badly as most of my photos came out slightly blurred and out of focus but this ended up adding to the aesthetics of the shoot, making my end result look
David Hockney was born July 9, 1937 in Bradford. He is a portrait painter, draughtsman, engraver, decorator, photographer and theorist of British art. These photos look like a collage. it looks like he takes a picture, cuts it into several pieces and then reconstructs it differently way like a puzzle.
Hockney commented that photography is all right if you don’t mind looking at the world from the perspective of a paralyzed Cyclops for a fraction of a second. Her harsh opinion, however, changed when in February 1982 a curator visiting her home in the Hollywood Hills forgot a Polaroid movie and Hockney began experimenting with it, trying to capture the three dimensions of the surrounding reality. What was born of these experiments are the most amazing composite photographs/photocollages (you call it) that you will see in a long time.
My photos
I took pictures that I used for another work (portraits with differents lights) I use my favourites pictures from this work. I wanted to create a very fashionable style for my photos. I was inspired by David Hockney.
Plan
Who: For this shoot I asked my mom to pose
Where: I took my pictures in a studio
Why: I needed different pictures for my montage
Here are the results:
pictures used for the first montage First montage
pictures used for the seconde montage seconde montage
Identity is who you are and how you became this way. Its how you portray yourself to others, and to yourself. This can be based on anything in your life: culture, upbringing, social identity in person and on the media, gender and sexuality, etc.
Social Identity on the media is commonly very different to your social identity in person. Many people use social media to portray how they would like to be viewed by others, rather than they actually are in person. Just like on social media, our identity can be portrayed through art- it can be difficult to describe yourself in words, so describing yourself through your own creations of colours and shapes can show more than some words can. This also links to any other form of identity.
Photomontage is the process and the result of making a composite photograph by cutting, gluing, rearranging and overlapping two or more photographs into a new image.
Thomas Sauvin, a French artist, created a series of images called, ‘No more, No less.’ This is where he weould edit and move around parts of the image, but not add or take away anything, creating the name ‘No more, No less.’ This was his one rule with the images, ‘nothing is removed, nothing is added.’
This interests me because it gets the photographer to work with what they’ve got and see how they can manipulate an image to create a new meaning/look.
This is one of his finished images. The edits made are simple but effective, leaving the final image looking clean and not over edited or distorted. The image is in black and white which gives eddied contrast to the blacks and shadows in the image, while the wide aperture focuses on the face of the subject, both adding depth of field to the image.
My Image & Edit
Here i used the same tonal range of Thomas Sauvin by changing the original RGB image into a grayscale image. I then Cut out a triangle around the eye and moved it to a seperate layer. I then cut out another identical triangle in another part of the image, moved that triangle to a seperate layer aswel, then swapped the location of the two shapes. The layers were ordered so that the original is behind the newly edited parts of the image.
‘Double or multiple exposures are an illusion created by layering images (or portions of images) over the top of each other. This can be achieved in the camera settings, or on Adobe Photoshop by creating LAYERS and then using BLENDING OPTIONS and OPACITY CONTROL’
Example taken by Man Ray:
My Double Exposures
Here, i layered two images of the same subject over each other in Adobe Photoshop. I then cropped the images to the desired size and changed the opacity of the layers. I moved them so that the heads of the subject are aligned and the correct transparency was achieved.
Juxtaposition
Juxtaposition is placing two images together to show contrast or similarities.
Here is one example by Henry Mullins where he compares a currant image and an old image, where the subject has a similar expression and is framed similarly:
My Juxtaposition
Here i used the same idea as the above images, where one image is recent, and another image is old, but both have a similar expression and framing:
Sequence/Grid
Duane Michals – ‘ The sequences, for which he is widely known, appropriate cinema’s frame-by-frame format. Michals has also incorporated text as a key component in his works. Rather than serving a didactic or explanatory function, his handwritten text adds another dimension to the images’ meaning and gives voice to Michals’s singular musings, which are poetic, tragic, and humorous, often all at once.’
Here is his sequence:
My Sequence
My sequence of images shows a series of 3 photos where the subject is exactly the same in all three. The camera is moving away from the subject with each photograph but the framing of the subject is the same. This creates a greater depth of field as the focal length of the lens is greater as the camera moves further away from the subject.
A ‘multiple exposure image is a type of photograph that is created by exposing the same frame of film to light more than once. Multiple exposure images allow a photographer to superimpose one subject over another on the same frame of a photograph.
Examples of multiple exposure images
My multi exposure images
To create these images I used Adobe Photoshop. I picked 2 images and then layered them and made them the same size and then changed the opacity of one of the layers to create the multi exposure look.
Satoshi Fujiwara is a Japanese photographer who has been based in Berlin since 2012. In one project of Fujiwara’s work, he has taken inspiration from Michael Haneke’s 2000 film ‘Code Unknown’, in which there is a scene where a character secretly photographs different people sitting opposite him on the train. Fujiwara was influenced by this technique of candid photography and similarly captured images of strangers on Berlin trains. In an interview with Lens Culture, Fujiwara described how he shot and edited his images in a way to keep his subject’s identities anonymous. It is clear that Fujiwara captured these images during daytime, as the direct sunlight provides natural lighting on his ‘model’s’ faces.
Photoshoot Plan
Due to having to isolate from school because of the COVID-19 pandemic, I will not be able to use the photography studio to conduct this photoshoot. Instead I plan on creating a ‘home studio’ using a blank white wall as a background and lighting my subject with a multi head floor lamp. Although it will be more of a challenge to re-create Fujiwara’s up close work from home, my idea is to only take inspiration from his project and work with the lighting/set up I am able to create at home.
Who – I plan on photographing my mum for this shoot as she is comfortable being in front of the camera and will be relaxed while I capture images that are quite invasive and close to her face.
What – I will be capturing images of close-up facial features such as lips, jaws, cheeks as well as close-ups of the full face. I plan on asking my model to have a conversation with me while I take some of the photos in order to capture natural images.
Where – As previously mentioned, I will have to conduct the photoshoot at home by creating a studio and using lighting I have around the house. I plan on taking these images in my lounge, as I have a blank white wall that can serve as a plain background for the shoot.
How – I will attempt to create shadows on and around the subject’s face by moving the different heads of the lamp I plan on using to different positions to highlight contrasting parts of her face.
Why – I wish to experiment with how close-up images can distort someone’s face so it is almost unrecognisable, taking inspiration from the works of Satoshi Fujiwara when he was influenced by the film ‘Code Unknown’.
Contact Sheets
Selected Images
Comparison to Satoshi Fujiwara
Satoshi Fujiwara uses natural sunlight to capture his candid images, I have recreated this in my shoot by directing my lighting to form harsh shadows across my subject’s face, similar to those Fujiwara took on the Berlin trains. This reflects the chiaroscuro technique used in renaissance paintings to create drama and atmosphere in images, it shows the strong contrast between light and dark. This use of shadow and highlight creates a more intense mysterious atmosphere in mine and Fujiwara’s images, which is furthered by the subject’s longing facial expression looking away from the camera. Similarly, both image’s direction of light on the subject’s face create a clear focal point for the observer at the subject’s eyes. They appear to have a glossy texture that catches the observer’s attention against the otherwise shadowed face. Nevertheless, Fujiwara has captured his image from a low camera angle whereas I have angled my camera at eye-level. I chose to photograph the subject in this way in hopes of creating a more ambiguous image and allowing the observer to interpret the subject in their own way. I believe an eye-level angle helps achieve this as it does not give the impression that the subject is looking up or down on whomever is looking at the image, therefore not giving them a set status.
Final Image Analysis
I have chosen this image for my final ‘Up Close’ portrait because I believe it successfully mirrors Fujiwara’s candid photography and abstract portraiture technique. Due to my subject having red undertones in her skin, along with bright green eyes, it creates a dispersed focal point for the observer- as green and red are complementary colours, letting each stand out as equally as the other. Additionally, the lighting I used in this shoot mixed with the subject’s skin tone creates a warm orange hue over the portrait. The texture of this image is formed by the lines and imperfections of the subject’s skin, for example due to the creases and furrows around her lips and eyes it produces quite a rough texture. These lines don’t exactly show physical movement in the photograph, but more like movement in time. They allude to the subject’s age and past by showing change over a period of time and how it can impact or alter someone’s appearance. Furthermore, the lighting of my final image creates subtle shadows which fall across the left of the subject’s face. Due to the placement of my main lighting source, the most prominent highlight can be seen on the top of the subject’s nose. This opposes with the shadows that fall around the subject’s nostril and shows the contrast between the lightest and darkest point of the image. I really enjoy the way this photograph shows the subject in a natural relaxed position, I believe it reflects Fujiwara’s images as the model is not posing or looking at the camera.
