I chose these images as my favourite from my personal study. I chose these images as I believe that they relate to my personal study the most out of my images, as well as this I personally just prefer these images to my others. I think that they are very effective in showcasing the movement in skateboarding and that they present my whole study very well.
Evaluation + Critique
Overall, I am very happy with my final edits. The edits created which are inspired by the artists I studied greatly compare to them in everything from looks, lighting and the colours seen in the images. They also fit into the theme of my personal study well in my opinion. My aim with them was to create unique and cool images which is exactly how I believe they turned out. To improve my artist inspired work, I would have created more photoshoots at more locations. Doing this would have given my a wider range of images to edit.
To start off, I selected my favourite images from my 3 photoshoots and put them in a new folder in Lightroom to create my photobook. All the images I selected were edited previously after their respective photoshoots and I had 62 photographs overall, and my book once finished consisted of 42 pages and I used around 40-50 of the photographs which I selected for the book. I decided not to use certain images as I could not find anywhere for them to fit into the book, and they did not match the style of the book too well.
Complete photobook
I decided to predominantly use black and white images for my photobook apart from the cover and a couple images within the book, I chose to do this because it creates a focus on the subject within the photograph and not anywhere else due to the lack of colour, I also believe that it makes the images look much more eye-catching and effective. I did not want to add a title for my book, as I want people who look at it to come to their own conclusion about what the book is about instead of being told by a title. I used a lot of double page spreads in the book as well as some juxtaposition to add some variety to the book and help with the narrative of the book. As well as this, I put photos on pages in a variety of different layouts and sizes to make the book much less repetitive as well as including photographs of people instead of just all skateboarding photos. Overall I believe that I did very well on this photobook project.
How has Tristan Still and Fred Mortagne explored the movement in skateboarding within their work?
SKATEBOARDING IS FAR BETTER THAN ANYTHING MAGAZINE’. ‘The spine of British skateboarding magazine ‘Sidewalk Surfer’, Issue 24, March ’98. One would be hard pressed to find a skateboarder who would disagree. The words – ‘Skateboarding is better than sex’ – more than once have been uttered to me at a skate park or dropped in a philosophical discussion of life between skateboarders. In this study I am going to investigate how the world of skateboarding and the movement in it can be portrayed through photography, capturing photographs from unusual angles that you do not usually see in skateboarding photography. I have been skateboarding from the age of 13 and have always been interested in the media side of skateboarding, whether that is filming or photographing skateboarding. I want to show in this study how the world can be portrayed through skateboarding and how differently the world is seen through a skateboarder’s eyes. Two photographers pop up in mind when I think about my intentions with this study, Tristan Still and Fred Mortagne. These certain photographers portray the world of skateboarding in their own unique ways, with Fred Mortagne even being nicknamed ‘Frangle’ – the unusual angle only he sees. Both artists have been documenting skateboarding since the 1990s, when skateboarding first started gaining popularity, capturing genuine and gritty shots of early skateboarders. This study could be linked with my previous urban photography work, as skateboarding is all about finding new spots within urban areas to experiment different tricks with. In this study I have explored finding new unused angles within the urban area of jersey as well as the skatepark to capture unique photographs of skaters. My work has developed from just taking my camera out with me every time I go for a skate with my friends, taking photographs of them as we skate about to create this photobook. Different digital processes were used to create some of my final images, such as Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom editing.
Both of my artists and my own work seem to relate to the photographic movement of Realism. Photo-realism first emerged in America in the 1960’s, it grew out of the Pop and Minimalism movements that preceded it. Photorealists were interested in breaking down hierarchies of appropriate subject matter by including everyday scenes of commercial life in their work. One of the biggest influences of the Photo-realism movement was Walker Evans, born in 1903 he is best known for his work for the Farm Security Administration documenting the effects of the Great Depression, his elegant, crystal-clear photographs and articulate publications have inspired several generations of artists. Artists such as Paul Strand photographed subjects on the streets of New York, to which he referred his work as ‘Straight Photography’. With Straight Photography the goal was to depict a scene or subject in sharp focus and detail, many photographers used darkroom techniques and manipulation to their images to enhance the appearance of their photographs. Skateboarding photography fits perfectly into the subject of ‘Straight Photography’, capturing your subject with sharp focus as they attempt to land a trick, or capturing a photograph of multiple skaters with sharp detail as they all attempt tricks. Skateboarding photography started to emerge in the 1980’s, around the same time ‘street’ skateboarding first started to gain popularity. Skaters would go out with whatever camera they had and start documenting their sport. During the early days of skate photography, magazines, zines, and write-ups from media were almost the only way to distribute the photographs taken by these photographers, with one of the artists I am exploring mainly having their photographs portrayed through magazines. As the Internet became bigger and more dominant photographers could easily show off their work through apps such as Instagram the landscape of skateboarding photography was altered indefinitely. It became very easy to show off skate photography, gaining it much more attention and leading to a very big variety of different styles of skate photography. Weather theses different styles involved using different lenses or photo manipulation techniques, skateboarding photography has evolved so much since it first started to emerge in the early 1980’s.
Old skateboarding magazines
The first photographer who I am exploring is Tristan Still, a multidisciplinary artist whose work is driven by his own personal relations, mostly in the photographic practice. His work has been published internationally and has won several awards for his work over his career. From 1996 to 2011 Tristan Still photographed skateboarders all over Australia in what he describes as his ‘personal search for Animal Chin,’ the proclaimed founder of skateboarding. ‘Skateboarding is powerful enough to change one’s vision of the world – concrete is no longer simply a building material, a bench is no longer just for sitting, and stairs and accompanying handrails are no longer simply devices to aid one in descending or ascending from one level to another. The urban world is a massive and intricate playground to be explored, full of potential.’ (reference using Harvard system) Tristan Stills work on skateboarding features not just the skateboarders posing and doing tricks, but also has a focus on the movements behind these tricks. Landing certain tricks with the right movements can be extremely difficult and Tristan Captures the right movements and moments within his photography. In this image photographed by Tristan, it showcases the perfect movement and moment a skater is mid-air in a stylistic pose. The image is shot in black and white, which I believe is very effective and adds focus to the main subject of the image, the movement of the skateboarder, as well as this, the black and white colouring of the image makes it much easier to see just how much height the skater has managed to get making the photograph much more impressive. The black grainy edges around the image seem to almost pinpoint the skater as the main subject of the image also, making it a much more effective image.
Tristan Still, Bondi
The second artist whose work I am exploring is Fred Mortagne, a French born artist who has a unique style of photographing skateboarders. As a teenager, Fred Mortagne shot his friends skateboarding through the historic city centre of his home Lyon. He grew to film and photograph some of skateboarding’s most iconic characters. Bit by bit, Mortagne began to blend still photography into his film. ‘I became used to visualising angles that would be good for photography, but didn’t necessarily work for video’, (reference using Harvard system) employing a 24-90mm lens with a high ISO so he can get a better grain within his images he has become known for picturing from angles no one else sees. Mortagne got one of his earliest shots of a skateboarder coursing through a hotels carpark while leaning off a balcony of a hotel room on the 17th floor. ‘Bewitched by skateboarding at the age of 8, my passion for the “useless wooden toy” eventually became the catalyst for my life to come. While feeling out of place at school, entering the adult world seemed like a never-ending foggy day. No perspectives at sight. Skateboarding was the only guiding light. It brought all the missing links: freedom, fun, friends, adventures… and all of a sudden, my future gained clarity.’ (reference using Harvard system) Mortagne’s work almost completely consists of black and white images, this creates a clear contrast between the skateboarders pictured in his images and the landscape surrounding them. With usual skateboarding photography, the focus is mainly on the subject within that image, but with Mortagne’s work the focus seems to be on the environment that the subject is within, leading to some very interesting pieces of work. Nearly 25 years since Mortagne started filming skaters he released his first photobook titled “Attraper Au Vol” (Catch in the Air) and features images of skaters on locations all over the world. ‘With skateboarding, you travel a lot trying to find new spots, we skate around modern buildings which often also happen to be very photogenic’ (reference using Harvard system). Mortagne explains that when you film skateboarders it is very close up, so you lose the dimension of where the skateboarders fully are, and he wanted to recapture that dimension within his photography. Attraper au vol is the culmination of Mortagne’s photographic career, from 2000 to 2015. A feast of lines and angles, his black-and-white compositions blend his subjects into their environments, offering an abstract perspective on architecture, geometry and the human figure. This image from Mortagne showcases the idea behind his work very well. The picture shows a skateboarder attempting a varial flip, as he is pictured from a very unusual angle that is showcasing architecture of a city as well, which is a unique but effective take on skateboarding photography. The skaters movement is perfectly captured within an opening of the architecture suggesting that anywhere can be skated with the right movements.
Steve Ramy, varial flip Lyon Auditorium
In conclusion, both artists who I have explored, Tristan Still and Fred Mortagne, showcase the movement of skateboarders through photography in their own ways. Tristan Still using a more traditional way of capturing skaters, showcasing the movements through up close shots as well as clear wide shots of skaters attempting tricks and skating around. While Fred Mortagne uses a less traditional way of capturing the movements of skaters, using unusual angles through the landscape around them to create some very interesting pieces of work. Both artists approach to photographing skateboarding is very different, however they both have the same outcomes, capturing the movement of skaters perfectly within their environments. Both artists have photographed in black and white, which I believe has made their work even more impactful as it provides a main focus on the subjects in the image instead of their surroundings, where the focus may be lost and the whole image would become less effective. Overall, both artists have used their own unique styles to capture the movement within skateboarding very effectively.
For my second photoshoot I planned on taking photographs of street spots around St. Helier, but it started raining, so I found myself in an underground carpark near the harbour photographing. I managed to take 199 photos during this photoshoot. Using the flagging option in Lightroom I managed to narrow it down to 36 photographs.
I then once again used the rating option in Lightroom to narrow down the 36 images, which left me with 13 of the best images taken during this shoot. While selecting these 13 final images to use in my photobook I made multiple edits of each as well as editing photos which were not rated.
Best Shoot 2 edits
Once again I decided I wanted to use mostly black and white images, as I believe it looked a lot more effective, I found photographing in an underground carpark was unusual scenery wise, as it all looked the same and was very repetitive, although it did lead to some interesting images.
For my first photoshoot, I took photographs down the harbour skatepark over the course of a day and took 318 photographs over this day. I used the flagging option in Adobe Lightroom to narrow down the images taken which left me with 123 photographs, which were still too many.
I then took the photos which I flagged and then used the rating system in Lightroom to narrow down the images again to my favourite, which left me with 11 final images, while narrowing down the images I edited a lot of them but only kept my 11 favourite edits to use within the photobook I am creating for this study.
The majority of my final edits were mostly action shots of skateboarders, but also included a couple images of the skateboarding community in the skatepark.
Best Shoot 1 Edits
I decided that most of the images that I wanted to include within my photobook to be black and white, this is because I believe it made a lot of the images look a lot more effective. It also draws the eyes of the viewer towards the skateboarders within the photographs, and not anywhere else on the image where there may be distracting colours or other subjects. I selected these images as my best edits as, I believe they are the most interesting photographs I took during this shoot and look the coolest out of all of them.
1. Research a photo-book and describe the story it is communicating with reference to subject-matter, genre and approach to image-making.
Jim Goldberg: Raised by Wolves. From 1985-1995, Jim Goldberg worked on the streets of Los Angeles and San Francisco getting to know a number of homeless teens, building the relationships that would come to form the basis of Raised by Wolves, the ground-breaking monograph that redefined commonly held notions of documentary work. This photobook describes the stories of runaway, and homeless teens trying to survive on the streets. Jim Goldberg was on the California streets photographing and interviewing his adolescent subjects, their social workers and the police. They all lend a distinct dimension to the harrowing picture of American urban life, and the adversarial institutional culture surrounding it..
2. Who is the photographer? Why did he/she make it? (intentions/ reasons) Who is it for? (audience) How was it received? (any press, reviews, awards, legacy etc.)
Jim Goldberg is an American artist and photographer, whose work reflects long-term, in-depth collaborations with neglected, ignored, or otherwise outside-the-mainstream populations. “I tried to pull the curtain away and talk about issues of neglect and abuse and show the breadth of reasons why these kids were running from home. Often it was because of abuse, or the pursuit of Hollywood dreams, or coming out to their parents and being kicked out.” Received well by critics, often described as very powerful.
3. Deconstruct the narrative, concept and design of the book and apply theory above when considering:
Book in hand: how does it feel? Smell, sniff the paper: Book uses laminated paper feels very slippery, but creates a good texture on the photographs included, book has a very woody smell to it
Paper and ink: use of different paper/ textures/ colour or B&W or both: Uses black and white and coloured photographs, majority of photographs black and white, all paper laminated.
Format, size and orientation: portraiture/ landscape/ square/ A5, A4, A3 / number of pages: Book is portrait, slightly bigger than A4, 315 pages.
Binding, soft/hard cover. image wrap/dust jacket. saddle stitch/swiss binding/ Japanese stab-binding/ leperello: Soft cover images wrapped on page no dust cover, stich binded.
Title: literal or poetic / relevant or intriguing: Poetic, very intriguing
Narrative: what is the story/ subject-matter. How is it told: Story is told through the lives of the people photographed within the book, book revolves around runaways and homeless teens.
Structure and architecture: how design/ repeating motifs/ or specific features develops a concept or construct a narrative: Stories of the teens have been put into the book next to photographs to help give understanding to the photographs themselves and to create a deeper narrative within the book.
Design and layout: image size on pages/ single page, double-spread/ images/ grid, fold- outs/ inserts: Most images take up a whole page, some double spread images, no fold outs or inserts, one grid.
Editing and sequencing: selection of images/ juxtaposition of photographs/ editing process: The book takes you through the stories of teens living on the streets with most photographs being black and white to compliment the dark lives of those photographed within the book.
Images and text: are they linked? Introduction/ essay/ statement by artists or others: Stories of the teens photographed are placed next to images within the book.
‘Skateboarding is powerful enough to change one’s vision of the world – concrete is no longer simply a building material, a bench is no longer just for sitting, and stairs and accompanying handrails are no longer simply devices to aid one in descending or ascending from one level to another. The urban world is a massive and intricate playground to be explored, full of potential.’ In this study I am going to investigate how the world of skateboarding can be portrayed through photography, capturing photographs from unusual angles that you do not usually see in skateboarding photography. I have been skateboarding from the age of 13 and have always been interested in the media side of skateboarding, whether that is filming or photographing skateboarding. I want to show in this study how the world can be portrayed through skateboarding and how differently the world is seen through a skateboarder’s eyes. 2 photographers pop up in mind when I think about my intentions with this study, Tristan Still and Fred Mortagne. These certain photographers portray the world of skateboarding in their own unique ways, with Fred Mortagne even being nicknamed ‘Frangle’ – the unusual angle only he sees. Both artists have been documenting skateboarding since the 1990s, when skateboarding first started gaining popularity, capturing genuine and gritty shots of early skateboarders. This study could be linked with my previous urban photography work, as skateboarding is all about finding new spots within urban areas to experiment different tricks with. In this study I have explored finding new unused angles within the urban area of jersey as well as the skatepark to capture unique photographs of skaters. My work has developed from just taking my camera out with me every time I go for a skate with my friends, taking photographs of them as we skate about to create this photobook. Different digital processes were used to create some of my final images, such as Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom editing.
“I am a multidisciplinary artist living on stolen land. My work is driven by personal relations, most often in the photographic practice. My collaborators are often linked by a shared commonality of resistance to capitalist ideals and authority – those who fiercely challenge cultural normative behaviours, practices and expectations through their actions and identities.”
“The spine of British skateboarding magazine ‘Sidewalk Surfer’, Issue 24, March ’98, reads ‘SKATEBOARDING IS FAR BETTER THAN ANYTHING MAGAZINE’. One would be hard pressed to find a skateboarder who would disagree. The words – ‘Skateboarding is better than sex’ – more than once have been uttered to me at a skate park, or dropped in a philosophical discussion of life between skateboarders.”
montage of his work
“Skateboarding is powerful enough to change one’s vision of the world – concrete is no longer simply a building material, a bench is no longer just for sitting, and stairs and accompanying handrails are no longer simply devices to aid one in descending or ascending from one level to another. The urban world is a massive and intricate playground to be explored, full of potential.”
As a teenager, Fred Mortagne shot his friends skateboarding through the historic city centre of his home Lyon. He grew to film and photograph some of skateboarding’s most iconic characters. Bit by bit, Mortagne began to blend still photography into his film. “I became used to visualising angles that would be good for photography, but didn’t necessarily work for video”, employing a 24-90mm lens with a high ISO so he can get a better grain within his images he has become known for picturing from angles no one else sees. Mortagne got one of his earliest shots of a skateboarder coursing through a hotels carpark while leaning off a balcony of a hotel room on the 17th floor.
montage of Mortagne’s work
Nearly 25 years since Mortagne started filming skaters he released his first photobook titled “Attraper Au Vol” (Catch in the Air) and features images of skaters on locations all over the world. “With skateboarding, you travel a lot trying to find new spots, we skate around modern buildings which often also happen to be very photogenic”. Mortagne explains that when you film skateboarders it is very close up so you lose the dimension of where the skateboarders fully are, and he wanted to recapture that dimension within his photography.
“Attraper Au Vol”
Attraper au vol (Catch in the Air) is the culmination of Mortagne’s photographic career, from 2000 to 2015. A feast of lines and angles, his black-and-white compositions blend his subjects into their environments, offering an abstract perspective on architecture, geometry and the human figure. “Well, it’s my first major book. We didn’t even really have to talk about it but it was obvious we would just go dig through my whole photo library. So I dug out a lot of things. Obviously all the famous stuff. And then actually there’s also a lot of new material that I shot that makes up almost half the book too.”
