Sequence/Grid

A sequence/grid is when a group of photos are arranged in a particular way either to create a sequence/story or to present the images as a group, linking all the photos together through the visuals rather than relying on words. It also allows photographers to convey a message without relying on one single shot to express their feelings towards the topic they’re photographing.

A good example of a photographer that is well known for his use of sequences is Duane Michals. Although his images look good individually, he combines them together to create a sequence of successful photos that work together to create a story. His photos are imaginative, tackling topics such as mortality, memory and desire, with little changing from image to image which have led them to be compared to stills from a film. Michals particular style of sequences requires him taking multiple images at the same scene, causing them to look similar and ensuring the sequence will be successful.

Another photographer called Shannon O’Donnell also uses her photos to create a sequence. Her series ‘That’s not the way the river flows’ involves her taking a variety of portraits at different locations and with different angles, props etc. Her style of photography still creates a sequence despite them being taken hours to days apart due to the story/topic of masculinity and femininity and gender experience that she chose to portray throughout the series.

My Sequence/Grid

To create my sequence/grid, I carefully chose photos that I thought would go well together and arranged them to look coherent with one another.

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Double Exposure

A double exposure allows two or more images to be seen at the same time and create one image, usually by one photo being more transparent as it lays on top of the other. There’s a variety of ways double exposures are created as any combination of images can be used. For example: portraits & portraits, portraits & still life, still life & landscapes etc.

My Edits

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Photomontage

A photomontage is the process of manipulating two or more images in order to create one final photo by splicing, cutting, sticking and more. This can be done digitally, like I’ve done, or through the use of many items such as paper, paint, tape, books pages etc.

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I took inspiration from Russel C. Smith, a mixed-media artist who cuts/tears photographs and glues them down in a variety of different ways. Sometimes the order of the images are mixed up, occasionally part of the photo is enlarged and in colour, often newspaper/magazines are also cut up and placed throughout the montage. Although each piece follows the same structure, no piece looks the same

My Edits:

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Here’s a small progression of how I got my final image:

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I began editing by increasing the brightness and adjusting the contrast of the original image along with increasing the vibrancy a little. From there, I copied and pasted a block of hair from a different image and pasted it on top of her eyes and erased around the fingers, making it appear as if the hair is underneath her fingers. Then, I pasted the block of hair again, this time on top of the mouth, and increased the brightness of it in order to make it appear different from the other block.

[I wasn’t sure which edit I liked best, even though both are very similar]

Throughout this photoshoot, we kept changing the lighting by turning them on/off, adding more lights, moving them closer etc in order to experiment with the different shadows and create different looks for each image.

Best Shots:

I think these are my best shots as they’re all in focus, well framed and have a variety of lighting types, all of which combine together in order to create an interesting set of images. Along with that, I like all the poses in these photos as they all differ from each other drastically, giving each individual image a different mood compared to the rest.

We started taking portraits with the help of a professional portrait photographer called Oliver Doran. He’s a British/French portrait photographer who often uses flash head lights with umbrellas attached to them, allowing the light to be controlled easily and creating a good contrast between the model and the background. He takes his photos in black and white, allowing him to see the different shadows easily instead of focusing on how the colours look in each photo as he understands that he can manipulate the colours later on Photoshop or Lightroom.

I began by taking a few portraits with his help and guidance, finding it very informative as he kept questioning how I wanted the lighting to fall, whether the background would look better if it was darker or lighter or whether I wanted to try Rembrandt lighting [when only half the face is lit along with a small triangle on the side] etc and would help set up the lights in order to achieve my desired look. This helped build my knowledge of lighting and how manipulating shadows are a key part of taking a successful portrait.

From this photoshoot, I learned a variety of techniques in order to help me improve when taking portraits such as camera angles [keeping the camera at eye level in order to keep everything in frame], lighting [the height of lights can change small shadows which can improve the photo altogether] and communication [talking to the model is important so they know how to pose in order for you to take a successful and flattering photo of them].

In my next photoshoot, I would like to experiment with different types of lighting in order to gain a better understanding of how lighting placement can change the look of a photo completely. Along with that, I’d like to take more photos and try a variety of poses to further experiment with shadows and how differing amounts of lights can create or take away shadows from certain areas without eliminating them altogether.

Lighting is an important part of photography as it can change the way a photo looks through the smallest movement and is one of the key components of taking a good photo. There’s a variety of light combinations that can be used in order to change how bright/dark a photo looks, the black/white balance, the exposure, the warmth/coolness of the image and a lot more.

Natural lighting is one of the most common forms of lighting, using no artificial lights and instead relying on the amount of light outside. Although it’s commonly used, it’s difficult to control as it can leave photos dark/dingy if there isn’t enough light out, being especially hard to use in winter due to the lack of sunlight, however, natural lighting can still create incredible photos but photographers need to be aware of more variables such as:

• Light Direction -> Throughout the day, the sun changes position, moving shadows and can brighten the photo if it’s shining directly onto the subject.
• Light Intensity -> In the early mornings, the light is less intense and will give the photo a softer look as it’s not shining as brightly as it would in midday when it’s the light is at its highest point.
• Temperature -> As the sun sets [specifically in summer], it creates a golden look, giving photos a warm, orangey tint [this is often referred to as ‘golden hour’] whilst winter mornings are darker and will give the photo a colder bluish tone.
• Weather -> Rainy days are more likely to give photos a darker/grey look whilst sunny days could leave photos overexposed due to the light intensity.

Artificial/studio Lighting is often used in portraiture due to how controllable it is. It can be moved in any direction and can produce both soft and hard lighting with the use of flash or continuous light which allows a bigger variety of lighting choices/combinations. Along with that, the colour of the lights can be manipulated in order to get warmer or cooler toned photos depending on what lights are used. Some examples of artificial lights are:

• Flash head lights -> They connect to the camera via a Bluetooth adapter that sits on top of the camera. This causes the lights to flash whenever a photo is taken and creates harsh lighting. They often have softboxes or umbrellas attached to them in order to diffuse the light and get softer photos.
• Ring Light -> A circular, continuous light that’s mostly used for portraits. The camera typically sits in the centre of the ring light which erases most of the shadows as the light surrounds the subject.
• Studio Lamp -> A small light that creates soft lighting and are usually too small to light up an entire image by itself. Usually, they’re equipped with ‘barn doors’ which allows the light to be redirected subtly. They can create both warm and cold lighting and are typically used alongside a bigger light.

With artificial lighting, there are certain techniques that are used in order to create specific effects:

Portraiture has been used for centuries in the form of paintings, however, in recent decades, as photography’s developed, portraits are easier to take than ever before, becoming easier and less time consuming as the decades go on.

19th Century – Louis Daguerre + Daguerreotypes

Louis Daguerre was a French painter and physicist that created the first practical process of photography called the daguerreotype after improving upon Niepce’s work after he passed.

He discovered exposing an idolized silver plate in a camera would create a permanent image if the latent image was developed through exposure to fumes of mercury then fixed by a solution of salt. Daguerre’s process lowered the exposure time from 8 hours to roughly 30 minutes! However, daguerreotypes were expensive as they were highly detailed, heavy and very fragile due to their mirror-like surface which meant only the wealthy could afford them.

Despite their pricing, daguerreotypes were very popular and used for still life, natural phenomena, documentary subjects and most commonly portraits.

19th Century – Henry Fox Talbot

Henry Talbot was an English scientist that created the salt paper and calotype processes which are known as an improved daguerreotype.

The salt paper process involved placing paper into a salt solution that would later be dried before one side of the paper got coated in a solution of silver nitrate, creating a light-sensitive silver nitrate that would darken when exposed to light. Objects would be placed on the paper or the image from a camera obscura would be used in order for the photo to be made.

The Calotype process used a paper negative to make a softer version of the daguerreotype which makes it possible to make multiple copies as a negative is produced.

19th Century – Julia Margaret Cameron 

Julia Margaret Cameron was a British photographer who is best known for her soft-focus close-ups of many Victorian people, creating ‘moving portraits’ due to how expressive they are.

Cameron often convinced her models to dress up for their portraits which helped her create biblical-esque photos, often compared to Pre-Raphaelite paintings due to how soft and spiritual her portraits look. She achieved this soft look by using dark lighting, a shallow depth of field, long exposure times and a soft focus, all of which combined together to create her now famous portraits.

Cameron’s work was heavily criticized at the time due to her ‘lack of technique’ causing most of her photos to be out of focus, have cracked plates, have fingerprints etc. However, these ‘mistakes’ are what led to Cameron’s modern day success as they added character to her portraits and allowed her to truly capture each model she photographed.

I went through all my photoshoots and picked some photos from each that I thought were successful photos, checking the lighting, framing and sharpness of each image, before adding to a collection I created in Lightroom for printing, having about 20 photos in total. From there, I went through all my photos again and lowered it down to these final 11 where I made some small adjustments to each image and exported them in he correct size, ready for printing.

My Final Images:

I printed out some of my photos from Hamptonne [using a mix of buildings, portraits and objects] along with a couple of my still life images in order to attempt to create some photomontages by hand. I made sure to use well lit photos that weren’t too big so the images wouldn’t overpower each other when being arranged with each other along whilst thinking of ways that the photos could be combined together.

After printing my images, I started to cut out different sections of them and placed them on top of one another in different places and angles, photographing whenever I moved a photo. I made sure to vary the images I placed with one another to ensure I used all my photos at least once and could get as many different montages as I could.

For Example:

Once I was happy with the quality and the amount of images I had, I uploaded them all onto the computer so I could make some small edits to improve them further i.e: increase contrast, saturation etc.

My Final Images

When enhancing my images I mainly focused on sharpening them and increasing the contrast in order to improve the quality of the images along with cropping out any unnecessary details in the background i.e: the edge of the paper .

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I enhanced this image by cropping the image to eliminate the background as it was unnecessary then increased the brightness and saturation so the details in the bottom layer could easily be seen. Finally, I used the burn tool to darken and exaggerate the edges along the top layer.

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For this image, I cropped out the background and increased the contrast so the creases in the paper were more prominent. After that, I subtly desaturated the colours in and increased the highlights slightly in order to draw more attention towards the darker areas of the photo, therefore accentuating the shadows.

Throughout these photoshoots, the main goal was to keep the objects in centre frame and decently well lit with little to no shadows which ended up being quite a struggle when using the soft box lights as we were using 2 lights that created 2 different shadows, leading us to move them around in order to try minimize/redirect the shadows. I didn’t want many shadows so I wouldn’t have to edit them out later which would’ve made it more difficult to combine the photos together later on.

Editing My Photos: Harvey-Regan

These edits were inspired by Darren Harvey-Regan’s splicing project. I tried to use my photos in order to recreate Harvey-Regan’s work by choosing photos that I thought would work well together and used photoshop in order to edit them together.

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In this edit, I tried to Harvey-Regan’s splices by including many elements of his work such as the sharp edges between the two different images, the white background and making the black and white image in order to get a deeper understanding of his work style.

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In this edit, I decided that I wanted to try blend the two images together instead of keeping Harvey-Regan’s sharp edge as I wanted to experiment with what I could do in order to merge his editing style with my own. I like this edit more than the first as I think both images work well with each other and I’ve managed to get them to merge together without recreating Harvey-Regan’s style completely.

Editing My Photos:

After experimenting with Harvey-Regan’s style, I decided to use some elements of his work with my own style in order to create edits that loosely resembled his work.

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I decided that I was going to start by experimenting with colour in order to see what I could do in order to manipulate the photo as there was a lot of objects in this photo, making it difficult to splice with another. Although it’s not my best edit, I think it still looks interesting as the blue tone from the right side of the image contrasts with the colours from the left side, creating two different moods in a single image.

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For this image, I created 3 edits as I couldn’t decide which one I liked the most as I liked different aspects of each: the simplicity of the first, the business of the second and the blandness of the third. Overall, I liked having multiple colours in one photo rather than taking 2 different images and montaging them together into a single image.

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Whilst editing this image, I knew I needed to make it busier as the whistle was quite small compared to the background so I started by cropping the image, making it easier to see the whistle then copy and pasted part of the whistle’s chain around the image in order to make the image look more interesting. I then added 2 squares as I wanted to add more colour and depth into the image, later adding some white to the edges to add texture to the edge of each box, making them look like torn paper. Finally, I added some subtle shadows by the squares edges to make the image look slightly more realistic and add depth.