What is photography?

Where did it all start?

Photography all started in 1822 when it was invented but it was only in 1826 whenJoseph Nicéphore Niépce took the first photo even though it got lost it still holds the title for the oldest photo.

Photography is the art of light and how the use of light can form an image you are able to create it with recording light, digitally with a sensor or chemically (on film which gets chemically developed).

Photography is highly mobile as you can take a photo at any time and at any place,

They can move over in time and have different meanings and concepts behind each photo.

With photography it is unpredictable, and you will never know the outcome of a photo until you take it, each photo tells a different story, and each story is also different as each person has a different perception of the image. In photography no two photos are the same.

A photo is instantly there, it can be difficult to understand causing it to be mysterious. You are able to give a photo a story by accompanying it with other photos or describing the photo whilst photographers may give background information about the photo, they are still giving the audience the creative freedom on how they view the photograph, there for you as the audience are able to take charge of the photograph.

Every photo capture someone’s attention for a reason because they relate to it, find it mysterious, are intrigued by it or you simply just like it. You look at an image more than once and each time you look at it more in depth and each time you pick up on the smaller details of the photograph. What a photo captures has the capability to mean something else as the meanings behind photos can be complicated. Photography is used to take advantage of the gift the world has given us; you are able to learn photography and the concepts behind it quickly but it’s mastering the art of photography may take up to a lifetime to learn.

Each photo is taken through the eyes of the photographer there for you see their concept of the world or topic they are taking photographs of, there for some people may find lightning destructive and powerful but other may find it majestical so those photographers may have two very different looking photos due to their opinion on the subject.

Photography can be seen as a form as art due to how you are able to manipulate photos into how the photographer wants the audience to view them. The purpose of photography is to communicate and document moments in time.

Yves Klein

This photo uses David Campany’s quote “photographs confuse as much as fascinate, conceal as much as reveal, distract as much as compel.” as you as the consumer of the photograph can’t understand why someone would photograph someone jumping off a building but at the same time its fascinating as to why is the man jumping, the photo is able to show a lot of emotion as to how the person might interpret the photo it also conceals how the photo was made and why the photo was made.

you can only find out how and why the image was made if you research it as the photo doesn’t tell the story behind it, the photo it’s self tells a different story.

Where did it all start and how?

Photography began in the late 1830s in France. Joseph Nicéphore Niépce used a portable camera obscura to expose a pewter plate coated with bitumen to light. This is the first recorded image that did not fade quickly.

The development of cameras:

At first, photography was either used as an aid in the work of an painter or followed the same principles the painters followed. The first publicly recognized portraits were usually portraits of one person, or family portraits. Finally, after decades of refinements and improvements, the mass use of cameras began in earnest with Eastman’s Kodak’s simple-but-relatively-reliable cameras. Kodak’s camera went on to the market in 1888 with the slogan “You press the button, we do the rest”.

In 1900 the Kodak Brownie was introduced, becoming the first commercial camera in the market available for middle-class buyers. The camera only took black and white shots, but still was very popular due to its efficiency and ease of use.

Coloured photography was explored throughout the 19th century, but it wasn’t till the 20th century when it became more commercially viable.

Alfred Stieglitz

https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/stgp/hd_stgp.htm

Photography became a part of day-to-day life and an art movement. One of the people behind photography as art was Alfred Stieglitz, an American photographer and a promoter of modern art. Stieglitz said that photographers are artists, the first photography art movement whose primary task was to show that photography was not only about the subject of the picture but also the manipulation by the photographer that led to the subject being portrayed.

How do you define photography?

The word Photography literally means ‘drawing with light’, which derives from the Greek photo, meaning light and graph, meaning to draw. Photography is the process of recording an image a photograph on light sensitive film or, in the case of digital photography, via a digital electronic or magnetic memory.

Whats the purpose of photography?

Essentially, the purpose of photography is to communicate and document moments in time. When you take a photograph and share it with others, you’re showing a moment that was frozen through a picture. This moment can tell someone many things, from the environment to what people are doing.

Why is photography important today?

Photography is important because we can document something and have it forever. Photography lets us see something we may never have noticed otherwise. Photography is a way to express your ideas for others to see.

This photograph is important to the readers intention as it leaves them confused/ questioning whether Yves Klein (the photographer and person ‘leaping in the picture) actually jumped. he described it as jumping into a void, to give the mysterious affect on his audience and keep them engaged and curious. The background story of this picture is actually that Yves had his friends to hold a tarpaulin to catch him as he fell, the other the surrounding scene (without the tarp)–were then printed together to create a seamless “documentary” photograph. To complete the illusion that he was capable of flight, Klein distributed a fake broadsheet at Parisian newsstands commemorating the event.

Yves main aim/ reason to create this photograph was to draw as many peoples attention to it so his work would be more advertised and recognised.

focus point in photography are zones on the camera sensor that are sensitive to changes in the imagine for example if you take a picture of a flower in a field the field will be blurry whilst the flower will be in focus, so the flower is the focus point.

what’s the point for focus point they help draw the eye to the interesting or point of the imagine and helps make the imagine “pop” choosing the right focus point is crucial in order to make the photo make sense you main want a different colour or light to be the focus point not a field or a dull wall.

whilst using Lightroom, I have learnt how to import my images to allow me to edit them, as much as photoshop is convenient, Lightroom allows you to do a range of different things to your images; including things that photoshop can do.

I have filtered out the rejects and chosen the photos I want to keep.

These are the photos I decided to keep, as they are the most interesting.

we compared two images using compare view. it allows you to zoom in and out using the magnifying glass to see if your image is focused or blurry. Helping to choose the better image.

I filtered down my images again by rating them with stars out of 5, this helps to choose which is the strongest image.

I experimented with my images by editing them using the editing tools on the right hand side. Tools such as: exposure, contrast, highlights, shadows texture and clarity ect.

This shows me exporting my chosen edited image into a file and editing the image size.

focal length is the distance between the lenses and the area that your taking a photo of. the right length is crucial in making a good photo that gets everything and not to much that image is to overwhelming or doesn’t look good.

Q1: What is the etymology (origin & history) of the word photography?

Writing with light
Capturing light
Painting with light
Filming light

Q2: What year was the first photograph made in camera?

1739 (Joseph Wright)
1839 (Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre)
1826 (Joseph Nicéphore Niépce)
1904 (Salvadore Dali)

Q3: When did the first photograph of a human appear?

• 

1874 (Julia Margeret Cameron)
1838 (Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre)
1856 (Henry Mullins)
1939 (Ropert Capa)

Q4: Who made the first ‘selfie’

• 

Kim Kardashian (2015)
Robert Cornelius (1839)
Cindy Sherman (1980)
Claude Cahun (1927)

Q5: When did the first colour photograph appear?

1907 (Lumiere brothers)
1961 (Andy Warhol)
1826 (Joseph Nicéphore Niépce)
1904 (Salvadore Dali)

Q6: What do we mean by the word genre?

A study of an artwork
A depiction in art
A style or category of art
A creative process in art

Q7: What do we mean by the genre of still-life?

In image where a person is sitting still and not moving
An arrangement of flowers
A picture of food
An image that shows inanimate objects from the natural or man-made world

Q8: What was the main purpose of the Pictorialist movement?

To capture moving objects
To record reality
To affirm photography as an art form
To be scientific

Q9: How do we describe the term documentary photography?

Capture images that truthfully portray people, places and events
Staging images for maximum effect
Provide in-depth information about a subject over a long period time
An interpretation of reality as witnessed by the photographer

Q10: What is exposure in photography?

To expose hidden elements in our society
To record fast moving objects
To capture bright light
The amount of light that reaches your camera’s sensor

Q11: What controls exposure on your camera?

Depth of field, composition, distance to subject
Aperture, focal length, ISO
Aperture, shutter speed, ISO
Shutter speed, distance to subject, depth of field

Q12: What control on our camera records moving objects?

Aperture
White balance
Shutter
ISO

Q13: How do we explain depth of field?

How much of your image is in focus
To photographer from a high vantage point
A view across a field
A deadpan approach to image making

Q14: What factors affect Depth of Field?

Shutter speed, distance from camera to subject, and sensitivity to light
Lens aperture, distance from camera to subject, and lens focal length
Lens focal length, shutter speed and lens aperture
Sensitivity to light, shutter speed, and focal length

Q15: What is composition in photography?

Capturing the quality of light
A piece of music with different instruments
Staging a portrait with props
The arrangement of visual elements within the frame

Q16: What is your understanding of aesthetics in art?

Concerned with the nature of beauty and taste
Is it subjective and in the beholder
Aesthetic qualities refer to the way and artwork looks and feels
Making a critical judgment based on observation and understanding

Q17: What are contextual studies in photography?

To provide historical cultural and theoretical understanding of images
Consider factors outside of the image, as well as inside the frame
To give an opinion without any research
To seek a definite answer

Q18: How many images are captured on average every day worldwide?

1.5 Billion
4.7 Billion
800 Million
6.9 Billion

Q19: Which portrait is the most reproduced in the world?

Mona Lisa
Lady Gaga
Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara
The Queen (Elizabeth II)

ISO and white balance are two crucial settings when it comes to managing exposure and tonal values in photography.

ISO refers to the sensitivity of a camera’s image sensor – higher ISO values increase this sensitivity, which allows for images to be captured in low-light conditions without decreasing the shutter speed or using the flash. When the ISO value is too high, however, it can introduce noise into photographs, which can lower a final image’s quality, which means that to achieve a crystal clear image, the ISO needs to be properly adjusted to the environment.

White balance is essential when it comes to accurately representing the tones in a photo. These settings are used to select an appropriate colour temperature for the light sources present in a composition, which can be done either manually using a white card or through the various presets that most cameras have available.

Continuous light is ‘always on,’ as opposed to flash, which delivers a quick burst of light only when triggered.

key light –  Key lights highlight the form and dimension of on-screen subjects and allow the photographer to control the atmosphere of a scene.

reflected light – reflected light is light that reflects off the subject. This is most often what the camera records to make a photograph. Regardless of the light source, light is altered by whatever it reflects off.

back light – Backlight involves positioning the main light source for a photograph behind the primary subject.

In photography, depth of field refers to the range of distance within an image that appears to be in focus. This effect is created by adjusting the aperture of the camera’s lens, which controls the amount of light that hits the camera’s sensor. Wider apertures – such as f/1.8 – will result in shallower depths of field, whereas a narrow aperture – such as f/16 – will leave the final image with a deeper depth of field.

When the depth of field is shallow, the subject in the foreground will be in sharp focus, while the background should appear out of focus. This can often be used to draw attention to the subject and create a stronger sense of depth in the image – commonly used in portrait photography.

On the other hand, when the depth of field is deeper, more of the scene will appear in focus – which is typically present in landscape photography to capture more detail within the scenery. Either way, depth of field is essential when it comes to developing a more visually appealing photograph.

Depth of field is also controlled by the distance between the camera, subject and foreground, the closer the subject is, the shallower the depth of field is, and vice versa.

Focal length within a camera is an essential aspect of photography that influences the angle of view and magnification of the image captured. The focal length of a camera lens is the distance between the optical centre of the lens and the image sensor when the lens is focused on infinity. Typically, it’s measured in millimetres and can vary widely depending on the lens used.

A lens with a shorter focal length, such as a wide-angle lens, captures a broader field of view, making it ideal when used in landscape and architectural photography. On the other hand, a lens with a longer focal length, such as a telephoto lens, narrows the angle of view and magnifies the image, making it perfect for wildlife and portrait photography.

The choice of focal length often depends on the desired effect and the distance between the photographer and the subject. Lenses with different focal lengths can be switched to achieve various perspectives and styles in their image.