Gender wars is the idea that men and women should be against each other and not equal. The idea that one gender is superior to the other (usually men).
Culture wars- Culture wars is when different groups have different beliefs and values and there are arguments and conflicts that happen because of these different opinions.
A well known and recent example of culture wars would be the black lives matter protest which gained most attraction in 2020 after George Floyds death.
This Gained the movement popularity because it really showed the racism within the police force in America and how people of colour were extremely mistreated. This is because a video came out filming George Floyds arrest where a police officer put his knee on George’s neck cutting of his airway which killed him. The officers were aware that he could not breath as he did say that multiple times but they did not care nor did the listen.
Due to this horrific act these protests started and gain a lot of popularity to the point where a poll in America came out and statics showed that 15 million to 26 million people participated in these black lives matter protests.
However these protests upset mainly American conservatives who believed that this movement was wrong and though it should be “All Lives Matter” and a big celebrity Kanye West also wore a “white lives matter” tee shirt. These completely make fun of the whole BLM movement because everyone one is important but its not like white people are struggling with prejudice or anything like that so we don’t need a movement.
Here used a photographic method to increase the dynamic range of my photos, I will apply this method on my next photoshoot.
It works by taking 3 or more photos, one with a exposure unit of 0, and other photos with a higher and lower exposure level (the aperture is kept constant but the shutter speed changes). You are now left with multiple photos of the same scene that capture every detail of the image (including the darkest shadows and the brightest parts of the sky). To make sure each image is taken is in the exact same place you use a tripod and a external shutter release. Then you follow this process:
Collect the images with different exposure levels.
Use HDR merge (High dynamic range) and set Deghost to high (removes ghosting effect that is caused from wind normally).
The image on the right is the HDR merged image and looks much more vibrant and full of life.
For my first photoshoot, I am planning on taking inspiration from Robert Mapplethorpe’s project body parts where he did close up photos of the male body and then edited them into black and white.
I want to do something similar however I’m going to try and do close ups of both the mascilin body and the feminine body. I want to show the natural differences between the more masculine sharp lines and the feminine soft curves.
photoshoot 2–
For my second photoshoot I am inspired by Duane Michals and his magic mirror project. For these he used a distorted mirror and had the model move it slightly which created these interesting effects he then later edited them and put them in black and white.
I will be doing my work slightly differently to his though because he didn’t use editing for the that distorted effect however I will be. Then like his work i will be editing it into black and white.
Photoshoot 3–
This photoshoot is inspired by Cindy Sherman and specifically her “untitled film stills” where she took photos heavily inspired by sterotypical women and their jobs like housewives and then later worked women.
My photos are going to be very similar to hers the plan is to do take pictures based on what i think your sterotypical house wife would be doing like washing the dishes etc… Then i think during editing i will edit them in black and white like her work because for this project she doesn’t have any of her work in colour.
Photoshoot 4-
For this last photoshoot the idea behind it is to take photos inspired by Lauren Withrow. She takes these beautiful photos of usually women outside and they have such a calming and feminine feel to them.
For my photos i will be going out to a field to get some images like hers with nature and i will also try and find some plants similar to one the one above because i really like the effect of her being surrounded by the plants.
Born on February 20, 1902, Ansel grew up in a house situated on the dunes west of San Francisco. In his early life he proved to be a ambitious musician. However, once he received his first camera in 1916, he slowly transitions from a musician to a photographer. He created his first visualized photograph in 1927, Monolith, the Face of Half Dome. This photo shows the mountain rising from an ink-black sky, its face illuminated by a dazzling midday sun just out of frame. Though Ansel initially made an exposure using a yellow filter, he immediately swapped that for a dark red filter, which darkened the sky and produced the deep shadows and bright light we recognize in the final image. He met many photographers that influenced his work, and changed his style away from the ‘pictorial’ (photos that look like paintings) and more towards the ‘straight photography’. And by 1935, he was famous in the photographic community.
He was apart of the sierra club and eventually because the sierra clubs official photographer – the worlds oldest environmental preservation societies. He proposed improving parts and wilderness areas, becoming known for both an artist and a representative of Yosemite national park. In his time, he managed to prevent the building of a dam in the national park (kings canyon), by convicting congress to preserve the natural environment. He was considered on the Americas most influential conservationists and received a presidential medal.
Kings canyon national park
Ansel Adams and the “group f/64” rebelled against the pictorialism photography. Ansel Adams states below what the mission of “group f/64” was, and how revolutionary it was: “It was devotion to the straight print, paper surfaces without textures that would conflict with the image texture. It was a belief in sharpness throughout the photograph. Good craft, in other words. F/64 is a small stop on the camera that gives great depth of field and sharpness.
Monolith, the Face of Half Dome – yosemite national park (1927)
He’s now considered to be the most important landscape photographer of the 20th century. His popularly has only increased after his death, as it shows the countries remaining fragments of uninhabited wilderness(especially national parks), which is only becoming more rare as time moves on.
monochromatic photography:
Monochromatic photography is a style of photography that relies on the use of one colour, in one or more shades, to create an image. Ansel Adams used monochromatic images in Black and white to bring out depth and high contrast in his images. Using one colour allowed Adams to focus on light and shadows, as well as lines and shapes. This can create an image that is highly stylized and that has a unique and memorable look.
Visualisation:
Ansel Adam began visualising his whole photo after he starting taking photography seriously. The idea behind this concept was to visualize in your minds eye the end result that you were trying to achieve prior to actually taking the photograph. An example may be finding the best camera angle, or the sort of light that will bring the best out of the scene, Or for professionals, Envisioning the whole image, creating an imaginary image in your head of the whole composition, colour, leading lines, and more. Of course, Some areas of the photograph may not look like how you envisioned it, so Ansel Adams might of changed the lens, colour filter, burning (increases exposure) and dodging (decreases exposure in areas).
The zone system:
The 11 zones were defined to represent the gradation of all the different tonal values you would see in a black and white print, with zone 5 being middle grey, zone 0 being pure black (with no detail), and zone 10 being pure white (with no detail).
When Ansel Adams spitted his image into different zones, He was able to visualise how the scene in front of him can be translated into black and white film. By doing this you wont leave out any detail as there would be less pure black and white in his images.
Photograph analysis – The Grand Tetons And The Snake River
Taken in 1942, in the Grand Teton National Park, It strikes the viewer with a sense of power created by nature.
This 1942 photograph was originally conceived as part of The Mural Project for the US Department of the Interior, which Adams worked through one trip during the fall of 1941 and another in May and June of 1942. The project was initially planned to celebrate the US’s National Parks system in a suite of large-scale mural-sized prints, that would have lined the walls of the Department of the Interior building, separate from, but in concert with, the pre-existing painted WPA murals already installed.
Adams offers a masterclass in compositional balance, The bright shimmering river that swerve from the bottom right on the image, all the way to the centre, which acts as leading lines towards the mountains. This is juxtapositioning with the craggy and dramatic peaks of the Tetons, Topped with brooding storm clouds, giving drama in the image. The storm could break within seconds of Adams taking this photo, or it could pass, giving the viewer a sense of tension when seeing the image.
