green coloured:

these are photos that I consider that perfectly match the criteria I was given or just one or two things I could have done better and it would be perfect. (rural landscapes, Ansel Adams similarity’s and also some storm damage). these photos are rated 4-5 stars

yellow coloured:

these photos are rated 3 stars and I consider them decent which were a bit off from what I had pictured in my head when I wanted to make these photos.

red coloured:

these images didn’t fit what I wanted at all and can not be salvaged with editing to fit what I wanted for this project at all and is why they are rated 2 stars or just 1.

best outcomes from my photoshoot

even though this photo isn’t much of an Ansel Adams I liked how the image turned out as it has some nice textures and you can see some colours coming through the branches.

this photo captured a nice sunset shows off other things such as hills fields and sea. which is why I picked it.

this photo captured lots of different textures and has some different colours to it throughout which I why I believe its one of the best I took.

who is Ansel Adams?

Ansel Adams was born in 1902 in San Francisco and was a famous photographer in 20th century, as he was well known for his landscape photography as he would capture mesmerizing photos of American’s natural beauty that had been untouched and had been preserved. His most common spots to take pictures would usually be at national parks as it was one of the few places that had kept its natural beauty to capture in west America. Ansel Adams signature style of taking photos for landscapes was captured in Yosemite park. as he captured a picture of a mountain peak using a heavy camera, a tripod and his own additional gear. he visited a place called half dome where he would use visualisation. this would really launch his photography career as would go on to create some memorable photos such as:

‘North Dome, Basket Dome, Mount Hoffman, Yosemite, 1935‘

“Yosemite Valley, Yosemite National Park, 1934“

“Nevada Fall, Rainbow, 1947“

Ansel Adam’s love for the American west came from the fact that he just loved nature. Quoted by Ansel Adams he visited such national parks like Yosemite and Sierra Nevada as they were “coloured and modulated by the great earth gesture”. his first trip to Yosemite was in 1916 were he would start his journey in photography as his father gifted his first camera , an eastern Kodak No.1

what is visualisation?

Ansel Adam’s always said visualisation was when you could see an image in the mind prior to using exposure. as its a continuous project up until the final print. Ansel Adams with some of his friends also created a thing called the “zone system”.

what is the zone system?

the zone system is a chart that ranks numbers from 0 to 10, this could be used to determine. this can be helpful as it could you visualise a photo before you go for your final print to really determine what you want.

Ansel Adam’s camera (kodak brownie) only consisted of two filters: one red and one yellow. for example the yellows would help browns stick out and look better. And the red filter would create an unrealistic look to the image.

Group F/64

Group F/64 was a group that was founded by Ansel Adams that consisted of 7 photographers from the 20th century, their aim was to create “pure photography”. Which could be considered as hypocritical as their work was enhanced before the final image was printed. however this group still created the zonal system which lead to producing some photographers who started to slowly grow into the spot light like Ansel Adams.

Edward Weston, had become far more recognizable for their work, this was shown when he took pictures of vegetables with this one being the most recognizable.

Ansel Adams links to romanticism

Ansel Adams was known for creating some of the most memorable pieces of the 20 century. some would say he even modernised transcendentalism, which is essentially the idea that society is spoiled by the very things they created like massive city’s that are so “brilliant” when they already have brilliant things such as nature with these beautiful landscapes that Ansel Adams is showing off in all his photos. this obviously links to romanticism as some could say this is a similar event to the 18th and 19th century Europe with paintings that artists created.

when looking at the pictures Ansel Adams took you could easily say that his images take inspiration from romanticism as they have many similarity’s.

what is romanticism?

Romanticism was a cultural movement that started in the 1800s but peaked in round about 1800 to 1850. it was essentially artists and poets criticizing the “lavish life” living in big city’s and also science as they thought it was glorified and wanted people to be glorifying nature and how happy people were living in the countryside’s in the middle of nowhere. this is because people that lived in these remote areas even though they weren’t very fortunate they were seen as a lot happier than these people that lived in wealthy places. inconclusion, there is 5 elements to romanticism which is individualism, emphasis on nature, emotion over reason, freedom of form, and exploration of the unknown.

Casper David Friedrich 1832

context to why the Romanticism movement started

the reason why romanticism started was because writers and artists rejected the age of enlightenment as it was all about undermining religion and other beliefs.it was all about pushing intellectual and philosophical ideas hence why it was also had the nick name of the age of reason.

coming from an era of enlightenment the art formed grew out of the disillusionment regarding reason and order after the French revolution in 1789, this when the French decided to revolt against their monarchs and wealthier population. Bringing a change to other countries in Europe such as Britain, Italy and Spain which adapted to these ideas.

what is the difference between bucolic and pastoral?

bucolic often refers to the nice and relaxed county life and its nature. And pastoral is quite similar as it focuses on the positivity of the working elements of country.

the art of the sublime

the art of the sublime has been understood to mean the quality of greatness or grandeur that inspires in awe and wonder. this specifically relates to to landscapes.

Romanticism artist-

John Constable, was a well known Romanticism artist in the 1800s, he liked to paint his personal concept of what the countryside was like similarly done by other artists. however he was able to still exaggerate the elements of nature. this was due to john constable growing up in a small village (Suffolk) where he had first hand experience what the country side was like first hand . this experience he had when he was younger would go on to inspire his paintings in the future.

for my masculinity and femininity project I based my project based off of Claude Cahun and Cindy Sherman my creating or recreating some of the photos they have made by using techniques they have used in the past through out my work.

comparison

in my opinion, I believe that I have captured the basis of what I wanted to achieve by when I created the images. however I wanted to put a little twist on one of the photos for the first Cindy Sherman image bellow I had it as a coloured image with a light pink lighting to still give it a girly feel even though I had a male model. And then for the rest of the images I wanted to recreate the artist images to the best of my capability. I was mostly inspired by the vintage photos of Cindy Sherman and Claude Cahun and therefore wanted to make my photos look vintage by using photoshop and adobe light.

studio portraits

for the studio portraits we had to come up with outcomes that used the different lighting techniques such as Rembrandt, butterfly and chiaroscuro. and also have images inspired by artists such as Henry Mullins.

inconclusion I think I came up with photos that fit the criteria that was given as I was able to have a chiaroscuro, Rembrandt and butterfly lighting effects while also trying to fit the style of the artists Henry Mullins.

however, if I had to go back and do it again I think I would try have more photos than I took to experiment with than what I had to help create additional images and diamond cameos as I didn’t get to create as much as I would have liked. and to also experiment with different multi-exposures.

Claude Cahun (Lucy Schwob) was a French photographer and writer. she has a very good reputation for being one of the first people to explore gender fluidity through photography, making her working advanced for her time even through it would have been seen as quite controversial as gender fluidity would have been looked down upon by the majority of the public in the 1940s .

Claude Cahun was born on October 25th 1894 in Nantes France, who would later move to jersey in 1937 a few years before one of the most historical things would ever happen in jersey (the Nazi invasion). she would eventually have to hide her religion and her identity to pretend to be German. making her work even more of a risk during the occupation as the Nazis were against any sort of gender fluid idea as they wanted to create the “perfect race”.

Cahun photographed herself in many different outfits and settings in self portraits to explore many different identities. her reasoning behind this was because she liked the idea that femininity and masculinity could be altered and challenged in multiple different ways as shown in the photos above and bellow

this photo is titled “under this mask, there’s another mask”

Cindy Sherman

born in united states, in 1954 Cindy Sherman is a photographer who was known for her feminine characters and the identities she would create, it was as if she was playing a character in each photoshoot. she was the idea behind it all as she was the model, photographer, stylist and the make up artist.

over a period of 4 decades she took a numerous amounts of photoshoots exploring the idea on how to create and represent femininity. Cindy Sherman’s most famous pieces came from the “untitled film still #21” which was essentially Cindy Sherman in black and white photos where she would have multiple different outfits and personas.

for this photoshoot I wanted to show masculinity and femininity by bringing in props to make the models look more like the opposite gender while trying to make some photos that have links to Cindy Sherman and Claude Cahun. I accomplished this by bringing in props such as a women’s jacket and lipstick for the male model and I also brought in a chain, a men’s fragrance and beanie to make the female model look more feminine. however if I was to do the photoshoot again I think I would to try to take more photos and try and get different types of photos focusing on certain things.

4-5 stars (green coloured)

3 star photos (yellow coloured)

1-2 stars (red photos)

in conclusion I think I came out with a lot of photos that I think are appropriate for the project that I think fit the description of what I wanted.

this mood board is a representation of how I want to portray my photos for this project as I want to show masculinity through women and I want to show femininity through males by making females doing stereotypically male things and vice versa.

What is Masculinity?

Masculinity is common traits, attributes and characteristics of men and boys for example the most prominent ones would be things like the colour blue or even jobs such as mechanic.

what is Femininity?

just like masculinity femininity is attributes and characteristics that are more common throughout women that you would really see men do examples of this could be using make up or working as a nurse.

what is the definition of identity?

identity is the qualities, beliefs, personality traits, appearance, and/or expressions that characterize a person or a group. Identity emerges during childhood as children start to comprehend their self-concept, and it remains a consistent aspect throughout different stages of life.

someone’s identity can link to many different things but peoples culture is a big thing when talking about who you identify as and who you are. things like religion and race is what I would consider as one of the main things when talking about your cultural identity but things such as gender age and other things are obviously your identity.

for example one of the biggest cultural identity’s in the world is Christianity as its the most followed religions in the world with 2.4 billion followers.

(common Christian church)

social identity is a concept of who you are in public, work or even with your friends. this can be influenced by things people do or say that people see online or even when they are out in public. a popular/trendy identity that has grown in the UK is roadmen. stereotypically roadmen are usually dressed in all black, they are also known for having a postcode war which is a where a group of people feel like they need to defend there area from the other people around them.

social identity can also be shown through what you wear (streetwear, fashion etc). this can give people an insight on who you are.

a good example would be bloke core which has really been popularised in the UK over the years

geographical identity, is when someone has an attachment to their country region or city. this is shown in jersey through the jersey post with its dedicated pages to sporting events throughout the island. and through social media from pages such as sports cast jersey

peoples identity’s can be formed through their upbringing with parents and siblings. as they are constantly around family so they pick up on personality traits and the way people speak or look. so people essentially become mini versions of there parents

what are headshots?

headshots is a more specific portrait and used mostly in a professional manner for things such as websites, press releases, publications and social media profiles. Headshots capture emotions, personality and possibly professionalism. headshots are quite basic as it just a clean image of the subject looking into the camera.

why are headshots important/useful?

Headshots are important for most people but more specifically they are much more important for people like business owners or for even an employee or potential clients as this photo will be your very first impression which can help to get top known someone before you even meet them.

well known headshot photographers:

There are multiple well known headshot photographers around the world but there are handful that stand out above the rest this list consists of Peter Hurley, Annie Leibovitz, Lindsay Adler and Greg Gorman. these photographers made a name for themselves by creating the best headshots with well known celebrities and models. their photos gained so much attention as they were unique and with how well they were able to capture emotion and personality.

for this photo I tried to recreate the Henry Mullins headshots to also help create the diamond cameo

camera settings:

green coloured photos (5 star photos)

yellow coloured photos (4 star photos)

red coloured photos (1-3 stars)

these weren’t fit for what I wanted to use for what I wanted to use for my diamond cameo.