I have made a mind map in order to create ideas. I incorporated different factors including the different causes, effects, human causes and the different gases that are produced. These consist of the different causes and their caused effects such as:
Greenhouse gases
War
Transportation
This mind map helps me to plan ahead for my photoshoots, and what different factors I can focus on whilst photographing my Anthropocene related images. for example:
After researching about rising sea levels and ice caps melting, I am able to further understand human’s contribution to Anthropocene and global warming.
I would like to photograph Jersey from a high angle to represent how urbanisation has taken over the natural landscapes and resulted in a world, full of cars and buildings. I think these photos will also show. I am going to create images in densely populated areas, where there is lots of people, technology and buildings, next to areas that look similar, which are deserted, filled with natural elements and demonstrate humans impact. My locations for my urban areas will be based on areas such as St Helier, Town, St Aubin. And my locations for my natural landscape will be St Ouen, St John, St Mary and places that are mostly untouched by humans. Having two photos side by side with a similar shape e.g.
A straight path
A winding road
An upwards view
A low angle view
This with help the viewer to get a direct view of what the earth would be like if it was untouched by humans compared to the destruction we have already caused. This conveys a powerful message bout Anthropocene with relating to technology and human activity.
PERSPECTIVES-
Play on words by discovering multiple angles and perspectives, whilst also discussing the different perspectives on views when it comes to global warming and Anthropocene, e.g. disbelief and conspiracy theorists.
These images are some examples of work I would like to replicate in my photoshoot.
Photoshoot Idea 2
For this photoshoot, I would like to photograph simple emissions into the atmosphere, that affect the earth more than we realize. I feel these side by side comparisons (diptych) with create a meaningful message on how the earth is meant to be and how it has been transformed. One side filled with trees, plants and natural landscapes, compared to urban buildings and light will create an impactful picture which will make further meaning come across.
Earth warming main contributors:
Burning petrol when we drive.
Burning oil or gas for home heating.
Incorrectly disposing of rubbish.
Food waste.
Deforestation.
Using electricity generated from coal, natural gas, and oil.
Travelling via boat or plane.
There are many household objects that are bad for the environment such as:
Tea Bags – Wet Wipes
Plastic straws – Suncream
Chopsticks – Laundry Detergent
Microbeads – Toothpaste
Razors – Cigarettes
Coffee – Exfoliating face wash
Glue – Hairspray
Light bulbs – Mattresses
Sandwich Bags – Bleach
Hand Gel – Cleaning sprays
I would like to photograph these items and edit them in photoshop to create an array of images of simple waste item which build up into long-term issues.
Photoshop Idea.
I would also like to work in Photoshop, to display images similar to these. By using different lines, shapes and icons, I want to to represent the waves, radiation and air pollution caused from technology. To replicate this, I need to find a high up area for an angle what is looking down from above, this area would also have to be densely populated with lots of houses, buildings and roads. I think this would be a good idea to be able to convey the invisible elements of Anthropocene caused by technology and explore its effects. For this I will use generative fill and Ai on Adobe Photoshop to achieve this effect. I want my images to represent all the waves and radiation that are being used constantly through the world and especially in highly populated areas with lots of roads, cars, workplaces and leisure locations.
Here is a mood board I created on how I see Anthropocene through images. This demonstrates what I think are the biggest contributors, effects and components of this topic. I included explosions, ice, fossils, buildings, humans helping out, waste dump sites and oil spills.
The word Anthropocene describes a geological period of time, where human activity has actively began to create a negative impact on the environment.
Different causes of Anthropocene consist of:
Agriculture
Urbanisation
Deforestation
Pollution
Anthropocene has been huge contributor to the development of Earth that an organisation named The International Commission on Stratigraphy is in need of identifying the ‘Golden Spike’ which would be a direct point in fossil records where the transition from Holocene from the Anthropocene can be located. It is said that this direct shift will have to be so significant that it would be detectable in rock layers thousands or millions of years into the future.
Some believe that Anthropocene began in the 1800s, which was a huge period of time for human activity to affect the planet. These large-scale productions that took place, were due to the making/growth of mines, factories and mills. However, some also say that it began earlier, during the period where farming and agriculture dominated the land. In the 1950’s, nuclear weapons cast radioactive elements across Earth. The debris and remains from these weapons, made its way and was absorbed into rocks, trees and the atmosphere. This absorbance would be a direct indicator of when the ‘Golden Spike’ took place.
The long-term shifts in temperatures and weather patterns of climate change results in a difference in that snow and rainfall patterns, it also affects average temperatures increase and extreme weather events such as heat waves or floods to occur more frequently.
Biodiversity.
Biological Diversity is a word to describe the the variety of life on Earth, this range varies from humans to small organisms. People on Earth need biodiversity to live, this means that all different elements in the large natural system, enables everyone to survive. Nature also plays an important part as components such as fresh air, clean water and animals and plants around us for breathing and food. However, throughout Earth, biodiversity is struggling, extinction and deforestation, are resulting in the world facing a dangerous future and even things like species becoming extinct can be fatal. Biodiversity loss is predominately down to human activity, and interrupting of the balance of biodiversity with the take over of farms, factories, roads, cities, buildings and homes are replacing natural habitats.
Anthropocene definition according to The United Nations of Photography- The Anthropocene is a proposed geological epoch dating from the commencement of significant human impact on Earth’s geology and ecosystems, including, but not limited to, anthropogenic climate change.
Mitch Epstein.
Mitch Epstein is an American photographer who approaches his subjects with a subtle and contemplative approach to photography which questions what it means to be American. He has been photographing since the 70s and 80s.
American Power (2003–2007)
investigate specific places. Epstein’s project American Power (2003–2007), critically documents society’s relationship to the industrial landscape. “I would say the culture of the built environment is always something that has engaged my attention.”
I fid Mitch Epstein’s work particularly interesting because he photographs meaningful pictures which captivate the audience and displays the world within the industrial landscape and how the world is changing. This is very meaningful and shows a true perspective on the world and how it change and continues to change due to human’s contribution to the world.
Naoya Hatakeyama’s work portrays human intervention with landscapes of the world with and natural materials e.g. the life of cities and the built environment. His work mostly encircles the topics of nature, the city and photography.
His first proper piece of work was Lime Hills- which was a collection of images of limestone quarries throughout Japan. He described the experience as “my appreciation of its cityscapes underwent a subtle change.” due to the fact he came to realisation that Japan was a land of limestones. These are some photos of his limestone photographs from 1986-1990
My Favourites and Why.
I particularly like this photo of Yonesakisho-Donomae which was taken in 2011, this captures the havoc that was caused by The Great East Japan earthquake, and was recorded as the largest ever earthquake in the country. This earthquake killed 20,000 people and causes 10,000 people to be homeless, I feel this is particularly inspiring as Hatakeyama’s photograph captures a completely submerged home, surrounded by waste and wood, this shows the severity of the situation and shows a direct approach on how it affected the residents lives. There is also a boat of people (4), who are seen to be travelling across the wreckage, they could possibly be looking for people, transporting or seeing the damage that has been caused.
URBAN LANDSCAPES PHOTOSHOOT.
Potential Locations to Photograph.
Front doors on the street
Cracks in the pavement
Puddles with bright reflections
Fences and walls
Stairs
Colours of all the cars in the supermarket car park
“The question ‘is this a work of art or not?’ is not very interesting for us.” – BERND AND HILLA BECHER
Bernd And Hilla Becher are a husband and wife duo from Germany who decided to photograph architectural forms which they named “anonymous sculptures”. They photographs many structures such as:
Water towers
Coal silos
Blast furnaces
Lime kilns
Grain elevators
Preparation plants
Oil refineries
Coal bunkers
Winding towers
Breakers (ore, coal, stone)
Steel mills
Factory facades
They named their works ‘typologies’ which represented their collections of grouped images in small symmetrical squares. They categorized these photos by the buildings functions. An example of their signature image of smaller photographs which have been grouped together:
Their work can be seen as conceptual art, and took place over course of 40 years. Their chapters all contributed to different structures and were all organised due to typologies and are laid out into 12 images into a uniform arrangement. There is over 1500 different images,, and they have received many famous awards such as:
The Golden Lion
-The 1990 Venice Biennal
The 2002 Erasmus Award
I find Bernd and Hilla Becher’s particularly interesting because their work is most definitely minimal and conceptual, which sets their work aside from other artists, as they focus on one main object taking up the majority of the picture, rather than multiple objects being the subject of a photo.
These are the camera settings I used for this photoshoot:
I also switched to the landscape setting and pressed the cloud option for the white balance. I ensured that I stuck to an ISO of 100, and had the Aperture between f/11 to f/16.
I also needed to remember to:
Keep my foreground and background sharp
Capture the foreground details
Straightened my horizons
Don’t shoot everything at eye level, use different angles
Pick the right time of day
HDR Images.– Exposure Bracketing
HDR IMAGE 1:
HDR IMAGE 2:
I attempted 2 different exposure bracketing images. After adjusting my camera settings (using the exposure compensation dial, and turning it to -1, take a photo, turn it to 0, take a photo, and then set it to +1 and take the third photo). I then imported them into Lightroom and merged them together to create the images. I then repeated this process once again. To improve this, next time I need to take a burst of 3 photos at once instead of needing to click it 3 separate times, this is because the camera is likely to move and change position slightly within the time it takes to press the button.
Best Images+ Edits.
These are my two favourite photos I took for this photoshoot. I like the first photo because of the angle facing upwards, and how the sky is blue with the sun is shining on the metal. It is also showing the vast industrial structures, which show the great power that they generate. To improve it, next time I would like the sky to be more cloudy and grey to also replicate a more morbid and dark approach to my photos.
I also like the second image because it is demonstrating the divide between the urban landscape and the natural landscape. They are facing each other and this photo captures how beautiful the natural mountain is compared to the rusty and dirty machinery and how it possibly ruins the landscape by showing the replacement of natural earth, to urbanised cars, buildings and machinery. I also like the deadpan approach in this image and how is is showing the straightforward angle which gives a ‘raw’ image feeling. To improve next time I should attempt to time the photograph as to when there is no cars driving past, I also would have taken it at a more straight on and direct angle and be aware of my camera slightly slanting to one side.
My Favourite Edited Images.
For this Havre Des Pas photoshoot, I decided to capture both natural and urbanised landscapes. I began with the beach an its natural beauty, these photos capture the sea, sand and rocks and demonstrate the natural landscapes of Jersey. My photos then progress from the original landscapes that exists before it is acted upon by human culture and into an urbanised landscape and how the action of man has such a huge consequence of the development on the territory, as a whole. I particularly like photos of the machinery and how the metal glistens in the sun, I think small effects like this create beauty even though they cause such destruction. Throughout Jersey the growth of local industries including agriculture, tourism, and financial services has helped grow the population of the Island. However, Urban areas are major contributors to climate change, they are responsible for 71 to 76 per cent of CO2 emissions from global final energy use. I decided to focus on highlighting the beauty and amazing modernisation of technology, but also highlighting how much money, climate change, sacrifices and landscape loss goes into the industrialisation of Jersey.
Black and White Images.
I also decided to create some black and white images from this photoshoot. This is to create a slightly more meaningful and morbid affect to the images when photographing Jersey’s landscapes and how they have been replaced with machinery. This ties into New Topographics as many of the photographers took black and white prints.
I also created virtual galleries to display my favourite photos in both black and white and colour, however, to improve I would like my photos to be a slightly better quality, this will help me to see them displayed better.
New Topographics: “Photographs of a man-made landscape.
This term was created by William Jenkins as a way to describe a group of keen photographers who all had something in common, their photography, which all shared the same aesthetic of a black and white landscape prints which shared a site of interaction between human+ non human contact.
The group consisted of:
Robert Adams
Bernd and Hilla Becher
Lewis Baltz
Joe Deal
Frank Gohlke
Nicholas Nixon
John Schott
Stephen Shore
Henry Wessel Jr.
These photographers decided to ignore the beautiful landscapes the world has to offer, and instead pay attention to how easily and effortlessly man can alter them forever.
The topic of New Topographics was based on both built and natural landscapes in America, which highlighted the tension and difference between the natural scenery and the newly- built structures of post-war America.
“New Topographics: Photographs of a Man-Altered Landscape” – This was a huge exhibition which commemorated the photographers and their creations, which also spread information and interest on the topic of urbanisation. The exhibition took place from October 1975-February 1976. It was held in Rochester, New York at the George Eastman House’s International Museum of Photography.
The photographs of the humanly altered landscapes mostly avoided any human presence- this was to that the images came across as, neutral in style, and focused mainly on the emotional, beautiful and opinionated visual information within.
Some examples of these altered lanscpaes are:
Motorways
Petrol stations
Industrial parks
Tract homes
Car parks
Suburban homes
Crumbling coal mines
Frank Gohlke.
Born on the 3rd of April 1943, Frank Gohle was a photographer, he took photos of urban landscapes such as towns and old factories. Frank made a contribution to the New Topographics group and focused on the pure destruction and wreckage that urban areas faced due to natural causes. He took part in the New Topographics group and contributed He also stood out from different photographers because his photos captured the sheer destruction in urban areas from natural causes. An example of this is a tornado which struck his home town in Wichita Falls Texas, in 1979. I think his work perfectly ties into my work on the aftermath of Storm Ciaran as there was also a tornado that struck Jersey, and there was serious life- threatening weather conditions. Frank Gohlke is an especially important person in landscape photography, as well as being included in the New Topographics exhibition.
Examples of Frank Gohlke Photography.
I particularly like Frank Gohlke’s work because I think the black and white images particularly stand out, when it comes to New Topographics, due o the fact the bluntness and lack of emotion when the photos are black and white show the destruction and life taken out of the landscape and the emptiness from the wreckage.
My Frank Gohlke Inspired Photos.
Whilst taking photos at Harve Des Pas beach, I attempted to replicate and take inspiration from Frank Gohlke and his images whilst attemping to demonstrate the same fascination with the world’s constant growth, destruction and unexpected change, by featuring different machinery, industrialisation, littering and urbanisation. I think I was able to capture a more modern approach from the present day, comparing to Frank Gohlke’s work from the 1970s through to 2004.
I have made a virtual gallery in Photoshop for 4 different photoshoots I have made in this landscape project. These consist of:
Ansel Adam inspired photoshoot
Storm Ciaran destruction photoshoot
The Sublime inspired photoshoot
I also chose 3 different empty gallery images off Google which I think are the best choices to display these photos. I have picked between 2-4 photos from each photoshoot which I think are my strongest images and display my work the best.
For this photoshoot, I decided to visit beaches such as Greve De Lecq, Beauport and other beaches, this is due to the fact they have a huge amounts of space covered with rocks, beaches and dramatic skies, which is perfect for my take on ‘The Sublime’.
My favourite photos.
These photos I think perfectly signify the sublime. This is due to the fact they have bright, dramatic backgrounds which emphasize and romanticize the setting. These photos are symbolizing how insignificant man is to their surroundings and how small humans really are physically and metaphorically when it comes to earth and its landscapes. In these photos I wanted my models to stand far away from me and look like they are exploring the area. This was to symbolize humans attempting to understand how big the world really is. I wanted them to also be appreciating the setting around them but from a far distance so yo can not see their faces or any particular individual details to show we are all as insignificant as each other when it comes to the vast landscapes around us. I also wanted some photos to be in black and white as well as colour as some do not need colour to show their romanticism.
My other photos do not have people in them but still signify ‘The Sublime’ because The Sublime is associated with the extraordinary and grand, which my pictures display with the huge blue skies, bright colours and beautiful views. These photos I also think inspire a feeling of awe or fear when looking at them, this feeling of fear may come from a feeling of overwhelm when seeing the large distance the e.g. sea goes on for. This may be defined as the sublime.
