What is Texture?
When talking about photography, texture refers to the visual quality of the surface of an object, revealed through variances in shape, tone and colour depth. Texture brings life and vibrancy to images that would otherwise appear flat and uninspiring.
I encountered some issues on Lightroom regarding my files. Due to some files getting corrupted and overwritten, I ended up screenshotting the raw images and having to upload them without editing. Despite this, some of the photos still turned out nicely and look effective without any edits.
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Texture Homework
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Brett Weston
Brett Weston was an American photographer known for his black-and-white landscape and abstract photography. Born in 1911, he was part of the Weston family of photographers, including his father, Edward Weston. Brett’s work often emphasized form, texture, and light, and he had a unique style that set him apart from his contemporaries. He was known for his keen eye for detail and his ability to capture the essence of natural and man-made subjects. Throughout his career, he experimented with different photographic techniques and was influential in the development of modern photography.
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My Photos
Inspired by Brett Weston, I took a camera outside and photographed natural things with varied textures. I ended up taking photos that looked very reminiscent of his, due to the nature of this style of photography.
I took the photos on a cloudy afternoon, by which it was starting to get dark. I struggled to get clear images and balance the ISO, aperture and shutter speed. Some photos I took underneath trees, whilst others were in the natural light, which resulted in me constantly having to experiment with the camera settings and adjust to the changing light.
I exported the images to Lightroom and put them in black and white, then edited them to bring out the texture within each photo as much as possible. I experimented with the ‘Basic’ editing settings until I settled on the look of each image that felt right.
For these photos (above), I used flash, as it allowed me to get sharper images, but unfortunately I couldn’t get them completely clean. Brett Weston had captured some images of mushrooms as well, and I thought they were a perfect subject to capture natural texture.
