Mood Board

what is environmental portrait?

Environmental Portrait photography is the art of taking pictures that will be used to tell a persons story via its connection to a certain place. In this type of photography the person should be in their natural environment like their work, house, city,… this is a way of telling the persons story without words. In environmental portrait the person is posing to the photo surrounded by their natural environment.

analysis- key features

The lighting in the picture is natural , from the side the picture is taken indoors. The environment is her house especially her living room, she looks like a typical lower-middle class person, in the picture her personal items are used like pens, cards her jewellery… The framing in the picture is half-body and deadpan. Her pose is neutral and has a natural face expression. She is making eye contact with the camera and engaging with the camera. Standard lens were used , the depth of field is narrow. I think the aperture used was f/22 because the background is clear. The ISO used was probably 100 because it was taken at in the day with lots of light coming in.

“August Sander was a German photographer whose work documented the society he lived in. Lauded as one the most-important portrait photographers of the early 20th century, Sander focused his gaze on bricklayers, farmers, bakers, and other members of the community. Born in Herdorf, Germany on November 17, 1876, Sanders learned photography during his military service in the city of Trier. By 1910, he had moved to a suburb of Cologne, spending his days biking along the roads to find people to photograph. By the time the Nazi regime rose to power in the 1930s, Sander was considered an authority on photography and recognized for his book Face of Our Time (1929).  Today, the artist’s works are held in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., and the Wallraf-Richartz Museum in Cologne, among others”^. Information taken from art net.

August Sander photographed people from diverse nationalities, genders, classes and professions in his ” people of the 20th century” project, He collected this pictures with the goal ‘ to provide a true phycology of our time and of our people’. His plan was to produce between 500 and 600 pictures. In my opinion his photography really transmits what the people feel without any words, In some pictures the people are with a straight face and in some they are smiling, I think that maybe he wanted to show how the people felt in their environment and how they like it or dislike it, how wealthy or poor, how tired, they are or feel.

Analysis

I think the light is natural coming from maybe a window ( soft light) and coming from the side . The environment is most likely her house or the place she works at. Shows social class with the chosen clothes and the broom. The framing is half body, dead pan her pose is formal and her face expression is neutral. She is making eye contact with the camera. I think the lens used was standard lens. The depth of field is narrow. I think the aperture used was f/22 because the background is clear. The ISO used was probably 100 because it was taken at in the day with lots of light coming in.

typology

Typology is a set or images made with a common subject or idea, then repeated through the set. This can include every thing for example different doors in different places, different cars,… The term ” Typology” was first used to Describe the style of photography when Bernard and Hilla Becher began documenting old German industrial architecture in 1959. Typology is a powerful method of photography that can be used to change the way we see the world around us. Typology has roots of August

Photoshoot plan

I would like to photograph people either at work/school or their houses because that’s the 2 places where a person spends more time in. Also I think it would be a good idea to photograph my friends when we are out I think that would be fun too. I mostly like these type of pictures in black and white. I would also ask the person that I am photographing to show on their face how they feel when they are in that environment so for example if they like being in that environment I would ask them to smile, if they don’t like it I would ask them to keep a straight face.

First step: find people who would like to participate, like friends and family, people in town working.

second step: ask them about what they do and speak about my ideas and about their story. e.i where they work, what are their hobbies, what they do that makes them happy,…

third step: Find a time and a day that we are are free and have time. Maybe the weekend because that’s when most people are off if photographing friends and family, for people working I would do during the week because thetas when most businesses are slower.

forth step: Photograph, I would like to use natural light in my pictures because I think it feels more natural, depending on where I’m photographing I would take some pictures half-body and some full- body. I will also use the persons personal items or items they make and work with.

first photoshoot at school

these were the pictures that I took at school I asked staff to take pictures of them and at look at the camera.

I started by labelling them either red, yellow or green.

From all the pictures I took at school these were the ones that I think are the best, also like how every person is doing a different pose, some are looking directly at the camera and some are actually focusing on something else.

editing my favourite pictures:

home photography

I took picture of my brother and my dad I photographed my dad in our garden and photographer my brother while playing video games.

these were my 2 favourite images edited.

this is my favourite picture I think the quality is really good and how I took the picture, I decided to edit the picture in black and white because I think the picture looks better in the terms of quality and ambiance.

from this photoshoot I only got one which was good since my friend was a bit award in front of the camera, however the picture that I choose I think its really good because it was taken in her house and it really shows her personality.

I edited the image making it warmer because since I photographed her at her house I wanted to bring the comfort of her house to the picture and I decided to do that through editing , I edited most on the tone and moving them around until I liked how it looked.

I took 2 pictures of a women that was working at a donut stand, when there weren’t many people around so she wouldn’t get uncomfortable or shy while being photographed.

this was my favourite between the two because the other image there is her co-worker behind her also this one is more closed up which I like she also looks happy and positive and the colour are very vibrant with makes the viewer focus on her rather than the background.

Editing

I kept the photographed in colour and I tried making the image more vibrant

I used photoshop to edit the donuts from the other picture into this one that I like more.

I this project we were told to scrunch up paper and photograph it in different lights and settings to try create interesting shapes and shadows.

this was the first photoshoot, I scrunched paper in different shapes and moving the lights around to the light and shadows were different.

these were my two favourite favourite pictures there isn’t much difference other than one being more zoomed in than the other.

This was the picture I ended up choosing to edit and work with because there is a lot a texture coming from the paper and think she shadow made an interesting shape, there is also a lot of dark and bright spots which I like to have in my images.

Jerry Reed

Image Analyse

This image is taken using artificial lighting which was smartly positioned to make the right shadows. The depth of field in this image is focused and sharp. And the aperture that was used to create this image mas about an F8.In this image there are only 3 different colours them being black, white and different shades of grey. The tone in this image in dark in the background but the actual focus point is very light this choice by the artist makes the image contrast very well and . There is little to no texture in this image everything is quite smooth. Jerry reed talks about his ” paper work series 1 ” he says that this series took him 3 years to create and it consists of 26 black and white images. the paper sculptures were crafted by Reed. In the the woven tale press website they say ” His studio background is evident in the creative use of Fresnel lighting techniques, which can accentuate sharp or soft edges as well as master shadows, their often sensual and quite subtle tonal gradients.” This image reminds me of a flower. In my opinion is one of the only images in this series that don’t actually look like paper and I think that’s really interesting how he used a simple material lie paper and made it look like something so interesting and beautiful. His knowledge in art history could also help him know how to look at simple things and have the creative mind to transform them in something so artistic and creative.

work inspired by Jerry Reed

for this photoshoot I used more structured paper and photographed it in different angles and ISO and lighting.

these were my favourite pictures, the ones that have better quality and are more interesting.

I then labelled it green or yellow to get closer to the best one.

Editing

photoshoot 2 in the style of jerry reed

In this photoshoot I liked more the pictures that were taken using a red light I like how the unfocused is in the right places.

these were my favourite pictures that I took, the more interesting ones and I like how they don’t look like they were made from paper.

these were the 4 pictures which I liked more I this the shapes are interesting the light is well positioned next step is to choose my 2 favourite ones so then I can edit them.

These were my favourite ones I think they kind of look like rose petals I really like that.

Editing

Experimenting with photoshop

I used photoshop to make this and I used an tutorial on the blog to do this. The name of this effect is Kaleidoscope​ Effect Which is basically using the same image ad stuck it together to make an interesting effect.

An artist that works with this effect is Amanda Buck she takes pictures of nature and then uses the Kaleidoscope Effect to edit the photo.

expedition created by me on art step

When on library mode it allows you to look at your pictures closely and choose if you wat to discard them pressing “X” or flag them pressing “P”. It also allows you to give star ratings from 1 to 5 and colour them in. This Is a really good tool do you can go from hundreds of images to your favourites.

Navigator tool:

ISO is the number that shows how sensitive the camera sensor is to light.

my pictures using ISO

picking my favourite pictures:

I started by flagging my favourite images and giving them rankings from 1 to 5

my 5 star pictures:

then I colour in the images:

And finally I used the compare tool to pick the image I would like to use:

As much as I like both of them I decided to choose the one on the right because I like how the light is more on the far part of the image and the closer part is darker and I think it contrasts really nicely.

Editing:

I decides to make the picture black and white because it sets an ambiance. I also removed most of the whites because I wanted my picture to be dark.

photographs taken with slow shutter speed found on the internet:

photographs taken with a fast shutter speed found on the internet :

photographs we took using shutter speed for the first time:

fast shutter speed:

slow shutter speed:

photographing balls in the air until if forms a line challenges:

best one:

I think this photograph is the beast because the balls are really close to forming a line which was the initial propose , i also think that because the sky was dray the balls contrast really well with the sky.

photo after editing:

trying out with shutter speed for the second time

Experimenting using low shutter speed:

we had an idea to draw some shapes with the flash using low shutter speed and it worked really well

all the pictures taken:

editing on photoshop:

On photoshop I made the picture black and white because I wanted the attention to be on the red light. So after I edited my picture black and white I erased the black and white filter so only the background would be black and white and the light would continue red.

Camera obscurer

Nicephorus Niepce

Louis Daguerre

Henry Fox Talbot

Richard Maddox

George Eastman

Digital Photography

Aperture photography

Editing