On going evaluations.pptx2.
- 1. Experimental Photography Emily Monsey 1
- 3. Use this slide to annotate your final image I chose to darken the image a lot to show the contrast between light and dark I used the burn and dodge tool to highlight and darken specific areas which gave a really nice effect to the image This shows fear through the positioning of the model and also the darkness of the image I like that the features appear slightly blurred, however they are still visible. I wanted the hair to fall over the face as it appears a little more mysterious which works really well for the chosen theme.
- 4. Evaluate: ideas eg analysis, results; I really wanted to create photographs that stood out and showed the theme of fear very clearly and obviously with the use of Photoshop editing and also Scanography as my method of photography as from doing research I found these images represented fear really well. My initial ideas involved the use of a model as I thought this would be much easier than using objects as that is much harder to represent the theme of fear, I also wanted to show fear through facial expressions and hands as when doing my research I found that a lot of the photography involved the use of the models hands which worked really well when conveying fear or danger. I went on to stick to these plans as with this project I wanted to stick to initial ideas and see what worked and what didn’t. Thankfully a lot of the images worked really well as they all gave a ghostly appearance to the models and the facial expressions and use of positioning of hands for example conveying fear was quite simple to do. In comparison to the Scanography I had seen in research, I think my work has worked really well as I had used some of the images as inspiration for my own which has been really effective. If I were to repeat this process I would like to include more pictures that seem a little more stripped back, meaning I only involve the models face, pin back the hair and avoid using hands in the scanner as I feel this could potentially work really well. Overall I am really happy with the final results of my Scanography photography as I think it shows the theme in an effective way and does match up to the images I had found when doing research in to this method of photography. Qualities: The final look of my images is actually really effective as it has worked well and I feel I have achieved what I had wanted for this photography. The style of Scanography always gives a ghostly reflection of the model you are using as it blurs certain features and doesn’t give a lot of definition in their face which I really liked, especially when trying to convey fear. I really like the way it has made the models I used look almost animated and not real as it blurs the definition and features at times, I also really like how it makes the hair and hands look as it seems to give more detail to hair than hands. The hair ends up looking really detailed showing the shapes the different strands have and it seems to define each piece of hair which gives a really interesting final look. However the hands don’t have much definition at all as they seem to always catch the most light and appear really white in comparison to everything else in the images. I feel the strongest elements of these images is when I have used hands as I preferred the images much more when I did use hands as I feel it helps convey fear a lot more and also draws a lot of light to the images. The weakest part of the images would probably be that due to the light from the scanner we weren’t able change the facial expressions very much as it was too bright to open the eyes and also when trying to show fear through facial expressions only some had worked. This meant I had to do the majority of the images with the similar or the same facial expressions. The technical qualities of my work involved use of the scanner, which was actually something really different and new for me as I have never tried this style of photography before. However I really liked using this method as I feel it worked really well and gave a really effective image that shows fear fairly easily. As I hadn’t used a camera the technical qualities of my work don’t involve much as I didn’t need to adjust shutter speed or aperture however I did need to include some editing on the photographs as without it, they weren’t as defined as I wanted them to be. To do the editing I used Photoshop and changed some of the images to black and white and then used the dodge and burn tool to adjust the darkness and lightness on the image. For the images I left colour in I changed the hue and the saturation and also the colour balance as I wanted to try out strange combinations of colour in the images to make it look a little strange and different from others I had seen. 4
- 5. How could you improve your work? Could you develop your work further with additional work? What would you try to achieve with this? Could you undertake further experiments? If so, what would they be? If I had the change to improve my work I have definitely found some things I would like to change or improve when looking at my final images. I found that the majority of the images I have taken all involve using hands and hair a lot as I used hands as a way to convey fear and I also made sure that hair was also a main focus my spreading the hair across the scanner as I really liked the effect this had and also found that it made the images a little more mysterious as it hid the face in some of the images. I would also consider using objects as an alternative as in all of my favourite and final images I used a model, although I really liked these images and I liked the final look of them I would really like to try something different and see if it works or doesn’t. I think this could potentially work, however I would have to really consider what would work well and what would convey fear in the best and most obvious way. Another thing I would like to include would be movement as we had experimented this with using movement of hands however this wasn’t a main focus which meant I didn’t give as much time to get the right look and perfect this image. I could then sue movement of objects as this could potentially work really well as it would distort the image and give an abstract final look. I would want to improve the editing when using colours slightly as I would make the colours a little more dramatic and defined to make them really stand out and look different from others I have seen as I tended to focus more on defining the black and white images as I had originally planned on doing this as I felt they would work better than coloured images. However after experimenting with the colour editing on some of the images I found it worked really well and actually worked with this theme so I would definitely try and improve this area. I also want to try out using double exposure over the top of the Scanography images as I want to experiment and see if this works or doesn’t. This is something I had originally planned on doing however due to timing I didn’t get to complete this though I will be doing this at some stage. In some of my images I had wanted my work to show the silhouette and shape of the model instead of including more detail and definition which actually worked well on some of the images, however I decided not to include this style and effect on all of the images as I felt it worked better on some rather than others. I really like how it just shows the defined areas of the face instead of focusing on all of it as it highlighted the main areas that the light had captured. I had done this by adjusting the levels of the image on Photoshop as by doing this you can change the lighting, meaning I could take all the light out the image or add light as needed. The colour used on the images where I hadn’t changed it to black and white were really saturated making it look unrealistic and a little futuristic as it looked so different with the use of changing the hue and saturation of the images. If I could change these images, I would potentially focus more on making it look even more like random shapes instead of including detail in the image as I think it could work really well and make it much more abstract. I would also possibly change the colouring by making it look even more saturated and being slightly more adventurous when it comes to adding colour as a lot of the images were still very dark with slight colour rather than them being focused on colour. I feel my images do fit the brief we were set as they all show different styles and fit in with the experimental photography category as they show both Scanography and potentially double exposure when I later experiment with this. I had really wanted to focus on my theme to ensure that they match ‘fear’ and also that it shows it fairly obviously instead of having a number of potential themes that they could fit in to. For example I made sure throughout my planning and production that the models represented fear very clearly, however the use of Scanography automatically shows this theme fairly easily in anything you use as even in research I had realised that this method conveyed theme the most effortlessly and it made it better when preparing and focusing on what I wanted the models to do and look like and also in the editing stage as I could improve on the appearance of the images. Another example of conveying fear would be when I was 5 editing the images as I ensured that I used dark colouring on the images and I also used the burn tool to further define certain parts.
- 7. Use this slide to annotate your final image I used the black and white filter on the image, then I used the dodge tool heavily on this image to really brighten certain areas and highlight it much more than the others. I wanted to show contrast to the other darker images I had done, so with this image I lightened it and it gave this really nice lightened, almost animated look to it. This one is slightly different from the others as the facial expression is different, I also feel that this one shows fear a little more. I heavily focused on the use of hair and hands on this particular image as I thought that it worked really well when trying to convey fear as a theme.
- 8. Evaluate: ideas eg analysis, results; How well do you feel you have realised your ideas and intentions and what results have you got? Ensure you talk critically (compare, contrast, assess) about your work. You should reference your influences and assess how your work compares. For this image I feel I have also met my initial ideas as I had planned to focus a lot of the images on using the models hair as a focus of the photograph as I really liked the way it looked on the scanner as it gives it a really detailed look as it takes each hair giving it lot of definition. It also shows all the light and dark in the hair showing the different shapes it makes on the scanner which is something I really wanted to focus on for some of the images as I felt it gave a really successful final look. I think that this image in particular contrasts to the rest as I really wanted to focus on the brightness and lighting for this specific image as I thought it worked really well and highlighted the face whilst still darkening the hair which I really liked about it. I wanted some of the images I had taken to be much brighter than the rest as I had stuck to really dark final looks for a lot of the images as I felt this conveyed fear best. However I really like this image in particular due to it being different and standing out due to the change in lighting. I haven’t followed my initial intentions as much with this image as I had planned to keep all the images really dark to keep the theme of fear relevant, however after experimenting a lot with the levels and curves in Photoshop, I actually really liked the effect this gave. This one is probably a little more like the images I had seen in research as when looking at different Scanography work I did find that not many used really dark lighting and instead when for this kind of style. This shows some of my influences as I had worked from the research I ad found to create my own, for example I imitated some of the models positions or facial expressions as and when I needed to, as some worked better than others. Qualities: I especially like this image as I find this really interesting, due to the strange, almost animated look it has given the model. I think that due to the brighter lighting I chose to use for this image in particular, it has given a much different final look as instead of cutting some of the image off with the darker light, this has highlighted the whole image and made it all visible in comparison. I particularly like that on this image it has shown a lot of contrast as it shows a lot of light which has given a lot less definition and washed over any imperfections that could of potentially been there. It has also given the skin of the model a really smooth surface instead of showing any features that could have potentially shown, for example freckles. I think this is possibly the strongest quality of this image as it makes it stand out much more from the rest as it has literally washed over the face showing a really smooth, light surface. I think that the weakest part of this image would be the lack of darkness in the image as it could potentially look a little better and defined with some more darkening in some of the areas of the photograph, I think that this could make it stand out a little more as now it looks possibly a little too washed out and too bright. Along with the other Scanography images I took there isn’t many technical qualities to consider as the scanner is what makes the image work and it’s what gives the image this effect and final look. I did however use editing to improve and slightly adjust parts of the image as I wanted to define more areas because before the editing stage it was actually even lighter than it currently is due to the brightness of the light on the scanner. From first looking at the image from the scanner I definitely planned on darkening it in order to stick to my initial plans and ideas of making all the images really dark. To darken the image I used the black and white filter as I had used on the majority of the images, I then used the dodge tool a lot to brighten it up a lot more, then the burn tool to define some of the facial features and where the hair had naturally darkened. 8
- 9. How could you improve your work? Could you develop your work further with additional work? What would you try to achieve with this? Could you undertake further experiments? If so, what would they be? I think that if I was to improve this photograph I would definitely darken parts of the image as I am definitely not happy with parts of it as I feel they could be much more defined which would help the image stand out better as a whole. Darkening areas of this image would help it to stand out and it would also mean that I was sticking to my initial ideas as I had wanted to keep all the photographs darker to ensure that it blends with the theme and that all the images go together as with the others I made sure they were all fairly dark. I think that with the use of double exposure, this could make the image much more defined and help it to stand out. I also think that something like a landscape image would work really well with this as there would be a lot of detail going on which would make it really interesting to look at. To achieve this I would use imagery of landscapes and overlay the images to create a blended effect. This is something I had originally planned on doing, however due to timing I wasn’t able to take the images in time to get them in to the editing stage. But I have been experimenting with this and have found that it works really well with some of the Scanography images. I may also try using objects as well as the model if I were to repeat this project as I feel this could work really well, and this is also something I had really liked in the photography I looked at when researching this method of photography. Due to the lighting this one is much more obvious of what it is in the image as in some cases when you brighten or darken the image too much you are left with shapes of your subject or a silhouette which can actually work well with some photographs. The lines in this definitely aren’t as defined as some of the other images due to the image looking fairly washed out due to the amount of lighting and dodging I applied to this particular photograph. The colour of this is quite simple as it is black and white, however focusing on making it heavily white as I wanted it to be different from the other darker images I had edited. I did try a lot of the images in colour as well as in black and white, however I found that for this image I preferred it in black and white as it gave this really washed out, and almost animated look for the final image which was really strange and I think makes it fit better with the theme as it doesn’t look real which can portray fear as it’s not how you would actually see that person. I think I could develop this photograph with the use of some additional darkening in some areas as it does appear to be a little bright and too washed out with out colour. I would also want to blend another picture on to this one by using the method of double exposure as I think this could work really well, ad also after experimenting this method on some other images, I think this one could potentially work really well with landscape photography. I think that overall this image definitely fits the brief as I had planned on choosing fear as the theme for my photographs, and I feel that with the Scanography it was quite simple to create this, however with the additional work of editing each image I think it had portrayed this. I also think that it could work with multiple/double exposure. The brief had asked for experimental photography which has also been done as I have shown Scanography in all of my photographs as this was something that I really found interesting and felt I could portray fear through best. 9
- 11. Use this slide to annotate your final image The black and white filter was put on this image as I felt this worked better after testing it in colour as well. I wanted to really shadow some areas of the face and hands. To do this I used the burn tool, however I didn’t use it as heavily as I have on many of the other images. The edit seems to have washed out some of the detail making it have an animated sort of look on the face and some areas of the hair. The hands seem to be the only thing that have picked up most of the detail along with some areas of the hair as it has picked up the lines and shapes.
- 12. Evaluate: ideas eg analysis, results; How well do you feel you have realised your ideas and intentions and what results have you got? Ensure you talk critically (compare, contrast, assess) about your work. You should reference your influences and assess how your work compares. I feel that with this image I do like the final look as it had turned out how I had wanted it to. I wanted to avoid making the image too dark with the burn tool as I have done with many of my other photographs however I still wanted to use it along with the black and white filter. My intention with the use of the burn tool was to lightly darken some areas creating a shadow effect and only darkening the areas that would naturally be darkened. I do really like the effect this has given as it still highlights these areas without being too overly dark meaning loss of detail. In comparison to my other photographs I do prefer this style of shading in areas instead of heavily darkening with the burn tool and use of the curve and levels adjustments. I like the effect of it on this image, however this may not work on some of the others as some had actually came out quite dark naturally without the need of editing. My influences when editing this image were from my previous research in to scanography photography. I had seen many of the scanography images on the internet look really animated looking as it washed out any imperfections and lines the model may have in their face which is something I tried to avoid. To do this I made sure that the levels were at a point where the darkness wasn’t too dark and also the lightness wasn’t too bright as if it is too bright it tends to wash out any detail you could have had. In comparison to the images I have seen in research, mine do have some similarities as the face has lost some of the detail making the face look almost animated and really edited like lots I had seen. However in my image I did manage to keep lots of detail still in the hair and hands as it seemed to leave the shape and lines that had been created by the scanner and position of the model. Qualities: Overall I do like the aesthetic qualities of this image as it seems to have kept some of the detail I had indented on keeping which I was really happy with as I had seen in research that many had lost a lot of detail due to heavy editing. I do like the shadowing detail I had created using the burn tool as I ensured that it wasn’t too heavy and the burn tool wasn’t going to be really overly dark. I think that the weakest part of my image would be that some of the detail in the face was lost as in the editing stage some of the filters and the changes in levels can effect this. This is also due to the actual style of photography as it does tend to wash out a lot of detail in the face. The technical qualities include everything done in the editing process as this involved changing the levels and curves of the photographs which can take time as I really wanted all of my images to be a little different from each other, however I did still want it to be clear it was a collection of scanography style photos. I think that the strongest elements would be the positioning of the model as in this position it allowed me to ensure lots of lines and shapes were created by the hair and also the position of the hands being placed on the scanner creates a really nice effect as the shapes and lines of the hands are shown really clearly. I also think that unlike some of the other images I have edited, this one didn’t turn out too over exposed or too dark as it ended up being a balance of the two. It was quite hard to judge if the image was too bright or dark when first edited, however I am really happy with how this image has turned out as it seems to have the right amount of shading. 12
- 13. How could you improve your work? Could you develop your work further with additional work? What would you try to achieve with this? Could you undertake further experiments? If so, what would they be? I could definitely improve this image as I feel that I would have liked to bring in even more shape and line with the use of hair. I really do like the effect that the hair gives so I do feel that this could have improved this image and made it slightly more interesting to look at. I think that if I was to repeat this image I would possibly bring in an object/prop as when I was doing research in to scanography I did find that many of the images involved objects which did work really well in some of them. This is definitely something I would like to experiment with and to test to see if this is something that would work with my images and also with the theme of fear. I think that another way to develop this image would be to maybe highlight certain areas slightly using the dodge tool a little more as I did use this initially but not as much as I could have. I would like to experiment with this tool a little more on this image as I do think that some slight touch ups to some of the lighter areas of the image could look really good and draw a little more attention to it. Something I wanted to be a focus was the hair and hands in this particular image as I felt that in the others it was one or the other that I had focused on. I do really like the effect it has given as it draws lots more attention and also helps to show fear as a theme. In this image I think that the hands especially have picked up lots of detail and the added shading with the burn tool has also given a really nice effect. I also like the lines and shapes that the hair has given as it is really simple to do when using scanography as it seems to pick up every strand of hair which is very different in comparison to when using a camera. I think that I could definitely develop on this image as I would love to lighten some areas and also make the hair even more of a focus by bringing it round more to the face and possibly covering parts of it whilst still keeping the hands in the position they currently are. I think that this could introduce even more shape and also lines in to the image which would be really interesting. I think that overall my images do fit the brief as I have ensured that scanography was still used and also that it remains within the theme that I had chosen. I think I could definitely improve on making the theme slightly more obvious in all of my photographs as at the minute they all rely on the facial expression and position of the model which on some didn’t exactly work. Darkening the image helps slightly also, however I would like to introduce objects in to my images to make it more clear that the theme is fear. 13