1)One of the most familiar concepts in photography is that of the decisive moment, capturing something notable or an historic moment.
2)One should never trust a photograph but people are drawn to photographs and tend to take them at face value. We need to be objective when looking at photography.
3)The Leica was revolutionary in 1925 as it was so small and light it gave photographers, more sped, accuracy and accesability, especially for documentary photographers in war zones.
4)Geaorge Bernard Shaw said he would exchange all paintings of Christ for a single snapshot of Christ.
5)Tony Vaccaro's negatives were destroyed by the USA army censors because the imagery they contained was too negative and disturbing for the American public to handle.
6)Henryk Ross was a Jewish German photographer who was the official Photographer of the Lodz ghetto in Poland where he documented life within the ghetto, good times and of course the bad. He then buried the negatives and returned having survived, years later to retrieve the negatives. They are fascinating, emotional pictures.
7) the Family of Man exhibition was the 'sticking plaster for the wounds of War' which was organized by Edward Steichen in 1955. 9 million people had visited by 1964 and the final sentimental photograph at the end of the exhibition was W.Eugene Smith's image of his children, The Walk to Paradise Garden.(1946)
Friday 30 March 2012
Thursday 29 March 2012
Genius of Moving Image Part 3
1)Bjork gave Chris Cunningham complete control over the video of All is Full of Love. The only analogy she gave him was that of Indian figures/ornaments. locking together in a sexual position to imply the connection and love. She had seen his work and heard of him and totally trusted him. I guess as an artist she respected his work.
2)Film directors who have made music videos include:
Martin Scorcese with Michael Jackson's Bad
2)Film directors who have made music videos include:
Martin Scorcese with Michael Jackson's Bad
Moving image part 2
1)The role of a cinematographer is to orchestrate lighting and cameras. A cinematographer works in unisn with art directors and directors and actors to achieve the best visual results for the script.
2)Roman Polanski insisted on using a hand held camera in China Town partly because this was the French/Polish filming method he was akin to. So it has cultural reasons. Also a hand held camera adds a sense of disorientation for the viewer. The camera had to be in close to the actors giving intimacy and claustrophobia.
3)Two films in which colour is used to symbolically is
1) Paris Texas- director Wim Wenders uses reed and green gels throughout the film, especially the first half. The characters costumes often follow this trend. Even the backdrops are thought out in terms of old, vivid colours. Red and green are colours which a re uneasy, especially when used together. they are also symbolic of stop and go. Travis the character has been on the run then is stopped by his brother, then runs again to find his ex partner with whom he has a son.
2) Schindler's list uses colour very sparingly however it is used poignantly. If we think abut the masses of Jews murdered by the Nazis it is hard to have a recognizable emotion other than general horror and remorse. However, the use of the colour red with the little girls coat makes us think of a small, weak child,a girl. It is more powerful and evocative to single out so strongly such a sweet, innocent character who has no dialogue in the narrative. She carries the message of the story.
3)Raging Bull- the fight scene is filmed in two different speeds to add emphasis to the figt which is filmed at the faster speed of 48 frames per second.
4)Vittorio Stararo was the cinematographer for Apocalypse Now.
Genius of Moving Image Part 1
1) Sam Taylor Woods work can seem filmic in photography and photographical in film. She often uses actors obviously associated with film in her photographic work such as Crying Men which shows a strong link between film and photography. A stronger message is sent b using recognizable, famose men. Her imagery in photography is ethereal which gives a sense of movement, also the use of colour can be filmic.
The other relationship is the overwhelming use of emotional states in both her film and photographic work and an autobiographical leaning. I think perhaps women tend to be dominated by this subject mater in art. She is a victim of herself and uses this in her art.
2) h euse of multi screen installations in Sam Taylor Woods work can play with the viewers sense of spacail percepion in terms f the narrative. The actors are presented in realtion to each other to give their charactors more ephasis to a viewer. it allows sound to be seperated adding to the intensity.
3)Two photgraphers wo have used film as part of their inegral work are Cindy Sherman as she created movie esque sets in which to portray characters which she called ' movie stills' This is photography directly influenced by film.
Also Gregory Crewdson creates hugely expensive photographs set up as if they were a movie with actors, movie lighting, art directors. He also has nothing to do with taking the actual shot which is similar to film as directors do not film as a rule.
4)
| Douglas Gordon in his own words: "I was trying to get to the point where you can make sense of even the most chaotic images or pictures which formally and aesthetically are battling with each other. While one film is representing good, and one represents evil, the fact is that they can coexist quite easily - on a physical and conceptual level. I simply played the two films at the same time, together and on the same picture plane. They were not manipulated in any sense - there was no alteration to the speed, or the sound, or the form." |
| |||||||||
Steve McQueen
Can art address these questions?
Art can't fix anything. It can just observe and portray. What's important is that it becomes an object, a thing you can see and talk about and refer to. A film is an object around which you can have a debate, more so than the incident itself. It's someone's view of an incident, an advanced starting point.
Shame is released on 13 January
5) David Lean
Ryan's Daughter
Lawrence of Arabia
Dr Zhivago
These are examples of films which the director in this case David Lean has chosen to take on a film/script as the locations are so visually captivating. Kerry, The Sahara and Siberia. The locations almost guarentee a great film.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-bkLmIRzV8interview with Steve McQueen
5) David Lean
Ryan's Daughter
Lawrence of Arabia
Dr Zhivago
These are examples of films which the director in this case David Lean has chosen to take on a film/script as the locations are so visually captivating. Kerry, The Sahara and Siberia. The locations almost guarentee a great film.
Genius of Photography Part 2
1)Typologies are pictures which represent nothing but the truth and depict things or people as they are in a documentary fashion.
2)The face of the times is a series of photographs taken by August Sander at the time of economic and social unease in Germany in the 1920's. It depicted people in different walks of life as portraits.
3)Rodchenko designed for the USSR in Construction magazine which through propaganda glorified the soviet union.
4)Photomontage is a graphical art of using photography to create re worked, abstracted images through cutting and pasting.
5)Atget used albumen prints because he did not grasp modern techniques being used elsewhere.
6)solarization is the reversal of the negative giving areas which would otherwise be black an extreme finish which can appear unlife like.
7)Bernice Abbott acquired Atget's estate and helped to spread his images of Paris and his unusual way of seeing.
8)Walker Evans was fired fromthe FSA probably for similar reasons to W.Eugene Smith. He could not help but personalize his experience ratyher than portrying the propaganda expected from him.
2)The face of the times is a series of photographs taken by August Sander at the time of economic and social unease in Germany in the 1920's. It depicted people in different walks of life as portraits.
3)Rodchenko designed for the USSR in Construction magazine which through propaganda glorified the soviet union.
4)Photomontage is a graphical art of using photography to create re worked, abstracted images through cutting and pasting.
5)Atget used albumen prints because he did not grasp modern techniques being used elsewhere.
6)solarization is the reversal of the negative giving areas which would otherwise be black an extreme finish which can appear unlife like.
7)Bernice Abbott acquired Atget's estate and helped to spread his images of Paris and his unusual way of seeing.
8)Walker Evans was fired fromthe FSA probably for similar reasons to W.Eugene Smith. He could not help but personalize his experience ratyher than portrying the propaganda expected from him.
Genius of photography Part 1
1)The true genius of photography is it's hidden depth which gives the viewer stimulating visual and psychological stimulation ad asks questions on many levels.Photography has the ability to stir our emotions through subject, colour and style as well as memory.
2)Henry Fox Talbot was on of the first pioneers of photography as well as Daguerre but he had a different technique for finishing the image which had more in common with a negative and allowed photography to become mass produced.
3)Mirror memory was the term coined with Daguerrotypes as the metal plate onto which the image was transferred shone/reflected the imposed picture 'memory' as well as the viewers reflection.
4)The term vernacular in photography is used to describe any use of photography which is not deemed as art. This would include passport photos, crime scene/forensic pictures and home snapshots etc.
5)The early pioneers of photography learnt how to stop an exposure from fading into blackness by fixing the black and white image with a nitrate solution, silver nitrate.
6)Cartes de visites were a knock on reaction to the sudden ability to mass produce images. They were small and mounted on card and were posted around by people as keepsakes.
7)Nadar had the ability to capture his models naturally without all the trappings of Victorian or the equivalent life. He brought out the essence of the sitter's personality.
8)Pictorialism was a back lash against the mass production and use of vernacular photography in society. I t wanted to create its own branch of fine art photography in keeping with painterly works of the time.
2)Henry Fox Talbot was on of the first pioneers of photography as well as Daguerre but he had a different technique for finishing the image which had more in common with a negative and allowed photography to become mass produced.
3)Mirror memory was the term coined with Daguerrotypes as the metal plate onto which the image was transferred shone/reflected the imposed picture 'memory' as well as the viewers reflection.
4)The term vernacular in photography is used to describe any use of photography which is not deemed as art. This would include passport photos, crime scene/forensic pictures and home snapshots etc.
5)The early pioneers of photography learnt how to stop an exposure from fading into blackness by fixing the black and white image with a nitrate solution, silver nitrate.
6)Cartes de visites were a knock on reaction to the sudden ability to mass produce images. They were small and mounted on card and were posted around by people as keepsakes.
7)Nadar had the ability to capture his models naturally without all the trappings of Victorian or the equivalent life. He brought out the essence of the sitter's personality.
8)Pictorialism was a back lash against the mass production and use of vernacular photography in society. I t wanted to create its own branch of fine art photography in keeping with painterly works of the time.
Genius of Photography Part 5
1) Diane Arbus said that 'the camera gave me licence to strip away what you want people to know about you, to reveal what you cant help people knowing about you'. 1960's
2) I think some photographers do prey on vulnerable people.
3)
4)Diane Arbus may have committed suicide for reasons unknown to us, however the chances are that she felt ill at ease with herself and struggled with fame and some of the bad press she may have received for her art.
5)Larry Clark shot Tulsa by living with a commune of young adults and constantly taking pictures of whatever he wanted as everyone was so drug addled and 'free'. I believe he wanted to shock and enjoyed the sense of bohemianism, although he may not have given much thought to any other sort of affect his pictures might have had other than to shock and or notoriety.
6)An example of confessional photography is the work of Nan Goldin. She documented intimate moments in her own life and those of her friends. She experienced abuse and documented this. She focuses on issues in society such as the third gender. The impolite genre is presented in Larry Clark's work such as Tulsa where things that people would normally perceive as shocking are depicted graphically such as drug taking and sexual activity.
7) Araki will not photograph anything he does not wish to remember.
8)The premise of post modernism is to question common thinking, it focuses on the individuals interpretation of the world through experience. Cindy Sherman's typologies of women in movie stills challenged viewers perceptions in an 'image saturated world'.
2) I think some photographers do prey on vulnerable people.
3)
4)Diane Arbus may have committed suicide for reasons unknown to us, however the chances are that she felt ill at ease with herself and struggled with fame and some of the bad press she may have received for her art.
5)Larry Clark shot Tulsa by living with a commune of young adults and constantly taking pictures of whatever he wanted as everyone was so drug addled and 'free'. I believe he wanted to shock and enjoyed the sense of bohemianism, although he may not have given much thought to any other sort of affect his pictures might have had other than to shock and or notoriety.
6)An example of confessional photography is the work of Nan Goldin. She documented intimate moments in her own life and those of her friends. She experienced abuse and documented this. She focuses on issues in society such as the third gender. The impolite genre is presented in Larry Clark's work such as Tulsa where things that people would normally perceive as shocking are depicted graphically such as drug taking and sexual activity.
7) Araki will not photograph anything he does not wish to remember.
8)The premise of post modernism is to question common thinking, it focuses on the individuals interpretation of the world through experience. Cindy Sherman's typologies of women in movie stills challenged viewers perceptions in an 'image saturated world'.
Genius of Photography Part 4
1) GarryWinograd took photographs to see what the world would loo like photographed
2)Citizens evolved from blurs to solid flesh due to cameras becoming smaller, more light weight with faster shutter speeds
3)The decisive moment is the much misunderstood theory
4)Garry Winograd was the Godfather of Street photography in USA.
5)Paul Martin was a French born man living in England in the Victorian period. He used a disguised camers to take candid shots of Brits enjoying social persuits.
6)Edward Ruscha said When he was growing up 'photographers were either nerds or photographers'. He said photography is about substance not soul.
7)Colour gives another level of meaning to the 'psychology of the commonplace'of William Egglestones work.
8)William Egglestone is not about colour!Snapshot aesthetic...at war with the obvious...
2)Citizens evolved from blurs to solid flesh due to cameras becoming smaller, more light weight with faster shutter speeds
3)The decisive moment is the much misunderstood theory
4)Garry Winograd was the Godfather of Street photography in USA.
5)Paul Martin was a French born man living in England in the Victorian period. He used a disguised camers to take candid shots of Brits enjoying social persuits.
6)Edward Ruscha said When he was growing up 'photographers were either nerds or photographers'. He said photography is about substance not soul.
7)Colour gives another level of meaning to the 'psychology of the commonplace'of William Egglestones work.
8)William Egglestone is not about colour!Snapshot aesthetic...at war with the obvious...
Wednesday 11 January 2012
Image and Text
I was recently given The Best Of Life book, when I saw this picture by Bill Ray I immediately assumed it was about the Beatles, I was right.
Some images do not need explanation, in fact in photography and art things are left to be pondered over, the artist doesn't necessarily write a statement to go with the art work in a gallery. A photograph in a newspaper will be surrounded by text explaining further details, the picture just draws attention to the article. Most of us don't have time to read full articles so we rely on an image to give us as much information as possible.That is the role of the photographer, to convey a message, especially in documentary photography. As I have discovers recently, it is not always possible to convey a complex issue easily without some explanation. Maybe we need to give the person in a portrait some justification.
Subjects which have a delicate nature such as Paul Wenham Clarke's Hard Times/Big Issue work recently exhibited at St Martin's in Birmingham call for consideration.I went along to his talk at Margaret Street in October and was lucky enough to be able to talk to him about my interest in the subject of alcoholism. This is another subject that would need some use of text. My aim is to make portraits of various people who are either currently suffering from alcoholism, have overcome it (are sober) and people who can admit that drink does play too large a roll in their lives although they don't consider themselves alcoholics. i think it would be unkind to have people allow you to take their portrait and then leave their image open to the abuse of cynicism and lack of understanding of the subject.
Paul Wenham Clarke
Paul Wenham Clarke
Paul Wenham Clarke
Ella Carman
Ella CarmanThis is not work I would put into my alcoholism project but they are images off alcoholics that I have taken. They are both people I know, in fact one of them is my partner.Micky the top picture suffers with ongoing alcoholism but has hugely moderated his drinking due to health scares and responsibilities. He has not engaged in AA preferring to dig deep and find his own determination.
This is an example of the sort of thing I might write but in a very draft form.
Paul Wenham Clarke's work explained how he came to meet the individuals, their situations and what happened to them as far as he was able to find out. He treated it with great compassion and it made the whole exhibition much more depth than it would have been without the information provided.
Where do you rate yourself on the novice to expert scale and why? Show visual examples to support your argument
This seems like a very relevant principle to chose as at University we are going through a process of learning, evaluating and improving for 3 years hoping to be refined and accomplished at the end.I have not been in an education system for 5 years or more so I am very aware that I lacked some of the ingrained skills in writing and most crucially technology.My willingness to learn and theoretical work is good and I am very happy with some of my work, however I am often to be found wasting valuable energy fretting over my camera or completely lost at a Mac/Photo shop or any other design program.
For my image content and style, also depth and story I would say I was around a 'Fully acceptable standard achieved routinely' however sometimes as far as technical quality/understanding goes it may be more of a 'fit for purpose though may lack refinement'.
The problems I was encountering with focus, as you can see in the two photographs of mine above, were hopefully due to my old camera which I have been using for seven years or so. I just bought a new camera which I haven't had much chance to use but it seems that I am getting much sharper results already. So I would like to say that my standard and score would go up after using my new equipment for a while. The picture below was taken with my new camera and I can see the improvement in tone and sharpness straight away. I always seem to be capturing a orange tone with my old camera.
I am a real mix between beginner and proficient having read the explanations. It really depends on what aspect of my work one is looking at but my overall goal is to round all my skills into the proficient category by the second year and expert by the third or somewhere between the two. I believe true expertise would come through experience.
Tuesday 10 January 2012
Connectivity:cultural context in photography
This is a potentaly huge subject with many sub categories one could cover. The first thing that came to my mind on this is how powerful photography has been in its relatively short life in all aspects of our lives, from what we wear, eat and talk about daily. However for the purpose of the blog I am going to focus on the Cult of Personality through photography. I feel it is prevalent and current in the media with the ongoing sagas of celebrity culture, paparazzi and marketing.
Iconic images of Marilyn, Elvis and Muhammed Ali are my first thoughts on the cult of personality, perhaps because of the use of images of celebrities by Andy Warhol are so familiar even now. They had something exuding from their pictures that you wouldn't forget even if you'd never seen moving footage of them. However this method not only worked for entertainers and sportsmen, it was abused by despots such as Stalin and Hitler to ruthlessly promote their image to brain wash the fearful public. The camera can capture the passion in people whether it is good or evil.
Andy Warhol
The celebrity culture,paparazzi lifestyle has recently been called into question because of privacy issues, have we crossed the line? Is it quality or quantity that we want. I feel it is the latter, because images equals money.
It would be the most terrible thing to realize you have no photographs of yourself or your family growing up, it validates your life even if you can't remeber it and gives even those from the humblest homes memories of happiness, staged or unstaged!
It seems we have almost come full circle in photograpy as we are now in a hayday of personal and home snapping just as we were at the dawn of photography. Proud images of families in a victorian home or current pictures on facebook and flickr of your children or fun nights out with friends serve the same purposes.
Robert C Wiles
Ella Carman
Iconic images of Marilyn, Elvis and Muhammed Ali are my first thoughts on the cult of personality, perhaps because of the use of images of celebrities by Andy Warhol are so familiar even now. They had something exuding from their pictures that you wouldn't forget even if you'd never seen moving footage of them. However this method not only worked for entertainers and sportsmen, it was abused by despots such as Stalin and Hitler to ruthlessly promote their image to brain wash the fearful public. The camera can capture the passion in people whether it is good or evil.
Andy Warhol
Nowadays in western culture we are selling more magazines and papers than ever before despite the internet due to our unquenchable thirst for images, not only of celebrities but of fashion, interiors, bands, music and so on.The celebrity culture,paparazzi lifestyle has recently been called into question because of privacy issues, have we crossed the line? Is it quality or quantity that we want. I feel it is the latter, because images equals money.
It seems we have almost come full circle in photograpy as we are now in a hayday of personal and home snapping just as we were at the dawn of photography. Proud images of families in a victorian home or current pictures on facebook and flickr of your children or fun nights out with friends serve the same purposes.
This principle has largely been about the theory behind photography, ie: the art history and the relevance of certain photographers and styles as well as the importance of photography in everyday life. Sublimenaly photography we have seen throughout our lives will affect our own work and way of thinking. Prehaps we a drawn towards bright, happy images or perhaps we are more attracted to a subtle beauty or sentimentality, even the beauty in sadness.
Robert C Wiles
Ella CarmanSomething both beautiful and tragic in both of these pictures even though they are very different.
For me in my practical work documentary photography has appealed to me very much as it can convey many different emotions that I may want to express through things going on around me.
The notion of inspiration comes from constant enquiry based on research, observation, recording and experimentation
I felt very inspired during the first term of this course. This is because for the first time in a long time I was being given work to do and HAD to think of ideas for articles, arrange photoshoots and write up articles.It was hard to keep up this momentum on your own with no direction, this is why Ihad set projects for myself before the course began and went to do a little photography course at the MAC during the summer. It set a task which I could take in any direction creatively. In the end I took some of my personal favourites so far. I approached people I wouldn't have other wise and I felt more confident about my skills.I felt inspired to continue and so took on more projects over the summer.
Some examples of the work I did during my MAC course (Midland Arts Centre) last summer. These pictures were taken through observing other people in fairly mundane situations. The ones of the little boy were taken because I noticed this group of people hanging around outside a barbers shop. I stopped to ask them if they minded having their pictures taken and the little boy 'Spud' stole the show. The other pictures were an area of factory and wasteland I pass regularly on the way tomy mom's ansd I had to use a launderette for a while and various people allowed me to take some pictures of them.
I often use my phone(I hate to say) to record ideas or if I happen not to have my camera on me. I recently visited London to go to the DaVinci exhibition, obviously the exhibition was very interesting but it was very rushed and very busy. I spent some time outside the portrait gallery recording people walking in the rain over the reflection of the National Portrait Gallery on the pavement. I also used my phone as a dictaphone this last term to record ideas that came to my head for articles. This really helped.
These were pictures taken on my mobile phone in London. It was a very rushed visit with a tight schedule and my main camera had broken and I didnt think Id get chance to take pictures anyway, but I was glad to have had my phone to capture a few moments of inspiration.
I didnt know quite what to make of the Da Vinci exhibition.Im glad I went but it was so busy that I couldnt really take it in properly.
I like to go to photographic exhibitions locally and recently I went along to the opening of John Myers Middle England exhibition at the Ikon and during my trip to London I saw some interesting pictures at the Tate,one that springs to mind was a sort of family tree portrait series that documented various families but the most poignant was a collection of photos of young children and babies from a Romanian orphanage, all of them looked so glazed and scared and some just completely mentally ill.
Another source of inspiration is my boyfriend who is a singer songwriter. I have been asked to document his new band and their journey fom early rehearsals through to first gig in February at the Symphony Hall.
I sometimes just go through photography books at the Ikon to see if anything catches my eye, then I will research a photographer.
During the first term I expeerimented with film photography, develpment and dark room processes. I hadn't had chance to do this before so it was an interesting experience, however with the magazine project demanding a lot of pictures quickly in a digital format I didn't get much chance to do as much as I'd have liked. I think in the second term it will be more of an option. I also wanted to sign up for the moving image workshops but again found it difficult to fit in after my film workshops, things were becoming a bit stressful towards the end of term. I am going to focus on these workshops in the second term as I have just bought a 60D Canon with which I aim to make some short films and documentaries!
So during the magazine work I tried to push my skills further, which I see as experimentation. I tried out an interiors photoshoot, I used a holga to get some artistic images from the custard Factory and worked in some poorly lit conditions. I learned a lot from these experiences, particularly about lenses and lighting.With my new camera I purchased a 35mm f/2 lense which I have found very effective so far. The only thing I feel I should have experimented with more is the studio but I'm sure there will be plenty of opportunity for that and I did attend the studio lighting workshop.
I will be experimenting with my new camera and my FM3A Nikon in the next term.
Finally on the notion of experimentation, I enjoyed working with stop frame footage. I thought it worked well for our Ident (although I wasn't too keen on the final music choice). I liked the jumpiness and I puposefully set the aperture very wide so it has a cold white daylight affect which is quite haunting. There was some better footage which was similar however I messed with the lense and zoomed in and out which didn't work with the stop frame footage in post production. I was quite annoyed with myself as it would have been great.
Below are a few pictures from the footage I messed up buit wish we'd been able to use, in fact in hindsight I wish I had pushed for it but it wasn't me who was having to do all the editing and I wouldnt have been able to anyway...something else I should learn.
This is where I zoomed in and 'spoiled' the footage.
I must have a fascination with people walking having looked back at my blog.
I have always been a big Lowry fan and came across some of his work recently. I'd like to think his work has inspired me but I possibly subliminaly.
I could write all day on the subject of inspiration but I'd better leave it here.
Friday 6 January 2012
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)