Assignment Four - Applying Lighting Techniques - Corrections

Following feedback from my tutor and some rethinking about my images, here is my revised selection for Assignment Four:

Colour 1

Colour 1

Shot in the park in strong sunlight; the pink is effectively contrasted against the green with the sun light bringing out the full colour of the geode.









Colour 2

Colour 2

A mixed media shot, using a previously taken photograph as a background scene.  The pink colours on the mountains from the setting sun support the colour of the back of the geode.









Form 1

Form 1

Shot overhead using side lighting from a table lamp to enhance the curved shape of the back of geode.

















Texture 1

Texture 1

Shot using side lighting and black background paper, this image clearly emphasizes the texture of the back of the geode.















Texture 2

Texture 2

Taken in side-lighting from natural window light; this image emphasizes the shiny surface of the flat plane of the geode, helped by the reflections of the lighting that fell on the paper.















Texture 3

Texture 3

Macro shot of the interior of the geode showing the inner crystalline texture; this was achieved using a macro lens and shining a table lamp and a little LED head lamp right into the centre, to bring out the crystals all the way into the back.







Shape 1

Shape 1

Taken using side-lighting from a table lamp, which has picked out the shape of the flat plane of the geode with the side shadow further supporting the concept of shape.









Shape 2

Shape 2

The second shape shot was taken by trying to catch strong rays of natural light coming in through a bedroom window.  This shot was underexposed by four stops and used a very narrow aperture so that only the shape of the tip of the geode was picked out.

A narrative picture essay

Set yourself an assignment and produce 5-15 photographs to illustrate the narrative.  Well, I was BLESSED with the opportunity to participate in and photograph a helicopter expedition with some National Trust rangers transporting rocks and boulders in the Lake District for some Fix the Fells path repair work.  This event was actually for the purposes of producing two of the photographs for my sequence for Assignment Five, however I was also able to capture this mini narrative in the process.  My focus in this sequence is around the helicopter itself (obviously there were two runs, so I was able to photograph the helicopter both inside and out).  The people in the red jackets are the NT rangers. The photography on this day was very hard, the helicopter was very dark and the light was changing constantly.  I took around 2000 pictures for the two that I needed for the Assignment.... I also used this as a gratuitous opportunity to practice with my fish eye lens :-)

My original selection was 28 photos long, showing the journey there, the journey back, and a bit of helicopter doing its job.  It was quite hard to narrow this down and decide what wasn't really necessary to the narrative, or what had already been conveyed in a different photograph.  In the end I cut back on some of the shots of the helicopter getting up and down as once it was off the ground, it was obvious it was off the ground!  I ended up with a few more than specified, but I think these are all essential.

BIG BIG THANK YOU to Tanya Oliver and the National Trust for letting me join them on the two days of helicopter drops!

Here is my sequence:

 

Juxtaposition

Juxtaposition in illustration is described in the learning text as the putting together of two objects so as to suggest a relationship.  The exercise required making a book cover illustration using two or three relevant elements showing a connection or relationship.  I elected for the viewpoint option maximising my wide-angled lens with perspective.

Meet "The Woodsman"!  The juxtaposition of the wooden sculpture with the focus on the axehead with the trees in the background shows a connection between what could very well be a mythical character, his environment and his tool in hand. 

Symbols

The idea of this exercise was to think of symbols for concepts and explain how you would use them in a photograph.  The brief was not to specifically take photos, although you could if you wanted, however, I wanted to find photos I had already taken to see if I could apply some context to them.

Growth

Growth can be viewed positively or negatively - for instance the growth of a new shoot is a positive symbol - the growth of an urban city might be viewed negatively, for example.  Which symbol you used would depend on whether that the context you were trying to illustrate was beneficial or detrimental.  Thinking back to recent photos I have taken, I found this which I think illustrates growth from a positive perspective, being the new shoots of spring:

Excess

Excess generally has negative implications.  It is used to describe a situation where too much of something has happened, beyond the point of being beneficial.  A situation I was in recently was a traffic jam on the M25 caused by an excessive number of people trying to get past the Heathrow junctions:

Crime

I imagine that crime will always conjure up a negative image - I can't think of any situations where crime is beneficial.  I certainly don't have any photos of crimes being committed and not sure I want to take any either.  Because of the very nature of crime - i.e. not wanting to get caught, a deliberate crime photograph would probably take place after the event - i.e. evidence of action.  I'm not sure I've got any of those either, but imagine such images might be a crime scene photographer for the police photographing a victim, or a burgled house for example.  But you could also take this one stage further and think about crimes against society, e.g. Banking scandals, or crimes against humanity, e.g. despotic acts and terrorist acts.  One photo that I took recently was during the Margaret Thatcher funeral at St. Paul's showing a protester; it's not a classic view crime, but this chap obviously has a problem with the way Thatcher ran her government:

Silence

Silence for me immediately conjures up scenes of tranquility, calm, peacefulness.  Silence could also have a negative connotation, e.g. if you were in solitary confinement, but I have happy memories of silence, and particularly think about landscapes with negative space:

Poverty

Symbols of poverty could be all kinds of things and will usually be unpleasant e.g. hungry children, people begging in the street, squalid living conditions and so on.  My symbol of poverty is the Big Issue building, juxtaposed against lavish living conditions - creating a contrast between rich and poor: