Photography Workshop

Self Portrait

Different ways of seeing yourself

John Hilliard - Camera recording it's own condition [ 7 patterns, 10 speeds, 2 mirrors] 1871

Michael Snow - Authorization 1969 -work about an idea rather than to represent something. Created by layering up photos on a mirror and taking shots.

Jeff Wall - Picture for a woman 1979

Manet - A bar at the folies-bergere 1882

David Hilliard - Home, office, evening, day, 2006

Dieter Appelt - Fleck auf dem spiegel [speck on the mirror] 1978

Nan Goldin - nan one month after being battered 1984

Katharina Sieverding -Night people

David Hackney -Mother, Bradford Yorkshire 1982

Cindy Sherman -Untitled series -Woman in a sun dress 2003

her work often involves her dressing up as people / characters 

Camera settings a few things to consider...

Wide Aperture = Narrow depth of field - out of focus more

Shutter Speed = Longer lets in more light but any movement will cause a blur.

We were set the task to come up with an idea for a self portrait. The idea I came up with was to take a picture of my face on my phone and have it on screen, sat on a bench with the photo taken from behind.

When we came to taking the photo we tried a few different settings, taking parts of the image in and out of focus and while doing it we found that rather than using a photo on the screen we could position the phone so that there would be a reflection of my face on it.

The image I choose in the end was quite dark so using photoshop I edited it adjusting the colour levels, which improved it although I'm not very happy with the quality look of the image I like the idea so I think it could work well with a little more time and planning.

Using a tin can, black plastic, an elastic band and a piece of black tape to cover the hole I had a pin hole camera. While in the dark room, I put a piece of photographic paper around the inside of the can oposite to the hole where the light would come through then attached a piece of thick black plastic over the top using a rubber band making sure also that the piece of tape was covering the hole before I went outside. Once outside I set up the camera 'tin' pointing towards the area I wanted to capture, then holding it still I removed the tape and timed 15 seconds as the sun light was quite good, after that time I stuck the tape back onto the can. Then brought it back to the dark room where it was put through 3 baths to develop before going down a shoot into a water bath where it could then be viewed. The images come out in negative and with a slight fish eye effect because of being curled around the inside of the can.


Using objects and drawing on acetate I created a set up image that I was going to place on top of a piece of photographic paper in the dark room, so when I switched the light on the objects shapes should end up printed on the paper. First I had to do a colour test to check the tones by setting up the machine and adjusting the focus and ............. once it was set I put the timer to 3 seconds and placed the paper under the area where the light would fall. Then using a piece of black card I switched the light on for 3 seconds then when it went off I moved the card over it slightly and switched the light on then repeated this about 6 times moving the card along the paper a little more each time. When I developed the paper I was able to see the different tones that it created so I could choose how long I was going to have the light on the paper for.

Communication Workshops
As part of the workshops we had reading week, three weeks to read subject journals and produce a presentation of the comparison of two related animals, I found this was quite useful as it was easier for me to take out a selection of journals, read and make notes on them at home, then I was able to prepare the presentation and have pleanty of time to work on it.

The following set of workshops involved drawing and performing as a way of showing communication. In the first session we split into two groups, each of us had a large piece of paper and we had to act as a 'tribe' creating a kind of identity for ourselves by drawing something using charcole, but we couldn't use symbols that would represent something such as a cirle and lines as the sun. We then had to move to the other groups piece of work and add something to their piece till they were full. In the following session we spent time in an area taking in the surroundings and atmosphere, then we came back and had to create a short performance piece to act out without using words, from this I learnt the importance of the unspoken communication and how much information you can give or receive without saying anything.

In the next session we were taught the basics of programs, photoshop, powerpoint, and final cut pro. We learnt the history behind things accociated with them why programs like powerpoint would be used. The first film, animation and editing. In photoshop we created a basic montage after learning anf seeing how it's been used in commercial work such as (beatles cover)

Lastly we had three photography workshops, first we worked in the darkroom starting with a pin hole camera and developing the image, then creating an image from layering objects on top the paper. In the second session we focused on self portraits, looking at other artists pieces and learning about different aproaches then working in groups of three we individually came up with an idea for the photo then had to explain what we wanted to the group so they knew what to do with the camera.

Researching and Creating a blog

Looking at existing blogs for graphics I came across this one that has tutorials that show people how to create a vector drawings and they have regular updates the latest being one aimed at people looking for something to do at Christmas, or just wanting to learn how to draw vectors and they have a Christmas theme so they could make use of the design after for cards etc.

I then created my own blog post using the host website 'blogger' where you can set up your own account for free and create several different blog pages under the same account. When you create a new post it dates it for you so you can clearly see when it has been updated and the options to edit and create are simple. It also allows you to easily add photos, videos and links to external web pages and has a variety of fonts and adjustments such as colour, bold, underlined etc to make it more individual.

The overall appearance of your blog page can also be edited you can select a layout and theme from a selection of pre created designs or if you are into designing and know how to work with html you would find it easy to create your own style design and can upload images or banners that you have made yourself.

Final Cut Pro

Film history 
Arrival of a train at la Ciotat - The Lumiere Brothers, 1895
believed to be one of the first videos shown. When it was shown in the auditorium people were said to have ran out thinking it was a train coming in, as they weren't used to seeing things like this even though it was in black and white it was still good enough to believe. 

The Lumiere Brothers - First Films, 1895

In the style of a Documentary, documenting time and what's happening.

Viaje a la Luna - Georges Melies, 1902
Science Fiction / Drama / story telling people began to realise they could use film for entertainment.

Humorous Phases of funny faces -Blackton, 1906
Believed to be one of the earliest animations, drawn on a board using chalk
-Stop Motion

Little Nemo -Winsor McCay, 100 years ago
all hand drawn and painted images.

How a Mosquito Operates -Winsor McCay, 1912

Collision -Max Hattler

Abstract, political short film

Collision (by Max Hattler) from Max Hattler on Vimeo.

Kong Climbs the Empire State Building, 1955
animation and relating sound now used to tell the story 


Diegetic & Non Diegetic sound
information  


Len Lye -Free Radicals, 1958
Created by scratching onto film 

Norman Mclaren -Synchromy,1971

Made using an optical printer

Planning ahead and time organising..

In wild life documentary's such as ones by David Attenborough, he might be seen to be wearing the same clothes in most of the shots, this is because these things can take months even years to film and when it comes to editing and they need to cut and order clips to make the program flow to make it seem to the audience that it's all in order and was filmed that way, so if he kept changing his clothes, it wouldn't look so good and it would make it harder to arrange video clips from different times which may be for another year even.

Motion Graphics and Animation can be seen in News and Advertising all the time

you can also find it in anything from phones to computers to billboards.

Thursday 25th
Presentation
Magic Lantern - slides that present a story
Slide Carousel
Presentation - tool used for buisness > more expensive
Conecting to a lot of people at once
First developed for mac bought by microsoft
Video / sound / animation
Towards a common understanding
Snr(t)aminski.com
Davidbyme.com/art
Aninconvenienttruth.co.uk
Pptworkbench.com

Photoshop

Thursday 18th November
We were taught the basics of photoshop CS5 and scanning an image

Pieces of work...

The Two ways of life by Oscar Rejlander is made up of 36 images

John Heartfield, part of the Dada movement, created political montages and played with scale.

Hannah Hoch 

Raoul Hausmann

David Hockney

Peter Blake, Beatles album cover, lonely hearts. his work allows him to play with time putting people together in the image that wouldn't be possible with photography alone.

Richard Hamilton

GigaPan: A huge number of images together taken by a camera on a tripod and joined together

Site Link

Scanning a negative photo & Montaging

set scan mode to transparency, Positive. Save image at about 1200 dpi

Montaging notes..

Open image in photoshop and clean up with retouching tools. add any filters/ effects to improve image colour etc.

to cut out images magic wand can be used for a quick outcome. when selecting areas you can change the tolerance so that areas of slightly different colouration that you don't wan't selected are missed out.

alternatively you can use the polygon lasso while the image is selected with magic wand and you can click around the section that shouldn't be selected and remove it from selection.

To use the image rather than remove the outline go to.. select > inverse and it will select the content that was outlined.

To move around the image while using a tool hold the space bar and drag the page.

Photoshop CS5 Tools

We used image slides and scanned them in then cleaned up the image in photoshop. Then to try out some basic montage we got some images from the web and edited them into the scanned photo. Below is the result that I created using the scanned photo and three images of animals from the web.

Thursday 10th November
Something in our life...
In this session we each were asked to think of something memorable in our lives that stood out and when we had all thought of something weather it be moving house, travelling, family, friends, pets etc. We were then told we had to create a piece representing it either drawn or computer made in pairs. I worked with Rachel and we based our work on the idea of friendship, how we had chosen to do the work together through being on the same course. What we produced was a drawn image of a book cover idea this incorporated the idea that we were doing graphics and the piece was a book design, also we used the title of 'graphics' and at the bottom the words 'Friends' 'Future' & 'fate' and we left the center blank from the idea that we were at the begining of our lives so there was no content so far.

Thursday [Date]


Performance
We were set a task in small groups of 2-3 again to find somewhere to sit for 10 minutes and take in what was going on around us then come back and put together a quick performance piece to show what we had seen however we were not allowed to use any dialogue, only sounds and actions. This was to show there is more ways of communication and how much of our body we use to communicate. I found the thought of doing the task quite difficult but once we started to plan and knew we would have to do it I just got on with it and played my role in the group.

Thursday [date]


Drawing
To begin drawing, working as a team and coming up with quick ideas we split in to two groups of three to four people. We were given two four pieces of A1 paper to stick together to make one big piece and a piece of charcoal each to draw with.
The only thing we were told is that we were like a 'tribe' and we had to draw something on our paper as a group, then swap over and add something to the other teams piece until the pages were filled. I think this was a pretty good task as we weren't really set any rules, apart from not making it into anything 'readable' such as drawing a sun etc.
Seeing the finished pieces with a bit of everyone's work on it was good, you could see how styles from each team were used on the two pieces.


I think this workshop was good for getting people to work as a team and because of it being set up that we were in a way against the other group and using the paper and drawings to interact we had no choice but to interact with eachother.