Lecture: Roland Barthes

The lecture will be focused on The Death of the Author - Essay wrote in 1967 
Camera Lucida wrote in 1980 

• Death of the Author is short assay in which Narties expands on his idea about how we responds to and interpret the messages we are sen through images and texts. 
• He was witting quit often words text and image. 
• It is important to interpret ate those words meaning so we can have more understanding by reading the author's texts. 
• It is up to us what we are going to interpret ate the text about. 
• " To give a text an Author is to impose a limit on that text, to furnish it with a final signifies to close the writing"
• Barthes is not simply talking about a literal author, or the individual creator of work. He's talking about the idea that there is some direct transmission process from the creator of a message to the receiver of that message. 
• BArthes suggests that all "massages" are constructed with a social and political context (time, place and sensibilities) 
• " Text is made of multiple writings, drawn from many cultures" 

The reader /viewer has more responsibility to the text than the author. The complexity of the different connotations and experiences that come from the author into the text are hidden when it arrives with the reader. 

The death of the author- the creator is giving clear description of the art. You can't translate it in an other way than what you have been given. 

Where in Barthes audience and creators has their on interpretation about the Art. 

Postmodernism is was introduced is a stand point, and this could be interpret ate in a different meaning. 

RIchard Prince was changing the actual Art image and interpret ate it into a different meaning. Like in Malboro advert. Not advertising its own cigarettes but trying to give the image the new meaning. 

Camera Lucida 1980 

• Unlike his other writings the book is persona and subjective. The book is very personal to him, he writes everything in a first person never in third. Writing his book from his own experience. 
• He was trying to send the message what photography is all about (at the time) 
• He talks about approach in Camera Lucida where he discuss photography from the perspective of the viewer. 
• He talks about travelling. Being there, to take photographs. 
• " I wanted to learn at all costs what Photography was in itself" 
• Barthes is frustrated by the problem of photography which hinges it to reality no photograph without something or someone. He calls it a "fatality"
• He wonders how we see the photograph if we can only see the referent . That's why discussions of photography are concerned with the history and sociology. 

The key terms in this book:

• The Operator- The photographer 
• The Spectator - The viewer of the photograph 
• The spectrum - what is despite in the photograph ( term related to the idea of spectacle ans also spectre ) 

Observe Subject: 

He talks about the posing in a very philosophical way. Not everyone can understand it, so it is important to translate in any possible way for yourself, so you can understand what he was actually writting about. He finds some images intriguing because of their discontinues elements, their heterogeneity they have interest "adventure"

The image: Koen Wessing : Nicarague 1979

 

He defects in these images information that he can recognise and understand and elements in the image that seem to be beyond his understanding. 

He goes on to define the two senses he obtains from the photograph. 

2nd Key therms: 

• Studium- general interest. Something that you have own opinion about it, doesn't have to be something that you don't like as well. 
• Punctum - Something that is available for everyone. Refers to the range of photographic meanings available and obvious. 
• To inform to present to surprise to course to signify to provoke and desire. It is something you like but you don't necessarily love it. 
• It can be also translated as: Unary- the image is a unifies and self - contained. The image dont have much to say . They are not bad photographs just unremarkable. 

Punctum : Shared intelectual understanding, Individual...

Not all photographs have this Punctum. No extra spark to it. Because it is something that attracts the attention.

Is not easily communicated through language 

Inspires an intensely private meaning in the viewer. 

The other view is that you can have your own interpretation about Art but you don;t have to share it with everybody, which means not everyone have to have the same description of the work. 

Something that is clearly presented on the image could be completely different story the author of the image.

  William Klein: little Italy , New York

Image is about the little's boys missing teeth not the actual clear message ( the gun pointing to little boy's face) 

Discernible - Obvious quirkls are not evidence of the punctum - this is a deeply subjective and non-rational response to images. 

Example: Image of Nadar - Savorgnan de Brezza, 1882 

The hand of one black male crossing the hands it's a punctum relative. 

Unmissable , uncoded instantaneous and intense it is the fragment that rouses the docile cultural subject that is the spectator of the stadium. To respond to the punctum , there must an openness to the photograph which based on the spectator's own particular interests. 

Barthes makes the point that he conventional flatness or emptiness of the photographed image (which people do not emerge, alive but are rather pinned down, dead or anaesthetised in the still image ) is altered by the discovery of the punctum. 

"Nothing surprising is, if sometimes despite its clarity the punctum should be revealed only after the fact, when the photograph in no longer in from of me and I think back on it". 

The Winter Garden photograph 

• In Part two of his book, he shifts his search for the essence of the photography from an investigation of many photographers to an intense analysis of just one. 
• 
  
• This is the famous Winter Garden Photograph of his mother which he found in November 1977. 

He is not reproducing the image, because for us it would be just a different photograph, another image in the book to flip over.

This is where the identification of photography with death and mourning becomes the strongest. Barthes was writing Camera Lucida shortly after his mother's death. 

The discovery of this early photograph of her exposes the distance between them the gulf of time. 

....That has been 

"....In Photography I can never deny that the thing has been there". 

Example; Alexander Gardner: Portrait of Lewis Payne in 1865 (just before he was about to be hanged ) 

In the future anterior tense of the photograph, Payne is both dead and is going to die. 

Although s "still, every photographs always represents this passing of the time from the future".

" I no know that there exists another punctum than the "detail" . This new punctum which is no longer of form but of intensity is Time. the locating emphasis of the noene. It's pure presentation" 

Punctum doesn't always have to be about the family or people, it maybe a photography about the tragedy about something that have happened. 

Image Example: Andre Kertesz: Ernest , Paris 1931 

Next week Seminar: Find a photograph that identify with personal studium. Something that tells a story about anything. Something that I like or not necessarily love. 

In the frame- Research- Documentary Photography

This research going to be about the documantary Photography which relates to the following Brief "in the frame". Documantary Photography is usually in Black and White prints and the most unique prints were made back in years when Photography was starting to develop. 

I personally like documentary Photography when I can see the actual people, and motions and some kind of real life scenario. Unfortunately many of those documentary photography is been planned so they are not a real life scenarios where people acting how they would want to. 

I have researched some artist that I have found interesting, and inspiring in some kind of way ( except my master Andy Sanderson) Some of them are the top celebrity's photgraphers and some of them are unique. Mojority of them relates to my ideas and visualisation of how I would like to do the shoots and take shots in Chester.  

Malick Sidibe, A Ye-ye posing,1963 (© Malick Sidibé. Courtesy
Fifty One Fine Art Photography, Antwerp)

Documentary photography is a style of photography that provides a straightforward and accurate representation of people, places, objects and events, and is often used in reportage. Until the mid-twentieth century, documentary photography was a vital way of bearing witness to world events: from shoot-from-the-hip photographs of the Spanish Civil War by Robert Cap. 

On the internet you can find various sources about the actual subject. but this time I have used the source I have never used before called "Youtube". I have watched some beautiful images of not well known photographers. However the images are just outstanding.  I have noted some details from that hour long film and of course over resources such like journals and books. 

Graciela Iturbide, Angel Woman, Sonora Desert, 1979

Resources from http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/d/documentary-photography

During this period the tradition of documentary photography was reinvented. Artists began to see the camera as a tool for social change, using it to shed light on injustice, inequality and the sidelined aspects of society. However, social documentary photography is often a subjective art and not all photographers in this category intend their images to aid the bettering of society.

Lisette Model’s close-up views of people on the streets of Paris, New York and the French Riviera were often taken without the subjects’ awareness or permission. From 1949 on wards, Robert Frank started to take pictures which reflected his search for artistic freedom, shooting stories which revolutionised the expressive potential of the medium.

I have researched book called Art and Photography by famous editor David Company. In that book I have found two interesting artists like Gregory Crewdson. 

Gregory Crewdson, an American artist renowned for his elaborately devised photographs of small-town life, digs into the commonplace and familiar to find images that are haunting, surreal and—most agree—profoundly unnerving. (Though Crewdson himself, we discovered, finds his work essentially “optimistic.”)

This artist is best known for his highly coulered still life tableaux which convey a claustrophobic sense of malaise. However , while doing this shot, he pulled the camera back and shot in monochrome , yet the effect is no less estranging. While the neighbours and a police cop look on, a man lays a turf lawn over the road. Turf is a com-modified packaging of the nature , making his activity less a visionary embrace of the wild than an impulsive act of modern frustration. In this setting he mocks the heroics of Land art. Whereas Land artists generally deployed the camera as a recording device for site specific work Crewdson involves in the creation of the image. His meticulous scene setting borrows as much from cinema as from documentary photography. 

Gregory Crewdson, Untitled , from hover series , 1996, 20 × 24 inches, silver gelatin print. All images courtesy of Luhring Augustine.

Untitled 
'Twilight'
2001-2002
48 x 60 in. (121.9 x 152.4 cm)
Digital C-print

Production Still (Brightview)
'Beneath the Roses'
2003
40.6 x 30.5 cm
Digital chromogenic print

He also have been interviewed by Allysa Loh and Alma Vescovi 
The link for this interview: 
http://theamericanreader.com/interview-with-photographer-gregory-crewdson/

Marilyn Monroe resting, 1955

Malcom X, Chicago , 1961

Joan Crowford, Los Angeles, 1959

Eve Arnold, left, with Marilyn Monroe during the filming of The Misfits, 1960

Widow Needing Companion. Dora Grubb and amateur painter at The Royal Academy of Arts, London 1961

Father Gregory Wilkins, Director of the society of the sacred mission at Kelham, Nottingham, 1963

Marilyn Monroe, Long Island, New York, 1955

I got them images from  https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2012/jan/05/eve-arnold-memorable-photographs

The longevity of Eve Arnold's career as a photographer matched the heterogeneity of her work. Despite the success of her portraits of the rich and famous, Arnold, who has died aged 99, was equally well known for photographing "the poor, the old and the underdog". She said: "It's the hardest thing in the world to take the mundane and try to show how special it is."

Arnold was the first woman to join the Magnum photographic agency, and much of her work fell within its tradition of in-depth editorial photography. She held characteristically trenchant views on the minority – and at times marginalised – status of female photojournalists, while being acutely aware of the role played by female stars as well as by unrecorded women the world over. The whole of the Magnum agency went on location to shoot John Huston's filming of The Misfits (1961), but it was Arnold's intimate portraits of Marilyn Monroe, fragile and poised by turn (including one incredible image, where she emerges from the black of a nightclub into the white glare of the spotlight, boogying uncertainly with a smiling Arthur Miller), that endured. Arnold not only befriended many of her subjects, including such greats as Monroe, Joan Crawford, Isabella Rossellini and Dietrich, but increasingly wrote about them as well as photographing them.

I really enjoyed researching this brief and I think I know how I can develop and explore my photography if comes about documentary or maybe as a journalist. I will deffinitely explore more of my ideas now than before I did my research. 

I quit enjoyed looking at Eve Arnold, as because I think she does a very unique pieces of work ( not just celebrities) but everybody else. She takes a very simple shots of people, but sometimes Im not too sure if the scenes are for real or not. But this is the special part from documentary photography, you never know what was behind the scene of the photo we see. Photos always explore some emotions, but sometimes they are fake however sometimes they are for real.  Majority of the time the real emotions are captured by photographers pointlessly. That's what I like to do, do very random shots of people doing their every day life business. I just have to captured them moments and explore the emotions on the prints I will make.  

In the Frame- Starting up

New Essginment is about shooting everything we see and make some kind of documentary out of it, without any decent subject or story behind it. To do this , first its important to do following parameters. Those I will consider while doing this project.
I'm going to start with things I am going to do first, and end with things I am going to do last in this parameters.

• Choose your favourite places to see and to photograph, but without the camera, come back with your camera and photograph interesting things along the way. 
• Make a spot circul on the map of Chester, and then document everything from the circul. 
• Select specific places on a map. Once they are selected, walk along the way and take photographs 
• While walking along the journey recognise decent sense (like: smell, touch, hearing, or taste), describing what I'm photographing. Trying to use a different sense each time 
• Picking some texture , shape or subject in my location and shoot examples of it. 
• Walk for some time around my chosen places, and stop to take several pictures of what is going on around me, while I've stopped. Making sure Im doing very random turns or go somewhere unfamiliar. 
• Following pedestrians for some time but without photographing them. See where they will take me along the way. Take the pics of the views along the way. 
• To find a place that interests me , and then turn around and photograph what's on the opposite side. 
• Taking pictures in a Black and White colour for a guide of my photography prints. 
• I have to use sit or stand position for a while. It could be either park, coffe, or bench or even gym. I need to photograph what I see while I stand or seat. including pedestrianise walking by and what passes by. 

After I take some decent shots I will put some answers bellow each point, like what I have done and what's my experience. 

Before I start to do all this, Im going to research something about photographs who does the same things, and maybe get some inspiration of them, or eventually do some more research about specific artist for more detailed subject. I'm going to try to research about at least 2 photographers that are familiar with this brief, my main source going to be , "google", library books, and youtube. The last thing helps me recently quit a lot. Listening and making some notes about specific subject is much easier than read the whole article or book about one person or one thing , and take some notes out of it. While Im watching documentaries about photography I'm making some notes as I go. 

Pictorialism- Henry Peach Robinosn

Henry Peach Robinson was born in 1830 in Ludlow, England. He sadly passed away in Tumbridge in 1901. Beginning of his photography career was made from Dr. Hugh Diamonds instructions. 
Some key points about Robinosn: 

• He made combination of prints, joining multiple negatives to create a singe image. 
• He was doing pictoresque aesthetic ( Artistic was of imagination) from painting, 
• He wrote books like : "Being Hints on Compositon", Chiaroscuro fro Photographers, Pictorial Effect in Photography.
• He abandoned the book selling trade and opened a photographic studio ( he was specializing in portraits)

H. Robinson was a photographer that used Pictoriasm as his technique of creating amazing images and was specialising in combination printing ( multiple negatives joined together, creating a singe image) . Pictorialism is a photo that emphasise beauty of subject matter, tonality and composition rather than documentation of reality. This method made a camera just a tool, that the paintbrush and chisel, could be used to make an artistic statement. Therefore Robinson photographs were called aesthetic value. ( artistically ). Some presume that, he was introduced to combination printing by Oscar Reijnader, one of his friends, and very first Photographer who discovered this method. Henry Robinson used this technique for much of his career and relied on it as tool for promoting his firm belief that , in the hands of artist who understood the rules of composition and lighting , photography could aspire to and achieve the status of pictorial art. 

However Many critics felt that photography was not and could never be art because it is a mechanical process . Other argued that the camera was like the paintbrush, simply one of many tolld available for making art. When Henry Robinson outlined his methods in 1860, he was getting howls of protest from people who seemed to feel that they had been deceived. But at the time, photographers who took the letter view,  turned their cameras towards picturesque subjects, such as landscapes and ruins , applying established rules of artistic composition and lighting. In order to established photography as a recognised art form it was important for Henry to demonstrate to critics how Henry's imagination and idealisation could be expressed photographically. 

Though Robinson is particularly known for his combination printing, he also produced a number of pictorial photographs of woodland and other scenes.

The Lady of Shalott by Henry Peach Robinson.
1861. Albumen print from two negatives, 12 x 10 in. (30.4 x 50.8 cm.).
 Unsigned. The Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas 
Image Recourse: The Lady of Shallot

Perhaps the most famous photograph that Robinson has taken is "When Day's Work is done."  The gentleman in the picture had appeared one day for a carte-de-visite, and Robinson earmarked him for this project. He then searched for a suitable old lady. Both were photographed in his studio separately and at different times, and then assembled. 

Henry Peach Robinson

12.6 x 18 cm (image); 28.1 x 37.7 cm (paper)

When the Day's Work is Done, 1877, printed January 1890

Photogravure, from "Sun Artists, Number 2" (1890)

The image source: When the Day's work is done

Quit often H. Robinosn was looking for costumed actors or society ladies modelled for his many bucolic scenes. It is because, since he found actual country people too awkward and dull to fit his ideal of the picturesque. The most famous picture that he have taken was "Fading Away". Shows a death of  a young girl surrounded by her family.  This photograph was taken in 1858. Albumen print from five wet collodion on glass negatives. 

Fading Away, composite photograph made from five negatives by Henry Peach Robinson, 1858; in …

George Eastman House Collection

The image source: Fading Away

For Victorian viewers, the image evoked not only the distressing reality of disease but also the romantic associations of consumption , which was combined with artistic creativity and unrequited love. Robinosn exhibited a study of Fading Away's central figure under the title " She never told her Love".

 On the other hand some viewers and critics in the same time, were disturb to see such a n intimate and morbid scene represented in a medium a realistic as photography, Victorian audience recognised that Robinosn had a photographed a model acting a part , not an actual dying girl. The contrived nature of the print (made from five separate negatives) may not been immediately apparent but the overtly theatrical nature of the composition with freezelike arrangement of figure framed by parted curtains, signalled that "Fading Away" was a staged scene. 

By Robinson's controversial way of composing his photographs, many critics or rivals were very straightfoward about his way of working in a Pictorialism. Another famous photographer Peter Emerson, called Robinson an "amature photographer" and later said in his book ( ) " This is an inane, flat, vapid piece of work, bigger and more worthless than ever. Its composition is childish and its sentiment puerile". He also said " images should never be altered after exposure" , and at the end he desired Robinon's practice of using costumed models and painted backdrops. 

Also Henry didn't leave it without making his statement:

 "Any dodge, trick and conjuration of any kind is open to the photographer's use.... It is his imperative duty to avoid the mean, the base and the ugly, and to aim to elevate his subject.... and to correct the unpicturesque....A great deal can be done and very beautiful pictures made, by a mixture of the real and the artificial in a picture." ( H. Robinson- Pictorial Effect in Photography – 1867)

And later he added: 

 “"I must warn you against a too close study of art to the exclusion of nature and the suppression of original thought.... Art rules should be a guide only to the study of nature, and not a set of fetters to confine the ideas or to depress the faculty of original interpretation in the artist, whether he be painter or photographer.... The object (of rules) is to train his mind so that he may select with ease, and, when he does select, know why one aspect of a subject is better than another."

 Yet Henry Robinson decided to it's going to be better in the future not to divulge the secrets of his craft , but leave people to enjoy the finished portraits. 

I believe that guy never stopped working and creating amazing and controversial images, even when people were criticising him he still kept his business and art photography going very well. He even kept receiving official honours and in 1892 became a founding member of the linked Ring " An association of prestigious Art photographers. He also use to write his own essays, and in 1862 Robinson was elected to serve on the Council of the Photographic Society, and continued to serve on that body until 1891. 

Reference: 

•  Robinson, H. P. (1860). On Printing Photographic Pictures from Several Negatives. British Journal of Photography, 7(115), 94.

• Britannica, Henry Peach Robinson, British Photographer, Written by: The Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica (2001), https://www.britannica.com/biography/Henry-Peach-Robinson
• Mpritchard.com, Robinson Henry Peach, Journal written by: Robert Leggat, (1999) , http://www.mpritchard.com/photohistory/history/robinson.htm
• Juliet Hacking, Foreword by David Campany (2012), Photography, The Whiole Story, London, Uk, Thames & Hudson 

Photography Lecture: What was and is Photography

Today I would like to mention and write about the topics effectively! 

I want to mention numerous topics I was introduced to at my 1st "Theory Photography" lecture, like:

• Wodgewood and Davey
• Niepce
• Daguerre
• Fox Talbot

I will write about them topics in historical order, this is because I would like to start from the very beginning and end on everything else. 

1826-1827: Joseph Niepce take what's is regarded as the earliest known photograph. View from his window at Saint -Loup-de Verennes

A Photograph of Joseph Niepce (1765 –1833)

Joseph Niepce was a French inventor of the very first photograph made in 1826 called "View from the window at Le Gras". It is the earliest surviving photograph, although there could be more photographs that were taken by others , however they haven't survived or never been discovered.  Niepce was experimenting with lithographic printmaking and then he discovered heliography. His interest to those subjects was caused by his ability to draft images by hand. While experimenting with his lithography he also had a go to play with light-sensitive varnishes and then images produced in camera, unfortunately he was unable to prevent images from fading.  After experimenting with solution of bitumen of Judea, he have realised this solution make the best effort. That solution was dated back to the ancient Egyptians but continued to be used for making lithographic engravings in the 1800's. 

Niepce has produced great piece of work with his lithographic skills and experience. In 1822 he made heliograph from an engraving of Pope Pius VII, unfortunately this piece was destroyed during an attempt to copy it some years later.  In 1826-1827 Joseph coated a pewter plate with the same solution from his previous experiments and placed the plate into a camera that was looking out from an upstairs window oh his house. The exposure was about 8 hours long (at least), but after the exposure the plate was washed with a mixture of oil lavender and white petroleum, dissolving away the parts of the bitumen that had not been hardened by light. The final result came as a permanent positive photograph on pewter. The photograph represents view of outbuildings, courtyard, trees and landscapes. Because Niépce could produce only a singular photograph with any exposure he made, the object on view is the unique original; the creator could not make duplicates of it.

The reason why the very first photograph is very difficult to read is because the chemical and physical characteristics of the heliographic process and the reflective nature of the pewter plate. Later a special enclosure have been made to create an environment that gives maximum lighting and positioning for viewing the plate. Most visitors who would like to see this photograph in real life must view the plate at an angle. Viewing from the back corners of the display case allow us to see the image most effectively!. 

Enhanced version of Niépce's View from the Window at Le Gras made in 1826 or 1827.
Made with camera obscura.

One of the three earliest known photographic artifacts, created by Nicéphore Niépce in 1825. It is an ink-on-paper print, but the printing plate used to make it.

The images source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nic%C3%A9phore_Ni%C3%A9pce

Portrait Project - Evaluation of Work

In my last project called " Project 2" I have been doing few photoshoot sessions regarding the portriat brief crateria. What I wanted to present was the actual topic that I have discussed with my collaborator. Together with her we were making very interesting scenarios on each shoot that we did together. The main topic was about , healthy life style and physical & mental health. Also I have considered what she enjoying doing the most and what she use to like to do when she was a little girl. I thought of doing one session outside when the weather was alright, as at the time the weather conditions were horrible and I was worried that, the equipment could get damaged because of the amount of rain that have covered entire town. Afterwords I planned to do another 2 sessions in the studio to present my collaborator  in a studio lights. 

At the beginning of the outside photo-shoot I was a bit disappointed because the shoots didn't go well as I planned and wished at the time. I think this was because I have forgotten to borrow an extended flash. It was after 4 pm and there was beautiful sunset which I was trying to capture as a background to the image , but it seemed to be to difficult for me, and I couldn't set up the camera , and do one good shot of my collaborator together with sunset in the background. So I think at the time my experience with DSL camera wasn't too confidant unfortunately, however I have learned to watch tutorials and remember about an extra equipment that I may have to use shooting pictures outside while the sun is down. 

The next step was to start experience with a studio lighting and equipment. I had some photography studio experience before, but it was long time ago, so I think  that I have forgotten most of the important information about how to work in the studio while taking shots. However, when I started setting up the studio lights and shoot scene like the background gels etc. I personally think I did quit well. I have been in the studio only twice while taking shots to the project, and each time I was learning something different. Each time I had some new ideas coming up to my and my collaborator's mind, and we were trying to progress those ideas in a best possible way. Of course the main focus was on the correct lighting and how to present the topic on the collaborator. 

I think working on my own without any help is the best way to learn because nobody can do anything for you. I just had to try hundred of times to set up the lights and finally I had the right light with the right pose and face expression. I personally believe if somebody would have to change the setting of the lights each time we wished to then we wouldn't learn as much as on our own. I have also learned to make sure that the background is clean enough to avoid unwanted finger or foot prints later on, during editing the photos. 

Working experience with my model was amazing. I think , this time I had a very really good model if we are talking about cooperation! We have spoken in the same mind language, she completely understood what message I was trying to pass onto the photos, and she gave her best to show it off to the camera. Like I have shown before , we have spoken about her favourites, her personality , her hobbies etc. and later on that day we came up with the plan for the photo-shoot that we could do together. Sometimes me or her came up with a new ideas while we were shooting in the studio or outside. 

While I was editing in the Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop I didn't find any difficulties doing that. I like working on a Adobe programs , producing great pieces of work, not just the photography one but the illustrated one as well. I tried to do well shots so I wouldn't have to spend too much time on editing my images from any of those sessions, but session like the outside one was just so difficult to capture for me so I had to use the photoshop and lightroom for bit longer than I usually do while editing the images for a final prints. 

The prints were bit more difficult because, once I have produced all necessarily images and final pieces to print out my pen drive broke down, and all the memory was unable to reopen or even print. This situation happened just a week before the deadline, and at the moment I had nothing to show in my portfolio as  a print version, because non of my images were ready to put in portfolio therefore , I tried my best to edit those pictures that I have done before. Unfortunately I didn't have a time to do them all , like I did before. Therefore I don't have own any prints on me from this project. And this is another lesson I have learned, to make sure you have saved all of your pictures as a back up just in case something goes wrong. 

Keeping my journal was a very easy thing. I like to write either on the blog or in the sketchbook about my experience and my goals and achievements. The only thing in my blog that I have forgot to write about is the very first sessions of how to use a camera, and my sample shots from outside. Maybe I should make a note of that next time as I could remember to take extended flash with me next time I am out to take some shots. Writing the journals is a good thing to have a recap of what I have done so far and where I am at, so I don't get into confusion and making sure what I have to do next to achieve the best results possible. Also the journal is a good place to write a quick comment about your own work and what you like about it and what you're planning to do to improve it maybe. 

I personally believe that the best part I have done in this project was the end results. I have spent a lot of time trying to make the end effects the best possible. Unfortunately, as I said before I had to do my work twice, and I was very short with deadlines etc. However from what I have done so far I'm pretty positive to be honest with my audience. I also enjoyed thinking about new ideas while being in the studio. I don't also like planning so much stuff ahead of me because sometimes they just don't seem to work the way I wished, therefore spontaneous ideas are good to do sometimes. I also think I improved my skills in setting up the lighting on my own. 

On the other hand the most difficult part of this project was, the actual outside shoot. The dark light was just so depressing for me, and I wasn't too happy with the end results when I have finished shooting pictures that day. 

If there would be anything that I would like to improve next time, it is definitely the photo-shoot outside, trying to catch the sunset. Next time I will use extended flash light to my camera to make sure my images are the best quality possible. And another big problem, printing my images that I have done. Next time I will print them straight after I have done them so I could have at least samples for my portfolio next time. On the other hand it is always handy to own memory device that is good quality and it's save to keep your beloved images that you desperately need. 

Final "prints" images

Pose Image 

In that image I would like present "the pose", which represents a very strong and confidant woman with a boxing gloves. As the subject mentioned before, she was always independent and strong little girl, and now by trying a boxing, her self confidant is the highest than ever before. The pose shows perfectly well that she is not afraid of anything and anybody. And the black and white form just presents it all in the best way possible. 

Camera Details: 

DCamera Model: Canon EOS 7D

F-Stop: f/8

Exposure time: 1/125 sec.

ISO Speed: 100

Focal Length 80mm

Max aperture: 4.625

The Face Image 

This is one my favourites images. The image brings attention to the subject's face. and I think it looks very well. While doing questionare with my subject she said to me what she enjoys and what brings her smile on her face. Her repsond was a jumping rope, that's brings her smile on her face the most while excersising. No wonder why, jumping rope presents a equipment that everybody used while being a child. And this is what brings her memories back, a jumping rope that she is using now as a excersising routine. The smile is not so big but its not a " fake" smile like sometimes can come out.

Camera Details: 

DCamera Model: Canon EOS 7D

F-Stop: f/8

Exposure time: 1/125 sec.

ISO Speed: 100

Focal Length 117mm

Max aperture:5

The clothing Image 

On this photograph I wanted to represent a clothing scene. On a photoshoot I had few outfits to try on and present in front of camera but, I think this is the one which suits to everything perfectly well.
Because the whole shoot was about my subject and from what she have mentioned she felt comfy in track suit and fitness clothing , so I thought presenting my subject with a fancy leggings and popular gym top could work together with weights lied on a floor. I think the only thing that is missing on this image is fake sweat, to make the picture looking more realistic.

Camera Details: 

DCamera Model: Canon EOS 7D

F-Stop: f/7

Exposure time: 1/125 sec.

ISO Speed: 100

Focal Length 50mm

Max aperture: 4.625

The Props Image 

On the other hand, on this image you can see my subject only with a weight in her hand standing up, looking at the camera. At the beginning I thought only one weight could not be enough to represent a props option , but then once I have edited the image I thought this can actually work because the weight is a big one, and it's quit distinctive, and that's the first thing we are focusing on when we looking at the image. And I think this is , what is about in the props details. 

Camera Details: 

DCamera Model: Canon EOS 7D

F-Stop: f/8

Exposure time: 1/125 sec.

ISO Speed: 100

Focal Length 80mm

Max aperture: 4.625

The Location Image 

This Picture is from my outside shoot I have taken at the River Dee. This was the place where my subject were spending majority of her time together with her family and friends when she was a young girl. Personally shooting her at the River Dee have brought her to a happy memories at the time of the shoot, and this made a lot of difference to me, even though, the weather conditions were sunny but cold, she didn't complain about it. This image is suppose to represent my model, at the River Dee and looking ahead of her. This perfectly represents her personality and the point that she is inspired by everything that going on around her. 

Camera Details: 

DCamera Model: Canon EOS 7D

F-Stop: f/5

Exposure time: 1/50 sec.

ISO Speed: 3200

Focal Length 80mm

Max aperture: 4.625

Practice Photoshoots

In this post I will talk about the practical side of the photoshoots I did and the final prints I wasn't able to print at the end (due to broken Pen drive). Luckily I had a backup on my PC of the images I did outside and in a studio sessions.

I think the first shoot outside didn't go well, I went outside to take some nice shots many times, trying to catch sunset, because I thought it would look very beautiful on the images. Unfortunately I haven't thought of taking an extra extended flash with me.... Therefore I have ended up with very dark and blurred images I don't necessarily like, but I decided to share it anyway, because I know what I have done wrong and I'm just learning from the experience and I know next time I'm going to use extra necessarily equipment. Within few days the weather was nice but was very cold outside and sometimes my camera got cold and the battery died very quickly, which made the shoot even more difficult. Therefore I tried very hard to do any shots out there, and make the images work at the end.

So here are some of the images from the outside. 

As you can see, it's not what I have planned and mentioned in a previous post I did about how I would like the shoots to look like. I think its due to the location. 

My subject were talking about what place reminds her of nice happy childhood times, and she pointed the River Dee for the place where she spent most of her childhood with her parents and friends.  So I thought of taken the images over there and use props of her fitness equipment. She is doing personal training as well, so she can use the equipment for sure. Some of the shots went well, but as you can tell from the images that, I was struggling with the light, even though I had very good quality camera. Unfortunately I seems like I couldn't use it properly. 

I choose only comple images that I have edited in lightroom and photoshop as well (for a better effort). 

The next photoshoot I did was in a studio but with much more props than I have used on the previous photoshoot. I think this time the shoot went much better than the other one, which I tried to make work many time while not having extended flash. 

This time I wanted presented my subject in a proper way she imagine. We worked together how the props is going to work, and if they going to work. Sometimes the light was awful because of my own fault, but sometimes the equipment just didn't work the way it should. So it took us many hours in the studio to figure out what's going to be the best pose, face, clothing and props etc.

All images you can find in my google photo album by clicking at the link below. 

All Photos from Studio sessions

And all edited images you can find in here: Portriat Brief- Ready Edited Images

This google album shows all of the images I have taken in two days time. Of course just like in a every shoot, some images went very well and I didn't need to edit them too much but some of them are just right but I still decided to show them off just like the ones from previous shoots, because of the same reasons. I would like to show what went wrong what went well, what worked and what I should leave behind. As on the previous subject we used many fitness props but this time there are a lot of them, and we  had plenty to choose from, and think what we can show on the images and telling the "story" about the images. 

I have taken some examples of the images and poses I can use from the books I have been given my unviersity. ( Photography: A cultural History by Mary Warner Marien & Art and Photography by David Company. Those books gave me some sort of inspiration and samples of what my camera could do this time. I didn't read them books before I have done my very first shoot session ( which I should do ). And that's why I think it is very important ant to read books , and look at the even very old images from back in 19th century time because they given you a very good flavour of thinking. I got more ideas in my head after I have red them books. 

The equipment that were used in them photoshoots were: small and big weights, jumping rope, boxing gloves, Yoga matt, sweating tower. 

The Clothes that were used: 2 different sets of sports clothes. Light colours were essential as the background was black so I wanted something to stand out from the background, and something that could potentially work. 

Unfortunately I did some samples of the images I wanted to print out, but decided to print it out later, but the day before the deadline, my pen drive got broken (somehow) and I have lost all my edited images I have chosen to be my final prints. 

Therefore the only way I can show my final "Prints" is on here, and also there are not exact images I have edited before, purely because I just didn't have a time to do them all in a one go. 

But I'd like to present you a collage of images I have tried to edit and present at the end. 

As you can see all the images I have edited. The program I used this time was mainly lightroom but of course I had a go in a Photoshop CS5  as well ( mainly because I don't own a lighroom at home) 

All images were taken by camera Canon EOS 7D- which is brilliant for any type of shoots. 

At the end my pre-evaluation is that, the over all feedback from myself is: It went ok, but I should be more proffessional if comes about lighting and using the extended camera equipments. I would change the first session of the shoots outside, because they aren't too great but they have gave me even more inspiration than I had in my mind while I was taken them. I think next time I will try my best to do better shots so I won't have to spend so much time editing the images I would like to present as my final ones.