Evaluation: Portraits

For this project we have looked at several different photo formats, from large format film, to digital.
I have made series of photographs based mainly on Cecil Beaton, using a medium format camera and film, as opposed to a large format camera. I have also taken colour digital photographs to go with the black-and-white film pictures and back them up. I think this project has gone really well, especially since I had to take the photos, develop and edit them in two weeks. The images themselves have turned out better than I expected. The first shoot I did I lost most of the images, but the second one was much better, and I didn't loose a single one. Overall, there is only about 3 photos not in focus, including on the film that got caught in the first photo session.
I'm happy with how the images have turned out - even though they don't all work together, they are all pretty good images in themselves. Of the 3 film images I've chosen to use, all are very different, but very similar. They are the same size and shape and hats and flowers feature prominently. Although I didn't mention flowers in my initial proposal, it seemed natural for me to include hair-pieces generally.
I did struggle a bit with the dark room - I don't think I developed of the negatives correctly, part of one is mostly black but still usable. The grey-scale varies between the pictures, and image that went wrong the first time I developed it, is much darker on re-doing due to (I think) using fresh chemicals or leaving in the developer for the correct time.

magazine stuffs

Magazines/Papers
Metro - cross between magazine and newspaper. Has both photographs and written stories - from breaking news to interviews with actors. The paper covers a wide range of different subjects, reviewing films, games and similar, writing about celebrities, the weather, important news, and fashion.
The fashion page has a plain background with cut out clothes pasted on it. There is a small paragraph next to each item saying what it is, where its from, and the price.

Sew Hip -  a sewing magazine, all the photographs are of young women and children but the actual content seems to be aimed more at retired women. Although the actual theme is practical based, it is very feminine, with a lot of pink, household items and childrens stuff. However, very instructive.

G2 (Guardian TV Magazine) - a short daily magazine full of random facts and topical news, with that days television at the end. The first pages are about topical news, with a run down of the days topics of interest, the next articles are all more cultural, while still based in current news trends. The magazine also contains several art, TV and theatre reviews.

Grow Your Own - monthly gardening magazine. Colourful and instructive - with coloured - usually green, sometimes red - boarders round extra info. Articles include pest control, Q&A, and what to start growing/harvesting now. With 'specials' including celebrity chefs winter recipes and whether or not a small-holding is a good idea.

Videos!
How to build a room divider, by Nuts and Bolts
Intro: title sequence showing close-ups of things being cut/screwed etc fairly proffessional looking.
Main: two presenters, introduce concept of design. The then show how to make the divider, while talking you through it. Made on MDF, dreadful colours and held together almost entirely by glue. All materials pre-cut - not as informative as it could be, very little genuinly useful info.

How to fix holes in your wall, by MattG (Fixin' things with MattG)Intro: small clips running across screen, nothing filling screen. Semi proffessional
Main: fills in pin holes with toothpaste, then goes off on a tangent about 'midget throwing' and Russian spies. Tells you 'facts' about toothpaste - such as how 'people used to eat it on bread', etc. Bit weird, never thought of filling holes in the wall with toothpaste before.

How to make your own bath salts, by Do It, Gurl
proffessional looking.
Intro: title sequence showing previous episodes and spray painting 'do it, gurl' on a pink background
Main: behind black counter, with brick work background. presenter gives ingredients list, and mixes them together in a jar. She is chatty, informal, and passing on potentially useful information.

Saundarya - Eye make-up - How to get smokey eyes, by Saundarya
Entirely in an Indian language [Hindi?]
Proffessional looking - filmed in a salon, by CareWorldTV
Intro: heavy graffics to start, really creepy all white women, like plastic maniquins.
Main: several different cameras, looks shoot in one go. Takes eye-shadow from same place on pallette each time, which is confusing. However, completely understandable, despite being in a different languange, and fairly useful, if its what you're looking for.

Red Carpet Make-up tutorial, by Beauty Smarties Showdown
Intro: just the presenter showing the look and saying hi - unproffessional, filmed in her bedroom
Main: one main shot, with close-ups for when doing eye make-up. Several speed-ups, dodgy cuts. Most like spent on eyes. Chatty, talkative throughout, but quite dull to watch.




see also: http://cerijudd.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/mark.html

http://cerijudd.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/magazine-stuffs.html

Proposal

For this magazine I would like to look at fashion, particularly homemade. The video I have to make will also be based around the same subject. The video will use the same still images as the magazine as well as some others, I do not want to use actual video, or a voice over; although I will include music.

The video will be still images edited to a sequence selling at once the idea of making your own and the designer. The magazine will be selling my fashion designer - Bina Miyangar - to a wider audience, and showing what people normally wear in and around town. The magazine will have a simple layout of full page images, with an interview over top on one side.

Influences have been fashion magazines and information things on you tube that the tutor has shown us. Many of them were more information based than photographic - however I don't think what I make will be so comprehensive.

I will need a camera, studio, patterns, and general dress-making stuff (fabric, needles pins, thread etc)

schedule: all done by 1st feb

Large Format Camera

During lessons we have been looking at large format film cameras - the sort that Cecil Beaton and co. would have used.
In the first lesson, we used photographic paper to take the photos, so that we could get used to using the cameras and experience the time it would have taken for the original photographers. Cutting it down to fit the slide, then using the enlargers to invert the image onto another piece of paper.

In the second lesson we used actual film, and took images properly in the studio, using and changing the lighting.

Taking photo's using a large format camera was much calmer than using digital. It was in entirely different experience, involving a lot more patience and thoughtful planning, which I tend to ignore when using digital

When developing the images, we discovered that some of the film may have been put in the wrong way, so out of 4 photos only one had been successful. We borrowed a negative from the other group, which was really 'thin' (most of the emulation had gone, very little contrast between light and dark) and took a very long time to get a good image from it.

Proposal

The concept of my portraiture based around Cecil Beaton and the very posed, still looking images that he and his contemporaries took. In particular I would like to look at hats as a fashion piece/statement. I will concentrate on head shots and close-ups.
The photo's will be taken in the studio, using a mix of both medium format film and digital formats. I'd like to use a combination of soft light and harsh to produce shadows. For that I will need three lights, with two soft boxes and a cone, I may also open the blinds so as to have as much light as possible, while still creating shadows. The models hair will be styled half up/half down
My influences for this project were Cecil Beaton and Horst P. Horst. To a lesser extent famous poses - such as Hamlet with a skull - have also influenced me, Rankin may also have an effect.
I will be producing 5+ images in a mix of colour - digital - and black-and-white - film. All the photos will be studio portraits with similar lighting, hair and clothing.

Rankin Photo Copy

As a group we copied a photograph by Rankin. playing with the lighting and exposure, and then changing the intensity and colouring to match, as close as posible, the original

Micheal Dean's edit

Rankin Image

Hill and Adamson; Napoleon Sarony

David Octavius Hill (1802-1970) and Robert Adamson (1821-1848) - calotype
Hill and Adamson were an arist and photographer team. Hill, wanted to document the separation of the Free Church of Scotland from the Church of Scotland, but being an artist, he planned to draw each of the 400 ministers present at this meeting. Hills friend, Sir David Brewster, seeing the difficulties in this plan, introduced Hill and Adamson. Adamson was a barely established photographer in Edinburugh. He knew Brewster, a scientist friend of William Henry Fox Talbot, through his brother, Dr John Adamson, and it was he that introduced Adamson to photography

Adamson and Hill were an excellent pairing, however. Hill directed the subjects, and Adamson took the photo. Together they photographed several series of photographs - nearly 3000 photographs - until Adamsons death in 1848, just 5 years after they met, and aged only 26.

http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/hlad/hd_hlad.htm
http://www.gla.ac.uk/services/specialcollections/collectionsa-z/hilladamson/hilladamsonbiographies/

Napoleon Sarony - photographer and lithographer
"lithographer and budding photographer recognized the opportunity presented by the ascent of theater in society and the innovations in modern photography and launched a studio on Broadway in 1866. Over the next thirty years he photographed virtually every star of the New York stage. Upon his death, it is estimated that he had more than 40,000 negatives of show business personalities in his possession."
http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA02/volpe/theater/theater/sarony.html