This piece is a collage of smllaer photographs. I edited a lot of different images then printed them all out ith the same square dimensions. I then taped them to an angled corner of a room with a special focus on the color distribution in the composition. I then phtographed the wall of photos and its relfection in a mirror. I particularly like how the different colors create balance in the piece. While it is difficult to interpret the subjects of some of the photoes like the ones that are upside down, I think my organization of dark and light as well as vibrant and dull suceeded nicely. I also apprecite the angular composition itself. While taking the photographs, it was difficult to predict how different perespectives of the corner would actual turn out to look like. The angled corner along with the angled mirror gives an interesting skew to each of the square photos. The differring texture as a result of the mirror's reflection also helps communicate my portolofio's continous theme of "different persepctives." Overall, the compliation of a diverse range of images edited in different ways allowed me to showcase all of the work I have done while also exploring new avenues of intepreting photography. I think the end result turned out to be aesthetically pleasing and interesting enough as well.
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I took this photo of the river on a pretty sunny day directly under a bridge. This created a nice shadow to see through the reflective, rippling surface of an eddie. I was trying to capture the image of a submerged rock, a subject that has always intrigued me. The moss on the rock turned out a lot clearer and more vibrant than I expected, with stark shadows and an undulating pattern. The spontaneous ripples also added a very interesting pattern that I could not have planned better. The original image included a brader scene of the river, so I was able to crop it to create a balanced, diagonal composition. I used adobe lightroom to emphasize the effect of the light in the water. I increased the clarity of the underwater scene and then reduced the clarity of the surface of the water (the white parts) in order to showcase the difference of what the viewer is actually looking at. My favorite part of the image is the contrasting highlights and shadows. I think the overall effect turned out amazing. It almost reminded me of images of the earth taken from space, so I decided to print the image out and place it inside a jar. The curvature of the jar emphasizes the ambiguity of the subject, allowing me to achieve my portfolio's overarching theme of "different perspectives." I have always wanted to take a successful photo of underwater, and this project turned out better than I originally planned.
This photo is an aerial shot of the dried up river bed. I took this photo with special interest in the dried rocks, the clear view through the water, and the creepy prominence of the river moss. I particularly like the prevalence of the rocks extending out of the water and how they are evenly dispersed and evenly elevated. I also like how the yellowish hue of the moss contrasts with the blue reflection of the sky. The depth of the shadows of the niches between rocks also adds nicely to the overall balanced intrigue of the piece. I think that looking at this piece makes a significant impression of looking though to another "world." It is evident that the rocks' chracteristics differ above and below the water; by taking the image parallel to the plane of the water, the illusion of rocks implanted into another material like glass intesifies. Overall, I enjoy how the image itself is very common-place but also very intriguing and almost grotesque. It evokes images of an ogre's swamp or the inevitable doom of flourishing oasises. The "new perspective" I used to remain continuous with my portfolio's theme is not only the subject material, but also the position from which I took the image. Most nature photos are take from eye level looking down at the subject at an angle. By looking straight down at the rocks, I supplied a new, broader perspective of looking at the world. It directly showcases the material while at the same time giving an uncomfortably different feel to familiar subject material. Even though I took this photo on a whim, the end result turned out to represent what I actually saw very well and communicates with it the feeling I experienced when I saw the endless field of dried mossy river rocks. For this project I tried to showcase the abstract concept of time and progress. I printed these three images on large glossy paper then plastered them on to a cylinder This encourages the question of whether the stack is being raised or razed. I really like how the images themselves turned out. They are very in focus, although I'm not sure how much I like how the subject is very centered. I like how the blue sky is reflected in the polished stone, but overall the image is rather colorless. Maybe I should have increased the saturation of the blue to emphasize its color. Even though the subject material is very centered, it is not completely symmetrical and it is sort of necessary to capture the entire object, so I think it worked out as well as it could have. It was pretty difficult to make the cylinder itself on which I matted these images, but I like how it is both large and 3-d. Overall, this was a fun piece to make and I think it was very successful in communicating my intended question of perspective.
I made this piece with two different photos of the same trees in my neighbor's yard. The first one I took in the summer and it is closer up to show the vultures roosting in the top branches. The second photo was taken a year earlier in the winter from my porch with icicles. I edited the vulture photo to make the contrast higher and the background darker to emulate some black and white photographs I had seen that seemed almost like infra-red images. I then printed the icicle image on clear paper and the vulture paper on smaller matt paper. I framed the larger piece and created a box to set the smaller piece in the back. This makes it so you have to look through the trees to see the roosting vultures.
I tried to make the set-up seem like a cheesy exhibit at a museum. The dark background and accentuated highlights makes the vultures seem hyper-realistic while the dead trees give the suggestion of an artificial setting that someone intentionally set up to provide the vultures context. I really like the contrast and I think that the branch texture unifies the piece very well. It is clear that the setting is continuous. I think the end product communicates my idea very well. It is evidently ironic that people try to exhibit things in their so-called "natural habitat" which ends up making the entire experience artificial. While the subject itself is very interesting, the presentation can cloud the viewers perception. I think I could have made the vulture image a bit lighter because right now it is difficult to see very well within the box. I also think it would have been cool to over-edit the front tree image, such as making it hyper-saturated and unnatural colors. The viewing box I made turned out better than I thought it would. I'm pleasantly surprised that my last photo shoot didn't go well or I wouldn't have looked back through my photos to find these. I took this photo of my table after I had been watercolor painting before I had cleaned up. In the foreground is my palette of mixed pigments. A paint brush angles in from the right and rests on the rim of the palette. Behind that there is a roll of twine on the left and roll of paper towel and a tube of paint on the right. In the center at the top, framed by the paper towel and twine, is a square of light coming in from the window illuminating the scene. The background is mostly white and blurry (an affect of photoshop) and the bottom quarter of the page- which is part of the palette- is also blurry and darker. The edges of the images are vignetted (in lightroom) to be darker. I framed it with the white, penciled side of a mattboard.
The use of texture in this piece helped me emphasize the unity of the piece. There are a lot of subjects- the palette, paintbrush, tube of paint, twine, etc. - so the focus of the image is difficult to interpret on its own. The original image was blurry at the bottom because I was focusing on the blue paint. By using photoshop to make the background a similar burry texture as the closest foreground I unified the piece. It is now clear that the focus is toward the center of the image and the paintbrush because those are the clearest parts of the image. The top and bottom of the piece have the same texture which makes it easier to group the different objects together in one idea. The original intention of this piece was to show what life is like in the absence of people. I hoped to communicate a sense of "recently departed" in showing how humans leave their mark on the world and how the world is stagnant (or in motion) when they are gone. I think I succeeded in this pursuit. The vignetting especially shows a shadow-y effect that makes it seem more stagnant. The image itself is obviously dependent on human action but at the same time is also obviously abandoned. I like this piece a lot more than I though I originally would. The mixed pigments and affects of the natural light makes the artificial scene very natural and elegant. I've always wanted to take a partially-blurry picture, but they never turn out as well as this one did. The frame looks like it was meant to be a mistake but is also elegant in itself and shows the lasting affect of humans. I did this because the plain was too bright and the plain black was too dark, and I like the final look. I think I targeted my theme of different perspectives very well in showing the perspective of life without humans. That which is left behind is beautiful too, and I think this photo works well to show that. This piece used a picture of elephant figurines lined up on a windowsill and layers of images of patterned carpets. The first image shows a small elephant with its trunk up following a larger elephant facing right while another smaller elephant faces the other two. A yellow, blue, and black geometric pattern is laid over (in photoshop) the elephants and is most visible on the windowsill, which horizontally divides the image about half way up. The second image shows the two smaller elephants facing the large one on the left. They are positioned lower down and another lighter image of the elephants is overlaid in the image and takes up the entire space. A zig-zag carpet texture with white, red, and black is overlaid on these images. The two pieces are matted side by side and each image is placed at an angle in the frame.
I think the use of value helped me enforce a sense of pattern. I found that in photo shop, depending on what layer is on top and what the opacities of each layer is, the images turn out differently. I put the elephant layers on top then slightly lowered their opacity while the texture layers were underneath and completely opaque. This made the texture and patterns show through only in the darkest part of the elephant images. I thought this was a really interesting technique and was invaluable when working with such repeating, intricate patterns and simple images of elephant figurines. You can see that the patterns are most evident where the values in the elephant images are darkest, such as the windowsill and the figurines themselves. I think that the use of layers really helped me achieve my goal of conveying "different perspectives." It's hard to tell which image is more important: the elephants or the carpet design. I like how they meld together to make one image but the viewer can also try to interpret them separately. By matting the two pieces together, I am also able to emphasize the importance of different perspectives in multiple situations. The conundrum of interlacing images does not just arise in one photo, but can be readily seen throughout life. I think I could have made this piece better by using different images other than elephant figurines. I think that using other toys, like rubber ducks, would have contributed more to the humorous idea. However, I was surprised by how well the layering worked out and I think that the compositions itself was successful, especially the image with two layers of elephants. I think that a lot of people will also like this, because it is generally simple and aesthetically pleasing, not to mention intellectually intriguing. This being my first photo edited in open studio, I think it turned out pretty well. I used multi-media by matting it on a piece of wood. I like the photo itself because it has a busy yet continuous background. I like the confined color scheme as well as the intersecting, diagonal branches. The composition works because the subject is offset from the center of the square. I think I succeeded in my idea of irony because the lightbulb seems to be growing from the branch. Moreover, by matting it on wood, it draws emphasis on the forest setting, reiterating the misplacement of the subject. I think I could have edited it better, with more contrast and saturation, in order to use printer paper and transfer the ink onto wood. Because I didn't do this, the end result is kind of fuzzy. I think I would also be more successful with indoor settings as the lighting is hard to control. I hope to do a similar thing as this photo in the future by purposely devising microcosmic ironies. However, this subject is pretty generic and I hope to focus in on more obvious, specific topics for the rest of my portfolio. |
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December 2016
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