Colour

Well its time for me to start the third section of The Art of Photography, after the comments from my tutor I have decided I need to do a lot more to my blog, adding what I have been reading watching and attending as well as my thought processes as I go through this section what research I have done and also including some of the shots that didn't quite work.

As a member of our local photographic society I get the chance to take part in competitions both internally and externally which is another way of having my work critiqued, we also have various presentations and talks from visiting photographers including Gavin Hoey who gave us a very interesting and informative talk on photo shop and how to use some of it.

I also watched an interview with David Bailey and Dylan Jones it was one of the hays session 2011 and was shown on sky arts. In the interview Bailey as he is referred to talked about a recent book he had published where he went with Dylan Jones to photograph military personnel both inside camp bastion and out in the open where the action was.
During the interview it was interesting to see that he basically referred to the book as a book of 'snaps' quite unlike anything he would normally produce but that he wanted to try and portray as much as he could what life was like out there, all proceeds of the book are going to the help for hero's charity. I found the interview interesting as he was more interested in trying to persuade people to buy the book to raise more money that taking any credit in the photograph's for himself, quite a thought provoking interview.
Now down to the project one: What makes a colour? One of the first things I decided to do was ask a small section of people to tell me what certain colours made them think.
The colours I picked were Red, green, blue, yellow, orange, Purple, as I expected most people agreed on the fact that Red is warm also yellow and orange are warming colours, and blue and green are cooler and also calming reminding people of fields and the sea. Yellow people classed as energy.  the colour that surprised me was purple, it was called Gothic whichI hadn't really considered, but they all agreed that the colour purple also meant luxury.

Photograph one is at the correct exposure F6 1/80 colour is very good and texture looks correct.
Photograph two one stop under F4.8 1/80 too light and texture not good.
photograph three one third of a stop under exposed F6.3 deeper colour
Photograph four two thirds of a stop under exposed F7.1 even deeper colour
Photograph five one full stop under exposed F8intense colour.


I noticed that the colour was much deeper on the under exposed shots but that it didn't do justice to the artificial grass that I had photographed,i noticed that the detail was not so apparent either, although I must admit there is something 'rich' looking about the one stop under exposed shot that I quite like.

Above are two photographs that I tried taking of a red dress but I found that I wasn't happy with the finished results, I also tried a painted door but again I was unhappy with the end result as all the doors I could find had windows in them and I really wanted one that was solid.

The first of these photographs show the correct exposure and the second show one stop over exposed making the red look more pink, completely wrong.

Assignment Two elements of design

 Well the time finally came for me to do assignment two, I knew I wanted to do food as my subject as besides photography its another one of my interests.

I was trying to go decide how to go about it when on sorting through some veg that were getting 'past their best' I decided to use them as my project.

I set up on the dining room table with the help of a lamp shining through a canvas and the help again of my long suffering husband helping by holding the reflector and I was ready to go.

Because the products I chose to use were not perfect I also decided to use my well worn chopping board to give abit of texture and feel to some of the shots.

My thoughts on doing it this was was to be a bit different, most people take perfect fruit and veg but I wanted to see whether it would be possible to use my selection and still get some good shots.

So finally how do I feel now that I have got to the end of this assignment and what have I achieved?

I am pleased to get to the end of this assignment which took me a lot longer than I had originally hoped and planned, although I didn't really touch my camera for a few weeks I did try to look at pictures in magazines and try and work out how they had been set up.

I feel as though I am on my way now and that I look at things in a different way now, hopefully with a photographers eye, I find I look at the shapes that can be made now in pictures.

I am ready to start part three with a renewed passion and a positive approach.

Well the results are in on this assignment and overall I am pleased with them I intend to re do a copule of the shots at some point, and I realise that I need to put a lot more information in my blog something which hoefully I will rectify going forward.

rhythms and patterns

Pattern: When you look around you there is pattern everywhere the problem being what looks good in a photograph?
Photograph's one and three were taken when I was putting the decorations up, I had put the tree in the window and noticed that the light caught on the glitter showing the pattern up. Photograph one is my favorite of this set I think it shows the pattern the best and how the eye can be drawn in two ways either up and down or across then up. Photography three was one of the first ones I took but overall I wasn't so happy with this one.
Photograph two is part of a shower curtain, I have found that since I started studing pattern I look for it all the time and fabric and wall paper often have good example of pattern on the.

Photographs two and three are really included as extra's as although they are both of pattern I think that one is the stongest.

Rhythm: This one was slightly more tricky but again I settled on  the tree adding a small decoration half way up this time the eye can again be drawn either from side to side or up and down but there is a 'stopping point' around the middle of the picture that adds interest to the pattern.

I decided to process one as black and white but I think the image is more 'muted ' in this one.