Tuesday, July 20, 2010

About the project making process

I always thought that the hardest thing to do in such a thing as photography series/project is to come up with the idea, but now I know that it is just a third of a way you need to go by. I have understood on practice that updating and processing, and editing through updating and processing is the rest of the way, and maybe the most important its part.
Expressing yourself is very difficult, and I guess it is even more difficult when it depends on a kind of technique things that you just need to learn to work with in addition to reach your goal/make your vision real.
Also the project helped me to realize how it feels to arrange a photosession. I faced a lot of difficulties, and the biggest one was human-factor; people get late - it is normal, people have an opinion even on things they do not have to think about (I mean my work and my project) - it is normal, people want to look beautifully on pictures - it is also normal, people have different tastes and opinions on what is beautiful - it is normal, again. So, you must work and consider lightening, make-up, clothes, detailes, camera settings and mood of people you are shooting.
But there were a lot of good and not stressful things also; it was fun, because I was doing something that interests me a lot, and also because my friends were with me; I have learned a lot of technique things in my camera; and I met a lot of interesting creative people (from the chemistry gallery).
I really enjoyed the time I spent on doing my project that I named "Mosaics".

Project: Mosaics


Mosaics of different personalities, different colors, different expressions/emotions, different detailes... mosaics of my friends.























Thank to The Chemistry Gallery for cooperation.
Thank to our digital photography teacher, George Allen, for all the experience he shared with us. 

Ouka Leele

I read a small article and a kind of review of Ouka Leele's photographs.
Her exhibition that we visited last week, in my opinion, contains photographs that are beyound of just photographing things and people, it is something between paintings and photographs. She tries to stage scenes from old paintings, and at the same time to show people as they are.
I had very strange emotions after seeing her exhibition in Prague; so, I had a look on her works that we have not seen. And I find a lot of them very interesting, I like some details that are really eye-catching. On the other hand, I do not like her nude pictures. Also some of her works seemed to me kind of too staged; I had feeling that people should look more into the picture than 'pretending' to be there and creating an atmosphere.
Also Ouka Leele makes very creative combination of painting style details and a photograph; it looks out of reality, but still has a certain idea.

Composition Assignment

Rule of thirds


Framing




Leading lines
Point of view




Friday, July 16, 2010

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

I'm waiting for a respond from my friend's friend whether I can shoot in a studio this week or not (hopefully, I'll get the answer on thursday), but still made some self-portraits at home. Just had a couple of free hours.





Sunday, July 11, 2010

Shooting upd

Also here are some pictures with anaglyph-effect applied; still look very dark. 
Hpefully, I'll find the way how to make them look nicer.






Shooting

Petr Hajek, the owner of 'the chemistry gallery', allowed me to shoot in his gallery and use some of graffities by Damien (one of the painters who works in 'the chemistry production' studio) as backgrounds.
I've had no idea that it is so hard to arrange and manage shootings.
I faced a loooooot of troubles with the lightening... Fortunately, the guys who work there helped me a lot.
The graffiti-walls are very heavy and we had to carry them inside and back to courtyard several times. Also it was very hot, and I had to refresh everyone's make-up almost every 10 minutes.
Finally, I have some pictures that satisfy me, but still feel that I just do not have enough experience to photograph  in the way I see them in my head.






















If everything goes well maybe I will have an apportunity to shoot in a studio next week.

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Project upd


my friend looks like a ghost ... (((
We went to the united islands festival where some of my friends participated as graffiti-painters and Djs. So, I took some portraits in front of the grafities... and it was not a good idea. Now, I at least know that to make a good portrait (so, as it won't be so dark after the effect i apply) I need to use additional light.

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Depth of Field Asignment




SCENE 1:
1) 1/60 F5.6










2) 1/20 F22






SCENE 2:
1) ISO 100 1/40 F5.6








2) ISO 200 1/6 F22












SCENE 3:
1) ISO 100 1/60 F5.6 
                                                                                                                                             







2)ISO 200 1/5 F22








SCENE 4:
ISO 200 1/3200 F3.5
1) the widest setting of the lens







2) zoomed all the way in

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Upd

Finally, I've decided to do portraits for my project, because I feel that it interests me most than anything now.
Also I've made a small research on anaglyph effects and methods of making this kind of pictures, and a lot of people suggest to use 2 cameras at the same time to shoot the same photograph. It is said that the cameras [or better to say cameras' lens] should be placed in a distance as between human's eyes [approximately 6-7 cm], but then you can look at photographs only through stereo glasses; so, I've decided to try to use 2 cameras [+ I have 2 same Sony cameras for a while; why not to try!?], but put them closer to reduce the difference between pictures that then must be put one on another as layers [one pic in red and one in cyan colors].
I couldn't find any photographs/portraits to apply the effect on [within pictures taken by me]; thus, I've just selected a picture saved on my laptop from i-net and worked on it in photoshop. Actually, this picture is not that good for this kind of 'anaglyph' effect [the background looks kind of lost, and also a mole on girl's face confuses]... but still at least it gives an idea/preview of how I see the performance of the portraits I'm going to shoot. The background is colorful, but still I think it should be with a detailed pattern to make the effect more obvious and eye-catching.
In fact, the picture that is attached to this post was processed in a different way and I'm not quite sure if this method is appropriate, because I've come up with it accidentaly.
3 pictures [one in red, one in cyan, and one in black&white] were put layer-by-layer, and cyan and red pictures were moved to the left a little bit. If the girl was looking into the camera it would look better and more natural, because the effect applied on her eyes that look somewhere aside looks more blury than anaglyph.