Alfred Stieglitz was an documentary photographer who specialised in portraits and documenting cities and towns. Alfred Stieglitz focused on a range of photographic topics I particularly like his city landscape work, in which he photographs the 19th century city scape. I have chose to research Alfred Stieglitz because I like the way he can turn an ordinary city landscape into something that represents the city but is also shown in a majestic light. This is a skill is wish to incorporate into my own work. Being able to turn an seemly ordinary scene into a piece of art work by looking and photographing in the right places at the right time. what I can learn from looking at the work of Alfred Stieglitz’s work is to take my time when setting up shots. I find myself rushing the photographs I take, especially when I’m shooting on a digital camera. For my next shoot I am going to use Alfred Stieglitz as inspiration and go out to a city and shoot using film. By using film I think this will slow me down and make me think about what I’m shooting and the composition of the photograph I am about to take.
Image Making Evaluation
Image Making, Image making- written statement, UncategorisedDuring this image making unit the brief was to make a Photo-book focusing on either documentary reality or documentary fiction. I chose to go down the route of documentary reality. In the initial stages of my project I planned to solely focus on an area of Kent called Leysdown. Leysdown was the first location I visited, I met up with my friend who has lived in the area all her life, and I let her take me to her favorite parts of the island. as I went to Leysdown off season the whole town was virtually abandoned which is a complete contrast to when the summer months when the seaside town peaks. My friend took me to a number of spots including, the beach, the town and even the ice cream shop she works at during the summer months (which was shut during the winter season) Overall I feel that I got some strong portraits in Leysdown but I felt that the seaside town did not give me enough content to base my whole project around. With this in mind I started to think about other locations I could shoot. I have a trip booked to Berlin already so that seemed like a natural decision for me to shoot at.
I went to Berlin for 4 days, over this time I spent everyday shooting different locations. I got round as much as the city as I could within the time I spend in the country. During my time in Berlin I tried to stay away from the typical tourist photographs instead I photographed people and the events that were happening around me. Overall I got some good shots from my time spent in Berlin. My next location for this unit was London. I chose London because its full of interesting people and places and its easily accessible for me to get to. I focused my attention on Greenwitch as there is loads going on such as; the markets, a fair ground and Greenwitch park. I chose to shoot this location using a 35mm camera, I did this because I felt as a photographer I slow down when I am shooting film an really think about what i’m shooting. My final location was a house in Rochester that I had been given access to by Medway Council. The house had recently been made unoccupied as the owner had recently been deemed unfit to look after himself. I was only allowed 30 minutes in the house to get the shots I needed. The house was completely destroyed however this gave me some great photographic results.
If I could go back and change anything about this image making project I would have allowed myself more time to complete things such as the contextual studies essay. If I could restart the project and had more time, i would have loved to focus on Leysdown a bit more. I would have liked to focus more on the permanent residents who live in the caravan parks all year round and even have done some audio to accompany the documentary photos I would have taken. Overall I am happy with my results for this image making unit.
Editing Berlin Shots
Image Making, Image Making- Test Shoots, UncategorisedThese are some of the results from my edited Berlin photographs. I put these images in black and white so there is a clear link to my previous London shoot. I think the black and white aspect of the photographs works really well, I like the level of contrast in the images. I still have a lot more of photographs to edit and sort through but so far I am happy with the end results.
Berlin
Image Making, Image Making- Test Shoots, UncategorisedThis week I went to Berlin with the university. This was a great opportunity’s to go any take some photographs. I had the opportunity to visit some key locations around German such as; the berlin wall, the Jewish memorial and many other great sites throughout Berlin. These are just some of the results I gathered from the 4 days I spent in the city. I am currently in the process of sorting through all of the photographs and editing the best ones. I believe I have defiantly got some photographs I can use in my photobook.
Edited London Shoots
Image Making, Image Making- Test Shoots, UncategorisedThese are some of the edited results from my London Shoot. I am happy with the results of my edit and defiantly now have a few favourites that I am considering for my photobook. I changed the photographed to black and white because I really liked the levels of tone and contrast the images had once I put them in black and white. I am currently editing the rest of the photographs from London. Overall I think this was a successful shoot that I got some good photographic results from.
London shoot
Image Making, Image Making- Test ShootsThese are the result from a shoot I conducted in central London. I chose this location because there was a lot going on around me such as; fun fairs, markets and general tourism. For this shoot I shot on 35mm, I find personally when I’m working with film I tend to slow down and really think about what I’m shooting, this often gives me better results. Overall I am happy with the shots I produced even though I lost quite a lot of my film roll when I was developing in the darkroom. These are the un-edited versions of my photographs. As you can see they need quite a bit of dust removal but I am happy with the quality of the colour on the film. Once I edit these photographs it will give me a better idea which ones make the cut of my photo book.
Tony Ray-Jones
Image Making, Image Making- research, UncategorisedTony Ray-Jones was a British documentary photographer who died in his early 30’s. In the short time Jones had he became a huge influence in documentary photography. Even though Jones career only lasted a decade his use of: irony, compassion, nostalgia and humor continue to inspire photographers such as Martin parr and many other documentary photographers. His aim as a photographer was to photograph everyday moments and highlight their sense of irony and British humour. Ray-Jones was not recognised for his work until 2004 when his book ‘England By The Sea’ was published after Ray-Jones’s death. Ray-Jones focused his attention to busy areas such as beaches and towns, these were the best places for Ray-Jones to create his pictures because there was plenty of opportunity to capture out of the ordinary moments within everyday life.
I chose to Research Tony Ray-Jones work because this is the kind of work I personally aspire to make for this documentary image making unit. Ray-Jones’s work is relevant to my own project because i am also photographing everyday situations and trying to find something different or humorous about them. Ray-Jones shot his work on film, I like this choice because it gives his photographs a really nice contrast and a hint of grain to the images, This is the effect want on my images, from researching Tony Ray-Jones I am going to shoot some 35mm around London to see what images I can get.
Leysdown Test Shoot
Image Making, Image Making- Test Shoots, UncategorisedThese are the results from my first test shoot in Leysdown. This shoot was all about familiarising myself with the location and getting to grips with some good spots to shoot for the project. I am happy with the outcome of these shoots, I think the grey outfit the model is wearing really complements the background and the cool mood of the images. I used the beach as the main shooting space as I found some interesting aspects such as the drain pipe featured along the coast line. I also discovered as I walked further along the coastline abandoned ice cream shops and changing rooms that would be opened during the summer months, these made for interesting backgrounds. Next time I shoot at Leysdown I am going to focus more on the town as I will be able to capture more of the locals and architecture along the coastline.
Robert Frank
Image Making, Image Making- research, UncategorisedRobert Frank is a very famous Swiss photographer and film maker who’s career in photography started in the 1940’s. Frank is most well known for his book ‘The Americans’ published in 1958. The book features a sequence of images taken throughout America showing the irony of everyday American life. Frank’s book ‘The Americans’ was so revolutionary because it changed the documentary photography’s previous traditions. Robert Frank changed the game in documentary photography by not letting his feelings and emotions affect the work he was photographing, un like previous photographers. Robert Frank is an inspiration for me in my image making project because his documentary photography work is looked up to by most photographers.
Frank photographed his subjects in a way in which had never been done before, always adding a metaphor within his photographs. I can take inspiration from Robert Frank by really looking at my surroundings and relating the location around me to the subject I am photographing. During this project I am going to use Robert Franks work as inspiration by using the irony of everyday life and using that to my advantage when I take photographs.
Leysdown on Sea- test shoot
Image Making, Image Making- researchThis week I am heading up to the seaside town of Leysdown on Sea to conduct a test shoot. I plan to walk around the sea side town document the local off peak sea side life leysdown has to offer. My main inspiration was from documentary photographer Martin Parr, I love his work in the British sea-side towns at peak season during the 80’s. I am aiming to juxtapose Parr’s idea by documenting sea-side towns in their off peak season. I plan to explore elements of the seaside such as the beach, amusements and the overall location. I am planning to also bring a model with me as a back up. I am bringing a model two Leysdown with me so I have a fall back if I can’t get the results from the documentation style of photography I want, as I have been warned that leysdown is quite a hard location to produce good documentary photography. This shoot is going to determine whether my project goes down the route of documentary reality or documentary fiction.
Grace Bontoft's reflective journal 