Shoot 1
Artist Influence - Esther Teicmann
AO1: Develop ideas through sustained and focused investigations informed by contextual and other sources, demonstrating analytical and critical understanding.
The artist I have been influenced by during my shoot and edits is Esther Teicmann. Teicmann is an artist and focuses on infusing coloured inks onto black and white images. I have not focused on Esther Teicmann as an individual photographer in my artist research blog post because her work doesn't directly link to my project however during this shoot I wanted to use her ideas and techniques to edit my photos.
The images above are dull photos of rivers which Teicmann has added elements of colour to. The colours that have been added create a slightly surreal effect because there are man different colours in one place which isn't something you would natural see on a tree. I believe that this mix of colours could represent being positive even when things aren't going as planned. I think this because its as if the colours are shining through the black and white of the images. The punctum of the first image above is the man standing over his boat. This is because you cannot see his face expressions and only his body language. He is leaning on his boat and holding it as if it is important to him. This could represent meaningful parts of peoples lives that are hidden from the rest of the world, like the mans facial expressions in this image.
Images that have inspired me
This image has inspired me because I like the bright colours that have been used. I also like the way that the saturated colours make the flower look slightly unrealistic which is something I would like to portray in my edited images through the use of colour.
This image has inspired me for this shot because when taking photos of plants and flowers I want to try and use a narrow depth of field. This will require me to use an aperture ranging from f/2-f/5.6. The image above uses a narrow depth of field and I like the way that this draws your attention to the flower itself rather than the entire image. I want to create a specific focal point in my images which is something that has been done very well in the image above.
Contact Sheet
The first shoot I completed was a small shoot which I completed in order to see what my camera was capable of in terms of close up photography. I feel as though this shoot was successful because I managed to take some extremely detailed photos which I would like to experiment with when I comes to my editing. I believe that one thing that was unsuccessful about this shoot is that I did not take as many photos as I would of liked. Above on my contact sheet I have circled 2 images in red and 2 images in green. This is showing my initial reaction to the images I took and which ones I believe are good and which ones I did not like so much.
My Best Images
AO1: Develop ideas through sustained and focused investigations informed by contextual and other sources, demonstrating analytical and critical understanding.
f/11 1/250 IS0 400
I have chosen this as one of my best images because I like the way that this photo resembles a macro image due to the fine detailing of the flower. I also like the way that the flower is slightly dying around the edges od the petals because this could resemble the life cycle of a flower which is something that I would like to explore. I feel as though although I used an aperture of f/11 the background is still slightly blurred which is what I wanted to achieve with this image. I feel as though I have captured a flower in its natural beauty and I like the quality of the image I have produced.
f/11 1/250 ISO 400
I have chosen this as one of my best images because I feel as though I like the depth of field in the image with the background being out of focus and the foreground being very sharp. I believe that the camera settings worked well in this image. I decided to use an ISO of 400 because although I was using natural light it was a slightly cloudy day.
f/9 1/125 ISO 400
I have chosen this as one of my best image because I feel as though I have manipulated the image in an interesting way. This is because the cactus I have photographed fairly small however in the image above it looks quite large. As I mentioned in the previous image I like the depth of field within the image. I particularly like how the background is so out of focus . When photographing this image decided to use an aperture of f/9 because this still allowed me to capture a narrow depth of field and a perfect exposure.
Images that require improvement
AO1: Develop ideas through sustained and focused investigations informed by contextual and other sources, demonstrating analytical and critical understanding.
f/6.3 1/60 ISO 400
This image requires improvement because I did not capture the correct focal point in the image. This was because I used auto focus and the image did not turn out how I wanted it to. I hoped that the foreground would be sharp and in focus and the background would be blurred however due to me not using manual focus the foreground is extremely blurred and I do not like the way the image turned out.
f/7.1 1/125 ISO 400
I have chosen this as an image that requires improvement because I do not like the composition of the image. Firstly I feel as though the plants I have used have been placed towards the bottom of the image therefore I don't think it is clear that they are the focal point of the image. I do like the depth of field in the image however I do feel as though I should have framed the image slightly better. The plants are not exactly central and I believe the camera was not fully straight. This could have been avoided by using a tripod.
Camera Setting and Equipment
AO2: Explore and select appropriate resources, media, materials, techniques and processes, reviewing and refining ideas as work develops.
To capture these images I wanted to get as close to a macro image as I possibly could whilst using my canon eos 400D. I wanted the object I was photographing to be very sharp and in focus and for the background to be blurred. I achieved this by using a low aperture. I used f-stop ranging from f/4-f/5.6. When capturing these images I used an ISO of 200. This was because I was shooting outside and had natural light however it was a slightly cloudy day which meant that I wanted the camera to be slightly more sensitive to the light to ensure that the image was not under exposed. When capturing the images I used a shutter speed ranging mainly from 1/125 to 1/160. This was because when I was shooting it was a slightly windy day and I didn't want to capture a blur in the photo. When shooting I decided to not use a tripod because I needed to get very close to the objects that I was photographing and I felt like using a tripod would have limited my access to the plants.
AO3: Record ideas, observations and insights relevant to intentions, reflecting critically on work and progress.
I have gathered ideas from various sources on how to begin my project. Firstly I looked at a range of photos from pinterest which gave me a lot of inspiration and creative ideas. Initially after completing my techniques post in relation to the macro technique I was really inspired by the amount of detail I could capture and I was intrigued into incorporating this technique into my work. After completing this initial research I wanted to explore the macro technique within my first shoot to see if I could capture images that had a lot of intricate detail within them. My work has also been inspired by Esther Teicmann because I wanted to look at the use of black and white mixed with physical manipulation using paints and water colours. Although this was my main influence for the editing technique I used I was also inspired my some other macro photographers that I looked at in more detail like Patty Hankins. To progress I would like to complete a larger shoot which is inspired by Patty Hankins photos in more detail because I feel as though I could explore her ideas more within my work. An example of this would be to focus more heavily on the formal element of colour. Overall my ideas for this shoot came from my initial ideas that I gathered whilst completing my project proposal. During this shoot I wanted to explore the idea of macro photography during my first shoot because initially this is the skill I am most intrigued to use.
Edits
AO2: Explore and select appropriate resources, media, materials, techniques and processes, reviewing and refining ideas as work develops.
Firstly I used the black and white tool in photoshop to edit each individual image to black and white. I altered the settings to make certain colours darker and certain tones lighter.
I then used different art materials to create my different edits and I wanted to use a range of materials to experiment with. I used water colours and standard art paint to experiment however I used different tools to put the colour onto my images.
For the first image I used water colours and I water to create a surreal atmosphere to the image by adding in colour where you would not normally see it.
To create the image above I used green paint and a sponge to tap the paint onto the image. It is fairly difficult to see the texture this created on scanned image however by doing this it created an uneven coat of paint which I think resembled the spikes of the cactus.
For the two images above I printed off the black and white images first and then layer the colour over the top.
In this image I have photographed the sponge that I used to create the image above. 
To create the three images above I painted three sheets of paper using paint to create a coloured piece of paper. I then printed the black and white images onto the coloured sheets of paper. I like the way these images turned out because they create a coloured tone which overlays the black and white image.
Final Images
AO4: Present a personal and
meaningful response that realises intentions and, where appropriate, makes
connections between visual and other elements.
I think that I have created a meaningful response in relation to this shoot because I have created a series of images that all have links to the formal elements colour and tone. Although I feel the images I produced link together this shoot was quite small and I feel as though I would have liked to produce some more images of high quality because then I believe my response would have been more meaningful and in depth.
Progression
To progress onto my next shoot I would like to aim to complete a bigger shoot with a wider range of images. I would also like to focus on a macro technique because I enjoyed taking the images in this shoot because they were close up and there was a lot of intricate detail visible in the images.
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