Used source; thesprucecrafts.com to help me
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The first permanent images were made in the late 1830s by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce who used a portable camera obscura to expose a pewter plate coated with bitumen to light. The development of this technique led to a number of other experiments and photography progressed very rapidly. Daguerreotypes, emulsion plates, and wet plates were developed almost simultaneously in the mid-to-late 1800s.
Richard Maddox developed dry gelatine plates in the 1870s which could be stored and used when needed. This was a huge leap forward in photography. Photography was only for professionals and the very rich until George Eastman started a company called Kodak in the 1880s. Eastman created a flexible roll film that did not require constantly changing the solid plates. This was the first time that photography could be afforded by the average person. You had to send the roll of film back off to the Kodak factory to get it printed. |
'The Great Wave, the most dramatic of his seascapes, combines Le Gray’s technical mastery with expressive grandeur. He took the view on the Mediterranean coast near Montpellier. At the horizon, the clouds are cut off where they meet the sea. This indicates the join between two separate negatives. The combination of two negatives allowed Le Gray to achieve tonal balance between sea and sky on the final print. It gives a more truthful sense of how the eye, rather than the camera, perceives nature.' - Victoria & Albert Museum Although the image looks like it is taken at night, lit by moonlight, it is actually taken during the day with the camera pointed directly at the sunlight, giving it that 'vignette' look. |
'Some of the most influential Pictorialists seen in one picture. Frank Eugene, Alfred Stieglitz, Heinrich Kuhn and Edward Steichen admiring the work of Eugene, circa 1907. This is a good example of post production scraping of the negative to isolate the subjects and produce a more impressionistic effect.' - photoimpressionism.ca Photographers started using Pictorialism and Chiaroscuro as a technique so that they could be taken more seriously in the artistic world; photography was a new medium in which people could express themselves, but wasn't yet taken seriously as a form of art, so photographers tried to make their images look ike paintings instead. |
'Painters of the Renaissance and Baroque periods wanted to engage their viewers. Like the cinematographers of classic Hollywood, they used the play of light and shadow to give life and drama to their images'. - study.com I think it is interesting that this source compares artists use of chiaroscuro to the cinematographers of classic Hollywood's use of light and shadow. Chiaroscuro was one of the new techniques used by painters of the Renaissance to make their paintings look truly three-dimensional. Painters used oil paint; by applying light tones on top of dark, painters could create the effect of figures emerging from shadow. |
This photograph is called 'Migrant Mother'. It was taken by Dorothea Lange in 1936. Two children hide from the camera behind their mother whose face has been permanently aged by hard work and worry. She stares off into the distance, tired and fed up. You can gage a sense of vulnerability from her concerned look; hand raised to her mouth, desperately wondering how her and her three children will get passed this.
Photography had a great influence on America because now people had a visual aid to understand society and its issues. For example, Lange's photographs humanised the consequences of the Great Depression and influenced the development of documentary photography. World War 2 helped shape this new style of photography (objectivity). In the 1930s, Henri-Cartier Bresson and other photographers began to use small 35mm cameras to capture images of life as it occurred rather than staged portraits. When World War II started in 1939, many photojournalists (such as Dorothea Lange) adopted this style. This style of capturing decisive moments shaped the face of photography forever. |
Steinert believed that subjective photography (a personal touch) had become more prominent since the Second World War. He wrote; ‘Subjective Photography means humanised, individualised photography and implies the handling of a camera in order to win from the single object the views expressive of its character.’ - tate.org.uk
Earlier movements had begun to establish photography as an art form. Steinert placed a new emphasis on the photographer’s own creativity. He outlined how a series of creative decisions – from choice of equipment, to perspective, to printing techniques – could allow the subject to assume a new meaning or significance. He wanted to explore the potential of photography beyond straightforward representation. I believe that the photograph to the right (by Steinert) was made by movement of the camera with long exposure times to record trails of light. |
Their image-making style is very objective, each photograph is shot in exactly the same way; straight on, symmetrical, black and white, full-frame capturing the entire subject, flat, shadowless, industrial and quiet.
Common themes in their works are; 'Overlooked beauty and the relationship between form and function. Both subjects addressed the effect of industry on economy and the environment.' - tate.org.uk Therefore I notice that the Bechers have an interesting mix of objectivity and subjectivity in their images; the meaning behind their work is personal to them but the way they take their images are very objective. Having no shadows featuring in images can also be considered as a technique/artistic choice. Using this technique leaves images very flat and unemotional which was a popular photographical style in Germany at the time. |
Three of my favourite colours in combination are red white and black, I wear this combination all the time. So, naturally my mind wanted to try pairing red card with my photograms to make the spaces in between look more interesting.
However, I feel that adding the red (which is obviously a much brighter colour than the monochromatic shades of the photograms) takes away from the fine details of the photograms, almost overpowering the images. |
I visualised creating a composition with the photograms and fixing them to the mount board. I tried laying them out in different ways and wasn't happy with any of them. The white space was too much yet too little at the same time.
So, in feeling that the constraints of the board were just too restricted for such free-flowing depictions of my thoughts, I decided to try something different... |
Instead of restricting the photograms to the constraints of the mount board, I decided I would make them stronger using the material to reinforce them. I stuck each one down with pritt stick and used the trimmer to splice the edges into parallel lines. Maybe I could develop these further and lay coloured objects on the surfaces of them? Or I could ask an audience to make their own arrangements with the reinforced pieces? |
Whilst experimenting, I found that the backs of the structures were much better at capturing the light than the fronts which are pasted with images. I am going to use this knowledge to my advantage during the exam. I am also planning on cutting holes In some of the structures to let abstract beams of light through. |