ENVIRONMENT
Lynne Cohen
Georges Rousse
http://we-are-star-stuff.tumblr.com/post/69115314103/for-french-artist-george-rousse-color-is-clearly
Above is a link to a website showing how Rousse creates his pieces of work.
Above is a link to a website showing how Rousse creates his pieces of work.
Catherine Yaas
Nadav Kander
Nadav Kander is a photographer, born in Israel, but grew up in South Africa at a young age.
What are Nadav Kander's intentions?
Kander intended to portray the beauty of mankind's imprint in his project 'Half Life'. The images show how people have created man-made structures, such as buildings and furniture. But as the area has been deserted for a long time, nature has began to grow back in to these areas. Kander portrayed this intention by capturing areas of Chernobyl where you can see plants growing inside buildings, such as the photo above. He wanted us to think about how humans can cause destruction, and disrupt the course of nature.
Kander also intended to portray an uncomfortable feeling in his images, so that he could best represent what it feels like to be in Chernobyl, surrounded by deserted buildings, and also capture the sense of abandonment in the area. He did this by taking photographs of some parts of Chernobyl in a way that makes viewers feel like they are actually there. Instead of taking photos from an unusual angle, he has taken some from an angle that we would see if we were standing there ourselves. This makes viewers get a better sense of what it would feel like to actually stand in parts of Chernobyl, looking in to deserted rooms and buildings. Kander wanted us to think about the people who were affected by the Chernobyl disaster, and how they might feel after having to leave their home.
What wider social, political or cultural issues is/was the artist addressing?
One issue Kander was addressing in his project, 'Half Life', was the smallness of man versus the larger scale of their ideas. Even though humans are small, they can cause great destruction, and have a deep negative effect on many others. Kander shows this in his work by highlighting the destruction and decay that was caused by the Chernobyl disaster. He has taken photos of places and buildings which were clearly often used by people who lived there, and has captured how they are now destroyed and rotting. These places were created by man, but now have been destroyed as a result of man. Kander wanted to explore this and get a message across to viewers, especially in other parts of the world, that mankind is more powerful than we think.
How do the formal elements, materials and techniques used by Kander contribute to the work and reinforce his intentions?
Kander is less interested in the photographer and their process behind an image, but more in the final result of how an image looks. He also takes images to represent his feelings at the time, and he is driven by emotion and instinct, so particularly likes the idea of capturing certain moments in time. As he didn't plan his shots for this project, he has created an effect on the images where they look and feel more natural. For example, he has simply explored the area, and captured anything he has seen at the exact moment in time. This also allows viewers to get a stronger sense of what it would be like to experience Chernobyl themselves. Kander technique's also help to support the point about how sudden the disaster was, and everything happened very quickly for people who were living there. People were happily living there, but then suddenly had to evacuate, leaving their homes and buildings to decay and rot.
Kander intended to portray the beauty of mankind's imprint in his project 'Half Life'. The images show how people have created man-made structures, such as buildings and furniture. But as the area has been deserted for a long time, nature has began to grow back in to these areas. Kander portrayed this intention by capturing areas of Chernobyl where you can see plants growing inside buildings, such as the photo above. He wanted us to think about how humans can cause destruction, and disrupt the course of nature.
Kander also intended to portray an uncomfortable feeling in his images, so that he could best represent what it feels like to be in Chernobyl, surrounded by deserted buildings, and also capture the sense of abandonment in the area. He did this by taking photographs of some parts of Chernobyl in a way that makes viewers feel like they are actually there. Instead of taking photos from an unusual angle, he has taken some from an angle that we would see if we were standing there ourselves. This makes viewers get a better sense of what it would feel like to actually stand in parts of Chernobyl, looking in to deserted rooms and buildings. Kander wanted us to think about the people who were affected by the Chernobyl disaster, and how they might feel after having to leave their home.
What wider social, political or cultural issues is/was the artist addressing?
One issue Kander was addressing in his project, 'Half Life', was the smallness of man versus the larger scale of their ideas. Even though humans are small, they can cause great destruction, and have a deep negative effect on many others. Kander shows this in his work by highlighting the destruction and decay that was caused by the Chernobyl disaster. He has taken photos of places and buildings which were clearly often used by people who lived there, and has captured how they are now destroyed and rotting. These places were created by man, but now have been destroyed as a result of man. Kander wanted to explore this and get a message across to viewers, especially in other parts of the world, that mankind is more powerful than we think.
How do the formal elements, materials and techniques used by Kander contribute to the work and reinforce his intentions?
Kander is less interested in the photographer and their process behind an image, but more in the final result of how an image looks. He also takes images to represent his feelings at the time, and he is driven by emotion and instinct, so particularly likes the idea of capturing certain moments in time. As he didn't plan his shots for this project, he has created an effect on the images where they look and feel more natural. For example, he has simply explored the area, and captured anything he has seen at the exact moment in time. This also allows viewers to get a stronger sense of what it would be like to experience Chernobyl themselves. Kander technique's also help to support the point about how sudden the disaster was, and everything happened very quickly for people who were living there. People were happily living there, but then suddenly had to evacuate, leaving their homes and buildings to decay and rot.
http://bizarrebeyondbelief.com/2013/07/23/the-zartorialist-prism-photography/
http://traceyreinke.com/prism-photography/
http://traceyreinke.com/golden-hour-landscape/
Rule of Thirds
Shooting on December 13th 2014
As you can see, this set of photos were taken in central London. My plan for the shoot was to capture vibrant scenes that would look unique and artistic once mirrored. I went to Covent Garden, Oxford Street and around Leicester Square for this shoot as I knew that there are a lot of tall vibrant buildings there. I knew that these buildings would be ideal for my reflections project.
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Mirror City Timelapse from Michael Shainblum on Vimeo. |
KALEIDOSCOPE// from DEAD SKULL on Vimeo. |
Jonah Shoot
During this shoot, I went to Vauxhall with my classmate to try and capture images of the power station. Once we got there, we encountered a few problems, as we couldn't actually get close or high enough to the power station as we wanted, to try and get the best shots possible. However, we still managed to take photos of other buildings in the area, and took a few long distance ones of the power station. In the area, there are a lot of tall buildings, and as you can see from below I took a lot of photos from my perspective on the ground looking up to these buildings. I thought that if I captured these buildings at a certain angle, I could produce mirrored images of them that would look symmetrical and feature some sort of pattern.
Sam/Final Shoot
Below are the contact sheets for my final shoot, where I captured the shots for my final pieces. As you can see I went to Leceister Square, Piccadily Cricus, Regent Street and the Southbank.
Final Piece
The pictures above are my final pieces for our Environment project. They are inspired by a number of different styles and artists. Whilst my main topic is Reflections, I have elements of other topics in these pictures as well, such as the urban maze, disorientation and links and connections.
As you can see above, I have produced a number of different images, including ones where several are featured together in a persian rug style pattern. I made the single images by mirroring one half of an original photo, and then applying a gradient map over the top. I then also changed the gradient map of a circle in the centre of the image, and then changed the opacity until I was happy with how it looked. The 'rugs' were made by changing the size of images I had previously made, and duplicating them to form a border pattern. I then either continued making borders using different images or put a bigger image in the centre of the borders.
These 'rugs' were inspired by Persian Rugs. As the first rugs date back to 500 B.C., I have taken something very old, and made my own unique modern version of it.
I like how the individual images are quite simple yet look detailed and busy at first glance. I also like the different colours I used to portray each image in a different way. Whilst each photo captures iconic London scenes, the colours don't make them instantly recognisable and make the images more abstract and interesting. As much as I like simple photographs, I wanted to create something unique with this project, so I decided to use interesting colours and patterns. Every photo I used for my final pieces were taken in the same shoot. I visited iconic areas in London, including the Southbank, Piccadilly Circus, Leicester Square and Regent Street. These places allowed me to get interesting landscape shots of famous areas and buildings, such as the London Eye, the River Thames, the shops on Regent Street, red buses and the Piccadilly Lights. By capturing famous London areas I knew that nearly everyone would recognise the images but then be surprised by the alteration of colours and the reflections. I also wanted to mirror my photos and change their colours to capture the vibrant nature of London, and hopefully produce unique images of areas that have already been photographed many times before in many different ways.
These final pieces could be interpreted in a number of different ways. The bright colours could represent how London is a bright and colourful city. The reflections and mirroring could represent how London is a busy and complex city. The circles in the middle of the images could represent how even though London has many different areas, there is still a similar feel that runs throughout the city. The patterns of the rugs could represent the maze nature of London and how every area can blur in to one feeling of the city.
One difficulty I found when I went out to take photos for this project, was that it was hard to plan ahead what I needed to photograph. I knew that I wanted to make a persian rug out of photos that were mirrored, but it was hard to think about what I wanted the individual photos to be of so that they would look good mirrored, and repeated in a border pattern, alongside other photographs. However, I found that most landscape photos looked good mirrored and then placed together in a pattern if they were fairly simple. None of my photos had a too varying depth of field within them, meaning that most things in the image (usually buildings) were all the same distance away from the camera. This allowed my photos to still look fairly simple when I mirrored them, which helped to make the rugs look appealing and not too busy. Another difficulty I had when producing the rugs was organising the individual photographs together to make one image (the rug). Once I had produced several mirrored images with altered colours and a circle in the centre, I had to decide which order I wanted to put them in when creating the rugs. It was hard to decide which images would look best next to each other, and which would look better as the outer border, or the inside picture of a rug, as I had to see which colours worked well together and which ones did not.
My final pieces were influenced by a number of different artists and work. One of these is Horst's 'Patterns from Nature'.
As you can see above, I have produced a number of different images, including ones where several are featured together in a persian rug style pattern. I made the single images by mirroring one half of an original photo, and then applying a gradient map over the top. I then also changed the gradient map of a circle in the centre of the image, and then changed the opacity until I was happy with how it looked. The 'rugs' were made by changing the size of images I had previously made, and duplicating them to form a border pattern. I then either continued making borders using different images or put a bigger image in the centre of the borders.
These 'rugs' were inspired by Persian Rugs. As the first rugs date back to 500 B.C., I have taken something very old, and made my own unique modern version of it.
I like how the individual images are quite simple yet look detailed and busy at first glance. I also like the different colours I used to portray each image in a different way. Whilst each photo captures iconic London scenes, the colours don't make them instantly recognisable and make the images more abstract and interesting. As much as I like simple photographs, I wanted to create something unique with this project, so I decided to use interesting colours and patterns. Every photo I used for my final pieces were taken in the same shoot. I visited iconic areas in London, including the Southbank, Piccadilly Circus, Leicester Square and Regent Street. These places allowed me to get interesting landscape shots of famous areas and buildings, such as the London Eye, the River Thames, the shops on Regent Street, red buses and the Piccadilly Lights. By capturing famous London areas I knew that nearly everyone would recognise the images but then be surprised by the alteration of colours and the reflections. I also wanted to mirror my photos and change their colours to capture the vibrant nature of London, and hopefully produce unique images of areas that have already been photographed many times before in many different ways.
These final pieces could be interpreted in a number of different ways. The bright colours could represent how London is a bright and colourful city. The reflections and mirroring could represent how London is a busy and complex city. The circles in the middle of the images could represent how even though London has many different areas, there is still a similar feel that runs throughout the city. The patterns of the rugs could represent the maze nature of London and how every area can blur in to one feeling of the city.
One difficulty I found when I went out to take photos for this project, was that it was hard to plan ahead what I needed to photograph. I knew that I wanted to make a persian rug out of photos that were mirrored, but it was hard to think about what I wanted the individual photos to be of so that they would look good mirrored, and repeated in a border pattern, alongside other photographs. However, I found that most landscape photos looked good mirrored and then placed together in a pattern if they were fairly simple. None of my photos had a too varying depth of field within them, meaning that most things in the image (usually buildings) were all the same distance away from the camera. This allowed my photos to still look fairly simple when I mirrored them, which helped to make the rugs look appealing and not too busy. Another difficulty I had when producing the rugs was organising the individual photographs together to make one image (the rug). Once I had produced several mirrored images with altered colours and a circle in the centre, I had to decide which order I wanted to put them in when creating the rugs. It was hard to decide which images would look best next to each other, and which would look better as the outer border, or the inside picture of a rug, as I had to see which colours worked well together and which ones did not.
My final pieces were influenced by a number of different artists and work. One of these is Horst's 'Patterns from Nature'.
How I made the Final Pieces
Below are the original photos from my final pieces before they were edited, mirrored and the colours were altered. You can also see the finished image compared with the original side to side.
Whilst this photo was taken in Piccadilly Circus, a very famous area of London, I decided to put the main focus of the final image on the red bus as this is also a very iconic London sighting. As you can see, I mirrored the bottom right corner of the original photo across each quarter of the image. I then applied a gradient map to the whole image, which made it have a red/blue glaze over the top. This colour choice was not intended at first. I knew that I wanted to make a different coloured circle in the middle of the image, but I had to alter the colour of the whole image first before setting it to only fill the circle. This meant that when I was choosing colours to fill the circle, I would see the whole image as that colour. When I set the whole image to this colour shade, I realised that I could create something even more vibrant and unique if I kept it this colour. This process occurred in my other images as well, and allowed me to think about how I could make my 'rugs' more colourful and striking.
When I went out to take photos for my final pieces, I knew that I wanted to include an image that featured the Piccadilly Lights in Piccadilly Circus. As it has several panels all displaying different moving images with different colours, I knew that it would work well for my reflections project, and would stand out from usual landscape shots. I knew that I would only be able to get a shot of it from a ground perspective, so I wanted to capture it from an angle that didn't show the Lights being in the center (I used the Rule of Thirds to help me take this shot). However, I still wanted the photo to allow viewers to clearly see it was the Piccadilly Lights, as it is a very famous London landmark. When I took the image, I wanted to leave a lot of negative space to allow room for mirroring later on. As you can see, I mirrored the bottom left quarter in to every other quarter, creating a smooth flowing pattern of the Piccadilly Lights across each corner of the image.
This final image is one of the only two where I only reflected the original photo once.
23rd April
Add research annotation
(Select best images from woods)
Write about editing methods (maybs w screenshots or something)
Add research annotation
(Select best images from woods)
Write about editing methods (maybs w screenshots or something)