26.01.2011 Jeremy and Claire Weiss

Day 19: Creative Portfolio- 

I found an article on the Weiss couple who are a husband and wife photography team living in LA, which really interested me, known for their ability to embody the inspirational sunny side realism of LA’s music, art, skateboard and film communities. With a great commercial portfolio it was interesting for me to see some of their personal work and makes me really want to take more Polaroid photographs!

 I really like how different this portfolio is, I love how they've mixed Polaroid and digital photography and really changed up the portraits and documentary. It certain doesn't tell a cohesive story but does give a general feel which I find appealing.

23.01.2011 Steven Meisel

This weekend I've spent a lot of time thinking about what project to select from a Digital Production unit. From the choice of documentary, fashion/cosmetics or mobile phone advertising I am swaying towards the fashion/cosmetics project and while scanning through old magazines I found a great series by Steven Meisel. Shot for American Vogue as the Autumn 2010 spread.

I love how the seemingly normal location still has an air of fantasy to it just by the overall considered aesthetic.

17.01.2011 Orange Dot Gallery

While planning my photography day at the London Art Fair this week I also came across a very interesting exhibition which would be great to go see. The exhibition at the Orange Dot Gallery, which has just started this week examines the success of the modern 'hipstamatic camera' and its revolution. For anyone else who didn't know (just like me) the exhibition features photographs taken using an iPhone App which recreates the experience of an old hipstamatic analogue camera on a modern camera phone. Awarded ‘application of the year’ by Apple, it has quickly attracted a mass of followers and self-made photographers. The exhibition will display 157 photographs taken from hipstamatics.com, the works themselves are not artistically challenging, but the charm of the exhibition lies in its investigation into instant technology within modern society. 

11.01.2011 Low Key

As part of my eductaion I needed to take a low key lit portrait on a Hassleblad camera and colour print it in the darkrooms.

 

I am very pleased with the outcome and really like this lighting effect which adds drama and mood to the portrait. While making this photograph I started looking at other photographers use of this lighting technique and found that it works very well with group portraits, moody fashion/beauty shots and black and white portraiture.

 Brendan Lea

 Ian Aitkin

Mark Horrison

11.01.2011 Digital Darkroom SURREALISM

The past few weeks I've been working on an assignment which is titled 'Surreal' and involves using a digital composite to communicate something. I decided to tackle the idea that everyone has a mask they wear in public to hide their personal feelings from the world.

 I tried to physically show the girls 'happy' mask which she'd use to put on a show for the world and how that makes her feel inside. When researching the surrealist movement and the effects it has had on photography I became much more interested in the work of Carmen Freudenthal and Elle Verhagen, whose photographic collaborations are an unconventional approach, exploring the boundaries of fashion photography - sometimes even literally - by working in three dimensions.

05.01.2011

My complicated relationship with the fill in flash exercise spanning three months!!


I was really pleased with the planning of the first shoot, I'd spent a while casting and location hunting and really like the end images though I did not fulfil the criteria of a dramatically lit portrait so had to re-shoot.

So I went back to the location, with my model styled similarly and re-shot the images trying to achieve the 'dramatic look' which unfortunately I didn't.

Unfortunately after this shoot my model became unavailable so I decided to change my aesthetic approach completely with my choice of model and experiment with lighting effects. These are my three completed images for the flash area of the unit. 

Ambient Lighting

 Dramatic Lighting

 Fill in Flash