Evaluation

The first stage of this assignment was to research about some photography artists, we was given a list of 7 to choose from so I managed to research about them all, getting some, really interesting information about the artists life, work, hobbies and background information in general. I wrote about these on my blog and then included two pictures of each of the artist’s work; to show examples of the photos they produced. When researching some of the artists, I found I couldn’t write much as I didn’t find much information about them and their work. I also wrote a statement on intent which explained what I chose to dress up as for my alter ego photo shoot.

The next part of this assignment was doing a photo shoot dressed as my alter ego. I chose to do a lady bird, as I already had the things and so it wouldn’t mean me having to spend a lot of time and money looking for something else to dress up as. When taking my pictures I think my photo shoot went really well as I got a lot of shots which were clear and high quality, I also got a lot of pictures that I could work with when using Photoshop to edit them. However when taking my pictures I had to make sure there was the correct lighting being used and the camera was on the right settings.

 For my photo shoot I used the flash and the settings were on auto making it easier to take pictures, the reason why I had the setting on auto was so I could get the right shots I wanted. I had to use a white background when taking my photos as well, as I was cutting my self out and putting myself into different backgrounds/locations. I then chose two photos from my photo shoot and four different backgrounds/locations to put myself into, the first one was in a woods as ladybirds are creatures that like wood, leaves and plants etc. When cutting out my image I did have some difficulties with it when using the quick select tool because the colour of my skin tone and the background was both light so, I ended up using the magic cut tool to draw line around myself getting rid of the background. This was so I could use a different background image. The second background I used was a garden; I again cut my self out of the picture and pasted myself onto the chosen background image. Although It did take a while to draw a line around my self using the magic tool as I had to get rid of all the white background and have a neat outline so it didn’t look to disordered when I put it on my chosen backgrounds.  The next background image I chose was to put myself in a picture with a plant behind me making the plant/flowers black and white and leaving myself in colour. The last picture I chose to put myself in the fake windows with an arch walkway at the botanical gardens, I managed to get the cropped picture of myself standing up so it looks like I was actually at the place.

After researching artists, writing about my statement of intent and placing my photo shoot image in my two different chosen locations, I then chose 4 of my photo shoot images which were my best ones, and uploaded them to my blog to analyse them. When analysing my pictures I talked about what I liked about them, the camera settings and the lighting control. I wrote about the lighting control as sometimes I had to re-take the shots. This was because the lighting affected the shutter speed on the camera when taking the picture so the picture came out blurry. I also wrote about the technical research which included: what camera I used, the lighting that was used, what type of background was used to take the 4 photos, and finally the process I went through to take the pictures.

If I was to take my pictures again I think I would go more adventurous and think about my alter ego  more instead of rushing into it, even though I do like the photo’s I have taken I do think I could of done better.  All in all I am happy with the work I have produced and don’t think I could improve the artist research as I just researched about them and their work, and put it in my own words, I then included some examples of their work that caught my eye.

 I also don’t think I could improve my edits because I managed to cut out myself the way I wanted it to go and if it didn’t look right the first time I would use the magic cut tool again and cut out more of the background to get a neat outline, I was also happy with the locations I chose and managed to find a high resolution picture which made the edit look even enhanced.  In the end I used 2 different pictures from the photo shoot and put myself in 4 different location/ backgrounds. The only reason I had to use background pictures that I had taken was because I was using the apple mac computer and the fire fox wouldn’t open which was a big pain, but I still managed to create my photos because I luckily had ones that I’d taken for my last assignment. 

Over all I think all of the steps of work I done went well because I thought about what I was going to dress up as for the photo shoot.  Then I managed to find some artist research that gave me an idea of the different types of photography artists out there. My statement of intent, the photo shoot and talking about the 4 different images taken in my photo shoot all went well, as well.

Analysing Four Photos

When taking this picture I used my camera which is a Fujifilm S1600, The lighting I used was a spot light and the flash on the camera which gave a really vibrant effect. I did have to re-take this shot because I blinked and the flash did blur the image a bit, but once it was taken again it came out much better, and I was more happier with it. To take this picture I used a white background which made me stand out more and it was easier for me to cut myself out of the backgorund and put myself onto another background/ picture. The only technical issues that arrised was the problem with the lighting, but once that was sorted the picture was more focused. To take this photo I had to put the camera setting onto auto; having the camera on auto is the recommended setting as it gives you crisp clear shots. In this mode the camera automatically analyzes the composition and then it selects the appropriate scene mode, this is according to the subject and shooting conditions. This will take effect once the shutter button is pressed down half way.

When taking this picture I used the same camera; Fujifilm finepix S1600, to get the lighting right I used a normal celling light and the flash on the camera, this again made me stand out more from the background. There weren’t any technical issues that rose when taking this photo. To take this photo I again had the shooting mode on auto which made the photo really clear and stand out. Once putting the camera onto the auto setting I then put the flash on and got a white background to use so when it came to cropping my self out to put myself onto another picture/background it would be easier. 

 I used my Fujifilm finepix camera to take this picture as I did for the other ones. The lighting I used was a normal celling light, I did try and take the picture with the normal celling light but it didn’t come out a clear so I tried it with the flash on as well and it came out much better and clearer. With the flash on this helped to make me stand out more from the white background, which made it a lot more easier when using the magic cut tool in photoshop to draw around myself and take me away from the white background and put myself onto another picture/ background. The only technical issue that rose was when I first took the photo without flash on and just using the celling light; as the picture came out very dark and blurry. To take this photo I put up a white background and then stood in front of it so I could have a picture taken and with the flash on it made it really hard not to blink so I put the blink detected setting on which a warning sign comes up on the camera screen if it detects someone blinking when the picture is taken; this also gives you the option to re-take the photo.



I again used my Fujifilm finepix s1600 camera to take this picture as well. The lighting used again was a normal celling light and I put the flash on as when taking the picture with flash it comes out a lot clearer. I also changed the setting on the camera to black and white so I could have a no-coloured photo. For the background I again used a white background but if I was to use this photo to put onto a different picture/background it would be really difficult because of it being black and white I wouldn’t be able to get a perfect outline. The only technical issues that rose was the lighting, which occurred for most the pictures because not having the flash on a using a normal celling light didn’t make the picture very clear, so I used ended up putting the flash on as well as having the normal celling light on. 

Alter Ego Photos

These are the 4 photos I have edited, I took pictures of myself dressed as my alter ego, and then used photoshop to cut myself out of the white background and put my self onto these pictures/backgrounds.

Statement of intent

For my photoshoot my intended idea is to dress up as a ladybird. This is because I found it was a simple but unique idea and I already have the apropriate clothing to wear for the photoshoot so I won't have to make so much effort in finding something as I would if I didn't have anything and had to go out and search for ideas and buy something.

Artist Research.

Cindy Sherman:
Cindy Sherman  was born on January 19th 1954. She is an American photographer and also a film director. Cindy is best known for her conceptial portraits. At a very young age of 12 Cindy recieved her first camera as a brownie and then not long after she got sent a dark room kit to share with her brother which her great- grandmother used. Cindy was given the role of a year book editor when she was in high school and she played a major part in that.  She became a inspired sports photographer along with her junior team after participating at the state championships. Cindy had a mentor called Mr Lou Ver Baere, he opened his studio to her and taught her a lot about running a studio, He also paid for her convention fees for the first year for her to attend the professional photographers of oregon attended. Cindy photographed her first wedding in 1976 and then done professional photography since 1980. After she done some freelancing for many years she opened photo's by Cindy in Union counrty Oregon which was in 1987. After all that she then sold her studio in 2000 to move to Boise, idaho, the move was all from her husbands job. 3 years later "Cindy Sherman photography" opened in 2003.

Andy Warhol:
Andy Warhol was born August 6 1928 and died in February 22 1987 at a young age of 58. Andy was an American painter, paintmaker and film maker, he was known as a leading figure in the visual art movement which is known as "pop art". He became famous as not only a painter but a filmaker, record producer, an author and a member of high diverse such as Bohemian street people and many more, after a sucessful career being a comercial illustrator. Warhol has been the subject of many retrospective, exhabitions, books, and documentary films. There is still the Andy Warhol museum that exists, in his home town in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The meuseum is in memory of his life and artwork. One of highest prices paid for his paintings was $100million, it was a 1963 canvas which was titled "Elight Elvises" The transaction for the money was priverate and was reported in 2009.

Arnulf Rainer:
Arnulf Rainer was born 8 december 1929 in Baden Austria. Arnulf Rainer is an Australian painter and he is also world wide renowned for his abstract informal art. In Rainer's early years he was influenced by surrealism. In 1950 he found the dog group along with Ernst Fuchs, Arilk Brauer and Josef Mikl. In 1954 Rainer's style emerged towards destruction of forms, with oerpainting, maskings of illustrations and photographs dominating his later work. However he was quite close to featuing body art and painting under drung influence. He did alot of work based on the Hiroshima after the bombing. He recieved a great Austrian prize in 1978 he then in the same year and in 1980 became the Austrian representative at the Venice Biennale. Then from 1981-1995 Arnulf Rainer he imprissioned a chair  at the academy of vine arts in Vienna. A lot of Arnulf Rainer's work is shown in the museum of modern art  and in 1993 Arnulf Rainer museum was opened in New York City.


Chuck Close:
Chuck close aka Charles Thomas "Chuck"  Close, was born July 5 1940 in Monroe Washington, he is an American painter and photographer, he achieved aknowledgement as a photorealist, this was through his gigantic-scale portraits. In 1988 he became paralyzed after a catrastrophic spinal artery collapse. Ever since he has still continued to paint and generate work that's desired by museums and many collectors. His work was first exhibited at the New York museum of modern art, this was in the early 1973. The everyday nature subject of paintings worked to secure the paintings so they was known as a realist object. He  was awarded the national medal of arts in 2000.

Alison Jackson:
Alison Jackson was born 5 May 1960 in Southsea, Hampshire. Alison Jackson is an English artists, she is known for her "lookalike" photographs of celebrities. For the BBC 2 chanel series 2 doubletake, she won a BAFTA and had 3 pieces of her photographic work published. Alison Jackson studied at the Chelsea College Of Art and the Royal College Of Art.

Aziz & Cucher:
Aziz and Kucher, known as Anthony Aziz and Samuel Cucher, Aziz was born in Fitchburg Massachusetts, USA and Cucher was born 1958 in Lima, peru but grew up in Caracas, Venezuela. They are both visual artists who work together as a collective team since meeting in graduate school at the San Francisco museum of modern art in 1990. They are the developers in the field of digital imaging and post- photography, as they have projects exhibited at many locations/ venues such as the 1995 venice Biennale and the LA Country Museum of Art. Both Aziz and Cucher have worked in many media industrys but onw of them was digital photography. They were among others who first used Adobe photoshop which was in the context of fine art photography.