Final Project

Critique: Emotions

Sadness, Joy, Despair... man, I need more Happiness.

Self-Proposed Project: Emotions

I would like to do a project based around the ideas of emotions. I've been on the emotion thought-train recently, due to my Interpersonal Communications class and a recent project I did for my drawing class.

I wouldn't mind doing images in color, but I would like to explore other ways to express emotions and moods. Like facial expressions, and maybe do a stop-motion video that runs through them. I would also like to explore the idea of using things other than the face to express emotions, like a room or the weather as co-factors to the mood set with a figure in the frame. Maybe some without a figure.

One specific idea I had in mind was a plain background with six figures - all the same figure, all wearing different colors of clothing, to represent the ideas of the six primary emotions as defined by my Communications textbook: fear, anger, sadness, joy, surprise, and disgust. And facial expressions to match. I could have my model wear a white t-shirt on a black background so that I could color in their shirt. The figures would be collaged together so that they are in one frame.

I could also explore the idea of showing no emotion at all. Like, someone being surprised at a party and they didn't react to the attempted surprise.

Constructed Realities and Final Project Prompt

Man Ray

Florence Meyer (top image)

I could recreate this image by making paper plate masks featuring different emotions and the person in the middle of them all have a blank face.

Man Ray

Le Violon d'Ingres (bottom image)

For this image, I could draw a flute on someone's arm and have another person pretend they are playing it.

- - -

For my final photo project, I would like to do one based around the concept of emotions - the obvious and the subtle, the facial expressions and body language. I would also like to explore constructed realities around the topic of emotions, in kind of an illustrated story-book way.

Constructed Realities

1. In what way do you "construct" your identity? In what ways do you "perform" in your daily life?

I construct my identity though my choice of clothing, interests, hobbies, extracurricular activities, religion, job and/or carreer. I 'perform' when I need to hide my emotions - like if something upsets me and I need to pretend that I'm okay.

2. Describe some ways in which your personal culture and social environments are "constructed".

I choose my friends, and my friends are one of my greatest influences, so based on their interests and how they construct their lives, my life will in turn be affected.

3. Describe some ways in which your physical environment/space are "constructed".

Buildings are constructed. Pretty much every space that is man-made is is constructed - I cannot think of anything outside of nature itself is not constructed.

4. In your daily life, what would you consider to be "real" and what would you consider to be "constructed/fabricated"?

The sun is real. Time is real. People are real. I think that most everything else is constructed.

5. Describe a narrative tableaux that you might create to be captured by a photograph. A narrative tableaux can be defined as "Several human actors play out scenes from every day life, history, myth or the fantasy of the direction artist" (Kohler, 34).

There are six people, each wearing a different color to represent one of the six following emotions: joy, disgust, fear, surprise, anger, and sadness. They are all in a white room, interacting with each other based on the emotion they represent.

6. Describe an idea for a photograph that includes a miniature stage or still life. A description of such an image is "the tableaux reconstructs events as in the narrative tableaux, but in miniaturized format, using dolls and other toy objects" (Kohler, 34).

There are several origami shapes, some in mid-form, some completed, and then there are still flat pieces of paper without a single fold in them, waiting to be molded into something new.

Constructed Realities: Photographer Research

Yasumasa Morimura

Yasumasa Morimura is a Japanese appropriation artist - he borrows images from historical artists and inserts his own face onto them, such as paintings by Frida Kahlo and photographs of Marilyn Monroe. He creates alternate people by making these hybrids of himself - alternate personalities, so to speak. If he were to be this person, have their body with his face, what would his life be like?

Man Ray

Man Ray was an American artist who lived most of his career in Paris. He was a part of boththe Surrealist and Dada movement. Interesting fact about the Dada movement - the name was decided by sticking a knife into a dictionary and the name that it landed on was dada. Man Ray is most well known for his photograms, which he named rayograms, after himself. He would place objects on photo-sensitive material and expose them to light. He would create interesting concepts by placing seemingly random objects next to each other in these compositions - one such included spoons and pearls. Man Ray would also vary the amount of time exposed for each of the objects in an image and sometimes move objects within the frame as well. Makes you wonder what the world is like if these objects have a significance when they are in the presence of each other, and what that significance would be.

Final Images

Prompts in order from top to bottom: Photobooth, Snapshot, Advertisement, Postcard.

The photobooth is of my friend Jordan - we had the idea to take a bunch of snapshot of him and roll them all together to make an interesting stop-motion film. The high contrast keeps the small images interesting, in addition to the variety of faces made.

The snapshot if of my friend's golden retriever, Mira. She is in the center of the frame, with a slightly unusual and unplanned crop. She is not looking at the camera.

The advertisement is featuring my friend Rebecca and the hat that I knitted for her. If I were to do this differently I would have gotten together with her again and take more up close shots of just the hat and maybe of some knitwork that is in progress.

The postcard is featuring the train system in Chicago, Illinois. I gave it a older feeling by increasing the amount of darks in the photo and then lightening the darks themselves.

Works in Progress: Advertising, Part II

Works in Progress Critique: Advertising

The first image is in with the Polaroid prompt, inspired by this set by Parker Fitzgerald on Flickr.

The following three images are with the Snapshot prompt.

Advertising

The image on the fourth page of the PDF is the image I used for my recreation inspiration. Instead of looking at the image straight on I decided to go for a more angled view, but like the image I chose I didn't show the entire cup - I cropped off some of the top of the lid.

Biggby coffee = delicious.

Aesthetic Aspects

A. Describe some common aesthetic aspects of “news”-related photographs.

News-related photographs tend to be very straightforward in what they show. There is rarely an artistic-hidden-meaning, so that the photograph goes along with the article. They have a large depth of field so that the entire image is clear.

B. Describe some common aesthetic aspects of “snapshots”.

"Snapshots" are not always pleasing to the eye compositionally - they are more focused on capturing the moment and sometimes the photographer does not have time to "plan" their shot. Sometimes they are unfocused because the moment needs to be captured quickly.

C. Describe some common aesthetic aspects of advertisement photographs. Fashion photography? Product photography?

Usually advertising photography is very simple, to avoid distractions from what they're trying to sell. There will usually be an attractive person with the object, especially with fashion. Product photography will sometimes have a model with the product, but not always. Simplicity is key.

D. Describe some common aesthetic aspects of film or movie stills.

Film and movies have a more artistic viewpoint - they will go for interesting angles to keep the viewer drawn into the movie. They will vary between large and shallow depth of field, depending on the situation, but the depth of field is important to give the viewer a direct idea of what to focus on and what is important to look at in the scene.

E. Describe some common aesthetic aspects of yearbook and/or senior pictures.

Yearbook and senior photos will want to be focused on the figure - in the yearbook, everybody has a bust shot. Senior photos are a bit more interesting because everybody handles them differently, but usually there will be nice sitting portraits with a soft focus on the figure.

Written Statement

The window is starting to be obscured by the ivy. The window serves as a portal of sorts - almost as if you were to go through it you would enter Alice's Wonderland. Or your own Wonderland. The window is the only serious highlight; it becomes a clear emphasis of the picture, in addition to being in the center of the composition.

The plant is growing next to the wall. I would imagine if I were to pan out to see more, I would see a cute little house that has plants growing all around the side of the house. There are no strong contrasts, but there are extreme darks and subtle lights. There is an asymmetrical balance with the taller plant growing above the rest.

The reflection is underlaid by concrete, giving a strange look. It has the feeling of a painting with the texture of the concrete coming through the glass. I'm not sure what kind of feeling I get from this photo - a sort of feeling of uncertainty and calm. I burned and dodged the pipes and myself so that there was more depth to the photo instead of a lot of gray area.

The legs of the ostrich are strange. They're so prehistoric looking - just two toes to balance 6 feet tall of feathers. One would look at this photo and they would wonder what kind of animal that these legs belong to. I took this photo at the zoo when I went with my drawing class. I increased the contrast so that the texture on the legs and leaves were very clear.

In all of these photos, the only one with a symmetrical balance is the first image; the rest are asymmetrical. There is a range of varying contrasts among all of them as well.

Works in Progress: Place 2.0

Should, Would, Could (Not)

Is there anything that:

1) should not be photographed?
2) cannot be photographed?
3) I do not want to photograph?

I think that:

1) there probably are things that should not be photographed, in the context that people would not want to see them. But, sometimes I feel like we do need to see these things - the poverty, the sadness, the broken roads. "We need to just stand in it." - John Green

2) that there is not anything that cannot be photographed. There are things that don't physically exist, like love for instance, but we can look at a couple who is truly happy together and see love through them.

3) I would not want to photograph at a funeral.

Works in Progress - Place

Dan Holdsworth

Dan Holdsworth's landscape photography evoke a kind of surreal aspect - many of them deal with the effects of light and how it changes the feel of a landscape. Holdsworth uses photography according to its original purpose - "the obsolete principle of light and time compressed to the translucent sliver of film, developed in the blind claustrophobia of darkness" (as it says in his biography). He creates landscapes surrounding themes such as sublime landscape, technology versus nature, hyper-modernity, and spiritual drive. His colors for the landscapes are quite saturated and the blurred effects give a sense of time that has past. "North of Nanaimo" from his project "Infinite Picture" gives this surreal landscape - not because of what is in the landscape but because of the colors and light effects. The cool blue-teal color evokes a calm and relaxed feeling.

Quote Responses 2.0

"I think photographs should be provocative and not tell you what you already know. It takes no great powers or magic to reproduce somebody's face in a photograph. The magic is seeing people in new ways."
- Duane Michals

When you look at a photograph, do you just stare at it for a moment and then move on, or do you look at it and try to come up with stories for the photo? What are the people are doing, wearing, and where are they? And the fun of this, when you look at photos that you see on the internet or in someone's scrapbook is that you can guess and you won't really have a sure answer. Which leaves room for more guessing.

"I believe in imagination. What I cannot see is infinitely more important than what I can see."
- Duane Michals

"Seeing is believing."
There are things like love - things we cannot see, but want to believe in. And, well, who doesn't find love important?
Imagination has no limit. We can explore and find new things infinitely. The things we can see have a maximum, and when we hit that we are at a loss for what else to do. The things we imagine are in an alternate reality, where anything can be what it wants to become.

"Photography, as we all know, is not real at all. It's an illusion of reality with which we create our own private world."
- Arnold Newman

With photography, we record memories that we want a record of. Mostly this means happy memories (have you ever seen people take photos at a funeral?). No one would want to remember the sadness if they could help it.
But when we hold a stack of photos, and others look through it, it's our own world that we create - who is in it, the places we've been, and all the things that we find important. People may go through our stack of photos and wonder why we have a particular photo, because to the others it will seem worthless, when that may be the most important memory to you.

Assignment 2: Critique, Part II

My photos for the portrait assignment were well-liked by my peers, along with which came some great critique and suggestions for improvement.

For my self-portrait, I received praise for the detail of the eyes and nods of approval for the choice of crop on my face. Someone commented on how they liked how I was looking upwards and not at the camera. I could see myself doing an extension on this, going through different expressions showing emotion through just one part of myself (mouth, nose, etc.).

For the first portrait of Allegra, the close-up, the angle of the portrait was well-liked for its interestingness - the view is looking down at the figure and off to the side. Some suggestions that were given were to apply more contrast and to blur the background out more so that the figure is emphasized even more as the focus.

For the second portrait of Allegra, where she is sitting in the Gilchrist Pub next to the window, there were no suggestions given during this particular critique to make it more portfolio-worthy, although I do remember that there was a suggestion previously for if I were to do a re-shoot to make her eyes the focus because they're so striking with expression. There were several good notes on the expression on her face in combination with the angle of the portrait on her - the viewer is in the position to be looking down upon her, but she is giving the expression of looking down upon the viewer. She is quite intimidating.

For the third portrait of Allegra, they like the facial expression and the trees in the background, but one suggestion that was made to make the figure pop was to go and lighten up the figure in more highlighted areas so that she wouldn't be as gray - so that she stands out more.

All the suggestions that were made during the critique that day are things that I could go into photoshop and fix.

The Passing of the Morning

Assignment 2: Critique, Part I

For the first image, my self portrait, I re-cropped it differently, which improved the balance of the photo. I'm quite pleased with the amount of detail in my eyes and the amount of light and the reflection of the window. I like my inquisitive-happy expression. I feel like the diffused lighting from the window of my dorm worked really well, and provided good values.

For the first portrait of my friend Allegra, I am happy with the range of values. I feel that the composition of her is interesting, and is not your traditional portrait. I like the little highlight of her necklace and the subtle value changes.

The second portrait of Allegra is one that I feel has an excellent show of contrast. I am pleased with how the morning light from the window is reacting to her form. Everyone has commented or noted her expression to the viewer, who is looking down at her, but she is giving a look as if though she were the one looking down on you.

The final image (again of Allegra) is my favorite of the three portraits of her - I like the almost blown-out background, and I like the blurred out trees to give the photo some depth. I feel that the values are good, and I like her somewhat-blank expression. I like the asymmetrical balance of the photo, and I also like that the darkest darks are on her so that it creates a focus of emphasis.

Blog Responses - Memories, Spaces and a Collage

Memory of a Place

The backyard of the house I lived in through elementary school was one of my favorite places to be when I was little - we had a playset in the back of it and a huge garden on the left side. There is a small shed in the corner between the garden and the playset. The playset had a slide, two normal swings and one of those swings that two people could sit on, in a fashion like a teeter-totter. My mom would always take photos of my sister and myself in front of the garden near the sunflowers every summer, and I have several photos of myself on one of the swings when I was about two years old. The grass was always super green in the spring and summer, and the leaves were always the brightest reds and oranges. In the center of our yard we had one of the tallest trees in my neighborhood, and we always had a thick layer of leaves on the ground at fall. Naturally, we had epic leaf piles as well. I haven't seen that place in ages - I have no idea what it looks like now, but I would hope that the garden is still there. I hope that the tree didn't cause any trouble like it's brother in the front, which had to be cut down because the roots were causing flooding with our pipes. I would imagine that they got rid of the playset by now.

Memory of a Photograph

When I was little, there was a small boulder on the front lawn of my grandpa's house in California. Every time we go out there, my mom will always take a photo of my sister and I sitting on the boulder. It's not so much that the place has changed, other than the different variety of flowers in the background of the front yard, but when I look through the series of these photos I notice how I get bigger. A reenactment of this photo would be my sister and myself sitting on the boulder, barely having enough room for both of us. Things always seem so much bigger when you're little.

Human-Made Space

It was interesting to watch the field behind my current house transform into more of the neighborhood. We were one of the early families to move in - I've lived there for a little over nine years now, and my bedroom window had a perfect view of the back field. Nothing but grass and in the great distance a line of trees - before my neighborhood existed, it was farmland, where country kids would ride their horses through, or so I heard. Wasn't hard to believe since I could also see horses from my house. I remember there were some days that I would watch the construction workers because they began to work while I was still sleeping and they would wake my up with their dinosaur-like machinery. I remember that sometimes after the workers went home I would go inside the houses as they were in mid-construction and explore. If I were in this class as this was going on, I would probably go in the houses and take photos from the inside of the house with the bare frame, before they put the walls up, so that you could see the rest of the natural land and fields.

Unknown vs. Familiar Space

Familiar: The Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

Unknown: Hawaii.

I could use photography to show the differences in temperature, how people dress, how the land looks, how the bodies of water are different and how the beaches look in January. Have you ever seen snow on a beach? It's pretty amazing.

A place that has been "touched" very little by people is space. Because it's so massive and so little of it has been explored in person - so much machinery and telescopes do the looking for us - that many things about space are still uncertain. We use telescopes to photograph the many stars and asteroids and planets, but I'm sure that it's an entirely different experience when you're there experiencing the event with your own two eyes. Like seeing the Grand Canyon, and standing right next to it while you're looking at it - it's just breathtaking.

In-Camera Collage

When I was little, I was always in my bedroom. I hardly ever went to play with the other kids on my street. I had a sliding-door closet, my twin bed right next to my windows, and my Beauty and the Beast sheets. This was the bedroom in my old house. I am not in my bedroom in my current house as much now, but through high school I was there a fair amount too. It would be interesting if I would be able to have a long shutter speed and set up so that there is a young me and then the current me sitting on the beds of our respective times in the same position. The current me would be more bold, but still transparent, and I think I would show the current me leaving the bedroom as well; to imply that I'm finally leaving to explore the space beyond my bedroom (finally!).

Works in Progress- Portraits (2.0)

Works in Progress - Portraits