Research On Photographers

Research On Photographers

Nick Knight:

Nick Knight is a British Fashion and Documentary Photographer. He was born in 1958 and has three children. He started his career by studying at the Bournemouth and Poole College of arts and design. He is also a web publisher and directed the very famous Lady Gaga’s music video for ‘Born This Way’ which was a huge success. From looking at his work you can match this video to his style of photography it is very unique and quirky. I think Nick Knights style of photography is completely different to things I have seen before, it’s creativity at its finest. However some images appear to be quite strange you can always see how much thought and time he has put into every image to create the outcome he intended. He went on in life to achieve many awards for his work, and you can see why when you look into his photography. I find the images in which he uses bright colours fascinating as someone who prefers black and white images he has made me think otherwise, he also uses a lot of black silhouetted style images with incorporated into solid bold colour. He is a very different style of photographer he dresses the models in extravagant outfits with hairstyles to match but yet they seem to work so well.

Rankin:

Rankin, Real name John Rankin Waddell was born in Paisley in 1966. He is a British Portrait and Fashion Photographer. He studied at the Barnfield College Luton and then went on to The London College of Printing. Whilst studying he met Jefferson Hack, they formed a working relationship and then decided to create a magazine with one another. This was called the ‘Dazed and Confused’. Then following on from this Rankin created his own quarterly Magazine names ‘RANK’. One of Rankin’s most famous pieces are up in an exhibition this is formed of 1500 Portraits of today’s British public he invited people to come across the uk to partake in this project. Rankin become very successful and has shot for world-renowned campaigns such as Nike, Rimmell, Hugo Boss, Coca-Cola ect. In 2010 Rankin Travelled to South Africa with the BBC To shoot the Documentary ‘South Africa in Pictures’.

Specialist Location- Final Images and evaluation.

Specialist Location 

My final idea for the specialist location brief was to create fashion based images that could be used In magazines such as Look and Ellie. However this wasn't the only angle I wanted to take when doing this project fashion comes In all shapes, sizes and forms. So I created a few band shoots, which could be featured In magazines such as karrang and rock sound. Overall I decided I would like to create a fashion shot for each of these categories men, women and band which all could be features when In a spread within a fashion based magazine. I chose to still encorporate band images into my work as this Is something I perticualy focus on as you can see through out all my projects. However I just changed It up slightly to three different styles so they would all fit how I wanted to make this project work.

In the end I think I did stick to my main idea within the planning, but I didn't create all the images I thought about, I am happy with the idea's I went with in the end and think they came back stronger then my original ideas. The oneIi kept with was the grunge style shoot, however instead of doing this outdoors I decided I wanted to use a white backdrop and keep It very plain and simple because the photo was so busy already. 

Here are the 10 images i chosen to submit:

MEN:

Model: Kevin Daos

Model: Sam Hardman

I think the black backdrop with this image works well With the contrast of kevin's skin tone and clothing. I used two sources of lighting one with a snoot on quite strong coming from the left and one soft box on the right to create the brighter effect on his face and for the right of him to be more shaddowed.

WOMEN:

Model: Caroline Grant

Model: Caroline Grant

Model: Caroline Grant

This was my grunge style shoot, As i proviously said I decided to go with a white backdrop so as not to overdo the Image I think it worked well, I chose quite dark colours for the clothing so it would be alternate to the background i kept a black and white theme through out and I feel the balloons created a good prop to use, I was unsure if they would be more of a hinderance towards the image but in the end I'm very glad I used them. I then chose a gingery brown coloured wig I though a black one would be to much to dark for the image and would just merge to much Into her clothing. Her makeup was also done by me i kept the pattern of the ballons also on her eye makeup to keep it consistant and matched her lipstick with her hair.
I don't think i would change much If I were to do this shoot again, Mabey I would try it outside but as I say I'm not sure If this would work well with the image I desired to create. I think this would suit a magazine as I intended due to the style of image  I tried to create a 'going out grunge' look and it seems to be quite fashionable currently. The bottom one may suit an atricle more, as the top one might be to posed, I could try work on this next time to create more of an inbetween of the two.

Band:

De'Nova Band

De'Nova Band

De'Nova Band

De'Nova Band

I really enjoyed shooting with De'Nova as they are friends, I know more insight into the type of people in which they are making it easier for me to shoot with them. I decided to try something different by using smoke bombs outside, this wasn't as easy as I expected it to be! you have to be quick as the smoke doesn't stick around that long also I could have done with using some which are more powerful.
For the inside shoot I chose to try use a prop in this case was the frame, I think this worked well as I can imagine It being used in a magazine and this is what i was aiming for. I think the thing i could have done better was the lighting In some places, On the day I didn't notice as much but now I have the images In front of me i can see where Iv'e gone wrong, I should next time take a look through on a computer before I leave In case any changes do need to be made.

Unit 35- Experimental Photography

Unit 35- Experimental Photography

For all my experimental images please refer to my sketchbook, as I have completed it all within that along with my notes and annotations. 

Evaluation:

Overall I really enjoyed completing the experimental brief, It took a lot of time, and effort but It all came together. Although some pieces of work worked a lot better then others ( see sketchbook) I think It really helped my to improve my techniques and get a bit creative to make my images stronger. Firstly i made a list of everything so I could tick them of one by one once I'd completed with them, I started with the easier ones such as scanning, To make it a bit more inventive I decided to print it onto different paper, to see how well they came out for images I have realised for a good quality image you will need to use good quality photo paper, normal A4 paper just Isn't good enough!

I got together all different types of materials I could think of i thought i'd really go out with this project as it gives you so much leeway to be creative, I used different colours cards, paints, glues and stickers to make all my images pop.

The one I found most difficult to create was the double exposure image, It's not easy to do but I gave it a few shots and I feel my final image came out quite well, I chose the red colour as it really stood out and I think this was a good choice in the end.

For all the rest of my notes and references for this project please take a look at my sketchbook.

Unit 23 Research and Evaluation

Unit 23  Music Research:

Within our era we are very music based, with this it involves a lot of advertising everywhere we go, and with music this is a huge industry we advertise in music shops on album and record covers, Posters and fly posting  We even find them within clothing lines. There are many famous lines from song writers we witness in everyday like, whether it being as i say on items of clothing on the pavement or even in homes on walls. An example of this would be Snow Patrols- chasing cars there famous quote ' If i just lay, iI i just lay here, Would you lie with me, And just forgot the world?' is found almost everywhere just the other day my mother bought a quote of this to place on her wall. Music is very much a part of our everyday activity even if you don't always realise it. 

Album covers are key to artists selling there work they are there to draw you in, such as posters and within fly posting the image is always eye catching. Even images for night clubs are almost always music based as it's such a key industry to us that it is something which we are drawn to.

Specialist Location Photography- Planning

Specialist Location Photography- Planning

I am starting my planning on the specialist location photography shoot, after out briefing in lesson today it has become very apparent I can pick almost any area I would like to focus this project on. Whether this be commercial, fashion, music, landscape the possibilities are endless, I guessI found this slightly daunting. I thought about staying in my comfort zone and sticking with live music photography but for my final project i'd like to challange myself and try something a bit different. So after a long hard think I have chosen to focus on Fashion photography. 

Fashion Photography:

Within picking this subject my mind immediately began racing, I have so many idea's of where/ what/ who I can use for this project but then getting them actually done could be quite challenging. There is a lot to think about but for my main subject i think i'd like to create a series of images as if I was adding them into a fashion magazine. This means i'd like to create some basic studio shots and some completely different ones outdoors. 

Some locations I would like to use would include, Heaton Park, Deansgate Locks, Castle Field and also some within the studio. I'm sure as I go around this may vary slightly but I already know some nice spots to shoot in these locations and it would be great to finally get to incorporate them into my work.

I think it's important for the style of the images I pick for each location to contribute to the scenery, such as i'd like to do a grungy style shoot in Heaton Park within the forests I think this would make a great shot if I can create it good enough. I think the messy style would create a good contrast in a wooded area as they would contrubute and reate to one another. Also within the studio, I would like to do a couple shoot with the woman very smarty dressed and the man quite rough looking to show different aspects and personalities I think this will be best in the studio so the models and my interpretation is this main focus in the image.

Here are some images which I find really inspiring and would like to try use some of the aspects they have created within my work:

credit: Jphotos Photography

I think the contrast they have created between the model and the background in the shot is beautiful and really makes the image. I would like to try something like this for my grunge style shoot.

Credit: Wilson Mcsheffrey Photography

I would also like to try a wedding/classy style shoot I think Heaton Park would be a great place to shoot something like this, Among all the glassy land areas. 

Photography Unknown

Photographer Unknown

Photographer Unknown

I would also like to try incorporate some dance style fashion photography, as this falls under the same category I think I could get some interesting shots from this and therefor will create a good range of different styles of fashion photography to go towards my final 'magazine pieces'. These images are some of the ones I saw and thought they were inspiring enough for me to want to create some similar for my work.

Credit: Nicola Selby

Credit: Freddieandcinnamon.com

Photographer Unknown

Photo Montage

Photo Montage Brief:

For this photo montage i wanted to take my passion for dance and incorporate it into the picture. I chose the beach Scene as i thought the contrast would look great as i wanted to used the space like kind of sky. I used the magnetic lasso tool to select the section of stary sky from the image i wanted to use then used the move tool to place it where i wanted. I did the same for both of the Silhouette of the dancers. I had a bit of a problem with the dancers as they were loads to big, so i then went on to select the image tab, scrolled down to transform and selected scale. To make sure the image was intact i used the corner tab to re-scale it whilst holding down the 'CTRL' button to make sure it doesn't change shape. Finally i used the rubber tool to correct any loose ends to make sure it all blended in nicely.

I think how there placed on the path shows my never ending journey within dance, I also like the contracting of colours how bright they are but then the wood within the bridge is quite grainy and more dull colours. In the end i used four different images to create this photo Montage.

Following on from creating this i was searching through my own images, and decided to try create a montage from my own Live music images. I think it works really well, I used the exact same techniques the only extra thing i did different was used the opacity of a couple of the images i then used the rubber tool to select sections of the image in which i wanted to overlap. 

Overall i found the photo montages quite challenging to create but now i think I've got the hang of it more i quite enjoy doing them and it will defiantly help me though out the future.

Unit 23: Photographic Media, Techniques and Technology

Unit 23: Photographic Media, Techniques and Technology.

Task one:

You can find each of these images in different blogs i have added a label to these names 'unit 23' Following each individual project e.g: depth of field, Motion Blur.

Task Two: Health and Safety

I have recently learnt a lot during the health and safety class. I was shown the 5 steps to the risk assessment which can be found on the HSE website as i have shown below.

I already had some previous experience in COSHH within previous workplaces, however we talked about these more in depth and i feel i have a better knowledge of them now. Such as different labels on packaging:

We have COSHH labels on all harmful solutions and products. We much ablige to this and follow these due to the health and safety at work act:

"Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974

The Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 , also referred to as HSWA, HSW Act or HASAWA, is the primary piece of legislation covering occupational health and safety in Great Britain. The Health and Safety Executive with local authorities (and other enforcing authorities) is responsible for enforcing the Act and a number of other Acts and Statutory Instruments relevant to the working environment."

Due to harmful products whilst working in the dark room, or in other cases as well we should make sure we wear the suitable equiptment at all times such as:

• gloves
• Sleeves
• Lab Coat

Also for activities such as landscape photography, making sure you are aware of your surroundings and putting up safety rails if necessary. 

Display Screen Equipment Regulations Act 1992:

We must follow this to prevent self injury making sure we have the correct support such as:

• Using a computer chair
• Making sure it is glare free, no reflections to prevent headaches
• Back support
• Foot support

We must also check we pat ( Portable appliance test) test all equipment to make sure if it safe for use within the studio. This is under the European Regulations on electrical goods.