Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Week Three, Part II





I recently stumbled upon Frieke Janssens’ “Smoking Kids” series- which at first I found hilarious. Though the more I looked at the photographs, the more my opinion of the series was skewed.  Most of Janssens’ work is advertising for big name companies in Belgium, but in a de-glamorized light. This project highlights that weird, dissonant feeling to her work. In her words, she wanted to “isolate the viewer’s focus upon the issue of smoking itself,” rather than the person doing the smoking. Though a smoking adult has become somewhat of a societal norm, a smoking child definitely has a “surreal impact,” and really walks the fine line between the attractiveness and ugliness of smoking. 

Sunday, December 18, 2011

Street Photography- Nicole





So I wanted to post something about flash since we have to use flash over break. I started looking for articles online about using flash and found an interesting one about using flash in street photography. The article talks about Bruce Gilden and includes the same youtube video we watched in class. The article also gives good tips on how to use flash in street photography!

http://erickimphotography.com/blog/2011/05/how-to-shoot-street-photography-with-a-flash/

Friday, December 16, 2011

Cashback





 I watched this movie Cash Back the other day and it was unbelievable. The cinematography was outrageous, as the directer constantly stops the scenes so they pause to still frames. As viewers your just sucked into this world as he  directs you upon these remarkable photographs that the main character freezes within. It's a world of a living breathing still.  It's a rather trippy story being that its depicting a man going three or four weeks without sleep. I cant stop thinking about these frames and the story line that mesh together wonderfully. Here are some photographs from the movie.  




Chema Madoz-Kara






Chema Madoz is a fine art photographer who creates images of things that may not always be what they seem. What I really like about this photographer's work is how they think outside of the box so much. They combine objects such as reflections and books to create extra pages within the book (shown by the reflection). I think that this photographer shows everyone how if you are creative, you can create very visually and ironically interesting images. I also like many of the tonalities that Chema chooses to turn the images to. I feel that these decisions are important because if Chema had kept the images in color, the viewer may not have understood the image as well as they do when it's in black and white.
To view more of Chema's work: http://www.chemamadoz.com/ingles/about.htm?

SOFT LAB- Keith













Michael Szivos is one of the founders of SOFT LAB studios in New York City. I had the pleasure of hearing him speak at a Visiting Artist presentation at my old school. This was where I was introduced to the work of him and his team. SOFT LAB creates massive installments of contemporary sculpture incorporated into architectural scenes. They have created a wide variety of incredible pieces of art with multiple mediums and colors, and the work is mind blowing. Being at one of these shows, when entire rooms or even buildings are interactive pieces, is one of the most spectacular concepts to this work. They often times will put donator's and contributor's names in the pieces, and they are a studio who has a very dynamic, very creative mentality. These installments from concept, to construction, to show, are all documented with time lapse photo or video for the most part. Their website www.softlabnyc.com, which I highly recommend visiting, is where you can see all of the installments the studio has produced.

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Nick Brandt- Samantha






This is another photographer that we looked at during M&P Nick Brant, he also does the same black and white/ greyscale type photography. Most of his images are from Africa and his images seem really stage but I don't know how they can be, how could he stylize an elephant out in the wild? Mind boggling! I like that his images are even beautiful without color, because you can see all the texture

Great posts! there is some really inspiring stuff here

Have a wonderful holiday!

Week Three, Part I






Paul Octavious is a boss. I stumbled upon this video one day and the rest was history. The video, taken at a photographic camp called, “Look Between” in Charlottesville, Virginia, was made to capture the portraits of the people he’d met. Simple. Though, as straightforward as this project was, it has always been extremely inspiring to me. Octavious uses soft focus and a somewhat hand-held feel in the video, making it feel even more personal and intimate. And though the video is in color, the black and white stills created after are just as strong if not, stronger. I recommend checking out his website (http://pauloctavious.com/) and his other projects, such as The Book Collection, Puffin Clouds, and Same Hill Different Day (where he documents life and seasons through photographs of the same hill in Chicago.)

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Inspiring Music

To wrap up the whole 'family' unit, I want to post this song. This is by a band called Radical Face, and the whole album "Ghost' is based around the concept of returning home. This is my favorite song off of the album, "Welcome Home."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8a4iiOnzsc

Greyscale Photography- Samantha








In M&P lecture this week we learned about how we shouldn't just press the button in Photoshop to convert the photo into black and white, we should play around with the grey scale so we can properly do it. Adjusting the contrast and brightness to the photo and its shadows. Some examples she had came from a photographer called Mitch Dobrowner. I looked up his portfolio online and I was especially interested in his Storm collection, partly because I used to watch Twister every Friday night on ABC Family when I was younger. The photos that Mitch Dobrowner has captured are amazing because of the grey scale and also because I can only imagine the situation and the atmosphere while he was capturing the images. All of his other sets are similar because he doesn't shoot people; he does only landscape. He'll have a mountain or a lake and then the sky. It's very impressing, because it's gorgeous without color.

Pakayla Biehn- Nicole

Okay so I LOVE taking double exposures with film and I love mimicking the effect in post processing with digital photography. I found this artist named Pakayla Biehn who is a painter that uses the concept of double exposures in her paintings. The paintings are very photorealistic and have a dream-like quality to them. The dream-like quality comes from the combination of portraits and scenes of nature. I think these paintings are incredible and extremely inspirational.








Monday, December 12, 2011

Tim Tadder-Kara






Tim Tadder is an advertising photographer who does a lot with Photoshop. A lot of these images may not be completely original, but I think that sometimes that is okay, especially if you are working with a client (which, in this case he was). Tim does a lot of work with athletes and companies that support athletics such as Gatorade. What really drew me to some of the images he creates is his amazing ability with Photoshop. He does composite images where he combines an athlete's place of play with their work environment. He also does interesting compositions with the same idea but has each half of the person as a different side to their life. His images are also really nice because he uses studio lighting extremely well to create dramatic images of the athletes. The one really intriguing part of his images is that they look almost cartoonish and like something is off with them. It might just be how heavily photoshopped they are, but I just can't figure out what it is that makes them look that way (it would be interesting to learn about that!)
More of his work: http://www.timtadder.com/#/portfolio/featured

Living Without Electricity for 29 years





Cathal McNaughton is an award winning advertising photographer in the UK and is now traveling and doing more documentary work. He did a story about a man living without electricity for 29 years and how he survives. I think that the work is strong because you get a sense of this man's isolation from the rest of the electrical-running world. I feel cold in this series which is an obvious but still very important feeling to portray in this work. I like that this series is very personal and isn't necessarily heartbreaking or a dramatically moving story but rather an average everyday american man living in a unique way.