Unit 31 Specialist Location "The Last Bastions Of British Industry"

                           Well, despite my adventures into the world of experimental photography taking up quite a bit of my time and imagination of late, I did eventually decide to stick to my original plan of The Last Bastions Of British Industry  as inspired by Donovan Wylie's collection Outposts. 
                           Having watched the weather change quite substantially over the last couple of weeks, I'd always found myself to be preoccupied with other arrangements on the days when I thought it was suitable to my needs, so with time running out I settled on early Saturday evening with a mixture of overcast skies and the odd burst of sunshine to try and achieve my goal. Now I'd previously observed a number of potential locations whilst on my day to day travels but on driving into Trafford Park there was another building that had previously gone unnoticed and so with a couple of drive-bys thanks to the restrictive nature of dual carriageways, I managed to spot a parking bay and proceeded to set up my previously arranged camera, tripod and filter arrangement. When I say previously arranged, I'd decided prior to leaving home that it would be a good idea to fire off some test shots in the garden as I was considering long exposures to get some added pop courtesy of the motion blur that could be attained from the clouds, so I already had the camera set on the tripod with a ND10 filter sat on the front so it was simply a case standing the camera up, sliding up the filter to gain a frame, and then resetting the filter to get some shots based loosely around the times I'd used in the garden, and the remote shutter release to avoid any camera shake.
                           It was shortly after firing this first test shot that I caught a glimpse of a guy marching rather briskly towards me with a radio in one hand, mid conversation and the other arm being swung to maximise the efficiency of his pace without him giving the impression that he could break into a slight canter at any minute. For the moment, there was no one else around, so it was obvious I was the focus of his attention and his radio communications hadn't been in vain as he then joined on the other side of the fence by three other chaps all demanding to know what I was up to. Now being the friendly sort of chap that I am, I directed my reply in a civilised manner towards the one that looked to be in charge and simply explained that it was for a college based project and that I wasn't in the slightest bit interested what they did at the site, before reassuring him with the presentation of my college ID badge which I'd had the foresight to include in my bag just in case any situations such as these were to arise. This was about as exciting as it got, although one of the guys on the other side of the fence proceeded to tell me that it was a sensitive site regards some of the work carried out there and that was why they didn't want me taking any pictures, which I found quite amusing really because if I had been on any kind of recognisance mission, then he was already telling me things I didn't know, God bless him. Finally, the chap on my side of the fence asked me if I had been down Lyons Road doing the same thing 2 weeks previous as I had been spotted but they failed to get my registration plate as they apparently have to report any suspicious activity directly to the police because of the nature of the site, again, more than I needed to know, but I did confess and tell him it was indeed me as I didn't want them thinking they had somebody else to worry about. And that was it, well except for me agreeing not to take any pictures ( it was only a roof top) so it was completely by accident that my remote shutter went off a couple of times as pretended to rummage for something that wasn't there in the car boot.
                         So what of the pictures I here you ask, well to be honest all they did was make me realise that the sky wasn't what I wanted for long exposures as they were just presenting the rooftop as a silhouette thanks to the lack of light on the front of the building and the rather dull cloud formations, but I thought I'd give it another go on the next stop before making a decision whether to continue down this avenue of attack. Below you can see a couple of images of the test shots from earlier in the day when I was just trying to get some idea of exposure times. 

                                                 

    

                         Shot with an aperture of f36 @ 25secs on ISO100  and using a slot in ND10 filter which has a given a slight purpley haze due to the quality of the filter being only plastic and not glass but this wouldn't matter so much as I was looking to produce monochrome images. You can also see how the importance of checking your equipment beforehand is crucial in producing images that you don't want to contain various bits of crud in the way of eye lashes, dirt or dust.

                                          

                                                                                                          
                             A slightly longer exposure this time with an increase to 30 secs and as the sun is going to be lower in the sky the later in the day, then any further increases in time using this filter would have to be achieved using the bulb setting and remote shutter release.

                             Next up is the first of the test shots on location a little later in the day where the sky had gone from a good contrast of blue sky and white clouds to just a virtual blanket of grey with showers threatening. This was also the point when I was in conversation with my new found friends so they'd put me off a bit and any further attempts to juggle around with exposure times would have just caused more aggravation for all concerned. 

                                          

                                             
                              This was shot at f29 and again for 30 secs @ ISO 100, now despite the intervention, if I was looking to continue to shoot like this I would have to probably bracket a few shots so that I wouldn't be in danger of losing the sky completely if I was to increase the exposure time. Now if it wasn't such a complicated outline, say a straight horizon, I could also compensate for this by using a graduated filter to reduce the rate at which the sky is exposed in conjunction with the lower half of the frame, but it was around this time that I'd sort of made the decision to shoot without the tripod and and filters and just concentrate on my subject matter and worry about the final image in my pp work. 

                               Now that I'd made a decision it was time to concentrate and gathering a selection of images that would work well as a set so I chose to shoot a selection of subjects, firstly square on, but then also as part of a greater landscape and occasionally more of an abstract viewpoint just to keep things interesting. I wasn't really looking to produce vast industrial landscapes as even Donovan's works were not only about the Outposts,  but also about the environment that surrounded them but seeing as though my work wasn't looking to directly replicate his, I decided to finally concentrate on producing a selection of individual structures that stood out against the sky and that were interesting enough to draw the viewer in to examine the finer details.

                                             The Last Bastions Of British Industry  

                                             

    

                                                              Evaluation

                 Considering I was having some reservations about my chosen specialist location, I'm rather pleased that I stuck to my plan as I feel I have achieved my aims whilst learning a few valuable points on the way. 

  

• Consider your viewpoint carefully because when shooting architecture with a digital dslr there is always going to be the chance that converging lines than cause slight optical illusions when it comes to thinks looking vertical or not especially when it's quite a complicated structure that you can see through as there'll be more lines to consider such as in the last one .
• With the weather somewhat changeable this last weekend the strong winds meant that the cloud base was changing at a fairly rapid rate, especially on the Sunday when it went from clear sky one minute to overcast again the next, so this is something that needs to be considered carefully if you are looking to exhibit work as part of a set with a common denominator, the background.
• Decide beforehand if you are going to be presenting your final images in black and white as that way you'll have a better idea of whether or not what you are shooting is going to be affected by quick changes in the weather.
• Always check on the position of the sun and the time of day you are looking to shoot if you already have some idea of what your subject matter is, I found this important as I wanted to use the natural light to maximum effect when trying  to make the stainless steel and bright white subjects really stand out.
• My original idea to include some motion blur via long exposures didn't really matter in the end because I feel that my subject matters stand alone enough as interesting subject matter without the added distortion in the cloud but in saying that it is something I will reshoot at sometime and compare the results then.
• If you feel your presence may well attract the attention of others either from a security point or view or just simple curiosity, make sure you answer any questions in a civilised, adult fashion and don't immediately be the cause of any confrontation by spouting out your rights, and by-laws etc etc ....a little common sense and a polite disposition can get you a lot further in life, some people have a job to do, some people are just curious, learn to live with it.
• Going back to what I said about long exposures I would certainly want to get a lot more practice in should I choose to shoot something in a similar vein within limted time constraints as turning up on location without a thorough idea of how you can tackle subjects could make the difference between you spending a couple of hours and a couple of days out there doing it.
• One thing I had forgotten about whilst shooting was what image size I was looking to present them in as I had every intention of printing them full frame and it was only afterwards I realised I'd ordered A4 mounts so I just kept the proportions the same for the larger A3 prints which of course meant I had to crop them ever so slightly and so they loose a bit of their landscape quality.     

                                                             Summary

           I have decided to print 2 sets of images off with DS Colour in Didsbury, the first set in simple A3 format because I'm curious to see what amount of detail will be reproduced at this size, and then a 2nd set in A4 format because I didn't want to just present them a images in a folder as we have done in the past, but instead wanted to see how they would look in mounts and presentation bags so as to go somewhere towards seeing what they would look like framed. Unfortunately at this moment in time I can't afford the frames but what I have done is noticed how good some of these images look printed on acetate so I shall be including some of these as part of my final submission with a view to perhaps exhibiting them this way once I've figured out a suitable format for presentation .  

                                                          The Next Step  

            Well I was never going to be happy with just leaving things as they were so the more I've looked at my images the more I've considered what else could be done with them so the first idea I've had was to create a panoramic landscape but not by using photostitching but instead just blending them all onto a canvas. As you can see, this is only in it.s early stages as I've left an area where you can see it's been masked and as this isn't part of my final submission I've just left it like that so you can see where I might be going next. 

                             

             And it doesn't end there, as the one idea invariably leads to another so next up was this little beauty which I definitely will be exploring a little more as the images below were just a quick scan as I put them together.

                                           

                       

Unit 27 Digital Image Capture & Editing - Research

                      When it comes down to photo montage I'd be the first to admit that I couldn't really name anyone off the top of my head but then I guess that's the whole idea behind doing some research as part of your studies. That's not to say that I wouldn't recognise anything of note if I fell over it because that wouldn't be true as we've all seen the propaganda images produced by all sides during World War 2.

                                                       

                              So I've been having a look around online to not just simply find a few people that produce these photomontages but see if I can actually choose those that I find interesting, either simply from a visual view point or even just because they might make me smile...the odder the better.

                            First up I've chosen Sean Hillen who's early works from between 1983 and 1993 documented the troubles in Northern Ireland by the simple approach of glue and a scalpel to produce such works as Jesus Appears In Newry from 1992.

                                               


                                     His work has appeared in the Royal Photographic Journal and on the cover of Creative Camera magazine as well as getting a double page spread in The Times .
Going back to what I said earlier about things that amuse me, I'm rather fond of this one because not only does it feature one of Newry's favourite sons but also a rather snappy title in Pat Jennings Appears In Bolton, Security Forces Investigate .

                                                  

                                     My final selection is a piece called Who Is My Enemy ? which at first glance just looks like a random selection of people pasted into a street scene but on closer inspection you see the pill box and then the accompanying words go on to explain how he discovered these observation/shooting posts when just out on one of his photo walks but they weren't an immediate feature. A bit like the viewer taking a second look at this image.

                                                   

                                      If you want to read more about Sean, trust me it's worth the trip, then head on over to his website at Sean Hillen.com or failing that at least take the time out to watch this short video about his project called Ghost Shops  in which his images are almost montages in themselves, but they're not really...you'll see what I mean and it's only a minute long ..
                                    My second choice came from a guy called Erwan Soyer who I discovered over at One Day You Will Find Me .com . Erwan is French graphic designer and illustrator who is influenced by, amongst others, Terry Gilliam of Monty Python fame which is fairly evident in this first image.

                                                          

                                             I can't actually tell you a great deal more about this guy apart from I just presume him to be fairly youthful judging by the interview that takes place over at the previously mentioned source of these images. My next choice I made because I like the way he has incorporated the apparent illusion of  texture into the image. 

                                                            
              
                                                The final image from his portfolio is this one which once again features a human figure interacting with a manufactured background but in a clever and slightly amusing way plus I'm also beginning to appreciate the use of things as simple as paper being incorporated to produce that slightly 3 dimensional effect by shooting it in a 2 dimensional situation .


                                                               

                                         My final choice comes from something I stumbled across this week by a photographic historian from The Hague called Jo Teeuwisse and her series Ghosts Of History  which started when she discovered a series of old negatives and wanted to find out who they were made by and where they were taken which in turn lead to her incorporating them into modern photographs of the original locations. I haven't added any further text to these as I feel they just speak for themselves but all the additional information and a whole selection of other images are available at her website in the above link .

                                                           

                                           
                                                      

                                              

                                                      
                                                        

                                           All in all some pretty clever stuff from quite a simple idea, sometimes you just have to let your mind expand all on it's own so it can soak up more ideas.

Music Photography Research Mick Rock

                   Again working in pairs, we were asked to research a well known music photographer and put together a small powerpoint presentation which we would then present in front of the rest of the class...or at least those that had turned up. So after a quick shufty through a few of the books Richard had provided to see who we felt stood out, it was then down to me and Amena to get some surfing done and come up with something half decent, and that is when we decided on Mick Rock.
            

                                                  

                                  Now then, unless I'm mistaken I think the powerpoint that we put together has long since disappeared so I'm going to have to present a short brief from memory on what we actually talked about.  
                                 Mick Rock was born in London in 1948 and went on to become one of the country's producers of some of rocks most iconic images. The Pretty Things were the first band he shot in 1969 but after meeting David Bowie in 1972 he then went on to become his official photographer. I guess it comes with the territory that if you're hanging out with Bowie in the 70's then somewhere down the line there's ever chance you'd be shooting the likes of Iggy Pop and Lou Reed which of course, he did, and most famously so got to shoot the cover Lou Reeds Transformer album.  

                                     

                                                     

                                                 
                                                            


                            If you think of rock stars from the 70's then he's probably shot them, be it Queen, Syd Barrett  through to The Ramones and Joan Jett. I love his black and white imagery, especially his live shots such as the Iggy Pop one above as I feel it puts you in the picture and you can almost feel the atmosphere and smell the sweat and grease paint.  
                            The best place to read about Mick and his achievements and exhibitions would be over at his website as all I'd be doing here would be reciting it word for word, but what I will say is that because Mick was trusted by the people he was shooting he was often granted access to shoot back stage and at the after show parties which is where many of my favourite images of his come from, and if I had to pick a special one then it would be the absolute corker that sees David Bowie and Mick Ronson sharing a moment over a meal on a train to Aberdeen in between tour dates in the 1972. Now I wouldn't say there was anything in particular that makes Mick Rock and his style unique in this day and age, but back in the day we were given the opportunity of seeing our stars 'off duty' even if they sometimes couldn't quite slip out of character .

                                      
                                                    

                                                                                              
                          

Unit 27 - Digital Image Capture & Editing

                           For my digital montage I have opted to go down the family/home route which will of course naturally involve my memory, or at least what's left of it . Now as fortune would have it,  I am one of those people that tends to keep little things that evoke memories, be it from trips away, love letters and in this case absolutely anything to do with my three children so I'm never too far away from a milk tooth or birth certificate, except at the moment because their birth certificates are hopefully sat on someone's desk in Doncaster awaiting the approval of someone in charge so that I can continue my studies on the foundation degree course with a little assistance from those wonderful people at Student Finance.
                            My plan is to create a montage based around the boys as they are now but to include a couple of things from when they were wee bairns, well one of them was, the 2 eldest are English so with this in mind I had a look around the house and collected the following:

1 x baby's birth wristband that belonged to Aidan, my youngest and was first slipped onto his wrist at Raigmore Hospital in Inverness on the 18th July 1999 and even though I wasn't there for the birth I was in the car as soon as she went went into labour and managed Inverness in a clear run in somewhere round about 5 and half hours or what ever the the least possible time within the speed limit is, officer. 

1 x  edition of the Sunday Times dated 1st September 2006 which I purchased immediately after Barney's birth whilst on my way home from the hospital to collect Reuben and his half sisters to fetch them back in again so they could add to the on going chaos of the maternity wing.

                                                   

1 x edition of The Times dated 21st April 2005 which I purchased in the early hours on my way home from the hospital to sort the dog out, freshen up, fetch his two sisters and generally ring around everyone that mattered and disturb the peace to let them know of my wonderful news.
                                                         
                                                    

1 x copy of Guess How Much I Love You ? by Sam McBratney which is my all time favourite bedtime read and I've read plenty of books at bedtime over the years as they'd get stories every single night from being born up until about the age of 10 when they graduated to story tapes and then eventually, and still CD's.
                                           
                                               

                                          
   
I x feather that just so happened to be in the drawer with the papers and seeing as though we were always out and about somewhere when they were little, it must have been one of the many things we ended up bring home with us. The worst of these, which I made a stand and said we weren't keeping, was a dead dog fish we found on the beach at Llandudno so once I'd been conned into taking into school for a show and tell, it went straight in the bin. Top tip : Never allow your self to be conned into fetching star fish home either as not only are you most likely breaking up a family, but their shelf life is rubbish and they stink to high heaven.
                                             
                                                       

  

                                              

3 x fresh images of the boys as they are now, taken with the dslr but with a manual lens added for that extra touch of retro authenticity.

                 These are missing from my files as my laptop died the before completion

1 x dead leaf shot in macro like the feather from local woodland just because we have walked there a lot and I needed a suitable canvas on which to start my montage .

                                              

                          The scanning of the newspapers was done at 300dpi because I was only looking to create an image no bigger than A4  should it be printed and that is more than good enough for purely web based files. I saved the files as JPEGS again because the quality wasn't going to be an issue for the purpose . Because I was placing the newspapers over the full surface of the flat bed scanner there wasn't going to be any issues with scaling . 

                           The process then involved just building up the image with a series of layers starting with the background canvas combining the leaf and the feather. Next I added the boys portraits so I could spread themm around in a suitable fashion without it looking too precise. Next the newspaper layers were added taking care as not to obscure the dates yet with a carful mix of opacity and masking make them fit around what was already there with out it becoming too obscure. The placing of the baby band was simple enough and I just decided to place it close to Aidan so as to inform the viewer who's it was. The next bit with the double page spread of Nut Brown Hare meant I used a total of 4 additional layers because I didn't want them obscuring anything else either so using opacity and masking I first placed one image bottom right and masked, then repeated the same but placed the corresponding words in a more suitable place and again masked as necessary and then repeated the same process in the top right hand corner of the montage. The final process involved adding an extra layer with the gradient map and then just merging all visible before saving at 72dpi. 

                             There was a point at this stage when I considered the inclusion of some negatives of the boys into the montage but I decided against it when I felt it was adding an extra dimension that wasn't need and so I applied the theory of less is more, and rightly so .

                                     

                                      
  

Viewpoint - Wide As You Like

                       We were set the task of going on a photo walk from college to shoot some images from a different perspective but more importantly with the widest angle lens we had available. Now I do actually own a Sigma 10-20 lens which isn't suitable for the full frame camera as there is a danger of mirror strikes but it is perfectly at home on my 400D, which, as luck would have it, were both perfectly at home in a camera back behind the couch , so it was down to the next best thing my Sigma 24-70, which I much prefer as the 10-20 can be prone to a certain amount of barrel distortion at its wider setting (think lamp posts leaning in towards the centre of the frame). 
                        One of the wonders of shooting with a wide angle is that it leads to a certain amount of creativity via the magic of perspective distortion which in lay mans terms means that parallel lines can appear to converge at wide angles so when shooting up at a building from a low angle then the building can appear to be leaning backward and another example of a shift in perspective for creative effect would be say shooting the sole of a foot of someone sat on the ground would make there foot foot appear remarkably large compared to the rest of their body sat behind it .
                         With this in mind I set off towards the centre of Didsbury to see what I could come back with .....


                        This first one goes a good way to showing you just what can be achieved in a tight space as this was taken with the camera more or less resting on my shoes and pointing up       
                           

      

                             This second one is just a classic example of of shooting low and pointing to enable you to get the full height of the subject in yet make the subject appear more interesting than it actually is by twisting the camera to get the 2nd point of interest on or about a point of thirds and in an ideal world I would have decreased the aperture to enhance the sharpness through the frame but perfection wasn't the point of the exercise, well not yet. 

       

                              This time I choose to shoot from the horizontal perspective to show some indication of how the converging lines can become greatly exaggerated and giving the impression that the garden wall may go on a lot longer than it actually does. 

         

                          Another one looking up but this time to show how it can completely throw things out of perspective by making the closest subject matter look completely out of proportion to the rest of the subject matter it is attached to.

         

                        I put this one in because even though it may not be the most interesting photograph I've ever taken, what it does do is show you how shooting at a wide angle cane be used to bring things together the frame in an abstract way which you wouldn't really be able to do when shooting at a narrow angle.
       

                   

                               
                          My final entry is another cliched shot but I thought it was worth including because I feel it shows how you can take the most mundane of subject matters and turn them into something worth looking at even if   my overall composition is slightly off the rails.   

                  

                          My overall conclusion on shooting at wide angles is that they are primarily ideal for landscape situations and even street photography if you can keep them around the 24mm mark but they do have a distinct advantage if you decide to shoot any lower than 24mm for expanding your creativity levels especially when shooting modern architecture where a stormy sky can work wonders within in the image. 

Fashion Photography Horst P Horst

                 For the task of identifying and researching a fashion photographer we were split into groups of 2 and told to seek out someone we admired that had a distinctive style before researching their career and portfolio so we opted for the man with two same names....

                                                       Horst P Horst 1909 - 1999

" I like taking photographs, because I like life. And I love photographing people best of all, because most of all I love humanity"

                     Born Horst Paul Albert Bohrmann and of German/ American parentage, he became a fashion photographer of note who's mainly monochromatic images featured clean lines and a certain classiness that you lead to him photographing many of the celebrities of the time including Noel Coward, Cole Porter and Bette Davis. In 1937 he met Coco Channel and this bond flourished as he went on to photograph her fashions for the next 30 years. 

                                                                                       

                        Influenced by the work of other fashion photographers such as Edward Steichen his style was such that he'd rarely shoot with shadows on the background which he would achieve by using 4 spotlights but with one placed above shining down from the ceiling, he also rarely used filters. Many of his shoots were shot where the sets and props were all prearranged in advance so he could then just issue the models with short and brief instructions when it came to the pose, plus it should also be noted that he generally left others to develop, print and crop his work . The majority of his fashion shoots would involve women including a lot of work for Vogue magazine with whom he became friends with its editor in chief, Diana Vreeland.

                                              

                                            

                             Horst's most iconic image Mainbocher Corset shot in the Vogue studio in Paris in 1939, was also a heavy influence, as was a lot of his work, on the video for Madonna's Vogue and you can just fast forward to 4:23 if you want to miss out all the other palaver that proceeds it, but to be fair, the entire video is a good representation of his work and style. 

                                              

                               I'd consider myself an admirer of Horst's work as it's classy, no nonsense and stylish plus his use of black and white really appeals to be and even the stuff he did that did features colour is again sleek and stylish as it was usually based on a single colour background to make the clothes and the model really catch the viewers attention, which is after all, what the   fashion industry is all about. 

                                               
                                       More of Horst's work can be seen in a variety of places but a good place to start would be on the website that bears his name, although this time only the once .

Fashion Photography Studio Brief

                Well, what initially appeared to be quite daunting in prospect, went on to become one the best times we've had in the studio working as a group. We were asked to produce a series of images in a fashion shoot style that could either showcase clothing or a brand so with that in mind, and me not being the trendiest bloke that ever walked the catwalk I thought I'd make the effort and call into a few of my local fashion boutiques to see what I could pick up for the day ahead. So there I was frantically searching the clothing racks of not only Help The Aged but also Oxfam, Scope, Pets With Problems the other half dozen charity shops that grace the sidewalks of Urmston but it wasn't long before I had a bag containing 2 shirts, 2 ties, a waistcoast and a trilby all for the princely sum of £10 so now it was just a quick visit to my other half's to see if I could borrow some ridiculous sunglasses in a Dierdre Barlow kind of stylee, not that she looks or dresses like her or anything, honest. 
                  So that was that, all I needed now was the bottle to wear all this clobber and try and looked relaxed in front of the camera . Fortunately for me I wasn't the only one who'd made the effort to dress up as it turned out our entire group had risen to the challenge and even those that weren't too sure about the idea ( Laurence) soon came round to the idea once they'd borrowed a few bits and pieces of those that had surplus. We opted for the typical white background high key approach to really show off the outfits and what we originally thought might just be individual poses, soon went by the by as we all felt more relaxed and dare I say,  giddy. 
                   I shot using the 5D MKII with a 24-70 Lens shooting at f11 1/100s and iso 100 with the lighting arrangement as below.

                        
                                         


                   My first one I've decided to present is one I'd previously posted on flickr but in mono, but for the purpose of this exercise I think a better representation of the fashion industry would be of me to post the colour version so here she is, the foxiest chick this side of her favourite wig shop, Anita aka my imaginary wife ...or are we divorced now ? To be honest I can't keep up with her ever changing moods.

                                                 

                          The second choice from my single portraits would this one of Besma which I've muted the colours ever so slightly to compliment the her some what serene pose.                                                             

                        
                                As a final part of the assignment we were given  the option of creating a magazine cover featuring us all in a group pose being careful to consider page layout and text so I thought I'd give this a quick go with Blogue (rhymes with Vogue)