December 2015 – Ashley's Bizarre Photography Adventure

Stranger Portraiture

Ashley Hill / December 3, 2015December 4, 2015 / Portraiture

The second task for portraiture was to take picture of complete strangers. Since the Christmas market was in Lincoln I decided to see if I can find some more uniquely dressed people to photograph. In the end I decided to take photograph of the people running an Ale stall. I chose these people because their clothing was vintage and not something you would see everyday. I decided to use the environment of their stall as a background. I found it easy to ask them once i spoke with them a bit and they was very happy to help even saying to wait a minute so he could go get his scarf and hat.

With this image I got the subject to stand slightly in front of the tap and kept the tap in focus, this was to show more of the environment and what the persons job is. The boxes and other things also made a mice background and the went around the area gives it a Christmas feel. I’ve also fiddled with the temperature and other parts of the image to create a warm glow effect.

With this image I managed to get the barrels in the background. Like with the first image i managed to give this a nice glow and use that along with the white in the image to create a Christmas like atmosphere. I feel the clothes such as the hat and his suit give the look of an older time, creating a much more unique image, making it look almost period (besides from the more modern environment). I also managed to interact with the subject for them to feel comfortable and for them to give a natural smile. Again this joy and cheer really gives across the message of Christmas cheer which is what I really wanted to show with these two images.

Landscape – Home

Ashley Hill / December 2, 2015December 4, 2015 / Home

For these 6 images i wanted to create Parallels between my home town of Kings Lynn and the place I’m living in now which is Lincoln. The First image is that of the green Quay, it holds alot of memories for me growing up. I used some of the environment in the foreground to hide what is behind it and bring more attention to the foreground as well as being able to look into the distance of the background.

The image that’s the middle right is of the Brayford quay in Lincoln, I decided to use the slight ramp that leads to the waters edge to get higher at first but then decided to go for a lower angle. This helped create a longer shot and an overall better image that I am happy with. shooting in the evening made it a bit harder to shoot the image but by opening up the aperture and then using Lightroom I managed to get a natural glow from the image that I’m really happy with.

The third image (top right) is of the custom house in Kings Lynn, it is also the tourist information. It holds the memories of researching the local history and events for school projects when I was younger. I wanted to get some of the other buildings around it to show the historical architecture of Kings Lynn. I really wanted to include the bottom half of the image as it shows how it is situated on the waters edge and hope it’s’ just a sheer drop.

The fourth image is bottom right I decided to walk up the bridge above the water to take a long shot that captured most of the Brayford. due to the time of day it gave off a calming atmosphere. I really liked how the water looked so i brought the clarity up in Lightroom slightly to show it better. I was able to get alot of the buildings and boats into the shot. I a way the mass of boats on the right parallels that of the people and business’s and homes on the left.

The fifth image (middle left) is of the cathedral in Kings Lynn. I wanted to try and show the age of the building, I did this by bringing up the clarity. I found the original image was a bit blue so I turned up the temperature, this helped correct the colouration of the image. I managed to get the whole of the building in as well as some of the surrounding area . There are some tree in the shot that I feel add to the overall image since it gives us something else to look at instead of it just being the cathedral.

The final image (bottom right) is of the Christmas tree just outside of Lincoln Cathedral. Having a picture at the Cathedral is to parallel the cathedral back in Kings Lynn. The image of a Christmas tree also gives off a friendly feeling, you tend to think of home when looking at a Christmas tree you tend to think of home since we normally put one up inside our homes and decorate it, they provide light and create a happy atmosphere. I was hoping to capture this atmosphere in this collection of images, which is why this image is the perfect one to finish it off as it symbolises the very thing i was trying to show.

Portraiture

Ashley Hill / December 2, 2015December 4, 2015 / Portraiture, Uncategorized

We was given the of creating 4 portrait images of subjects of our choosing. We should be concentrating on what makes the image, this means factors such as the lighting and compositions of the image and where the subject (and any props) are placed within the frame of the image. Personally i decided to shoot later in the day to get a darker lighting, using a high light shooting light directly down to give a noire like effect. I also took inspiration with this idea from the poster for the original Exorcist movie. I played around with casting shadows and making the image seem moody yet clear.

For the first Image I went for a more wide image approach, this allowed me to show the shadows created on the body and emphasize it. In light room I’ve brought up the highlights and shadows while also tweaking the black and white balances.

The second image I wanted to obscure the models face, I did this by getting them to look straight ahead getting the light to not hit their face as much. Then in light room I brought the shadows up slightly. The source of light can not be seen in the image but you can see the beam it’s producing against the wall, I feel this gives a spotlight like effect and creates a dark and mysterious atmosphere.

Portraits 3 and 4 are both very similar in terms of the models pose but between them i changed the distance from the model leaving more of the area around the model. I turned up the clarity of the images to bring out the textures of the wall behind which gives it a nice rough look which matches that of the leather jacket. I made the background lighter to help show the texture of the wall. I managed to keep some shadows on the model while keeping the detail in the image.