Portraiture Work Diary

This photograph was taken with a lower figure aperture of f8 which brought about focus on the person as well as the wall behind. The camera settings were set to an aperture priority setting so the shutter speed was automatically adjusted to show a clear photograph. Minor changed could be made to make the bricks in an orderly fashion while keeping the person as the main focus of the photograph. This adjustment would be made by rotation and cropping.

Before Edit

After edit

I believe that this was a successful edit since the bricks in the background are aligned. However the lower section of bricks gradually become more disorganised in the photograph. The only solution to this would be retaking the photograph. Overall I think that the final photograph was a good result.

This photo was also taken with a relatively low f stop value with a value of f 8 which slightly blurs out the background. Cropping and colour adjustments could be made to create a more aesthetic photograph.

Before Edit

After Edit

  

I think that this edit was successful since the photo includes the rule of thirds with the persons eyes line and the windows being in the top third.

John Baldessari Research Notes

John Beldessari is an American conceptual artist known for his work featuring found photography and appropriated images. He lives and works in Santa Monica and Venice, California.

John burned his own paintings, put coloured dots over faces in photographs, and covered floors at the LA County Museum such as this picture. The dots on top of the peoples faces are actually conjured price stickers that John has collected. The aim of the image was to hide the peoples face and have the viewer focused onto the peoples clothes, facial expressions and surroundings to paint a scenario without using facial emotions. This photograph in particular connotes love and interest in one another  since they're very close to each other while also having a relaxed body language at the same time.

This photograph was a manipulation of paper and colours to piece together this image of the womanly figure onto of the man. In my opinion, this artwork gives a mixed impression of love and invasion of person space. The connotation of love is presented through the hand holding of this photograph. However, the connotation of invasion of personal space is connoted by the purple colour of the woman's leg, onto of the red male figure which would demonstrate some kind of authority. The green, blue, purple and pink colours of the womanly figure also demonstrate more emotion and variety to a woman's personality while the male only has the colours red and orange which could depict aggression to a mans personality.

This photograph also uses the manipulation of coloured paper as well as the collected price stickers collected by John. This photo displays an orange coloured tiger jumping through a flaming hoop with three other people behind the cage with the price stickers over their faces. This connotes the helplessness of the tiger since it is behind the cage while the other people spectate the helpless animal. The motivation to make this picture was to highlight the wrong that people are doing to these animals. Therefore this was created and adapted to John's style of artwork.

Physical Images Image Bank

 Both of these photographs, created by Hannah Hoch, looks to have been created with physically manipulated items like paper which was probably traded and scratched. These photos were aleo transformed and altered to achieve its desired results such as the disproportionate body parts.



This artwork by John Baldessari manipulates images with filling subjects with colour to bring about different connotations and meanings to the photographs.

Physical Images Definition

Gilliam's animations link with Hanna Hoch's composites since both images and animation involve the manipulation of physical items to create something. For example, both Hanna and Gilliam's work both involve the use of newspaper that was cut to create their final pieces.

Hoch and Gilliam are a part of the Dada art movement. Dada or Dadaism was an art movement of the European avant-garde in the early 20th century, with early centers in Zürich, Switzerland at the Cabaret Voltaire and in New York.

Definition: Physically manipulated images.

Photo manipulation involves transforming or altering a photograph using various methods and techniques to achieve desired results.

Whilst this is usually done using software,  the physical adaptation of images is practised through e.g.

Tearing

Painting

scratching

Composite Image Making Image Bank

I believe that composite images can be used to make something that is aesthetically pleasing such as the photograph below. This photo does not connote any unrealistic expectations from the general public nor does it convey any sort of false information to the people viewing. Therefore this photograph has the purpose of an aesthetic appearance without any false meaning.

However composite images can also be used to mislead. It can lead to humour or false information.

This photograph obviously is misleading. However it has been done with the intention of humour without having the general public believe a misleading source to a controversial topic.

However these photos are misleading on a controversial topic. OJ Simpson in the first magazine is in his normal colour. However the second magazine has manipulated the image to make OJ Simpson a person with a different race. This causes controversy since there is no real racial identity to him and the general public could be lead to believe that people with darker coloured skin are unacceptable and harmful people.

Composite Image Making Definition

A composite Image is a picture that is made from the combination of multiple images merged into a single image. I think that this can have its benefits as well as its drawbacks such as making as aesthetic picture. However it could also make misleading images which could be published into the media. I think that composite images are right but only to a certain extent. They could be used to create aesthetically appealing images for the viewer. However it can also be used to create unrealistic/fake images such as magazine covers. This would then be viewed  by the general public who would be fed false information. 

This photo was created using photoshop to bring about a composite image of large rubber ducks in the river themes. The photo of the rubber duck was pasted as a separate layer than the background. This was then resized and placed into the appropriate position. Then a mask was created in every separate duck. The paintbrush tool was then used to 

Aperture and Depth of Field

Depth of Field - The difference between the nearest and furthest objects giving a focused image.

Aperture - a space through which light passes in an optical or photographic instrument, especially the variable opening by which light enters a camera.

Aperture is important because it can affect the sharpness or blurriness of  a photograph. For example, if you are aiming to take a landscape photograph and want to bring about a sharpness of the photo, a high aperture is needed to achieve this.

Main Apertures: f 2.8, f 4, f 5.6, f 8, f 11, f 16, f 22, f 32, f 64

A shallow depth of field uses a low number f stop such as 2.8 to bring about a focused image while blurring out the background.

Aperture Comparison

These are photographs that I have taken to demonstrate how a change in aperture can affect the sharpness and blurriness of a photograph. 


The photograph on the left side brings out the post on the left side since there is an aperture of f5.6. However the photograph on the right has a high f stop of 22 which keeps most of the image in focus. This shows how an adjustment in aperture can change the appearance of a photograph in terms of sharpness and blur. 



This principle also applies to this photograph. There was also a low f stop f 5.6 used to bring out the bark on the left photograph while on the right photograph, every detail is sharp because of the high f top used of f 22.