Friday, May 3, 2019
Project Evaluation
When starting out this project I wanted to capture natures beautiful landscapes but I wanted the photographs to show an intervention of the man made world. County Councils and governments are targeting picturesque locations such as fields and empty plots of land so that those locations can be the host for the next lot of housing development, their reasoning for so many planned builds is because the world is so extremely over populated that they believe that the new builds can "solve" and potentially "end" the over population crisis.
I went back to the same 7 building sites on 3 separate days so that I could experiment with Digital, B/W 35 mm film and Colour 35mm film, the lighting conditions were pretty much identical on every shoot but the overcast skies meant that I could take photographs of the different areas of the sites without the risk of over exposure, lens flare and without the risk of being unevenly lit.
I chose my 8 favourite photographs, collectively, from both the black and white and the colour film shoots, after scanning them onto the computer I opened them in photoshop and converted them back into negatives so that I could use them for my alternative process.
For my alternative process I decided to produce 6 salt prints, the salt printing process is organic which, in itself, echoes the natural world and the sepia effect that is created from the silver and salt mixture adds an old fashioned effect which visually helps my concept of the loss of nature. I predominantly used the technique of salt printing but I chose to photograph all of the prints just after they had been brought in from the sunlight, I was faced with a problem when it came to fixing my images, when putting some of my prints into the fix it completely stripped away and removed any remanence of the photographs from the surfaces so I decided to print the photographed copies onto the surfaces that they were originally printed onto. For me, the image that is lost represents the past, they represent spaces that were once filled with vegetation which are soon to be replaced with the elements of the manmade world, the photographs themselves are a way to preserve that natural world as it once was.
To improve my project I would spend more time developing the technique of salt printing as I feel that I didn't work as well as it could have, if I had limited the amount of variables such as perhaps doing this in my own home where I wouldn't have to risk the chance of the cross contamination of chemicals and I would've chosen to produce the images in a different time of year such as summer as the sun would've been more dominant which would've made the effect more vibrant and the summer sun would've made it more possible to achieve better outcomes.
I went back to the same 7 building sites on 3 separate days so that I could experiment with Digital, B/W 35 mm film and Colour 35mm film, the lighting conditions were pretty much identical on every shoot but the overcast skies meant that I could take photographs of the different areas of the sites without the risk of over exposure, lens flare and without the risk of being unevenly lit.
I chose my 8 favourite photographs, collectively, from both the black and white and the colour film shoots, after scanning them onto the computer I opened them in photoshop and converted them back into negatives so that I could use them for my alternative process.
For my alternative process I decided to produce 6 salt prints, the salt printing process is organic which, in itself, echoes the natural world and the sepia effect that is created from the silver and salt mixture adds an old fashioned effect which visually helps my concept of the loss of nature. I predominantly used the technique of salt printing but I chose to photograph all of the prints just after they had been brought in from the sunlight, I was faced with a problem when it came to fixing my images, when putting some of my prints into the fix it completely stripped away and removed any remanence of the photographs from the surfaces so I decided to print the photographed copies onto the surfaces that they were originally printed onto. For me, the image that is lost represents the past, they represent spaces that were once filled with vegetation which are soon to be replaced with the elements of the manmade world, the photographs themselves are a way to preserve that natural world as it once was.
To improve my project I would spend more time developing the technique of salt printing as I feel that I didn't work as well as it could have, if I had limited the amount of variables such as perhaps doing this in my own home where I wouldn't have to risk the chance of the cross contamination of chemicals and I would've chosen to produce the images in a different time of year such as summer as the sun would've been more dominant which would've made the effect more vibrant and the summer sun would've made it more possible to achieve better outcomes.
Monday, April 29, 2019
Why Salt Printing?
I have chosen to look at the alternative process of salt print for my final outcomes, salt blocks could soon be used when building houses, however, the blocks would have to be coated with a waterproof material to prevent them from dissolving. Salt may not necessarily be used in the building process just yet, however, a salt print does give photographs an old fashioned sepia effect which I think would work really well for this subject matter.
To make sure that the salt printing process ties in with the subject of construction, I am going to be sourcing materials that are commonly found at building sites such as cement bags, plaster bags or ply wood, anything paper based or anything porous, and I will be using those as my base to print my photographs onto.
My next step will be to go through my final photoshoot and choose which photographs I think would be the most effective as a final outcome, I will then turn the photographs back into negatives using Adobe Photoshop and I will print them onto acetate so that I have, what is known as, a digital negative. From there I plan to coat my surfaces with a mixture of salt and water then I will leave that until it's dry, my next step would be to coat those same surfaces with a silver nitrate solution so that they become light sensitive which will enable me to print my photographs onto them. My final step would be to place my digital negatives onto the surfaces and weigh them down with a piece of glass (it has to be glass so that light can still get through it) so that they are flat and either place them in the sun or onto the UV machine so that they can develop.
Final Photoshoot Contact Sheet (Colour Film)
This is the final photoshoot for this project. By using colour film it has taken away the gloomy effect that the black and white film gave and it has replaced it with elements of vibrancy and warmth, which gives it more of a naturalist feel. I again travelled the same route, I chose to stick with the same route so that I had the order fresh in my mind and so I could remember the compositions and framing I used for each site. I knew that if I had tried to mix the travel order around I would've forgotten what parts of the sites I took photographs of so I decided to keep every variable the same to ensure that I produced the same, if not similar, outcomes.
Second Photoshoot Contact Sheet (B/W Film)
This is the contact sheet of my second photoshoot at the building sites, I'm more used to producing black and white 35mm films so I decided to try that to see how it looked. I travelled the same route as the trial run so that I could start from the furthest building site away from my house and work my way back to the closest site. After analysing my black and white images I like that compositions that I have produced, however, I feel that black and white film doesn't give me the effect that I want for this project so I plan to go back to each site for a final shoot, I will try to recreate the same compositions that can be seen in the photographs below but I will instead use a colour 35mm film as I feel that it will give me the desired effect. By using colour film it will also make the photographs look less gloomy than the black and white photographs.
First Photoshoot Contact Sheet (Digital)
This is my first photoshoot of the building sites. My aim for today was to take my DSRL so that I can take some quick shots of each site, I used today as a dry run to make sure that I was able to visit all of the building sites in one day as well as spend 30-45 minutes at each one, the reason I only took my DSLR was so that I could work quickly and not worry about my films messing up or being under/over exposed. Once I got home I analysed the photographs that I had taken so that I could see what areas of each building site interested me so that I know exactly what to photograph when I go back for the next shoot.
Sunday, April 28, 2019
Friday, April 26, 2019
My Starting Point
My starting point for the project was that I needed to buy a map so that I could pinpoint where each of the building sites were that I was going to be photographing, at the same time I looked them up on Google Maps on my phone so that I could get the exact location marked onto the map.
These are all building sites that I knew about, I drive past pretty much all of them on a daily basis whether I'm on my way to work, coming home from work, going to university or just driving around my local town. There is a lot of building work going on around Sittingbourne, especially with the new cinema and restaurant area that they are building in the centre of town, however, I didn't feel that the town renovations fit in with my chosen theme as I wanted the project to be solely about County Councils destroying natural areas to develop housing.
Link to Sittingbourne town renovations: http://www.spiritofsittingbourne.com
After marking each building site location on the map it was time for me to decide on the route that I was going to take, I ended up deciding to work backwards, so I planned to start with the furthest site away from my house and work backwards so the order went:
1) Faversham (Graveney Road)
2) Faversham/Oare (Western Link)
3) Bapchild (Fox Hill)
4) Sittingbourne (B2006)
5) Sittingbourne (Church Street)
6) Sittingbourne/Bobbing (Vellum Drive)
7) Sittingbourne/Borden (Wises Lane/Cryalls Lane)
Faversham (Graveney Road)
Sittingbourne (Church Street)
Sittingbourne (B2006)
Sittingbourne/Bobbing (Vellum Drive)
Bapchild (Fox Hill)
Faversham/Oare (Western Link)
Sittingbourne/Borden (Wises Lane/Cryalls Lane)
Tuesday, March 19, 2019
William Eggleston
In this particular series he wanted to explore ordinary scenes and places where he could photograph 'the uncommonness of the commonplace', by using this as his rule for the series he wanted to capture the most basic and the most generic of landscapes but he wanted them to have a disturbance of something that you wouldn't normally come across within that space. This ties in with my project quite nicely with the way that he photographs the many manmade interruptions within the natural landscapes.
Information can be found at: http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O93824/untitled-for-the-portfolio-southern-photograph-eggleston-william/
Images can be found at: http://www.egglestontrust.com
Stephen Shore
I have chosen to look at Shore's work 'The Hudson Valley' which is the first of his blind spot series. I feel that the photographs that are included in this series are very influential for my project as it includes very beautiful mundane landscapes but with the interruption of the manmade world.
Information can be found at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Shore
Images can be found at: http://stephenshore.net/photographs/hv/index.php?page=1&menu=photographs
Friday, March 8, 2019
Dan Holdsworth
'A Machine for Living' (1999-2000) is Dan Holdsworth's series of photographs that depict Bluewater shopping complex at night. The shopping centre was built on the site of a disused quarry near a major motorway junction in suburban Kent.
In Holdsworth's long-exposure photographs he captures the landscape and the structures built within it, making them seem "other-worldly". This is created by the presence of artificial light which pollutes the scene giving it a strange, toxic glow. Bluewater shopping centre recorded at night, in the bright glow of its own streetlights, seems far removed from the consumerist Mecca we might expect.
His choice to photograph Bluewater has the underlying concept (even though he hasn't vocalised that this is a concept of his work) of photographing a manmade element that has been built into a natural location.
Information can be found at: https://imageobjecttext.com/2012/02/15/machines-for-living/
Images can be found at: https://www.danholdsworth.com
In Holdsworth's long-exposure photographs he captures the landscape and the structures built within it, making them seem "other-worldly". This is created by the presence of artificial light which pollutes the scene giving it a strange, toxic glow. Bluewater shopping centre recorded at night, in the bright glow of its own streetlights, seems far removed from the consumerist Mecca we might expect.
His choice to photograph Bluewater has the underlying concept (even though he hasn't vocalised that this is a concept of his work) of photographing a manmade element that has been built into a natural location.
Information can be found at: https://imageobjecttext.com/2012/02/15/machines-for-living/
Images can be found at: https://www.danholdsworth.com
A Machine for Living 01, C-type Print, 114.5 x 92.5cm, 1999-2000
A Machine for Living 02, C-type Print, 114.5 x 92.5cm, 1999-2000
A Machine for Living 03, C-type Print, 114.5 x 92.5cm, 1999-2000
Stephen B. Smith
Stephen B. Smith is a Photographer whose work chronicles the transition of the Western landscape into suburbia. His two photographic series 'Your Mountain Is Waiting' and 'The Weather and a Place to Live' are a documentary style of Photography that show the transformation of the Western landscape being turned into a suburban housing area. These works are a perfect exploration of natural landscapes being disrupted by the presence of the manmade world.
Information can be found at: https://www.stevesmithphotography.net/about
Images can be found at: https://www.stevesmithphotography.net
Information can be found at: https://www.stevesmithphotography.net/about
Images can be found at: https://www.stevesmithphotography.net
Saratoga Springs, Utah, #12
Rental Fence, Rancho Santa Margarita, California, 1996
Stephen Gill
Buried is a Photographic series created by Stephen Gill, in which he chose to collaborate with the physical place. He not only photographed his locations he then played with the idea of burying his photographic C-Type prints in those places to see what they would add or subtract from the photographs, the final products are both conceptual and earthy.
"The photographs in this book were taken at Hackney Wick and they were later buried there. The amount of time the images were left underground varied depending on the amount of rainfall... Not knowing what an image would look like once it was dug up introduced an element of chance and surprise which I found appealing. This feeling of letting go and collaborating with the place - allowing it also to work in putting the finishing touches to a picture - felt fair. Maybe the spirit of the place can also make its mark".
Information can be found at: https://www.lensculture.com/articles/stephen-gill-buried
Images can be found at: https://www.stephengill.co.uk/portfolio/portfolio/nggallery/album-1-2/buried
"The photographs in this book were taken at Hackney Wick and they were later buried there. The amount of time the images were left underground varied depending on the amount of rainfall... Not knowing what an image would look like once it was dug up introduced an element of chance and surprise which I found appealing. This feeling of letting go and collaborating with the place - allowing it also to work in putting the finishing touches to a picture - felt fair. Maybe the spirit of the place can also make its mark".
Information can be found at: https://www.lensculture.com/articles/stephen-gill-buried
Images can be found at: https://www.stephengill.co.uk/portfolio/portfolio/nggallery/album-1-2/buried
Andy Sewell
The Heath is a series of both subtle and complex photographs of Hampstead Heath in London that were taken over a court of five years. He published a book with the same name as the series which shows a landscape of imagination as well as a record of a real and familiar place, the book and the series itself are seen as a classic understatement of observation.
Hampstead Heath was once a beautiful countryside area that surrounded London, it is now only a small green fragment set within the urban landscape; its a place that it engulfed by ancient trees, tall grass and thickets that are dense enough to get lost in.
"I go to the Heath to be somewhere that feels natural, yet I know this is no pathless wood. The Heath is as managed as any other part of London but managed to feel wild; I am interested in this paradox".
The project is is about perceptions of what is natural, it is also an attempt to explore the human condition of "biophilia" which, according to the biologist E. O. Wilson, is an innate and genetically determined affinity of human beings with the natural world. Which means that Sewell wanted to photograph a natural area that he felt drawn to without knowing why he was drawn to it and that in itself is what makes the project so beautiful and profound.
Information can be found at: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/photography/8432619/The-Heath.html
Images can be found at: http://www.andysewell.com/the-heath-1
Hampstead Heath was once a beautiful countryside area that surrounded London, it is now only a small green fragment set within the urban landscape; its a place that it engulfed by ancient trees, tall grass and thickets that are dense enough to get lost in.
"I go to the Heath to be somewhere that feels natural, yet I know this is no pathless wood. The Heath is as managed as any other part of London but managed to feel wild; I am interested in this paradox".
The project is is about perceptions of what is natural, it is also an attempt to explore the human condition of "biophilia" which, according to the biologist E. O. Wilson, is an innate and genetically determined affinity of human beings with the natural world. Which means that Sewell wanted to photograph a natural area that he felt drawn to without knowing why he was drawn to it and that in itself is what makes the project so beautiful and profound.
Information can be found at: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/photography/8432619/The-Heath.html
Images can be found at: http://www.andysewell.com/the-heath-1
Robin Friend
Bastard Countryside is a Photographic series by Robin Friend, the photographs show landscapes in which the manmade and natural world collide to create a strangely beautiful, yet ugly, body of work.
"Bastard Countryside" is a phrase taken from Victor Hugo's novel Les Miserables, in which he describes the city of Paris as "amphibian", which means that it has two modes of existence, this is conveyed by the manmade buildings/structures being stretched out into the countryside and devouring everything in its path.
"I see the Bastard Countryside everywhere I go, I ran with this idea of city and countryside splattering into each other, creating this hybrid nature"
Friend decided to choose areas in which the urban and rural mix, the manmade and the natural, clashing and colliding to create a strange but new form of beauty and ugliness. He would photograph things such as huge trees entangled in pylons or windmills standing lonely on the edge of riverbanks.
He uses large-format colour film to scrutinise the in-between, unkempt, and often surreal marginal areas of the countryside highlighting frictions between the pastoral sublime and the discarded, often focusing on the polluted reality of the present. His work with the traditional landscape depicted from 5x4 photographs are given heightened effect through the exaggerations of colour and composition.
Information can be found at: https://www.bjp-online.com/2018/11/bastard-countryside-by-robin-friend/
Images can be found at: https://www.robinfriend.co.uk
"Bastard Countryside" is a phrase taken from Victor Hugo's novel Les Miserables, in which he describes the city of Paris as "amphibian", which means that it has two modes of existence, this is conveyed by the manmade buildings/structures being stretched out into the countryside and devouring everything in its path.
"I see the Bastard Countryside everywhere I go, I ran with this idea of city and countryside splattering into each other, creating this hybrid nature"
Friend decided to choose areas in which the urban and rural mix, the manmade and the natural, clashing and colliding to create a strange but new form of beauty and ugliness. He would photograph things such as huge trees entangled in pylons or windmills standing lonely on the edge of riverbanks.
He uses large-format colour film to scrutinise the in-between, unkempt, and often surreal marginal areas of the countryside highlighting frictions between the pastoral sublime and the discarded, often focusing on the polluted reality of the present. His work with the traditional landscape depicted from 5x4 photographs are given heightened effect through the exaggerations of colour and composition.
Information can be found at: https://www.bjp-online.com/2018/11/bastard-countryside-by-robin-friend/
Images can be found at: https://www.robinfriend.co.uk
Chudleigh, Pigment Print 152 x 190cm, 2005
Tower Blocks, East Reservoir, Pigment Print, 122 x 152cm, 2018
Dolly Engine Remains, Pigment Print, 122 x 152cm, 2006
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This is the final photoshoot for this project. By using colour film it has taken away the gloomy effect that the black and white film gav... -
William Eggleston is one of the most renowned Photographers in the world, he changed the course of colour photography by taking the intens...
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I have chosen to look at the alternative process of salt print for my final outcomes, salt blocks could soon be used when building houses, h...
