final images

work record 1

·         Research influences

My influences for this shoot are Ansel Adams and Fukase Masahisa. These are both artist who work using black and white, which is something i am going to carry on through my final responses. They both produce highly contrasted images which may have been done using burning and dodging. This is also a technique that i will use for my responses.

For this shoot, i used a Nikon D7100 and a zoom lens. This meant i could take wide shots of the landscape and capture more of the trees as well as more close up shots of the trees.

·         Contact sheet




·         Straight images (as many as you wish to post)




AO1: I chose these images as they will be very useful for creating composite images. The trees and church should be interesting to use as together they may loom quite eerie and strange, which is similar to the style of Fukase Masahisa. His work is quite macabre and dark which is what i want to portray through my final images. The clouds in the photo directly above look quite interesting and are something i would like to try and place in one of my final responses. 

      Although i am going to use these photos, i am also going to use some from my preparatory shoots as they have different elements such as different churches that i would like to include in my final responses. 

AO2:  (including Computer experiments (if carried out during the exam)

This image is an example of how i have edited my photos, before using them to superimpose into another image. The one above is the main background that i am going to use for my composite image. I have converted it to black and white, then increased the contrast to bring out the lines in the trees. After this, i am going to use the burn tool to darken the sky and give the clouds more depth.

After creating the background, i have started to add in the different pieces that i am going to include in my final response. These are the gravestone in the foreground, the church, the stack of hay and any extra trees. I did this using Photoshop.

Firstly, i converted the individual images to black and white. Then i used the magic wand tool to select the pieces i wanted and pasted them into the background. I then free transformed them and positioned them where they would blend in. A problem i found with this was i couldn't copy and paste the pieces into the background successfully. I found that this was because i had to flatten the image to get rid of the other layers. Then i could move them to another image.  I then used the eraser and the dodge and burn tool to blend them in.

This is a screenshot of the final image before i used the dodge and burn tool. You can see the individual layers that each have a different part of the image. For example, layer 3 has the church and layer 4 has the hay stack behind it. I then flattened the image and highlighted the different areas to create more of a contrast between the light and dark areas.

AO4: emphasise how the work has developed and how it has been influenced by prior research

During my research into Fukase Masahisa and Ansel Adams, i found that using black and white photos instead of colour not only creates a darker and more old fashioned feel but also allow you to create more contrasted and detailed images as there is no risk of making the colours too bright and unrealistic. Similar to the solitude of ravens, i am going to be taking more photos of birds and other wildlife that i find when I'm on a shoot. A bird that i would look for as an example are crows. These birds are jet black and are associated with  death. By including these in my final responses, i am going to try and create an eerie atmosphere in the photo. 




Final Pieces







Final evaluation

Overall, i am please with my first outcome. The different elements like the church and hay stack blend nicely into the background and the photo does have an eerie feel to it. Some of the things i would change however are the horizon line that is visible through the church and the slightly off angle of the church itself. If i were to do it again, i would make sure the photo i took of the church was straight at the bottom so that it sat nicely in the photo. I was however able to adjust it with a combination of rotating the image and using the eraser with a low opacity to correct it slightly. I would've also liked to have included the birds in this piece.  Overall though, i am happy with the work i have produced for this shoot.

work record 2

     Research influences

      Similar to my first shoot, my influences are Ansell Adams and Fukase Masahisa. the individual styles of these artists are very different in themselves. Adams uses black and white and shot using different filters to bring out different light and shadows. Fukase Masahisa also used black and white but made darker and more sinister images. some of which were in a slaughter house while others were of ravens. both of these artists use the sky as a big feature in their work. 

f     For this shoot i used a different camera, and a lens with a longer zoom length. this is because during the last shoot at this location, i struggled to get clearer shots of the birds as the lens on that camera had a shorter zoom length. this meant i focused more on the landscape and trees rather than the crows. during this shoot however, the longer lens allowed me to get closer to the birds and get photos that i can use in my final images.          






      Contact sheet

·         Straight images (as many as you wish to post)









 AO1: i chose these photos because they have elements in them that i can use for my composite images. for example, the birds can be cut and pasted into the sky or perched on the side of the church to give the image some signs of life. these should go well with the petrified oaks as it shows a contrast between life and death. they also go together as they both give the photo a more eerie tone. 

the photo of the rabbit should also make the image more interesting as it is associated with spring which, furthermore, is a associated with bright colours and green leaves, however in the image that i hope to create, it should seem oddly out of place amongst the crows and dead trees. 

the branches of the trees against the sky should stand out and draw the viewers eye towards them and the sky, as they almost have the illusion of movement. this is because of the way the branches overlap and seem to snake in between each other and also look like theyre reaching out, which further adds to the eerie theme of the image.

when taking these photos, i used a nikon D7200, with an ISO of 400, a shutter speed of 1/400 and an aperture of F8. this meant the photos came out quite dark but could be brightened using photoshop.

AO2:  (including Computer experiments (if carried out during the exam)

for this image, to begin with i converted it to black and white and increased the contrast and brightness to bring out the detail without darkening the image. 

i then used the lasso tool and the eraser to delete the background. this was because i only needed to use the church and the ground around it.  by getting rid of the rest of the background, i could then select the church and copy it.

AO3:

i then pasted it onto the image i chose for the background of my image. in this case, it was a landscape shot of the petrified oaks. in the photo above, you can see that the church doesn't blend into the background very well which is something i fixed before adding the other elements of the image. 

to blend the church in, i used the eraser tool and decreased the opacity so that the effect would be less harsh, and i could erase the background in layers rather than blocks to make it more subtle. this also meant i could include the gravestones and not have to erase them too.

once the church was blended into the background, i could start adding the different pieces from other photos that i wanted in the image. for example, i placed the bird in the photo above on the roof of the church. i also used trees from separate photos and placed them around the church. i did this by cutting them out using the quick selection tool, and then pasting them in and blending them with the eraser tool at a lower opacity.

for the last piece, i used the sky from a photo i took previously and selected a section of cloud. i then placed this above the church and in spaces where the sky would be, before blending it with the eraser tool. this proved to be quite effective and gave the sky more detail. 

in this screenshot, you can see the final image and the individual layers with each piece on it. 

   AO4: emphasise how the work has developed and how it has been influenced by prior research. during my research, the photographers i looked at showed a strong interest in producing black and white images with highly contrasted light and dark tones. this influenced my work quite a lot as i liked the style and wanted to reproduce it in my final pieces. fuakse masahisa's work influenced me most because of the series he created called the solitude of ravens. i like this because it showed a different viewpoint of the sky rather than just showing it as a feature of a landscape. 

     ansell adams influenced my work because of his use of a dramatic sky to make his photos more powerful and eye catching. this is another thing i have tried to include in my final pieces. 







Final Pieces







Final evaluation


overall, i am happy with the work i have produced in the time given. although i was only able to complete one edit per shoot, i am pleased with the result of my work. 

parts that i am pleased with are the tone and feel of the image. i wanted to create an eerie and atmospheric piece which i feel i have achieved. i included all of the elements i wanted to and am happy with the end result.

parts that i would change however, are the gaps in the clouds and the church itself. if i were to do this again, i would add some more birds, add trees and more clouds. when blending the clouds, i would try to erase less and make them ore even so that there are less gaps. i would've also liked to included the rabbit somewhere in the foreground i was unable in the time limit.