Asainmento 3 no Konshepputo

For assignment 3, we were instructed to come up with a photo essay. I decided to cover LGBT people in uniforms. I originally wanted to do two photos of each subject, one of them in uniform, one of them indicating that they're LGBT. But, I've decided instead that I would like to do one photograph, just of the them in uniform, and have it with a quote from them about hardships (or lack of hardships) that they've faced.

By uniform, I mean military, police, firefighter, boy scout, athlete, or even priest.

I've already taken two photos for this assignment. These are the unedited copies of them:

Priest of the North American Old Catholic Church

Former Marine in USO-Inspired Drag

Ichiban Suki na Shashin

Now I get to post one of my favorite photographs that I've taken - although not for this class. There are a few but I'm going to stick to two.

This photo was taken of my boyfriend at the time, posed to imitate an earlier photo of him taken by his mother. I edited the photo to make it look vintage.

Taken outside Kyoto in Japan, this is one of my favorite images. I love the composition, the moment, the color, and the lighting.

Nippu to Taakku

Nip and Tuck! Editing is a beautiful thing when it comes to photography.

Before:

After:

Besides the addition of a white border, quite a bit of editing went into this photograph. I burnt (darkened) the sofa, some parts of the wall, and Tatianna's butt, legs, and arm. I also enhanced the colors a bit, and sharpened the image by increasing the darks (I accidentally shot with too high an ISO and tried desperately to salvage this photo).

Yuumei na Shashinka no Onajiisou na Shashin

For this post, I had to look through my photographs and find one that's similar to another photographer's work.

The photo I chose, one for my third assignment, reminded me of Cindy Sherman's work. Cindy does a lot of queer photography, and great queer portraits. While she usually does portraits like this with a backdrop, it reminded me most of her.

Yuumei na Shashinka

We've talked about several famous photographers in class. This post is an analysis of the work by a handful of the photographers we covered.

Let's start with one of my favorites: Ryan McGinley. He first got famous for his scenes of nude models in nature. His mastery of lighting and color fill me with envy, and his portraits are just perfect. Take a look:

 This one is easily my favorite of his. Just sheer perfection. Interesting subject, great composition, unbelievably real lighting, and so many colors. Love love love.

So weird and so good. Again, great composition, color, and light.

 Like the one above, just so strange.

The lighting in this could not be more beautiful.

I love how weird this is.

Great portrait, the lighting is phenomenal.

Great composition.

 

L.I.G.H.T.I.N.G. And the fact that the subject looks so soft and effeminate, but is covered in tattoos and appears to have a broken wrist.

Next we'll look at Gregory Crewdson, who does photography with a very eerie, cinematic feel. I normally don't like to set up a photo, I like to capture reality, but his work in creating a scene is simply poetic.

Odd colors, odd situation, really interesting.

Great use of different lighting sources.

Utterly bizarre scene. Can't help but stare at this.

Shows the tremendous effort he goes to in order to set up a scene. This was probably using a rain machine.

Next up, a master of Photoshop. Anthony Goicolea (don't ask me how to pronounce his name) got famous by photoshopping himself into really weird situations, making himself look younger, and playing all the parts of the photos.

Very obviously photoshopped, but so wild and fully of life.

 Less obviously photoshopped, but equally wild.

Bizarre and colorful. I can't help but wonder how he so perfectly photoshopped himself hoisting himself.

Looks like a great vintage boarding school photo but it's all him.

Asainmento 2

Assignment two was focused on light. We were to choose a location and photograph it with different light sources. I originally chose Logan Circle, but I got sick so I went with my bedroom.

 Light coming in from the window is shown both on the desk and in the phone. Taken during a sunny day.

 Cityscape through the window. Taken during sunset.

Reflection of candles on the window with bokeh from street lamps. Taken just after sunset.

 Light source as a subject - focusing on candles. Taken just after sunset.

Light coming from the window, captured in a murky vase. Taken on a cloudy day.

It is clear through these photographs how much of an impact light has on a photograph, especially on the color of the image.

Asainmento 1 no Riijekuto

The two images below are rejects from the first assignment, ones that I liked but did not choose for print.

 Purposefully crooked, because I like the angles. Shows depth of field.

Shot from inside a restaurant, overlooking Adams Morgan.

Asainmento 1

 Our first assignment was to shoot photos that capture motion and depth of field. We had to hand in two for depth of field, two for motion, and one that we just liked.

(Note, there is a white border around the photos from when I went to print them and wanted matte.)

  This photo captures depth of field and was taken during the magic hour, in the minutes just after the sunset. I love this photo because it focuses so closely on something so mundane, and because of the bokeh (the blurred lights) in the background which I always like to incorporate into my photos. This was taken with a very wide aperture (f/1.8).

 

 This was also chosen for depth of field, and fell into the "still life" category in our list of things to photograph. This is of a sculpture on a street corner, the red dot is a traffic light. This was taken with a wide aperture (approximately f/2.2).

 This photo was chosen as my "favorite," to include just because I liked it. It also shows depth of field. I really enjoy portrait photography, and am lucky to have a friend narcissistic enough to let me photograph him all the time.

  This photo was taken at Cobalt of a drag queen who appeared on RuPaul's Drag Race Season 2. Her performance name is Tatianna. This photo was used to show blurred motion. I chose this photo because I love the bright colors, the composition, and, well, that one lone dollar bill on the floor.

 This is probably my least favorite photograph of the series, but was used to show a moving subject in focus with a blurry background. This is called panning, when you follow a subject with your camera. I was sitting inside of a café and started taking photographs - stalker style. I do enjoy the colors of this, but the blur of the lights glaring on the window from behind me ruins the photo.

 

Ekusupouja Buraaketto

The first thing we're going to talk about is exposure bracketing (just bracketing from here on out). Bracketing is probably the most annoying thing to do while shooting, but you'll love yourself for it in post-production.

What is Bracketing?

Bracketing is when you take several photographs of the exact same image, each with a set shutter speed and a changing aperture. To start, you check the light meter to find what seems to be the "perfect" image. After that, you shoot one stop below, two stops below, one stop above, and two stops above. You can shoot however many stops above and below, but doing two stops is common.

What is a Stop?

A stop, or f-stop, is the aperture setting (e.g. f/1.8, f/3.5, f/20, etc). With most DSLR (digital single lens reflex) cameras, you change stops by holding a specified button down and turning the wheel. F-stop and aperture affect how much light your lens takes in, and the depth of field (what is in focus).

Why Bracket?

Because you're a masochist. No, but actually... it's because what seems like a perfect photo according to the light meter may not always be perfect when you go to edit or print.

Examples of Bracketing

The photos below show bracketing.

-2 stops







-1 stop


 

0

+1 stop

+2 stops






In the situation above, I wound up liking and going with the +1 stop, and not the one that appeared to be perfect in the light meter.

Youkoso

This blog was created by Blake Bergen, a senior at the George Washington University, for his Color Photography course.

His other blogs include...

Pages From My Passport
Om Nom Culture
To The Soul

The titles of each post on this blog will be Romaji Japanese, for a layer of tackiness.