Has the media shaped our vision of women through photographic portrayal and is their true purpose and identity betrayed as a result?
Amy Byron Photography
SHOOT 1 - TAYLOR WESSING INSPIRED
The Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize is the leading competition to celebrate and promote the very best in contemporary portrait photography from around the world, the works exhibited in this competition tend to explore various moods and characters as well as scenic locations, which particularly inspired me to create my own images with a strong sense of location.
What specifically stands out for me about many of these portraits is their importance of composition. Although the images are based on portraiture they show a strong sense of landscape, making them very scenic, through the use of background and composition they manage to tell a story, often enhanced, through their use of depth of field and framing, for example by placing the subject in the foreground and blurring the background. By Framing the images in such a way it leads the eye towards the main focal point, making the portrait evidently more captivating.
Many of the images are of high contrast, which ensures the subject stands out drastically in comparison to the striking backgrounds. They often use a classical balance, where the subject is centered. They use a lot of natural light due to the location, therefore it is important to think about the time of day and weather conditions, to achieve a certain appearance. The style of these images can often be quite chilling, which I think is the most effective approach to capturing viewer's attention. By exploring the Taylor Wessing exhibitors I have gained knowledge and inspiration in how I could create my own images to ensure a sophisticated approach. As this style of portraiture is rather simplistic, I wanted to add my own element of style within my own photos, which specifically focuses on colour. I decided to explore with creating vintage style effects. I found that to achieve this style it included exploring with the colour channels, noise and high pass filters and many more...
MY PHOTOS
Many of my images in this shoot experiment with the high pass filter, as I found this enables me to make the image stand out in a scenic photo, with a subject against the background. Although I wanted an effective background, I didn't want it to over come the photo, therefore I feel this feauture has helped define the subject. To develop the focus on the image from the background I added a gausian blur effect to the background, subtly blurring it to enhance a shallow depth of field. I did this by selecting the background avoiding the subject, making sure to feather the selection to avoid any harsh lines, curves or edges. I then enhanced the blur so that it became more noticeable, I found this left an outer glow to the subject which I rather liked and think added an extra element to the image. Although the image was initially black and white, I rejected the idea of having a traditional black and white effect, and I decided to add a subtle sepia tone, adding an extra warmth to the image, which I think worked best as a cool black and white washed out the background completely.
The aim of this image was to add an old-fashioned styled element which was mostly created by adding noise. Due to the textures within the background, such as the bushes and the leaves I found this image to work best with the noise effect, common of a vintage style. I also focused this image on composition, cropping the image to a much smaller size, of 4x4, almost mimicing the style of a poleriod, which is also a common vintage quality.
For this image I applied two shots in one. I began by editing the original background image with a sophisticated black and white effect, I did this by changing the levels in the image, creating more contrasts and highlights. I then duplicated the layer and added a high pass filter, to make the image stand out and the details become bolder. I repeated the same process with the second layer and then over-layed it onto the background layer. I temporarily changed the opactity so that I could see the area I wanted to remove. Before removing areas of the second image I added a masking layer, selected the black paint tool and set the brush to a soft edge to ensure there were no harsh marks. Additionally, I subtly increased the brightness of the second image, making the image look more vibrant.
I wanted this image to represent a vintage effect, ensuring to keep it simplistic because I think what works best about this photo is the captured image itself. I like how the young girl is completely focused on the camera, with a soft expression on her face. I also like that the mother is looking directly at the child, with a subtle smile, almost implying she is in deep thought. The fact that their hands are tightly held together signifies their connection. Similarly, the use of natural light was captured perfectly within the image, as it reflects across the entire picture, connoting positivity and happiness. Once again I used high pass to create the depth within the image, making the subject stand out from the background. I also changed the colour balance to create a more vibrant effect that mimics that of a vintage photograph, I did this by firstly adjusting the highlights and contrast, for an enhanced effect. I then adjusted the colour balance tool, increasing the highlights and decrease the lowlights using an S-shaped curve for the red channel. For the green channel: increase the highlights, keep the midtones neutral and decrease the lowlights. For the blue, decrease the highlights and increase the lowlights. this gives a softer yet more vivid outcome.
I experimented with two images in this image also, however the second image overlay forms part of the background. I began by adjusting the lighting such as the levels and brightness and contrast making them stronger. I then changed the hue and saturation and selected colourise, choosing a cyanotype blue colour. I did the same to the second layer and then added the layer to the background image, I changed the transformation and the opacity so the it immediately fit better with the image and didn't cover it. I experiemented with the blending modes, creating different styles and colours, I eventually chose lighten. Finally, I added a masking layer, then selected the soft black brush and rubbed away the edges so make the image fit even better.
Initially this image was intended for shoot three, however shoot three was intended for exploration of tessellation. Therefore I chose to stylistically experiment with the colours within this particular image, keeping it rather simple as this is how I feel images like these work best, and I tend to gravitate towards this style, rather than manipulation. For this reason I began changing the highlights and contrasts within the image, making them appear stronger. I decided to experiment with the black and white filters, mainly because the models were dressed in very basic block colours, which I think looks most effective when made black and white. To my surprise, the infrared filter worked best for me, it brought the constrasts to life, such as the eyes and lips, and gave the highlights a rather dusty effect. The mother, who naturally has darker olive skin appears to have tanned freckly skin through the infrared effect, as it enhances any speckles within the image making them look rather attractive. The young girls eyes which were naturally lighter than the mothers have been made darker, and vice versa. I particularly like how this image has worked out with this effect as it has brought to the surface what may not have worked as well in any other effect.
I originally edited this picture in colour, although I felt it would look good in black and white, therefore I experimented with the black and white filter.
This is my most successful image from the shoot, for many reasons. Firstly, I like the fairlytale-esque feeling it creates, mainly signified through the props within the image such as the dandelion, but emphasized through the subtle outer glow around the models. Similarly, the background carries connotations of a fairy-tale theme, although I ensured it to be rather dull and basic, as I didn't want it to become the strongest feature within the image. These qualities are then all collected together by the bokeh effect, which in habits colours from within the photo, such as the pinks from the coat and the vibrant red streaks from the fluff of the hood, I find small effects like these have a significant effect even without realisation. To achieve this outcome, I firstly applied a vintage style effect over the background image, by once again changing the colour channels, adding a high-pass to make the details within the image stand out. I changed the brightness and contrasts and the curves to create a stronger depth from the lighting in the image. I then added a new layer and filled it with magenta and changed the blending mode of this layer to Screen, then ensuring to reduce the opacity to about 6%. This adds a little of the warmth associated with the vintage look. Next, I selected the background layer and edited the hue and saturation, changing the saturation slider to about -20. This blanches the image subtly without reducing the warmth added in the last step. At this stage I decided to enhance the depth of field by selecting the area of the background ensuring to avoid the models, I feathered the selection and applied a Gaussian blur, which gave an overall blurring effect.
I began adding final touches by exploring with the lens correction, to complete the vintage style edit with a vignette, which I did by selecting the Custom tab and in the Vignette section, reducing the amount to -100 and push the Midpoint to +35, so that the vignette is obvious but not too dark and overpowering. I then found a bokeh overlay from a stock image, one that possesses similar colours that already exist within the image, I then reduced the opacity and used the rubber tool to smoothly eliminate any areas of the bokeh I did not want to cover the photograph, I tend to keep the bokeh around the edges, almost using it as a border, and also where there is clear natural light added, as this is where bokeh would be created in any ordinary case. I changed the blending mode to overlay, as this made it fit more naturally within the image and also produced more advanced colours. To enhance the depth of field further I found a stock image of a dandelion and pasted it on the image, deleting the background and changing the transformation to then apply it within the image where it fits, giving the idea that the dandelion seeds had floated towards the camera, away from the subject and even further away from the background.
What I think works best for this image is the strength of sharp details, in comparison to the strong use of blur, created by the Gaussian blur. In some areas of the image the blurring has over-lapped to some of the sharper parts of the image, such as the bottom of the mother’s hair, giving the effect of captured movement. I particularly like how this image represents the connection between mother and daughter, showing how they can relate and identify themselves with one another on a day to day basis, without even realising, which is an idea that I am exploring within this unit- the idea that the truths of motherhood become blurred or masked by a women’s representation in todays society.