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Experimental Photography

Brandon Parker

Final Image 1

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My first image started as a standard photograph that I had taken whilst walking across a bridge across the river Ouse at the early hours of the morning when I took the photograph I didn’t realise but I had captured a perfect reflection of the trees along the river, because of this it didn’t matter as to which way I have the picture as no matter the rotation it looks the same although you can tell from the original that there's a different as I have cropped it to make it symmetrical sizing and to make the reflection the main part of the image. I didn’t notice this until looking at the photograph and someone pointing it out to me as I originally took it with the idea of have the main focus on one part of the image and then rest blurred. After importing the photograph into Photoshop I was then able to look at the levels of the image and then make certain parts brighter although when I did so I felt the image looked to much and didn’t look as good as it did originally so I took that off as it didn’t look right, then I had a look at importing stock images from the internet to see if I could import them and make it look none realistic as that’s what part of experimental photography means in my eyes anyway and so I tried importing stars, when I did they were hard to be seen when I put them on the actually sky which is at the bottom as I did rotate the image 180 degrees to be the opposite and so I tried putting the stars in with the river which was the reflection and so looked a bit better but you still can’t really see it but when you look you are able to see them. There wasn’t really any photographer that I was trying to mirror when I took this photograph although the images created by Jerry Uelsmann is a standard I could only dream of achieving. When I was taking this photograph I wasn’t using any different types of filters or changing the shutter speed or the aperture.

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If I was able to redo my image and I had the chance to go back and re-take this image I would, but only to make the image have the reflection in the direct centre so I wouldn’t have crop to crop the image, I would also want to take my own picture of the night sky full of stars so I wouldn't have to use a stock image from the internet as it would then completely be mean and also look at how i would merge them together so it would be much more noticeable and affective, but other than that I feel the rest worked well and I was happy that the picture didn’t need all that much tweaking in order to achieve this style. As the brightness of the photograph worked well as it was and I was impressed at the fact it was taken with just a standard filter with the least amount of editing possible for the Photoshop edit. I feel it works as an experiment photograph as I have edited it like each different styled photographer has to and although its not aimed at trying to be like one photographer i just feel its a clear attempt at experimental photograph in my own way.

Final Image 2

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My second style of experimental photograph worked well and I feel is my favourite out of the three, using a photograph I had taken from my street which in itself was good image as it contained the power of thirds meaning it was able to be split into different segments equally. It contained the sun peering over the end of the street which was good and the dark clouds coming down on the sun which gave it the look of the night sky. By changing certain colour levels of the image i was able to make it look almost night light and by doing so i felt i could add stars in (the same stock image used in the first image) to give it a more night look. The image still looked liked i would be able to add more to it without it looked stupid as i like an image to look good but not over the top, with that in mind i had seen an image where the bright light was going along a dark walk way next to dark shadowing trees so i thought i could try that as an idea but instead of using a model I used myself to be walking through my street. I then used a tool on Photoshop in order to input the bright light at the end and because the sun light was already in the image it looked well as it fitted with the reflection on each of the windows. I then imported myself and sized me to be in proportion with the rest of the image, i then copied this image and rotated 180 degrees and made me completely black to loo like a shadow of myself which was created by the light and so reaching my final picture. I feel the image works well together without being to over the top which is how i feel it should look and so feel the whole image in itself is a strong point.

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To me I feel everything about this image works well together and I feel shows off some of the skills I have acquired throughout the course and using Photoshop admittedly some of it I used walk through but that was only to achieve the best standard of quality with my picture and even so was changing it so that it fit in with my picture. Each different layer is what adds to the picture and is what builds up the actual image to make it look like its one. I have centred the beam of light to make it the main focus of the image but each of the parts around it add up to make the full picture what it is. My theme was to have pictures that look like dreams like effects, places that only seem dream like but when I had my photographs that I wanted to use I felt it needed to be changed.

Final Image 3

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With my third image I felt that it was my weakest of the three images although still worked well and it well suited with the rest if the other two photographs. I made this from using a picture I had taken from one night in York, then I added a filter on Photoshop and edit the contrast and colours on first layer. I then added another image on top of this that I got from the internet of rain drops, as the was rain on the floor i thought I could make it look like there was rain on the camera lense as it adds a different sort of affect. And by editing the opacity of the rain made it look more realistic as if it was actually there from before as i feel the key in my style of photography is to make it look as realistic. With this wanted to add something more but I wasn't sure until I looked through some of my other photographs and found one from where i had taken whilst looking down the river and because the water was still I was able to get a good reflection of each of the lights as they went down stream. I then added this as a layer on top of my other picture and changed the contrast on the picture to have the lights as the brightest part and then change the opacity again so that all you can see would be the lights on the building as this would work well as there we bright lights reflecting of the puddles already.The final result was good in my eyes although as it was my last picture I didn't have as much time to of spent on it as id of wanted but from all the photographs I had taken I didn't have to use any different exposure techniques or change the shutter speed but i was still able to get the final result I want.

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If I was to restart this whole image I would change the majority I feel its my weakest photograph, I do like it as a whole but I preferred each of the separate image not as much as a whole but I do like it overall but I feel that because I didn't have all that much time in order to make my images I had to rush to get this last one done. The image does work well as it has a good central image part and the colours are good and work well together as a whole. My theme that I originally had hasn't come through on any of the three final images as i would need to be taking images in other places that wouldn't of been accessible or even possible in the time frame that we had in order to get them done. But the images i have do work well although all three don't particularly have a set them instead each have there own one which i feel is acceptable since its experimental photography