On the day shoot I re-took my strongest night time images and took some new shots too. I think looking through the images I took of the day shoot they do have a completely different feel and effect brought to them- the images look lighter, clearer and sharper- almost as if their more alive than the night time images. The colours aren't as dull and pulled back. Shadows are still a playable factor though which I loved because I have a choice to "move" the shadow around in my composition to how I like, giving the images another layer of context and the contrast between light I aimed for. I'm glad I did a day time shoot to have being able to recognise the difference time of day makes on images.
When I was going through the day time images that I took of the places I'd already I noticed that I missed one out that may be used in the final images so I went out and took some last minute shoots of it but unfortunately the light wasn't touching the wall yet other than these too little bits which at the time I thought would be good for the picture but during post production in my efforts to get the picture to be less dull, it made the two spots of light go overly orange coloured and I'm not sure how to avoid it, I've tried but whatever I do just ends up making the light spot look silly.
What I did in post production of all the images was: add a slight warm filter to add to the streetlight's effect and make the images seem softer toned plus I needed the images to look like a set and this was one of the common factors I made between them. I also adjusted the levels of each image and added some contrast; because the images seemed to unrealistic- the colours too flat and I wanted the contrast between light/dark to really pop out. On some images I cropped in because a few times I took the image from too far away and got some unwanted parts into my framing. Also in some images I adjusted the highlights and shadows because with the images being at night, I lost some of the details I would have got if the images had being taken in the day and some images needed a slight rotate to be straighter. And the images I took in the day had to have the white balance adjusted a little as the colours were a tiny bit off correct.
Showing the different between original images and images I'd post produced:
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Evaluation/Review:
I think that I picked a project that required a lot more time than I actually had to do it in; I did multiple shoots but never came out with the series of images I wanted instead I kept shooting a few possible images that could be in the series and bits of maybe a different series of images. The tripod I was using was the college's and that didn't help my rush for time, only being able to book it out when it was available and most of the time it wasn't. The whole project would have gone much more successfully if I'd of had more time to think and more time to shoot as my narrative was not fully clear and decided to me until I'd had at least two shoots done and the shoots I choose to do at night, I didn't feel safe walking around on my own with my camera and a tripod so I asked my parents to go around with me and they complained about the cold so I had to rush then as well- time was a crucial part of this project and being slow and I struggled with the slowness but it's clear now that if I was to do this project and be happy with it I'd need to base it over a longer period of time, I'd need a tripod of my own to use whenever I required it in which I'd go out for at least two hours every night shooting around the area.
The good things that have come out of this project are the fact I had a chance to do a completely different style of photography- I challenged myself in many ways one main way being having to slow down when thinking about the shots I need and what I want them to say and another is using a tripod which I've never done before this project. I came across another series idea based on walls which I might continue doing; I also may use them images as my final presentation for this project since I feel them images are perfect as a set matched with the fact I don't feel I have any other images from this project which I can say that about.. I'm afraid by using them though I'll be doing the wrong thing because they don't really say the narrative and therefore don't fit the brief so I'm stuck between having a good final presentation of images or having filler images which fit the brief What I found challenging was trying to get the clear narrative I wanted, I tired so hard but somehow nothing seemed to do it, also again the time I had to do the project in was a challenge in it's self as I stupidly picked a project which needed a lot more time to complete it.
Although the project was more or less unsuccessful to me I did still really enjoy it(even though the images I was producing were un-enjoyable to me) I enjoyed the change and really thinking about what I was doing, I enjoyed having the narrative behind my project and making it come out in images, I enjoyed working at night(even though it was freezing) because I got to see the effect it has to images, how shadows can be used and settings played around with, I enjoyed the struggle to produce the images I wanted and I enjoyed not being able to complete them because of this.. even though I would have loved to, I do like that the project itself is left unfinished because it provides wonder as to what could have come of it and it's always there for me to pick back up again and plus it's taught me that not all photography project ideas will work out like you plan.
The project has defiantly developed me as a photographer and I will certainly take the things I've learnt from doing this and use it in everything else I do; to really take time to think about what I want to say/accomplish with my images, to not be afraid to do new things and change my mind, to be more confident because I really hated the images I was producing when I first started the project but after the crit it was clear that people saw something in them that I didn't and it work for them. I'm defiantly going to be a lot more careful with the projects I do and what rules I set myself and I also I've learnt that even if I don't enjoy the images I produce all the time, you never know who might like them so I shouldn't trash a project idea before showing my work.
My work relates to Richard Billiham the most I think; the straight on, long exposure, night time feel and also the use of light,shadows and lines. I think my images have some search for information like Paul Grahams does too not to his extent but it's there for sure and I think I achieved the emphasizes of shapes I wanted sort of like the Bechers do in their images.
When doing the project I chose to do it at night because I wanted to make sure no one was around as I wanted the images to be about the area and not the people living there(kind of like when you shoot people on a white background to take them away from the location to make it all about them but I took the people away from the location instead to make the only focus the location), but I also chose to also do a day time shoot because I wanted to see the different effect it makes and I also wanted to highlight the differences time of day has on the same areas. I chose to edit all the images in the way stated early in this post because I was trying to edit them as little as I could to keep them more realistic and truthful but edit them in a way that was effective and added to the over all feel to the images. My series of images fits the One Square Mile brief because the images I took are with in One Square Mile of my house.
Final Images & Image Order:
I decided to order the images like this because the images are paired as night/day images, the night time image after the day time images because night follows day. And I chose to have two images "joined" together then a space between every two images rather than a space between each single image because I thought it would be more effective presented this way because both day/night images are right in front of the viewer, then the next etc so the differences between them are more clear and obvious.
Each image comes in a pair and there's a few more images which I want to add/may add to the final set but I need to take the second image to go with them before I can add them. The first image below is the picture I defiantly want to add into the final images and need to pair it with a day time image and the picture below that is a possible image I may use/pair into the final set.
I retook the day images I took of the image above and this is the contact sheet:
and here's the image I chose and edited:
I felt that it wasn't quite fitting with the rest of the images I chose to use in my final images so I edited the saturation and contrast a touch so that it didn't look as flat colour-wise. Although I'm still unsure about weather it fits or not, it was taken on a completely different kind of day compared to the other day shoot I did- the weather and lighting is dull where as the other day the weather was sunny and bright and its effected the image in maybe a far too obvious way, this wall image may not get to be in my final presentation after all.
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