Photography Planning - Ruraltopia (3)

"You don't take a photograph, you make it."  Ansel Adams

I have learned that indeed there is a difference between taking and making a photograph, mainly to do with photography practices and having a plan for and structure to the creative process.  As an educationalist, I groan internally and think of forward planning, which the majority of teachers dislike because teachers wish to teach and therefore photographers like to take pictures.  But just as planning class lessons has clearly a positive point, so does planning for photography. 

From my research on Yousuf Karsh, the world's greatest ever portraiture photographer, I find that he clearly highlights his meticulous preparation and research before his photography shooting.

 "It was in London, I started the practice of doing my homework ......."  Yousuf Karsh
(Ref.    http://www.karsh.org/#/the_man/biography)

So in order to make photographs for 'Ruraltopia'  I need to have a plan. I hope to utilise some of  of the techniques used by my chosen photographers - Gus Wylie (documentary genre) and Yousuf Karsh (portraiture genre) -  following my research on their photography.

AIM:  

• To visually interpret Ruraltopia through a range of photographs which demonstrate careful planning, creative composition and technical competence;
• To use the subject matter of crofters working in their local crofting environment and portray them in the documentary genre;
• To use the subject matter of indigenous people and portray individual crofters in the portraiture genre;
• To use the model of planning, shooting, evaluating for photographs in order to select final images for assignment.

TECHNIQUES

• Make contact with individuals beforehand to fix ideal location of shoot, eg their working environment;
• Tell the story in documentary by shooting what happens naturally, remembering to capture the details - set the scene;
• Capture the true essence of the person in portraiture, focus on the eyes/hands;
• Use an effective focal range, wide end of 24mm - 120 mm Nikkor lens (shooting with Nikon D600)  for documentary - smaller aperture to give larger depth of field to include detail;
• Use 70-300 telephoto lens with Nikon D600 for portraiture to create blurred background and give a comfortable working distance -  wide aperture/small DOF to give shallow focus;
• Establish social interaction with subject to put them at ease;
• Use tripod for better quality and to get more creative and sharp images;
• Use natural light (outdoor environment if possible) - consider the available light and use fill flash and ISO adjustments as required;
• Prepare to wait and see what happens naturally for a good documentary capture;
• Produce monochrome images in the style of both Gus Wylie (documentary) and Yousuf Karsh (portraiture); shoot in colour and use processing for monochrome conversion;
• Use post-production techniques for image files using iPhoto and Photoshop Elements 13 for completion of the task;
• Produce contact sheets for test images - to be presented in folder along with final six images.

EQUIPMENT

Nikon D600 camera body 

24-120mm kit lens (Nikkor)

70-300mm telephoto lens (Nikkor)

MeFoto Travel Tripod Kit

Props were not pre-planned but subjects were photographed using recognisable props as they were used in the natural working environment

SUBJECTS/LOCATIONS

• Arrange photo shoots with four different crofters, to allow choice in final selection
• Location 1 - Crofter A -  new farm steadings - Knock Farm, Sleat
• Location 2 - Crofter B - Crofthouse kitchen and croft land - Tarskavaig, Sleat
• Location 3 - Crofter C - Ord moorland and Sheep Fank, Sleat
• Location 4 - Crofter D - Crofthouse interior, Ardvasar, Sleat

Mt next blog post will feature how I achieved the aims of the plan, the techniques used and the challenges encountered along with my evaluation of the selected photographs.  My assignment submission will include test prints and contact sheets as well as hard copies of final six images.

The images below are from each of the locations from where the photo shoots took place.  (Click on each image to view large).

"You don't make a photograph just with a camera.  You bring to the act of photography all the pictures you have seen, the books you have read, the music you have heard, the people you have loved."   Ansel Adams

Knock Farm Steadings

Tarskavaig Croft

Ord Moorland

Ardvasar crofter at Crofthouse

YOU'RE LOOKING BLURRED .....

.... YOU MUST BE DRUNK!

      And no, this is not another famous photographer quotation - it is indeed my cheesy joke which is usually rolled out at Christmas to much groaning from family members when it appears and a reminder to share it, if it has not.  But being mindful, I should focus on the now which is the submission of the first photography assignment.

        Blur was very much part of my focus this past week as our homework exercise required the submission of four photographs, two from aperture exploration and two from shutter speed exploration, the former requiring the use of a slow shutter speed that records the subject's motion as a 'blur".  This is known as panning which is the action of following a moving subject with a camera to create motion and the end result being a picture with a blurred background and a crisp subject.  A monopod is a good choice for panning because it gives you freedom to move the camera laterally while preventing vertical movement.  So my recent purchase of a MeFOTO RoadTrip Travel Tripod which  quickly converts into a monopod was put into use for this task.

http://www.mefoto.com/uk/products/roadtrip.aspx

     So after a few attempts I was able to capture some images of the morning traffic (not quite city rush hour) coming in to Sleat.  The secret is to make sure you follow the shot through after depressing the shutter half-way and continue to follow the subject even after the  shutter has been depressed. This involves moving your hips with the camera which could be construed as a gentle morning exercise for those of us who are less fit!

Some images captured

showing the blurry background
which is effective in portraying motion.

       However, I discover a problem with these images as the shutter speed exercise required you to photograph the same subject by freezing the motion, but of course the afore-photographed vehicles had now escaped in a motion blur! Of course, the secret is to READ the exercise task thoroughly beforehand!

     That was not my only challenge - the 'mini' exercise also required that an appropriate photographic syle/genre be identified in which to locate the photographs taken. I'm not sure whether it is being a West Highland Gael that makes me have difficulty with the word GENRE, starting with its pronunciation.  Is it SHAW-RUH or indeed SHAUN-RUH and whatever it is I needed to choose one. Perhaps in the style of Lewis Hine (Social Documentary) with Powerhouse mechanic working on steam pump in the 1920s or Richard Avedon (Portrait) famous for his 1981 Ronald Fischer Beekeeepr portrait and a cracking shot of Bob Dylan.  The choice was endless and agonising but I decided I could attempt a surveillance style and go as a sleuth to see what UHI students ate for lunch by spying on them with panning shots from two floors above the refectory, resulting in this image:-

Panning was difficult from up above and not sure whether my shot was mean and moody to fit the genre

Anyway, when it came to Friday evening and careful consideration of my input so far, (while partaking of wine to help anaesthetise negative feelings of not having met the task requirements) I decided that indeed my pictures so far were exploration and that I needed to start with deciding on a photographic genre.  The following afternoon, it happened - a eureka moment and I became an advertising/product photographer on a photo-shoot!  So my, four digital images are being submitted, my journal has been written up with evaluation of the images and I am about to set off for my class.  I am hopeful that I have met the criteria although I took the long way round to get there! (My photography progress with this will be documented in my next post.)

"If I have any 'message' worth giving to a beginner, it is that there are no short cuts in photography"  Edward Weston

PS  My list of photographers and genres has grown now that we have studied the styles of at least twenty and seen some amazing photographs.  

Check out Sebastiäo Salgado, the greatest living photo journalist and his Bombay Train Station (framed print now valued at about £4,000).