Looking All Fancy in Studio Lighting

For my studio lighting project, a couple of yawns caught on camera and a hell of a lot of rearranging lights, and I finally results I liked. I used Andie as my model in all three pictures, and had her play around with faces and angles. Taking the first picture at the top for example. Using a Nikon d3100, with a shutter speed of 1/80, and an aperture of F-5.6. I set my lighting at a 1:2 ratio, and was of course, formally posed, using two studio lights. This one ended up being my favourite because I loved the way the light Andie's looking into sharpens the profile of her face, and her long hard is dark enough to contrast well with that. It has a classy, elegant look to it, unlike the other pictures I took of her with a little more freedom to make weird faces and poses. The catch light in her eyes gives depth to the photo, and draws your eyes in.

In the second photo, it was taken candidly, as the subject was just making different faces at the camera, and I decided not to tell her when I was going to take the picture. For this one, I used the Nikon D3100, with a shutter speed of 1/80 and an aperture of F-5.6. I love the way her hair against her arm contrasts, as well as with her face. I had a light closer to her on the left, and farther away on the right, as you can see through the darker shadows on the right.

For the last studio lighting picture, using a Nikon D3100, with a shutter speed of 1/80, and an aperture of F-5.6, I let Andie play around (with her hair apparently), and shot candid pictures while she did so. I used two studio lights, the one on the left is once again stronger, because I set it closer than I did with the one on the right, but I did it so that you could hardly tell, because I wanted her entire face to be lit similarly. I love the contrast between her eyes and her fancy strand of hairstache.

Finding My Name In Unexpected Places

For this project, we were to find our name in abstract places, spelling it out letter by letter, first to last. It was most definetely something that got easier as I went along. To find the letters of my name is unexpected places, I had to think outside of the box, and get out of my own head. In order to get creative with this, I had to see beyond an object itself, and look at the detailing for something beyond what it actually is (what is really not as deep as I made that sound). Through this, I discovered that through the use of lighting, angles, and editing, we as the photographers have the power and control over what we want our viewer to see. We can make our viewer see something through our perspective. For example, I took a clock, and made you see it as an "L". We can convey messages and show things to our audience by getting out of the box and forcing them to look at things differently, as we had to.

VENEZUELA. Caracas. 2006. Reflection in window in Altamira.

My photo inspiration for grade 11 photography is none other than Christopher Anderson. Born in British Columbia in 1970, Christopher Anderson spent much of his early years in Texas, where his father was a preacher, before moving to New York City, and then Paris (so he's most definitely had his share of exploring the planet). His life in photography began in the photo lab of the Dallas Morning News, where he learned to develop film and print pictures. Along with now working in black and white, Anderson was honored with the Robert Capa Gold Medal Award. Later that year, he photographed the stone throwers of Gaza and was named Kodak's Young Photographer of the Year. In 2003, he published his first monograph, Nonfiction, later publishing Capitolio.

Aside from the fact that his photos are super intriguing, Christopher Anderson eloquently gives you something to look at, and another thing to think about. Anderson gets out of an office or a kitchen, or any room that I've seen more times than my own reflection. He gets out into the world and shoots pictures that tell a story that people need to see. The first thing that comes to mind when I see a photo by Christopher Anderson is that there's such raw emotion and passion in his shots. His photos of the stone throwers inspired me to take pictures that move people. I think he has a strong drive to show things like that to parts of the world that don't get to witness things like that on a daily basis. He shot several photos in Caracas, Venezuela that showed you emotion and pain in the faces of the people, that gave you a strong sense of the poverty, political power, and negative influence on the area. Yep, that's my inspiration.