Final Project: Close up Portraits

I had a lot of trouble when I first started this project. Everyone else had these cool ideas, like fairy tales or the progression of a life. I tried so many different things -- a poem, weapons, nature, dance, etc. And nothing worked.
I finally went back through my work from this term and decided on portraits. That had been my favorite assignment, and I felt like I could go much further with it. I took 69 pictures of my cousin on Sunday, but when I went into the digital lab I realized that they all kind of looked the same. I was looking for something that would make my assignment unique.
I went back through her pictures and picked out my favorites. The closer I got to her face, the more I liked the picture. I decided to do close-ups for my assignment.
Once I had decided, the assignment was suddenly simpler. I still worked hard to get quality and good lighting, but I knew what I wanted.
These pictures tell me about each of these people. I found that when I cut away all the complications of background and posing and what they were doing, I got something perfect. I take no credit for the quality in these pictures that draw people to them. It was already there -- I just caught it on a camera.
I had to make a conscious decision about who I was going to shoot. I had to choose the age group. and how well I knew them, and what they were like. I picked students, kids who I have known for years and grown up with. Waterford is such a small community that everyone knows each other, and I wanted people that I knew well so that I was more comfortable with working with them through a camera.
So here we go.

The first picture is the original one of Sage, my cousin. I love her expression -- smiling because she is comfortable with me, but a little shy of the camera.



Here are the rest in order. The first is Olivia Mitchell. I didn't do too much to this picture, just some blacks for her eyes. I love her contrast-ey hair and dark eyelashes. I had to put in a little fill light to keep them from being too blocky, and a tiny bit of extra exposure to pop her collar. It was great light though, so I tried to it as close to the original as I could.



Next is Rod. He was hard, because he kept on posing or messing around. I finally got him to stay still, and used some Macro focus. This is in the same light as Olivia. I discovered quickly while working with these pictures that the trickiest part when pushing up the blacks is that the hair will go chunky quickly, but I think that I got a good balance with his over the left ea.



Emma was next. Hers is the only picture that doesn't have the subject making eye contact with the camera. I think she was nervous about having her picture taken, and kind of goofy. I love that I got this picture -- it's so quintessentially Emma.
On the technical side of things, I mostly left this one alone. Her hair is beautiful, and I didn't want to lose any in black. I nudged the exposure and a tiny bit of black to contrast it, but that was mostly it.



Zel was a nice person to shoot too. I knew her so well, and she was so familiar with photo, that it wasn't even like she was in front of a camera. She was just Zel. I picked a picture of her smiling because she is never afraid to laugh when she thinks something is funny, and she has a big, genuine smile.
I loved pulling out her blond hair with a bit of extra exposure. I had to be careful with the black around her neck, but I think it looks fine. Overall, I love this picture too. (Actually, I love all of them. That's just how cool they are.)



I shot Alli on the quad right before English. The light had been kind of harsh up until then, but a miracle in the form of clouds showed up. It was still light, but not harsh and bright.
She was very confident in front of my camera, and even posed a little. I liked the pictures.
They were a little underexposed, so I pulled that up in the lab but otherwise left it alone.



The next day, I shot Hanna and Gabi on the sidewalk between the math and science buildings after math and before adviser group. These two are my favorite pictures (I'm not criticizing the other people... really.) It was the same light as with Alli, and a little windy. I love their expressions in these shots. I have spent the past year sitting in between these girls in algebra II, and they are confident about who they are. I admire that, and I think I caught that at least a little in these shots.
It's a different confidence from what you would think of. They weren't posing in front of the camera, or smiling like movie stars. They just trusted me to take a picture of who they are, and they are comfortable with showing me that.
Hanna:



Gabi:



I also grabbed Lorna right after these two pictures, and shot her in the same spot because of the gorgeous lighting. She's absolutely gorgeous in this picture. It was a bit tricky to touch up because the hair was very black and I lost some of it. But i tried to brighten her face a little, and bring in some depth and contrast.




I shot Nat outside the music building, and there's a bit of a shadow, but I love this picture a lot because it's just simple and straight-on. He didn't grin or tilt his head or pose, he just looked right at the camera. It's powerful because of it's simplicity.



This is the one picture I would re-shoot if I could. It's me, but Emma took it and she wasn't used to the way i was framing and setting my pictures. It's also the only one indoors. I was lying down, which accounts for the weird angle, and the lighting is kind of bad, resulting in a low time and consequent blurriness.
However, I do like my eyes and that I'm looking directly at the camera.



Clark was my last person. I set up in good light, but right as I began shooting the clouds moved, so the light is a little harsh. On the other hand, it's great contrast and shadow.
I like his expression. Like Nat, he's just looking at the camera, and there's the same blunt power in that.



Overall, I can definitely say that this is my best work this term and possibly in my photo career so far. I had great light and focus overall, and produced some pictures that even i keep coming back to. I was surprised by how natural people were with me -- very few goofed around, and they all looked at the camera without trying to pose or make faces. There was none of the self-conscious shyness that results in them ducking or turning away. I think that this was because these people know me and trust me to take their picture.
I'm extremely proud of this project.

Assignment # 4 High key/Low key take 2

Ok here are the prints for high key/low key take 2. I can't really remember which print I ended up using for them, so they might not be as good as the prints I turned in. The assignment is only for two pictures, and to talk about them. Both of mine are high key, because while I did shoot low key I didn't get any I was very pleased with.

The first one is of saltines. I like this one a lot more than I expected to. I had to bring up the exposure a bit because I was doing it without a tripod, and so I had to go to a low time for it to be in focus. I love the crinkles in the wrapper, and the crumbs along the paper. I was actually eating these, and just looked down and decided to take a picture because it was a good high key and had beautiful light. I was looking from picture to picture after bracketing, and the number of crackers was getting smaller because I would eat a cracker between each picture. But I love this picture, and am glad I had my camera with me.



This is actually a literal redo, as I used bbs in my bathtub last time too. I zoomed in this time, focused, and bracketed more to the light end so that I could get a more natural shot without a ton of touch-ups. I had to pull up the black a tiny bit to get the shadows around the bbs, and the awesome reflection on the inside of the cup on the far left. Overall, I think I did better this time around, largely because I took more time to bracket.

Last pitch for final ideas before I begin shooting

OK, here are the two ideas I've come up with for my final. I'm going to shoot both of them this weekend and then see what I like more.
The first is weapons. I have a couple swords, and the theater program has some really awesome swords too. I also have a dagger, and Krissy has a Katana. I also have some bows and arrows. The challenge with this one would be making it interesting, so I think I'll have to experiment with different stuff.

The other one is extreme close ups of faces -- just faces. Not the hair or background or shirt. The challenge with this one would be to get amazing light, so I'll see how the light is when I'm shooting this weekend.

Final Project -- other ideas

Ok so i'm having trouble deciding on a final prject idea. I have my poem, but there are some images I just wouldn't be able to get. Here are some other ideas I've had too:

1. Portraits of women
2. Hands, feet
3. Hair styles of different people
4. Dance -- not just the turns and jumps, but warm-ups, stretches, taking off shoes afterward.
5. Eyes
6. People outside, what they do

It's kind of a mish-mash right now, but i'm going to start taking pictures tomorrow and this weekend, and see what I have on Monday, which I hope will give me more of a sense of what i like to photograph and what looks good. I'll have a solid idea by tuesday.

Assignment #7 Numbers

So this is my numbers assignment. I love the light in these first three prints. Two were in the kitchen, and the other is in our guest room. They were taken about midday, and the light is gorgeous.

Number 5 This is one of my favorites. I like the arc of heights, and the light on the metal lids of the salt and pepper shakers, especially the small dent in the second from the left.



Number 6
This one is my other favorite. I actually just found our kitchen table like this, with six dish towels. I love the slant of the table from the bottom corner.




Number 12
My brother's old room, with a big window on my right that gave me gorgeous light.




These last two aren't as good, but it was mostly just finding ones that were in focus. This one is really boring, though. I don't like the monotone feel of it.
Number 22



I'm not sure what this number is -- it's large. I actually kind of like the contrasts in it, but the DVDs were all black, so i kind of lost them. It probably would have been better with books in different sizes.

Assignment # 6 Portraits

For my portraits, i shot my cousins. The pictures were Saturday and Sunday at their house, and the light is gorgeous. I took some pictures of them just playing, and then one by one, posed. There are five children, two older girls and three young boys. There are five candids and five full on portraits.
When i first tried to upload the pictures to the blogger, the computer got all messed up, so i had to delete and re-import, so what's on here isn't as good as the actual prints because i didn't have enough time to redo them completely.
Portraits first.

This is the youngest, Gary. This was his own pose.



I love the light in this one. These are the 8-yr-old twins, Dustin and Corwin. They have kind of opposite personalities, but are a lot alike at the same time. Dustin is the one in the shadow, Corwin is the one looking at the camera. This was how they were actually standing, and i just happened to be there and snap a picture.



This is Indigo Joy, 11.
She is doing that eye-to-eye thing -- you know, that means "I'm going to GET YOU for this."
It was originally a little flat, but i pulled up the contrast to get depth in her face and hair and pop the whites in her collar.



This is my self portrait of me not being me. I chose Greta Garbo to be, and imitated her famous picture. I had Eli bracket, so i had more options to work with. I gave it a really high contrast to echo the original picture.



The candids were really fun to do, because the kids were much more natural and didn't burst into nervous giggles just as I took the picture.
This is the first. Indigo and Gary are in the foreground, warding off Darwin (the dog). There was a picture just before this without the twins in the background, but it had too much blank background so i chose this one instead.



I love this one. Sage is the oldest -- she just turned 12. I love her expression in this picture. It's a little self conscious, and a little bit amused at whatever i just said that was probably stupid, but she looks very calm and happy at the same time. I especially love the light hitting the side of her face.
When i think of Sage, I always think of her as strong. Not physically, but very much in her personality. When she was 3, she was diagnosed with leukemia, and spent four years fighting before it went into remission. She lost all her hair and still has big scars below her collarbone, but she did it. So here is the closest picture I took that says that this is a strong girl.



This is Indigo again. She spends a lot of time in her own world (when she isn't glaring at me) and strikes dramatic poses such as this instinctively, looking contemplative and philosophical. The light was a bit tricky -- I wanted to make the stripe on her cheek to stay bright, but had to bring back details on the wall behind her.



Gary again, after bumping his eye. Sage brought his some ice. I love his lower lip that's sticking out. It looks like he can't decide whether to sulk or whimper. I also like the contrasts here.



This is my favorite. I was fiddling with it in Lightroom, and decided to yank up the blacks, pull exposure out enough to keep the lights, and print whatever happened. Further testament that impulse decisions are the way to get through life.

#5 On Your Belly

My biggest problem with this assignment was focus. With most assignments I can use a tripod so that even long exposures can turn out well, but with this one I was holding the camera, so that by the time I got to a good exposure, the time was so long that it was blurry (It didn't help that I wasn't getting home until around 8-9 every night, so the light was awful). I liked the actual images of the thread, the open cupboard, and the sweater at the bottom of the stairs, but they were very tricky technically between the light and the focus. Overall, I liked the concepts and images, but not the amount of messing around I had to do with them on the computer, because whenever I do too much on the computer I feel like I'm losing too much of the original picture. I had fun doing it, though, and had fun thinking up ideas.

The Chandelier. My favorite part is the trippy shadow around the top.



A cupboard in my kitchen:



A spool of thread i spotted under a chair:



My stairs, with a dark purple cashmere sweater at the bottom: