Fay Godwin's Work.

On the advise of my tutor i had a look at Fay Godwin's work because he said that because of my interest in the British countryside her work would appeal to me. The first thing i noticed about her work is that she kept things very straight forward, by this i mean she didn't try to over complicate what she was shotting for example in Top Withens, Chad Valley, 1977 its just the grassland, tree and building but you get the idea of it being a desolate wind swept area just from these small features. I was surprised to find that in the majority of her work she didn't feel the need to include any people in the scene but yet still managed to make the world seem lived in by including the signs of human activity within the landscape such as the drainage ditches, the sole sign standing on its or even the industrial scene of Colne in Lancashire. Finally like all great photographers who chose to work in black and white she had great control over the contrast thought the scene meaning that she understood how and when to use the light to get the results she wanted and like I've said before about Ansel Adams you have to respect that because they didn't have digital cameras where they could see if they'd got the exposure wrong they just knew how to setup the camera right from year of experience of working in the outdoors. As ever my tutor wasn't wrong in thinking I'd find here work interesting plus it's given me some ideas for my next assignment.

Project 28- Intimate Landscape.

For this project you were asked to produce intimate landscapes, by this it means more the details within a landscape an not the full blown image from ground to horizon and the sky above.

For the first three shots above what i tried looking at are very small things that would appear that tiny within a more normally frame photo that you'd hardly notice or would be completely over looked. What i do find is that at this kind of scale is that colours become very important, by this i mean that you could end up with a large solid mass that wouldn't make that good a shot but by breaking it up with either contrasting or complementary colours as I've done above you find that its not as constraining as you may think.

With the two shots above I've tried using slow shutter speeds combined with flowing water to create quiet different effects but still work as a intimate shot.

With this project it helps you to focus more on the little details that sometimes you'll over look, what i found myself doing was studying an area instead of just looking at the obvious points of interest I'd go further by looking the scene from a different point of view. I say its been a different project but maybe I've found it not very interesting compared to others in this section, maybe I've just miss the point.

Project 26- Shooting the Moon.

I was looking forward to this project for a while because its a subject I've never looked at that closely so didn't have any idea of what I'd be producing or how good the end results would turn out. The idea was to shot the moon within the landscape, sounds quiet easy first off but there are things that need to be considered before hand. First you need a telescopic lens because without one you're making life very difficult because unless you can catch the moon very near to the horizon you'd end up with this very light point (looking very small) in a huge black sky. For this project i used my 150-500mm lens that I'd normally use for wildlife but because of the size and weight the next problem to over come is supporting it enough so you get a good stable image, so a sturdy tripod is a must. Finally you have to be aware of the street/house lights around you if you're shooting in a built up area, I'd never realised how much light is sent into the sky until i tried this project its quiet amazing how much light pollution spoils the night sky.




The above shot i used a slightly longer exposure because i wanted to show the moon as a bright point illuminating the trees that it was moving across behind, by experiment i found that if i wanted to catch the details on the surface I'd need to use a much faster speed because what you don't realise to begin with is how bright the moon actually is.

1.

2.

3.

Over the course of time I've experiment with a few different way a shooting the moon but after doing some research online and in some astrophotography magazines i discovered a piece of software call Registax5. What you can do with this is take a number of shots of the moon in this instance and then stack them together to create a much sharper image because it helps to build up the surface detail.

Image 1 and 2 where just single shots that have be tweaked and sharpened using the software while 3 is five images stacked together to create a brilliant photo.

One thing i have noticed during this project is that although a full moon is good to shot you find that a moon with some shadow on the surface is a lot better because it picks out the details and the cont ores while the full moon seems very flat in contrast.

Above i gone a little further with the project by having my first attempt at shooting a long exposure (about 30mins) of the night sky. I seen this in lots of magazines before but have never thought of having a go myself, i love the trails the stars leave as they streak across the sky. I'd never thought about how much movement there is up there you just don't notice it, plus again as I've said earlier how much the lights from the streets and buildings around us hide much of the night sky. I'd love to go right off somewhere into the countryside away from any built up areas and try this again because i know the results would be spectacular.

This project has opened my eyes to a form of photography that I'd never really thought much about before and i shall defiantly continue to experiment with it in the future.

Project 24- Clouds and Sky.

The aim of this project was to produce images where the sky and clouds dominated the scene. I found this a useful section because I'd never really considered how the sky can effect the feel of the shot or that with the right sky/cloud conditions even the most uninteresting photo can suddenly make an impact. Soft light clouds as in the above photo give the scene a far lighter less oppressive feel as compared to some of the more stormer Sky's below.

This shot in particular you really feel the weight of the sky pressing down on the landscape, you just know its going to chuck it down any second.

With this shot above i wanted to try something a little different by seeing how gaining alot of high and getting level with the clouds effected the feel they have on the shot. There quiet heavy clouds similar to the second shot but by being nearly above them they don't feel as flat an they make an interesting comparison to the similar structure of the landscape below.

I know alot of my work above does quiet fit into the guide lines set out in the course which where that the horizon line should be near the bottom of the frame, but i feel that because alot of the cloud formations are either very large or seem extremely heavy they dominate the scene still as strongly while keeping the shot well balanced overall.

Project 22- Positioning the Sun.

Didn't really think much to this part, what you're asked to do is position the sun differently and observe the results.

What i found is that you can control where you want the shadows to fall by positioning the sun appropriately for example by completely leaving the sun just outside of the frame the shadows become nearly none existent but by placing it in the middle of the frame you get a fairly even spread through the frame. A project that i found a little pointless but never the less I'm sore its taut me something even if a struggle to see what.

Project 23- Soft Light.

For this project you were as to shot 3 photos under overcast light conditions, these kind of conditions naturally soften the light because the cloud acts as a diffuser similar to the kind you would use in studio photography. What i thought this project was trying to get across is that in this country alot of the time you'll find yourself confronted by these conditions on a regular basis and they shouldn't be avoided all of the time because they can be used to create good images.





In the shot above i used the approach of using a neutral graduated filter to darken the sky because normally you'd be left with a very bright white sky which obviously spoils a perfectly good image but by doing this you still can keep as much of the sky in the shot as you would normally be happy with.

Although with this second shot the cloud was breaking up a little it hadn't gone so far as to completely loss the softer light i was looking for. Under a clear blue sky at the time of day i took this shot the end result would have seemed a little darker because the stronger light would have increased the amount of shadow around the bass of the trees while also the sky might have over dominated the view. With conditions as they where the end results are much better because what shadows there are see softer and do not hide as much detail, while the very light sky doesn't over power it just feels more natural.

The final shot in this section has shares similar points with the previous image in that with stronger light the shadows between the two hedgerows would have hidden alot if not all the detail that make this shot interesting such as the wild undergrowth on the left hand side.

I enjoyed this section alot because its help me to see that it isn't always the right thing to do to avoid shooting in certain conditions because sometimes these can produce a completely different feeling photo which if compared to the same shot taken in full light works better on a number of different levels.

Project 21- Silhouettes and Reflections.

This project was quiet a straight forward one in that you where asked to shot images with water in them showing reflection while shooting into the sun to make the surrounding landscape appear in the form of a silhouette. You were then asked to bracket the exposures and examine how the shadows and detail in images change. One of the main problems i found when doing this is that its very hard working facing into the sun because if your not very careful you get end up blinding yourself (and i bet some have) so you have to work fast and hope you're getting the photos you need. Another problem i had was dew to the spot i pick, not thinking it was where a herd of cow come down to drink from the river in the evening i soon found myself surround by about 20 cows so it was a little bit of a rush to get out the way ( the things you do for work).


-2 STOPS- What you see above is that as well as the shot being completely silhouetted, the shadows are also so strong that you can't pick out any detail, the reflection seems very soft but it is clear. A good thing about this exposure is that the sun is clearly visible while in the later shots it'll just be a brighter and brighter spot instead of the ball above.

-1 STOP- In this exposure the detail is starting to become apparent while the trees and horizon are still silhouetted, also the reflection appears a little brighter.

0 STOPS- Virtually all the silhouetting is gone and now the shadows are beginning to be reduced slowly reveling more and more of the foreground detail.

+1 STOP- Shadows are very much reduced but the reflection doesn't appear to be getting any brighter. Now though the sky is becoming very bright and over exposed.

+2 STOPS- Finally the shadows are weaker , again there is no obvious change in the reflection and the sky is pretty much spoiled by the over exposed nature of the shot.

The photo that i think works best is the -1 stop image as it quiet a happy medium the sky isn't to over exposed so the sun still has a little shape, the background is still completely silhouetted while there is some detail present in the foreground and finally the reflection is clear if not to bright meaning the whole shot just feels right. A enjoyable project but i think I'll be seeing spots for the next week.

Been doing a little more reading on this subject because i didn't maybe grasp the reasons why its so hard to get a good expose when working with water. Never thought to think as the water as a reflect er of light meaning that when the camera reads the view its going to make the shot seem very bright. The best time to shot scenes involving water is obviously during the early morning or just before sunset when the light isn't as intense, meaning i could have improved my shots for this project by shooting maybe another half and hour later.

Project 19- Choosing the Moment.

When shooting early in the morning or late in the evening you have to be aware of how fast the light changes because in the blick of an eye a shadow that didn't effect the image one minute can now completely spoil the whole landscape. With the shots above you can see clearly how over the period of about 30 minutes the shadow of the hedgerow rapidly increases spreading further into the frame. Also you can see how the colour cast on to the corn changes because it starts off being very yellow at the beginning but by the end it has a very reddish cast to it. This wasn't something that I'd ever taken a lot of notice of before but having completed the last couple of project and having spent quiet a few evenings now standing around watching how the light changes the landscapes around me i now feel that i understand that in the hours before sunset and after sunrise then light tends to be best for certain images but you have to be on your toes because things can change fast.

Project 20- Sun Stars and Diffraction.

This was a very simple project in which i had to create images showing what they call a "sun star" effect. This is produced mainly by using a low iso and a small aperture while keeping the sun relatively small within the landscape.





1.

500secs at f22

2.

250secs at f22

3.

125secs at f22

What you can see from the above shots is that by altering the exposure you can effect the size and shape of the rays produced by the sun, i particularly like the rainbow halo that is produced around the sun. This is good effect to be aware of but I'm not sure its something that i would look to use very often as i don't like including the sun in my landscape work that much unless its at sunrise/sunset when you can make it a really eye catching part of the image.

I did produce this shot as part of assignment 2, it show what this project is trying to illustrate as well as anything I've produced so far.

Project 18- Sunrise and Sunset.

The aim of this project was to photograph a sunrise or sunset showing the way the light and colours change through the period as with my shots of the sun near to the horizon and then after it has moved to below the horizon. The first thing that is most noticeable is that as the light gets low and less the more the shots become silhouettes as the shadows increase across the landscape. Next i noticed that while the sun is above the cloud level there's some colour to the cloud and sky but it isn't very strong, but as soon as the sun travels under the cloud level it becomes far stronger and more intense. The reason for this is because of the light reflecting off the clouds which is then spread throughout the sky because of the very low angle of the light. I wonder if there had been a little more cloud cover whether the colour would have been even stronger because the clouds would have held the reds/oranges more then the blue sky? Again this project has taken a little time to complete as with project 16 because you can never rely on the British weather to do what you expect, if anything this has made me more aware of how important it is to take notice of what the weather forecast are telling you (even though half the time they don't get it right). It been good to study how the light can change over a very short period of time because what i discovered is that i may think I've reached the point where the colours may start to weaken but then to my surprise they would get stronger or just completely fade away in a few seconds.

Project 16- Dusk

This project has really tested me because the weather just never seemed right for about the last 4 weeks. Before hand we've had nice relatively clear warm nights that would have been just perfect to do this project but of course its sods law that as soon as i reached this section the weather changed meaning its been a long wait to get the right conditions once more.



What i found most spectacular while watching the sun go down was the incredible range of tones that are produced from purples right through to reds, and this then can alter the feel of anything you shot during this period. I never really understood how peaceful and relaxing it is to just sit and watch the sun go down.

By using a telescopic lens i was able to capture this beautiful sunset with the silhouetted trees and the sun rays coming out of the clouds as the sun passes through. I hadn't done much work this close to dusk before so this project gave me the chance to play with alot of different exposures and settings to discover which i felt worked best for me so moving forward through this next section I'll be much more proficient and hopefully be able to capture the perfect moment all the more better.