Assignment 1 - Contrasts

Assignment 1 - Contrasts

This assignment was to show 8 visual contrasts from a list and also one photograph to show both.

"Express the extremes of different qualities and take pairs of photographs, which bring out the essential differences."

I worked through the list and eventually went with the following photos to represent my 8 visual contrasts and 1 representing both together.

Continuous/Intermittent

Continuous
f22 1/2s 100 ISO 10mm

For continuous I decided to visit a large waterfall not too far from my home, called The Falls of Clyde. They are extremely large although when the gates are shut you can walk on the falls and this is where I managed to photograph the top section. This would be covered with rapids when the gates get opened and it is this force that has helped create the wonderful shapes in the stone all around. The continuous flow cuts through the middle of the stone and I decided to use a tripod to use a slow shutter speed and have the water as a soft and gentle as another contrast to the surrounding rough edges and jagged rocks. I cropped the original image and converted to black and white in Silver Efex Pro 2, increasing the structure/clarity to emphasise the texture of the rocks and stone. The sun was coming from the top left and was a problem for choosing my viewpoint as from of other points I was facing straight into the sun and too much flare was created, so I found from here I was in a small area of shade and able to shoot free of flare. This was my first time photographing the falls but I hope to return perhaps in late evening for a less harsh light and less intrusive as the sun will have fallen behind the surrounding gorge walls.

Intermittent
f2.8 1/1000s 1600 ISO 62mm

I stuck with a water theme for representing intermittent. I setup a continuous light behind a transparent reflector and placed some water in a black baking tray. I used a small syringe to drop small droplets of water into the tray and set the camera up on a tripod, put the shutter release to continuous and pressed as I dropped the droplets hoping to capture a few individual drops as they hit the water. The ISO had to be increased in order to get a fast shutter speed of at least 1/1000s and also I opened the shutter as wide as it would go, although this caused the problem of making sure the focus was spot on, meaning it was a bit of a hit and miss and hence a good few attempts to get the right shot. A little increase of clarity in Lightroom, the white balance cooled a bit and cropped to suit was all the post processing required.

Diagonal/Rounded

Diagonal
f2.8 1/50s ISO 200 24mm

For diagonal I wondered around Glasgow city centre looking for examples, these quite often ended up being stairs though. Although, I found this slight variation in Princess Square just off Buchanan Street where the escalators criss crossed to create the diagonals I was looking for. There was a nice diffused light coming from the large glass roof although not enough to have the detail and low ISO I wanted so I compensated by opening the shutter and focusing on the front escalator. I converted to black and white in SEP2 although wanted to bring back the beautiful browns of the mahogany that decorates each floor and stairway. 

Rounded
f2.8 1/100s ISO 200 24mm

 In the same mall as before for diagonal I found this staircase was a perfect contrast and representing rounded in every way. I took a few shots of these and was pleased when the people using the table at the bottom finished up and moved away leaving the table free for me to shoot. The rounded table, rounded seats and rounded staircase with only the 2 straight poles for a sense of height were a great contrast to diagonal. Again the low light a detail wanted I shot with f2.8 and focused on the table allowing any fall off to come up the poles and stairs towards the eye. Converted in SEP2, I increased the structure to keep the detail in the whole shot and cropped to a square in contrast to the circular shapes in the image. 

Liquid/Solid

Liquid
f7.1 1/1600s ISO 800 42mm

This shot shows liquid frozen in movement as it is poured into a glass.  I set this up similar to the intermittent shot, although I taped the glass to the baking tray and put it at a slight angle. The aperture was shut as much as possible without lowering the shutter speed too far and some colouring added to the water. Again as I poured I would shoot continuously to capture the whole process. I shot most of the shots in portrait but for the final shots I moved to horizontal and glad I did as I much prefer the composition after I cropped, with the space for the light source to shine left of the glass and the whole image to be more pleasing to view. Very light post processing, just a slight boost to clarity in Lightroom.

Solid
f2.8 1/250s ISO 100 24mm

For solid I looked for a strong solid structure and found these pillars on a building in Glasgow city centre. It was very much a snap as I passed and cropped  in Lightroom to eliminate the distracting top and sky that was intruding in the neatness of the formal rigid composition I desired. Converted in SEP2 and lightened the shadows to bring back some lost detail. The solid stone suggests strength and with them supporting the solid roof only emphasises this more, I feel the whole image gives a strong feeling of solidity and strength. 

Much/Little

Much
f4.5 1/8s ISO 200 24mm

I found this sowing machine display in a shop front in Glasgow city centre and did my best to avoid reflections hence the angled view, I would have preferred a straight on view but with it being a bright day I couldn't avoid my reflection being in the shot. I wanted to emphasise the wheels of the machines as this suggested the concept of MUCH, so this is why I chose to convert to black and white in SEP2 and remove any distraction from the close behind them. I cropped in Lightroom to compress the machines into to a tight image.

Little
f5.6 1/500s ISO 800 70mm

 Here I tried to suggest little as a contrast to much by showing a pinch of salt. The small van salt holder was another play on the word little but the main aspect was the pinch of salt showing little as in an amount. I setup a continuous light and put the ISO up to 800 to get a fast shutter speed to freeze some of the movement of the falling salt although I was happy with some blur to help show the pinch as it falls. Again the shutter was on continuous shooting mode to capture the whole process of lifting and dropping the salt. I used the clone stamp in Lightroom to tidy up some excess salt that had fell on the black base and blacks where also darkened to get a solid black backdrop. 

Pointed/Blunt

Pointed
f4.5 1/250s ISO 200 24mm

I had a few choices for pointed but went for this shot of the Duke of Wellington statue in Royal Exchange Square in Glasgow which has almost constantly got a traffic cone on it so felt it had to be used.  The only point is the traffic cone in the image and obviously stands out as it is not in its normal environment. It was a bright sunny day when I took this so was conscious of the suns placement and chose to have it behind me. I cropped the image and decided the centre was ideal to showcase the statue and being in the lower half would allow the clear blue sky to be good background. I used a cross process preset in Lightroom and lowered the highlights slightly to give the feeling of 1960's summers of anarchy.

Blunt
f2.8 1/250 ISO 800 62mm

For blunt I used this shot of my daughter pretending to cut paper with imaginary scissors drawn on her fingers. The blunt element being the fingers but contrasting the usual thought of sharp from scissors and the safety side of a child using them. The lack of tearing in the paper emphasises the blunt concept also. An Old Polar preset in Lightroom helped bring out the colours with a boost in contrast and clarity adding to this and a square crop helps focus the eyes on the hand and the scissors.

Still/Moving

Still
f11 1/30s ISO 100 10mm

I found an image for still when I was at the shores of Loch Lomond when the weather was very still and peaceful which is very unusual for this part of the world. I liked the shape and isolation of the newly budding tree in the middle of the pebbled shore. I took this with a 10mm lens but after viewing I decided to crop it to a square format feeling that the shore in the foreground had little interest and wanted the tree to be in a more prominent position along with the horizon being in lower allow the viewer to work up along the tree into the still sky. The rocks from the left also direct us into the horizon and along the water. Converted on SEP2 with the tree lightened individually to help highlight it from the dark sky.

Moving
f16 1/125s ISO 100 31mm

 With moving I tried to show bouncing balls moving around chaotically and originally this was done buy throwing them against a wall but I tried throwing them into a tank of water and liked the effect of them darting towards the bottom of the tank and leaving bubbles as they fall. Some balls are captured sharp but with some blur from others it highlights the movement. I used a strobe light for this shot and used a black background to emphasise the colours and highlight the bubbles. Cropped, increased contrast and clarity in Lightroom.

Straight/Curved

Straight
f2.8 1/800 ISO 100 24mm

Here I used the double yellow lines on this street to show straight. I felt the surrounding slabs on the road were all going horizontally and thought the contrasting vertical yellow lines helped highlight the almost never ending straight lines cutting through the image. I used a wide angle lens to try and elongate the lines. Again I liked the cross process preset in Lightroom to give a sense of street photography. The shallow depth of field was used and I focused on the foreground to allow the lines to drift off into the distance.

Curved
f2.8 1/640s ISO 100 24mm

I found these stone benches next to the yellow lines for straight a loved their shape. I went for a low angle of view and a shallow depth of field focusing again on the foreground and allowing the curves to drift off into the background. I felt the black and white (converted in SEP2) helped emphasise the curves by allowing the shadows to be part of the image and the detail of the stone was also highlighted. I tightened up the crop to cut off any distraction at the top of the image and increased contrast and structure to help show the detail of the stone.

Transparent/Opaque

Transparent
f11 1/125s ISO 100 24mm

Here I used a fish tank full of water and tried to make a self portrait with my face in the water to show transparent. I had a few images to choose from where there were more bubbles coming from my mouth but ended up going for this one where only a few bubbles appear making the viewer explore the image to get the full story of its making. The tank was also perfect to suggest a frame around my face again making viewers ask questions of its orientation. Converted in SEP2 and some cleaning up of the eyes and face in Photoshop along with a little crop to make sure the tank appeared to be a frame. I used 2 strobe lights lighting my face from either side and had the camera on a tripod under the tank, I controlled the shutter from the remote. 

Opaque
f11 0.8s ISO 400 62mm

I stayed with the idea of a self portrait for opaque but this time took it in a steamed up mirror. I thought I would mark out a smiley face and try and get my face reflecting behind it. I was unsure where to focus, either my face or the mirror face. When I focused on my face it was hard to make out that there was steam and it wasn't possible to see the drawn face. So i felt focussing on the mirror was best but results in giving an overall look of blur, although I feel it works ok. The suggestion of the rest of me behind the steam shows the opaque nature of the shot. It's a slightly scary image but I think it adds to the mystery and searching questions it asks. I had to set the camera on a tripod and not wanting to use a flash I used a slow  shutter speed as I wanted to get as large a depth of field as possible, and controlled the shutter with the remote. I cropped and increased the exposure slightly in Lightroom.

Large And Small (Both)

Large & Small
f4 1/160s ISO 800 45mm

This was the one I chose to show both contrasts in one photograph. I got my eldest daughter, and we put our feet together to show the extremes of large and small. I set the camera on a tripod and focused on my daughters feet before joining her and setting the camera off from the remote. I needed a fairly wide aperture with the light available as the ISO was as high as I wanted to go. A tight crop and cross process preset in Lightroom was the majority of post processing required.

Conclusions

I found this assignment got me taking a great variety of images where I was using many of the elements from the previous exercises. I found myself to be a little flustered at first when I was randomly looking for images from the list of contrasts until I started writing down ideas and beginning to get organised and a feel for which ones I would persue. I did have many more images and it took some self assessing to choose which ones to use. 

I feel I managed to portray the desired contrasts and show each visually. I always try and make each image of interest to the viewer and not just an image of something, and hopefully I've managed this in some way at least.