Bathtub IV

Above is a spectacular find. I simply typed “tilt and shift” into the website www.youtube.com and this was the second video of the search result, and I was totally blown away by it. It is simply a time laps of hundreds of images that have been taken using a digital stills camera, but also incorporating the use of tilt and shift, to create a miniature effect video. So much so this video upon first glance wouldn’t look out of place on children’s television. I found it rather moving. This set of images has been put together to create great narrative. In this case, being the rescue of the fisherman at sea.

This has even made me consider attempting such practice, but unfortunately it wouldn’t be possible, as I do not have the money to buy, or even hire such a specialized piece of equipment, this being the lens of the camera with moveable elements to create the tilt and shift effect. Also I was to attempt this, it would go against my usual methodology on only photographing using analogue photographic techniques, and this is something I wish to stick to. As I have stated many times, that despite the fact I have to put so much more effort and time than shooting digital, I feel the benefits out weigh the negatives. Also I have heard so many people say that ‘film is dead’ and this I feel to be totally untrue, so I wish to use my work and methodologies to prove them otherwise. But despite all this I still feel that this video as highly influential, if not this, highly amusing.

Examples of Light Pollution imagery.

Above is a small selection of images that illustrate light pollution, or sky glow as it is sometimes referred to. This glow is formed by large amounts of light created by street lights, buildings etc that escapes into the night sky. The glow that is formed by large cities can be seen from miles away as an orange glow on the horizon. Such pollution is seen by many as killing the night sky as it makes it too light to see the usually bright stars and planets of space.

Unlike the images above however which show the built up areas that have emitted the light, I aim to simple show the sky and the different colours that have been generated. In doing this I feel that the images appear like an abstract gradient of differing shades of artificial light which eventually fade into the blackness of the natural night sky.

Whilst scouting the internet for large format tilt and shift imagery I noticed a name that kept cropping up. This being the photographer Vincent Laforet, who is a 3 time winner at the prestigious 2010 Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival and has been commissioned by almost every important international publication, with the likes of Vanity Fair, The New York Times Magazine, National Geographic…. The list goes on really.

And I found that a lot of his work showed the exact affect I wish to employ with my imagery for this project. Laforet uses the principles of tilt and shift photography to make his subjects look miniature, emphasising heavily on his subjects in a very unique way.

From these few examples it is clear why Laforet has become such a name within the medium of photography. and as stated previously with the work of Keith Carter, i do not wish to copy this work, i simply wish to emulate it and still have my own individualism. because even though i shall be photographing in a very similar way, i shall be using black and white conventional film, and shall be using a large format camera, where as for this work Laforet uses a digital SLR with a specialised tilt and shift lens, i also wish to photograph mass crowds within a city. like on the first example of his work (at the train station) but from viewing his work i have had the idea of maybe photographing Preston's football ground (Deepdale) in a same manner. this image i feel would be rather similar to the fourth example above of the tennis match. so this has been a very helpful find indeed and has pushed my ideas even further than first thought.

More keith carter images.

Here is another few examples of Carters tilt and shift methodology, but i have now only selected images with people in. as for this project i wish to focus on people, unlike my work of old, where i didn't photograph the people within the city, but the inanimate details.

Project Location Ideas - Manchester.

Having already photographed this location last year, I have a rough idea as to where I would reshoot the images with better quality to be used as part of this brief. I carried out my test shoot from the hills around Winter Hill and Rivington Pike as it is an ideal location that looks down over the whole of Greater Manchester. From this vantage point it is also, on a clear day/night possible to see Liverpool. But i feel that in terms of this project I would have to find somewhere closer to Liverpool to produce an image of that city.
The link below shows images by another individual showing the views from this area and how it is ideally situated in terms of my needs;
http://stigvista.co.uk/pa/walks/dkpeak/winterhill/winterhill.htm

The above map goes some way of showing the location of the hills; they are situated in the top left corner of the image, and look down directly over the Greater Manchester region.

Research - Keith Carter

I was introduced to the work of Keith Carter by the tutor Andrew Sanderson last year, after telling him for the first time that I was interested in beginning large format photography and the process of tilt and shift. And by chance Andrew has one of his books in the office, Holding Venus- 2000. And I instantly felt myself in complete awe of his work. His technical expertise allowing him to focus directly on any given subject, but then using his tilt and shift methodology to softly blur the rest of the frame I felt was fascinating. And I seriously aimed for that standard of work, not to be like Carter or to copy him, but to in fact emulate him so that my work could clearly show influence from his work, but at the same time still be individually recognisable as my own.

As you can clearly see the use of tilt and shift makes some lovely aesthetically pleasing images.

http://www.keithcarterphotographs.com/images-venus.html#

Initial Project Idea

For this project I have decided to follow on from an idea which I had during last years "Photography and the city" module. During my open brief for the module, i was trying to think of different original and interesting ideas that would help represent the city, in such a way that was different to how it is usually viewed.
One of my ideas, which i then chose not to continue was that of photographing the light pollution created by cities such as Manchester. Below is a test shot that I carried out during the module whilst considering what to do.

At the time, I really liked this idea as I feel that the image itself is visually appealing, and also successfully shows an aspect of the depicted city in a way that is different from convention. Even though there isnt a single building of the city shown, the image in essence still shows the city, as the patterns of light would be different for each city, and if it was not for the buildings that make up the area this glow would not exist.
However, when I came up with this idea I had the vision of photographing several different cities; Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, London etc. I felt that each image would be individual and when displayed together, the viewer would be able to appreciate the differences and similarities and i feel their simple yet intriguing appearance would create quite an impression.
This idea of photographing different cities created a problem; the logistics of realistically travelling around the country to take the shots. The main difficulty would be finding a suitable location, as it would not be suitable to simply travel to a certain city and photograph the sky, the image would have to be taken from outside the city from a viewpoint that looked over the area. 
At the time of the project last year, I did not have the means of traveling around the country to do the project, so reluctantly I chose to move onto a different idea.
However, my circumstances have now changed and it is a viable option to go to the various areas to produce the images, and because of this I have chosen to do the idea for this brief. I feel that the resulting images would be ideal for our joint exhibition, and they are a good example of how I try and aim to produce original and (hopefully) interesting images.