Theme –> ” Human: Nature”

This was the big kahuna that everyone was waiting for, and when Miss Jing laid the bomb on us, not many knew what to expect. It is good though, that the theme is the same as the Singapore International Photography Festival 2010. This is quite a good opportunity for those in the class who intend to be photographers in the future to get exposure and to get their work exhibited (though I don’t know how many there are).

I thought the theme of Human Nature seemed pretty interesting to explore. My mind launched into thoughts of trying some street photography to try and catch people in their essence. And then I noticed the COLON. Who would have thought two dots would have changed the complexity of the entire theme. The colon in Human:Nature represented a relationship between human and nature, instead of purely being on the essence of human nature.

Again I decided that I should avoid cliched photos that will be used by others, like a direct juxtaposition between people and plants. I gave the topic more thought and I liked the idea of relationships (that the colon offered), and I decided to go along with the idea of how people relate to one another and the whole notion of give and take.

People have always been involved in exchange. Since the olden days, people did barter trade to get what they wanted. Today, people are giving and taking to get what they want, from other people. I wanted to focus on this exchange, and play on the meanings behind this exchange, which has become part of human nature.

Very often when people give or take something from one another, someone usually stands to gain something from the exchange on top of the physical object. I wanted to zero in on this hidden meaning behind exchange and illustrate it using objects. This was the first obstacle I faced. I had to decide whether to choose an object and give it meaning, or to think of a meaning and try come up with an object that could represent it. The meanings behind the objects were abstract, yet they had to be symbolised by something physical.

Working on such an abstract theme allowed flexibility in its interpretation that gives room for creative freedom. At the same time such a level of liberty also threatened me with a lack of focus and direction. I dwelled longest on interpreting the theme as I wanted to work on something meaningful.

The colon in the theme offered another dimension that I could explore. Adding a colon in between the two words implied a connection between the two, similar to how a colon in a mathematical ratio denotes a relationship between the two numbers.

People around the world are involved in relationships. This plays on the saying: ‘no man is an island’ where nobody could survive on his or her own and need someone whom he or she could depend on, to survive and thrive. As such, it is within human nature for us to be part of a relationship.

It was on this basis of relationships between individuals that I wanted to develop on. Giving the topic more thought, I deduced that behind all relationships there lies an exchange. This exchange could be either explicit, implicit or both. Participants of this exchange usually gain something for being in it, where the gain may be physical or otherwise.

I wanted to expand on this idea where the meanings behind the exchange may be specific or otherwise. These meanings may be hidden in the different parts of this exchange like the gesture or the product exchanged. In this series I focused on the physical item exchanged, and to represent the duality of the exchange, each item carries with it an alluded meaning.

I chose tangible items that carried with it an intangible meaning that people can and usually obtain from one another whether unknowingly or not. These items are not out of the ordinary and can be found in everyone’s home. But what is unique about them, is the meaning they offer to the exchange.

This meaning is extremely subjective but the objects chosen in my series were meant to symbolise the following – ‘Book:Knowledge’, ‘Flower:Love’, ‘Kite:Freedom’, ‘Umbrella:Protection and ‘Clothes:Care’. However in the last frame, there is no physical object, but just an outstretched hand reaching for another. This represents the ultimate underlying truth behind exchanges, that all we need is each other.

The characters in each image were desaturated, leaving only the objects coloured to draw attention away from them and onto the items instead. The images were also framed without the characters heads to show that this interaction is universal and does not and cannot have a face to it.

The photos themselves were created to exist in a series. If one of the seven were missing, the series would be incomplete. Just like us, we would not be the same person we are now, if someone in our lives were not there to complete us.

The hardest part to taking the photographs for the final piece was probably the hardest part of the project. Most of my peers are tied up with school work and projects and were unable to spare me time. I attempted the project using only two people, alternating between frames, but the finished piece did not look polished enough.

Left with barely a week to go, I tried rallying a group of close friends who fortunately obliged after much pestering. Prior to the meet-up, I planned where everyone should stand and the item they would be holding. Luck was not smiling down on me when the time for the shoot approached as it started raining. =(

I had to improvise and found a fairly clean wall in a fairly secluded place in school.  Owing to it being indoors, there was not much room to allow everyone to spread out at once, so I had to make do and made my friends stand in positiion two at a time. After a few takes, I got the images I wanted and here they are:

HUMAN

Book:Knowledge

Flower:Love

Kite:Freedom

Umbrella:Protection

Clothes:Care

NATURE

The image below is the entire series, when seen as a whole. =)

Give:Take

Out of the five assignments, this one is arguably the most interesting for me, because it went beyond basic camera and photography proficiency, but required abit of thinking to create the final image. I had to find one object and use it to portray different emotions. As such, I needed an object that is dynamic, with different sides to it that I could tinker around with, like different colour, shapes, and uses. I particularly like the idea of using a Rubik’s cube for this exercise, but I remembered that a Rubik’s cube was already a subject of a classmates’ previous assignment, so I put that idea aside.

I thought of using water to show emotions because of its fluidity and I thought that I could play around with shutter speeds to either freeze water, or to use motion blur to my advantage, but eventually I put that idea aside as well, since I’ve already used water in previous assignments for form, and fast shutter speed.

Eventually I settled on using eggs. Eggs would have been interesting because it has a shell that can be manipulated, and can be photographed raw, fried, boiled, scrambled, mix-ed and combined with other food! I have a winner! Shooting the egg, I used a white sheet and an off camera flash to try and manipulate light a little to get some effects that I thought could be used to my advantage.

FREEDOM

50mm, 1/60th, f/2.8, ISO400, mounted flash bounced off ceilng

This was the first emotion I thought of for this assignment. The shell on eggs seemed to represent a shell for the chick inside. Breaking the shell would give freedom to the chick that was held captive. My initial images with just a broken egg shell did not have enough ‘feel’ to the entire theme, so I added a row of intact eggs in the back ground. The eggs were lined in a row to show conformity and orderliness, so that the effect that the broken egg shell gives would be exaggerated.

VULNERABILITY

50mm, 1/60th, f/5.6, ISO500, flashed fired from left of subject

Apart from confinement, a shell also represents protection. For this emotion, I wanted to show how a shell can be portrayed as giving protection to its contents. I did a little brain storm, and managed to churn out the above.  I boiled the egg, and carefully stripped off half the shell to expose the top part, and retain the bottom half with shell intact. I like the contrast of the shell against the white of the egg, and also the shadow that the light cast. The texture and detail that I got off the egg shell is a bonus! =)

LONELINESS

50mm, 1/60th, f/5.6, ISO500, mounted flash boucned off ceiling

In this last photograph, I wanted to depict a sense of loneliness. I predict that this would be an emotion that would be used by others in this course because its really easy to show loneliness: just capture the subject isolated. I challenged myself to portray loneliness by having several of the same subject in the frame. To achieve this, I surrounded a de-shelled boiled egg, surrounded by many raw eggs. I managed to make the raw egg stand on one end, to seperate it from the raw eggs that were lying down sideways. Somehow, this gives the sense of hope, that the egg is still trying to be strong, despite the loneliness it faced by being different. Or maybe i’m just reading too much into the photo. =)

The Ignorance of Man

This assignment to me, was the hardest of all. I think capturing images is easy. Getting images right, with balanced right and proper composition is abit trickier. To capture a photo and process it to look just like it looks like in real life, is extremely hard. BUT TO TAKE FOUR PHOTOGRAPHS AND COMBINE THEM TO FORM A COMPOSITE IMAGE TO THE THEME OF SURREALISM IS A BIG STRETCH. okay maybe im exaggerating.

This was a tough exercise, but it was quite interesting working on it, especially finding an idea and a theme to work on. The title we had to work on was ‘false reality’, so I wanted to portray a real life scenario, but give a highly exaggerated twist to it, to add the ‘out-of-this-world’ effect.

I decided on showing how people lose their senses under the influence of technology. This is shown in how the main subject has his eyes closed, and has no mouth. Things that he listens to goes in one way, and exits the other. This is represented in the person whose body passes through the main subject’s ears. He is given a flower for a face as I feel that he should be anonymous, and also because I was influenced by Rene Magritte’s ‘The Son of Man’.

I faced a tricky obstacle in choosing something to represent technology. I thought of using iPod earphones to show modern technology (a white wire sticking out from a person’s ears represent so much), yet it seemed too cliched. I settled with a jumbo jet (a sign that Man has conquered the skies) circling over the subject’s head instead. I added the heavy vignette to draw viewers to the main subject, and away from the empty spaces in the photograph, and also to add a darker mood to the overall image.

I gave the piece the first title that came to my mind, and I kinda like it. What I don’t like, is the glaring armpit hair in the image. =l

Below are the seperate photographs for this exercise.

Getting this assignment, it seemed pretty straightforward to just shoot four photographs: One wide open at the max aperture, one slightly stopped down to get more depth of field, one at a crazy fast shutter speed, and one slightly dragged out to see some motion. The problem with straightforward assignments, is that everyone might shoot the same objects, so I set out with this assignment to get photographs that will (hopefully) make people look twice. Here are my photos:

DEEP DOF:

22mm, 1/640th, f/9, ISO200

I took this photograph at the rooftop of a HDB block. The block was undergoing its Lift-Upgrading Programme at the time, and the stairway to the rooftop was not locked and I had an EXCELLENT view of the surrounding view of Chinatown and Outram Park. I love how the rooftops of the shophouses in the foreground give a nice contrast against the dull gray of the skyscrapers in the background. The leading line that the road gives, adds a nice touch to the picture. I’m also thankful for the nice blue sky on the day itself.

SHALLOW DOF:

68mm, 1/1600th, f/2,8, ISO1600

Honestly, this is my most favourite photograph I’ve ever shot before. I love street photography and candids, and nothing gives a photograph more soul and life than one snapped of a subject in its essence. I managed to shoot this photograph at a HDB market, and I guess both subjects were waiting for people to finish their marketing before going home. They were sitting by staircase and thankfully I had on my telephoto lens on. I quickly framed my shot, and fired off a few frames. It was tricky getting the two subjects isolated as it was a pretty crowded place so I was lucky for this photo. In another photograph, I managed to fire a snap just as the girl on the right turned around, and I got her hair flying about (I’ve added this photograph below). I can shamelessly describe that as a Henri-Cartier Bresson quality of  “The Decisive Moment”. =D

FAST SHUTTER SPEED:

50mm, 1600th, f/4, ISO2500

Before shooting this photograph, I told myself that I had to get something different. I also wanted something interesting to look at, that was made up of more than just an object frozen by shutter speed. I got the help of my brother (who is bumming around at home, waiting to enlist in the army for national service),  a few balloons with water, a needle and the rest was history. I got my brother to stand against a brown wall of my void deck on a hot day (with lots of sunlight), and got him to pop the balloons over his head.

My initial problems were trying to time the popping so that the water was spread out enough, yet did not drench him. I was also trying to catch a little bit of the balloon flying away, but it was far too tricky. I have a little bit of the green balloon on his right hand though. I love how the white of the water contrasts with his black tshirt, and the PRICELESS expression on his face before the water hits him! =)

SLOW SHUTTER SPEED:

32mm, 1/2sec, f/9, ISO800

This was another photograph where I had to give a bit of thought into, so that I could produce something that is not commonly shot by people. I predict alot of panning photographs and streaks of traffic on a night street for this exercise and had to avoid the technique to get my photograph. Admittedly, it is an easy way to get an interesting photograph that shows motion. I browsed through my friend’ set here to get a little bit of inspiration. He is a photographer by profession, but loves taking photos with motion blur. He told me once that it is easy to take a nice sharp photograph but to take a nice one with motion blur inside  is extremely tricky. And I have to agree.

I made my way down to the Night Safari where they have a nightly tribal dance performance. The performance is held outside the gates so no tickets were necessary to catch the show. I got myself good seats and experimented with the shutter speeds to get the right mix of motion blur and detail. If the shutter speed was too slow, the light trails would have been too short, and there would have been unneccessary blur on the background. If the shutter speed was too long, I risked the trails being too white, and I would have lost the details in them.

Below are some rejected photos from this assignment:

Getting this assignment, I initially thought it would be rather simple. ‘Lines’, ‘shape’ and ‘patterns’ all seem rather easy till I actually have to shoot the subject. It then dawned on me that some elements might easily cross-boundaries. For example, patterns that are made up of lines could be interpreted as lines instead of the intended patterns.

Another difficulty I had was in interpreting ‘form’. ‘Form’ seemed alot like ‘shapes’ to me, but a little discussion with my classmates and research online, showed that form was a three dimensional version of shapes. I took alot of time to think about my photographs, to make sure they were not something that has been seen before.

These are my chosen photographs:

LINE:

50mm, 1/100th, f/4, ISO1600

I found this dried leaf where I work part-time at the Singapore Night Safari. The cleaners were raking up the leaves before opening hours, and I was drawn into the patterns on the back of the dried leaves. I brought one home and looked closer, and they were made up of small little lines, and I had that ‘A-HA’ moment! I took this photograph by an open window, using my 18-50mm f/2.8 lens that has macro reproductions of up to 1:3, and the above photo is what I got. =)

SHAPE:

23mm, 1/125th/ f/5.6, ISO500

The above photograph was taken during a street photography walkabout session I had with two of my photography kakis, David Toh and Jamie Ng. I saw the two doors along a corridor, and I liked the symmetry that the doors had, as well as the nice and bright background wall colour that contrasted the dark brown of the doors. I also like how the doors are such bold rectangles that pop out and draw your eyes towards them.

FORM:

150mm, 1/60th, f/8, ISO1250, bounce flash triggered 45degrees left.

This was arguably the hardest of the five elements to portray. From the examples shown in lecture, I could identify an object with form, but could not come up with something of my own, as it all seemed very abstract. I was surfing the internet one day, when I came across photos of water droplets on flickr, my favourite photo-sharing site. On the forum of one of the groups there, a member recommended looking at Martin Waugh’s website, and so I did, and the photographs there were BRILLIANT. More importantly, they were full of form!

I decided that I could try taking some of them. I set-up my 18-50mm lens again on a tripod pointing at a bowl of water. I tied another bag full of water to another tripod, and suspended the bag over the bowl. I pricked a hole and tried to time the shutter to catch the droplets falling. The first few photos were too dark, so I balanced my SB-900 on a stool (I ran out of tripods!) and set to to trigger remotely off camera. After another round of droplets, I discovered to my horror, that water was splashing on my lens! I wiped it clean and dry and switched to a longer lens (50-150mm f/2.8) that allowed me to zoom in closer, even from far. After a few rounds, I managed to get what I wanted! =). Other water droplet photos I have taken can be found here.

For a view of how my rather messy set-up looks like, here it is, taken with my cameraphone.

Set-up for water droplet photography

PATTERN:

50mm, 1/1000th, f/2, ISO1600

This photo was seen by chance, when I was at the annual Ramadan bazaar held at Geylang Serai during the Malay fasting month. It was a last minute trip that my family thought of after dinner and so we rushed down. I anticipated a lack of light and brought along only my 50mm f/1.8 lens and snapped about. It feels different working with a prime lens. Using a zoom, I let my eyes wonder everywhere looking for angles, but with a prime lens, my eyes seemed set to a fixed distance away from me. It was initially quite tricky but I eventually got the hang of it.

There were alot of neatly arranged products that looked like patterns, but I particularly like this arrangement of cushions because of the colours and orderliness. I don’t think the photograph was exceptionally awesome, but I do like it quite alot. Other photos I took that night can be found here.

TEXTURE:

38mm, 1/60th, f/7.1, ISO320, flash triggered 1/64th power from 90 degrees left

This photograph was the last that I shot because I thought texture was everywhere. I initially thought of photographing a tree bark, but I thought it was too obvious a choice. The problem with this piece, was that since texture was everywhere, I had trouble picking something to shoot. I settled on buying some kiwis from the supermarket and tried setting them up. I experimented with putting a bunch of them together, shooting a pair together, and finally thought that cutting the fruit open would add a little colour to the image.

I had fun taking photos for this assignment, and here are some outtakes:

It is quite amazing to learn how much photography has evolved from its past in the 1800s to the present. Its evolution has transformed both in terms of its technological aspects as well as its sociological acceptance in it being an art form, a profession and a hobby.

There are many key milestones in the journey that photography took to arrive where it is now and each turning point is as important as the one preceding it. In my opinion, it is the efforts of those who took photography to the masses who play a key role into transforming photography into what it is now. Only when it was welcomed into the masses did the entire art of photography become more widespread.

Initially, it was merely seen as a ‘bastard child’ to artists, especially the early painters who worked on their skill and ability to paint a highly realistic image of a subject. When photography was born, it is understandable that artists did not think highly of it, given the ease of capturing images that photography offered.

However it was with George Eastman’s Kodak camera in 1988 that introduced photography to the public. Eastman had found the process of photography cumbersome especially with the technology during his era, which required coating a glass plate with liquid emulsion and then using it quickly before it dried. He developed a dry photographic plate using gelatine emulsions on the glass plates. He managed to improve on it and replace the glass plates with emulsion coated on paper rolls. In 1888, Eastman patented a camera that used roll films and coined the phrase, “You press the button, we do the rest.” And the rest was history.

Technology itself plays a crucial role in society’s acceptance of the art. People used to ponder at what should be done with photography, and its uses. Should it be an art form? If so, how do we go about using it? With advances in the technology involved, photographers could step forward from merely recording a scene, to giving more thought into composition and lighting, as seen in Gustave Le Gray’s “The Great Wave”, 1865. In that photo, Le Gray aligned the horizon neatly with a hint of land on the left of the image. He also manipulated two images, one exposed for the sky and another for the sea to result in an evenly exposed photograph. This is not unlike the workflow used by modern photographers albeit in a digital setting.

To me, photographs involve more than just composition and lighting. I feel that emotions and mood give photographs an added dimension. To get this, a photograph should capture the exact moment of a smile, laugh or hug that shows the emotions clearly through the image. Undeniably, technological advances has aided greatly in capturing these moments.

An example of how technological advances have aided photography can be seen in wedding photography is one genre filled with beautiful and happy moments. While the occasion is a happy one, the photographer’s job is filled with pressure to deliver photos to the couple. Technology has helped greatly in easing the pressure to perform. The most overlooked technological aid that I feel has helped, is the much unappreciated ‘image review’ function. With this, we can check to ensure the photograph has been properly framed, exposed and captured, much unlike the film era where the photographer only knows the outcome of each photograph after the film has been processed, and if there were any adjustments to be made, it would have been far too late. Other improvements like cameras with high ISO tolerance and lenses with large apertures (eg. f/1.2 or f/1.4) has helped a photographer work in low light settings without the need for an external flash, which often ruins the mood of the occasion, especially in solemn moments like during a church ceremony. Powerful telephoto lenses also help in capturing intimate moments without interfering.

While the technology has offered many contributions to photography, I feel that it has also robbed an intangible essence that film photography has. In film photography, there is an element of suspense included when taking photographs and the excitement in the anticipation of collecting processed photographs from the lab. Photographers also considered lighting, shutter speeds, aperture size and focal length, before pressing the shutter release button, to a much higher level than photographers today. Now, all that needs to be done is shoot and review. If results are not satisfactory, then photographers simply re-shoot. Although this is a more efficient and easier way to go about doing things, it is the lack of effort placed into taking a photograph that has truly butchered the art. Photography may be a bastard child to artists, but digital technology could very well be the bastard child of photography purists.

In class today, we explored a genre of photography that I have always associated with paintings: Surrealism. I personally am not a big fan of highly manipulated photographs, especially if elements were added into or taken from the photograph. I have always felt that the beauty of a photograph lay in the fact that the image captures the scene accurately, and tries to emulate the feelings and emotions that the shutter button was pressed.

Initially it was a little difficult for me to comprehend the meanings behind surrealist pieces. I guess the whole juxtaposition of subjects that have otherwise no link with each other is a little complicated for my mind to process.

Persistence of Memory, by Salvador Dali

We were shown arguably the most famous piece in Surrealism: “The Persistence of Memory”, by Salvador Dali. The painting depicted several melting clocks on a barren landscape with water and a rocky landform in the background. In the foreground, there was a clock draped over a white object that I never managed to identify. It was only during class that I found out, that it was an EYE.

I never managed to understand the meaning behind the painting, but as I learnt in class, the beauty of Surrealism lies in the fact that it’s open to anyone’s interpretation. To me the most obvious subject in the painting, are the melting clocks, probably symbolising fluidity of time. Another interpretation that I had of the piece is how time wraps itself around us, dominating us, and turning us into slaves of time, always rushing for time without appreciating beauty in life, eventually turning us into a barren landscape.

We broke into groups of four, and tried coming up with our own surrealist piece, and we managed to sketch out a decent surrealistic piece. Our main intention was to make a commentary on the state of tertiary education in Singapore. Our picture depicts a hand rising above a pool of books and papers, reaching out for a letter “A”, dangled from above by a man in a suit. The whole setting is in a desert area with the sun bearing down on everything.

The hand represents students, reaching for the ever unattainable “A-Grade” that is dangled in front of them. In real life, society makes education a very important thing in life, to the point where students drown themselves in work to try to get the grade to please their parents, to the point where they end up drowning in work.

Surrealist Piece for Class

The piece was done in a rush during class, but I guess it was good exercise to practice priming our minds to see surrealist pieces. Im still not a fan of it,  but I have to admit it was a refreshing change from the normal photography. =)

Overall Winner:

‘Fun Bathing’ by Tan Choon Wee (Singapore)
URL: http://poty2009.dcmag.co.uk/winners/Overall.aspx

In my opinion, the Photo of the Year 2008, fully deserved its title. The most eye-grabbing part of the photo, is the contrast of the white flowing water on the black background, the brown of the children’s skin over it. The coloured pails add a nice touch of colour to the whole picture especially the red and blue ones, which really stand out.

The lines in the photo are also quite pleasing to see. The most obvious one is the horizontal line at the bottom third of the photo which adds contrast to the vertical lines of the flowing water. However, the part of the photo that seals the deal for me, is the curved lines of the water that the children are playing with, AND the curved lines of their bodies. These two elements work together to add an extra punch to the photograph.

The motion and emotion in this photo are excellent. The fast shutter-speed that the photographer used managed to freeze the water in mid-air to great effect. This helps the viewer feel the excitement and happiness of the children, playing in a waterfall on a nice and sunny day.

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Personal Pick:

‘Goal’ by Shui Kee Yim (Hong Kong)

http://poty2009.dcmag.co.uk/3913562629175280915/goal.html

If I were judge of the competition, the above photo would definitely win top prize. When I first saw the photo, I loved it immediately! The expressions on the children’s faces are priceless, and I love how the photograph captured the moment of innocent children having a friendly kickabout on a grassy field. The fact that they aren’t ordinary children, but probably monks in training in a rural village seemed to convey the message that all around the world, children are the same: innocent and fun-loving. Even amidst their strict lifestyles, as seen by their shaven heads, bare feet and simple, see-through red cloth covering their skinny bodies, they are able to find some fun.

The rooftops and trees in the background along with the sloping grass in the foreground, shows the viewers that the photograph was taken in a rural setting, hinting at the effort the photographer must have taken to arrive at the location to get the photo. This element enhances the photograph and makes one wonder at how amazing it is that soccer is available at such a remote area.

Lastly, the soccer ball in mid-air with the running and kicking poses of the children adds energy to it, making it more dynamic than a regular static image.

]]> http://farhan3223.wordpress.com/2009/08/20/judge-for-a-day/feed/ 0 muhamadfarhan Overall Winner Goal http://farhan3223.wordpress.com/2009/08/18/yayy-for-new-blog/ http://farhan3223.wordpress.com/2009/08/18/yayy-for-new-blog/#comments Tue, 18 Aug 2009 08:15:14 +0000 frhn http://farhan3223.wordpress.com/?p=3 ]]> I’ve finally got this blog up and running. Pretty happy about it since im quite a blogging goondu. I hope i’ll get this blog ready and updated weekly, not like my old 2208 blog that I left till the LAST minute.

I’m trying to get my first assignment sorted out, but I dont have the links to the photo competition. I guess i’ll start off with this first post hanging then. =)