Contemporary Colour.

In the world today, it is hard to describe colour without referencing it to a particular object of that colour. It is not a constant in the world, as it derives from the light spectrum. Although colour photography has been around for over a century it was really only used for commercial advertisement until around 1970’s, when William Eggleston started to increase recognition for the subject by using it with documentary photography, which was only really taken seriously using black & white photography in those days.

Initial Idea.

My initial idea for this project is to use colour to show the atmosphere of the city, in particular of the city at night. The idea would be to capture the colour of lights around the city of Brighton in the some of the more main shopping areas of the city among other areas to. Amongst this I may capture the shoppers & commuter going to & from their work & around the city, so in a way there will be some documentary themes occurring in this project too. One of the main focuses of this idea though would be to use long exposures to seek photos of light trails from public transport; this theory ties in with the whole nightlife theme to my project. 

After debating between using film or digital for this project, I’ve decided that I will use digital, mainly due to the fact I have never tries to capture nightlife & light trails with film before, you can also never predict how some light trails will come out, so it would be easier to use digital to see the outcomes directly after the photo has been taken. However, my decision is currently not finalised, so I may decide to use both film & digital at the same time, as so that if the film negatives or photos themselves do not come out right I have them backed up on digital.

One of the artists I will research is Bill Jacobson, who takes photos of that are usually out of focused & blurred. Another photographer I want to do a bit of research on is Tommy Ga-Ken Wan, a 25 years old from Glasgow, who takes stunning photos both in black & white, & colour of the public, as well as a few famous faces. The main photos of his I want to look at though are his nightlife shots around cities. One of my favourite photographers I've had a look at though has to be Phillip Klinger. He takes numerous different subjects of photography, but as my colour project will be based around city life, then my main focusing point of his work will be his bright & colourful cityscape photography. 
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Research:
American photographer Bill Jacobson is possibly most known for his out-of-focus photographs, which he started experimenting with in 1989, during then & 1993 he did a number of group exhibitions before finally getting a solo exhibition at New York University's Grey Art Gallery. He went on to the series Song on Sentient Beings, which continued the interest of his defocusing technique in his images. His first out of focus photos were mainly themed around the human body & always done using gelatin silver process. The pale figures almost look ghostly in a way.

'Song on Sentient Beings' (1995) by Bill Jacobson

It wasn't until 1999 that Jacobson started to use colour with his out-of-focus photos. He photographed both urban & rural areas, with both people in them & out of them. The out-of-focusing in his images represent the uncertainty of the mind's eye instead of the sharpness that can be created through a camera lens. The colour in his later images brings to life an aspect of day to day life in my opinion, & although out of focus, we can make out people as they go about there daily lives.

'New Years Day' (2003) by Bill Jacobson

I really like some of his work, his images are very intriguing due to the out of focusing, it makes you want to look closer, make out what is really happening. If i were to incorporate an out-of-focus technique to my photos it would be to create a bokeh effect with lighting around the city to make it look more appealing than say just photographing the actual lights themselves, as by blurring them it gives a more aesthetic quality to them. 

The next two photographers I have researched I both originally found on Flickr, the first being Tommy Ga-Ken Wan, a 25 year old photographer from Glasgow. He may not be very well known photographer, at least not in the mainstream, but his stunning photographs have made him popular on Flickr. He works internationally for the majority of his time, photographing film sets, theaters & even operas. He likes to look at reality a lot more than set up images, to quote him "In photography, I am more interested in reality than fiction; observation than direction. I'm not interested in the studio, but in the world: that's where life is."

Kev (2007) by Tommy Ga-Ken Wan

He first caught my eye with his photo Kev, which I had found when i searched up "city nightlife" on Flickr & looked at the most interesting section. The first thing that made me notice this photo was the colourful blurred lighting in the background, it has a very nice feel to it, to get this effect I would say that an aperture of around f/4 was used. The detail of the person in the foreground too is also very nice, its sharp & in good quality.

Matthew (2011) by Tommy Ga-Ken Wan

His photos always seem to have a coolness to them with the blue toning in some of his images, like this one for example. Like Kev, I would say an aperture was around f/4 again, like in several other of his photos of people he takes. I think the main reason I like his photos is because they have beautiful quality to them, they are also very simple & natural.  

 http://www.flickr.com/photos/tgkw/

 

The second photographer I found on Flickr was Phillip Klinger. Klinger is what I would probably call a traveling photographer, having been to several different countries & taken several different photographic subjects, the main ones being Landscapes, Cityscapes & Architecture. He started photography as a hobby in 2007 as a student in Germany, which still remains as a hobby.

New York, Times Square - Busy Crossing (2009) by Phillip Klinger

One of the first of his images that caught my eye was possibly this one, taken in New York's Times Square when lots of people were crossing this crossing. It was taken twice & combined into this one image, as if it had been all together the brightly lit advertisements on the skyscrapers would have probably come out over exposed. So for the background he used a shutter of 1/125seconds, then a shutter of 1second for the darker areas & to blur movement of the people in the image. I think what did attract me to the image was in fact the brightly lit buildings, they are very colourful & really bring out the atmosphere of New York.

New York - West Side Story (2009) by Phillip Klinger

I like his work because its one of my favourite styles of photography, which is city life in general. I think the bright colours really captures the city nightlife in New York, as well as it does in any other city. From looking at his photos the technique I would take from this is long exposure, which I am already fairly well at.  

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dcdead/ 

William Eggleston was the first photographer to use colour imagery in documentary photography, & from this he increased the recognition for colour photography worldwide, as up until the 1970's the most professional documentary photography was only taken seriously in black & white photographs & colour had only been used for advertisement. He takes photos of whatever he see's interesting, & usually only takes one shot of them. Other photos of his almost have a cinematic feel to them. 

Untitled (1971) by William Eggleston

One of my favourite images was this one, it feels like a scene from a movie from where the car door has been left open like that & how the two men are standing there looking in the same direction, as if there looking at someone or something out of frame, they both also echo each other in movement as they are both stood the same way. Eggleston commented on this by saying "Someone pointed out that when 2 people live in the same house together for a certain long period of time, several amount of years, they start to not consciously, but almost imitate each other, like in the way their standing."

Untitled - Supermarket Boy With Carts (1965-74) by William Eggleston

Supermarket Boy With Carts is probably one of his most significant colour photographs as it was his first successful negative in colour. He switched from black & white to colour because he wanted to see a lot of things in colour, he was interested in the process of colour too, using the dye-transfer process to create several of his colour images.

Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Competition over the years has had a variety of different styles of portrait entered into its yearly competition, some are interesting, others are frankly weird, but mostly they were all excellent photographs produced with stunning quality. For the past 2 years the competition first prize place has gone to photos of teenage girls that have red/auburn hair, which links back to paintings such as Ophelia 1852 by John Everett Millais, as Ophelia, much as many other women painted throughout history, had auburn hair.

Hunter With Buck (2010) by David Chancellor

Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2010, 1st Place Winner.

The girl in this photograph is of 14 year old American girl Josie Slaughter, who is a skilled hunter from Birmingham, Alabama. This photo is from Chancellor's series named Hunters which looks at the lives of hunters, the animals they hunt & places that are associated with hunting. Chancellor commented on this photo saying ‘The contrast between the peace and tranquility of the location, plus Josie’s ethereal beauty and the dead buck, was what I wanted to explore. Here was a vulnerability and yet also a strength.’

Harriet & Gentleman Jack (2011) by Jooney Woodard

  Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2011, 1st Place Winner.

This portrait features 13 year old Harriet Power & her pet guinea pig Gentleman Jack at the Royal Welsh Agricultural Show. Harriet was working as a steward when this photograph was taken, & it was shot in the guinea pig judging enclosure. Woodard commented on the photograph saying ‘I found her image immediately striking with her long red hair and white stewarding coat. She is holding her own guinea pig called Gentleman Jack, named after the Jack Daniel’s whisky box in which he was given to her. Using natural light from a skylight above, I took just three frames and this image was the first. There is something unsettling about the austere background and the scratch on her hand.’ 

Nancy Honey is an America photographer who has studied the subject in both the US & UK. She photographs a range of subjects, including street & documentary, as well as portraiture for both public & private clients. One of her favourite subjects however is children & teenagers, who she finds continuously refreshing & inspiring to photograph. With this subject in mind, her life long obsession has been photographing her daughter Daisy, who she has photographed through all the stages of her life from childhood to being a young mother.

Daisy - Teenager (1992) by Nancy Honey

Out of the photos of Daisy as a teenager this is probably one of my favourites. Honey has used a low key lighting for this from look of it due to the black background & dramatic shadows on Daisy's face. What I like most about this photo is the expression on Daisy's face, its a relaxed expression with what could be some annoyance to it. The lighting used really brings out the colour of her hair & skin, it also allows us to see the detail of the subject.

Citybus Series (1993) by Nancy Honey

This photo from her series Citybus, is a very striking image down to the vivid red consistency throughout the photo from this ladies coat, the red bus & the red bus stop shelters where this was taken. Citybus was my favourite series of Honey, it was a documentary photographic series about the public who travel on the bus to get into town. I liked how Honey wasn't afraid to use images that were out of focus or had camera shake in the series, it gives them a lot more real life than an ordinary documentary photo might do.

Light trails will be the main subject of my photography for this project. Light trails are created by setting a camera up for a long exposure, the best way to do this is by find a stable surface or tripod to put your camera on, as then there should be no camera shake from if you try holding it whilst on long exposure. There are many different subjects you can use long exposure for, one of the most common form is light trails produced from cars on roads & motorways, the best results usually being from those taken the sun has fully gone down & it is completely dark outside. As well as light trails produced from cars/transport, this long exposure technique can be used on various subjects with a main light source, for example funfair rides & wheels such as the London Eye.

Examples of Light Trails & Other Long Exposure:

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Contact Sheets:

Contact Sheet 1:

Contact Sheet 1.

My first contact sheet was more of a test than to find an actual final print. It was a test mainly down to the fact that I hadn't done long exposure light trails in a while, it was also a scouting mission to try & find some interesting places to take these photos within Brighton & Hove, the first place I tried was around the area of the Old Steine. I admit there were some decent places I looked at the first time around, but they were not directly what I was looking for. Out of all these photos there was only one I truly liked, which was number 10 just simply because to me it was the most interesting one.

Contact Sheet 2: 

Contact Sheet 2.

My second contact sheet was taken around the Seven Dials. Again it was a test of hunting down more places to get long exposures of light trails, & I have to say i fairly liked some of the results. I managed to get some good view parts from various angles around the Dials, but they still didn't seem like final photo material to me. I think the main thing was that you could see that I had placed my camera on the railings, there was also a lack of colour to some of these photos.

Contact Sheet 3:

Contact Sheet 3.

My third contact sheet was taken around various areas around Brighton, the first 3 photos taken around Edward Street, the second 3 taken by the clock tower & the final photo down by the Old Steine. Out of the 3 contact sheets I'd already done, this one was currently my favourite. The light trails are very clear & there's lots of colour in them from various lights from different vehicles passing at the time I shot the photos. Upon looking over these photos I did consider that I may be able to use photos 4 & 5 as two of my final prints after a bit of cropping & editing of contrast to them.

F/Stop: f/18 - Exposure: 20seconds.

F/Stop: f/18 - Exposure: 20seconds.

This was the final result of my editing of these two photos. From cropping them down I have gotten rid of the areas of the photos that didn't really fit, for example the part of the clock tower was originally in the second photos from where I had placed my camera. From increasing the contrast on these photos I was able to increase the brightness of the colour & make the photo slightly darker to get the full effect of the long exposure. At the time I did feel as I wanted these as part of my final set of photos, but the only problem was there wasn't a third photo to go with them. I did contemplate using the 7th photo on my contact sheet as it was the only other one that had people in the photos as well as light trails from buses to match the other two photos, the this final image was taken on a separate day to the others, & didn't fit as there was no rain or wet pavements to help increase the amount of light in the photo. This led to my fourth & final contact sheet.


Contact Sheet 4:

Contact Sheet 4.

My final contact sheet taken around Shoreham, the first four taken over Shoreham Bypass (A27) & the other four over Old Shoreham Road (A270). These photos were a lot different to my first 3 contact sheets as they had been taken from bridges over the roads that I was getting the lights trails from. Although none of them matched what I had currently wanted for two of my final photos, these one all matched, so I discarded the other two photos for the three photos on this contact sheet, this way I wouldn't have miss-matched photos.


The Final Decision:

F/Stop: f/4 - Exposure: 10seconds.

F/Stop: f/22 - Exposure: 15seconds.

F/Stop: f/22 - Exposure: 25seconds.

My final three images came from my final contact sheet. Out the 3 images they were all different to each other, they were also the clearest of the photo. I need to edit them though, the first thing would be to crop the second & third image down as I want the light trails to be in full frame & cut out the majority of the sky, I would then increase the contrast of them to make the reds from the light trails more intense. Although these photos look fine as the are in full colour, it didn't really feel right like that for me, I wanted to experiment with selective colouring on this photo, by making only the red light trails in colour & the rest of the photo in black & white.
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Editing & Photoshop:
For my final prints what I wanted was to have only the red from the light trails to be in colour on my photos, which meant I had to use Photoshop to create selective colouring on the photos. Before this stage however I needed to crop down & increase contrast on my photos. I have Photoshop Elements 9 on my laptop, so I went onto the Edit > Guided section to crop down my image to the size I wanted it to be.

Cropping.

I then edited my contrast under "Brightness & Contrast" in the guided section under "Lighting & Exposure" & increased the contrast up to 100, I did this because it makes the colour in the photo a lot more intense, it also darkens areas such as the sky to make them more black in night shots.

Increasing Contrast.

The next step was to create the new layer that would be the black & white areas of the photo, for this I had to go back to the Edit > Full section. So then I went to "create new layer" & filled it all black (it can be done in white too, but its just easier to do with black to view any mistakes made). Unless the layer type was already selected the photo should now be all black, so then I adjusted the layer from a normal layer to a colour layer to make the image black & white.

Creating a New Layer.

Changing Layer Type to Colour.

The Black & White Version of the Photo.

With the image now completely black & white I could start on selecting the areas that I wanted to be in colour. To start I first needed the eraser tool to erase the main areas of the photo I wanted to be in colour. I didn't need to be neat with this as I would touch it up later with the paintbrush.

Selecting Eraser.

Main Areas of Colour.

With the eraser brush on Elements 9 you cant be as accurate as you want to be, so I just coloured the main bits un-neatly so it would be easier to re-touch them up with the paintbrush tool. To be as accurate as I could whilst re-touching I zoomed the photo in to its actual size to start colouring bit back in black.

Selecting the Paintbrush Tool.

Re-Colouring Areas Black.

I continued to do this, often having to redo some areas, until I was satisfied that all the areas I needed to re-touch into black & white looked good from a distance, it took around 40-50 minutes to finish off this photo. I continued to do this to my two other final prints to make them ready for printing.

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Final Images:

After editing all of my images, these were the final results. 

F/Stop: f/4 - Exposure: 10seconds

Out of my final images I would say my personal favourite is the top one taken over Shoreham Bypass. Its my favourite because its probably the clearest image of the 3, & I prefer the surrounding landscape around the motorway on this photograph too. On this image the light trails are not as vivid as they are in the other two, but that's another thing I prefer about this image.

F/Stop: f/22 - Exposure: 25seconds

So far this has been my favourite project of the year in terms of the photographic techniques into colour photograph, & its been really nice to shoot one of my favourite subjects of photography, even if I did have to stand out on freezing cold bridges to get my final shots. If I were to ever redo this project I don't think I'd change the theme I chose to focus on, but I would experiment more with the location of where I took the light trails, seeking out other places other than around Brighton & other surrounding areas.

F/Stop: f/22 - Exposure: 15seconds