A countryside is a rural area full of scenery. When saying the word 'Countryside' images of flowers, grass, sun and trees automatically enter my head. Recently I have found myself travelling on buses a lot and always pass through a village named Altham, every time I pass through this village I can see rows and rows of fields, pretty flowers, grass and trees. So my initial idea was to go to this village and photograph all the scenery. Before looking at any photographers I have decided that I am going to focus taking photographs of flowers and trees as they are what makes the countryside look beautiful and I think sets the scene. I am going to look at several different photographers work for more ideas and for some inspiration before I decide to start taking photographs.
Places where I could photograph trees and flowers could be -
-Altham
-Burnley/Townley
-Blackburn/Corporation park/Witton park
-Blackpool/Lytham/St Annes
-Skipton
-Hebden Bridge
-Clitheroe
I think photographing flowers and trees will show the natural beauty of the countryside. I want my photographs to be filled with bright colours and full of detailing.
Imogen Cunningham
Imogen Cunningham started taking photographs in 1901. In the early 1920's Cunningham began taking portraits of artistic nudes of her friends and family and doing studies of the plant forms found in her garden. Her floral images are refreshing and became her most acclaimed photographs. I have chosen to look at Imogen's most renowned photograph 'Magnolia blossom'.
Magnolia Blossom is produced in a sharp clear focus that emphasises Cunningham's dedication to using wide apertures. This photograph is so detailed and shows the true beauty of the magnolia bud in a sharp focus. The photograph displays an element of pristine elegance and can be described as a feminine beauty. Cunningham and other photographers founded a group named F/64 which proposed that photography should reach a fine art status through purely photographic methods. I feel her work is a fine piece of art. I love how the whole of the newly opened flower fills the frame with a perfect composition. I also love the low contrast of black and whites in her work, in my work I would like my flowers portraits to fill the frame but to be bursting with colour.
I chose to look at the above image from Imogen Cunningham because of the strong tones of black and white used unlike 'Magnolia Blossom'. Again Cunningham has filled the frame with these natural florals and the outcome is stunning. For my floral portraits I am also going to think about filling the whole frame, perhaps by using a macro lens to capture all the beautiful detail of the flowers. Imogen Cunningham has an amazing body of work filled with bold and contemporary forms.
Ron Van Dongen
I decided to put Ron Van Dongen's onto my blog because of the vibrant sensuality in his floral images. He grows all his photographic subjects in his own garden and then captures the subjects natural beauty with a large format view camera. Van Dongen originally started shooting in black and white but his career really took off when he produced colour photographs. His colour works are so stunning and he is quite prolific in this area. Working in black and white has a quality of seriousness to it and is more respected and official so his colour photographs are a breath of fresh air.
I love the photograph pictured above because of the beautiful mix of colours and because of the strong shallow depth of field. This image to me looks like a sea of colour and the flowers in the foreground are stunning. I want this vivid mix of colours to be produced in my own work. His work is truly inspirational , he grows his own flowers in his own garden and then shoots them inside his house in his studio. His portraits of these flowers remind me of a painting. I feel Van Dongen's and Imogen Cunningham's portraits of flowers are both fine works of art and are very inspirational.
The backgrounds used are painted my Ron himself and paints them so the colours are similar and work well with the colours of the flowers. I think the plain background works amazingly well because there are then no distractions from the detailing and beautiful colours of the subject. If I decide to photograph flowers that are in the countryside I may have no control over the background as I assume they will be busy because of all the other elements to the countryside. I will have to think carefully about depth of field and about what angles to use so there are no distractions from my main subject.
Robert Mapplethorpe
I have decided to look at Robert Mapplethorpe's skilled flower portraits as they are very well known. They are very well known because his works have beautiful colours, contrasts, composition and lighting. Mapplethorpe especially likes to photograph Orchids and calla lilies.
I chose to feature the photograph above in my blog because of the beautiful contrast in colours. The reds of the flower are so vivid and contrast wonderfully with the darkness of the background. So much detail is captured in Mapplethorpe's photographs and I want this amount of detail in my own flower portraits. Capturing this amount of detail may be hard as I only have what lighting is available outdoors and the background to my photographs may not nescessarily be plain because of all the other elements of the countryside. Also Mapplethorpe, Cunningham and Van Dongen have photographed some of their subjects in a studio so it will be hard for me to create images that have the same amount of colour and detail.
Alfred Eisenstaedt
Alfred Eisenstaedt was established as one of the most important German-American photographer's and photojournalist. There is a particular image that I have been drawn too by Eisenstaedt which is why I felt the need to include him in my work because of the image below.
Trees in snow, St Moritz 1947. In the background are the mountains bordering upper Engadine valley. I have not been able to find out very much information on this image but I chose to put it in my work because I think it is incredible. I love the shadows created and the high contrast between the shadows and the snow. This is something I could think about doing when taking photographs for my own countryside pictures. I will have to work with what lighting is available at my chosen location, so I am going to take photographs on a day that is quite sunny to perhaps I can create my own stunning photographs with high contrasted shadows just like in the work of Eisenstaedt.
I am now confident in my idea of photographing the trees and flowers of the countryside, I am hoping to capture a range of flowers to I will have plenty of images to work with and choose from when deciding on what to use for my final photographs. I am going to consider all elements of the outdoors and be desicive about angles and compositions as I want my subjects to be clear and sharp and not have the backgrounds too busy, as a countryside is relaxing and simple so I would like my images to reflect on this.Contact Sheets
Below I am going to present my contact sheets from my day photographing flowers and trees in the countryside. I have reviewed and annotated each image and decided which photographs fulfil my aims and the brief best.
Editing
Earlier in my blog when researching into several photographers work I wrote that I wanted my photographs to have bright beautiful colours and to be very detailed. I have done some screen shots during the editing process to display how I achieved this.
I used the sharpening tool and carefully selected the parts of the image that I wanted to be sharpened, this was mostly on the main subject of the photograph because I wanted the flowers to stand out and have as much detailing showing as possible. This was such a helpful tool as it allowed me to bring out the detailing of my main subject.
I adjusted the brightness and contrast sliders just slightly too illuminate my subject. Thankfully I photographed in wonderful sunny weather so my photographs had the exact lighting I wanted. I just wanted to use this tool to enhance the natural lighting and contrast in colours.
The above screen shot illustrates the use of the Saturation slider. Again I only adjusted the slider slightly as I didn't want a tacky, over powering use of colour in my photographs but for slightly enhancing the natural colours in my images this tool was perfect.
I didn't feel a lot of editing was needed for my countryside images because the lighting when I took them was wonderful and I feel my images were bright and colourful like I wanted them to be. I do not feel the need to re take these images as I feel I got quite a few successful photographs which fulfil my aims for this section of the brief. I feel the work of Ron Van Dongen was my biggest influence when taking these photographs and have added an element of his wonderful mix of colours in my own images.
Underneath I am going to show what I think are my best shots from this shoot and then I will be choosing which to print to represent this entire section of my blog.
Best shots
