Portfolio week 2.

Genre

Creative Genre: So Ive had a bit of trouble trying to figure out what genre my portfolio images are going to be because at first I said fashion photography and that was what I was looking up on pinterest but when we had a group discussion and got asked whose my designer going to be I didn't know because I wasn't really thinking about the fashion side of things I was more leaning towards intense makeup, hair and over exaggerated poses. I then searched glamour shoots up on pinterest which was more nudity and beauty but they had the poses I was looking for. I then went on Wikipaedia and searched 'Fashion photography' and came up with these two definitions  

"Fashion photography is a genre of photography devoted to displaying clothing and                                                                                            other fashion items."

"Over time, fashion photography has developed its own aesthetic in which the clothes and fashions are enhanced by the presence of exotic locations or accessories."

after reading those two definitions i came to the conclusion that my portfolio was going to be fashion and beauty genre. When i was on pinterest and searched up fashion photography the images that came up were very beautiful, but fashion was not the main focus in the image, it was the way the models were posing and making use of what they had around them that made the image.

I want to show the difference between photography in the studio and photography on the street, also natural and studio lighting. My two main photoshoots are going to be of Tessa in the studio and Samantha on the streets of auckland.. Doing Ballet, something different and more natural for her.

These two images below are good examples of how the fashion is not the main focus.

Kingsize studio's research.

Kingsize

Kingsize studios offers high quality photography gear , professionals to help you with shoots and also four different studios for you to hire. Kingsize studios also offers education programmes for beginners right through to expert levels.

The four studios are really nice and are a great ideal for any photographer wether they are professional or beginners, I myself think the garden studio is really beautiful and wouldn't mind hiring it one day. Just from looking at the Kingsize Studio website you can tell straight away you would be working with professionals who are eager to help you and teach you what they know and give you the guidance needed to produce amazing images.
After going to kingsize it is safe to say they are all extremely helpful, as soon as I walked into their office I felt welcomed and every question that i had was answered. The guy who spoke to us was very passionate about education and really wanted to make sure we were on the right track with our portfolios and even suggested photographers that could give us inspiration.
He gave me http://www.danwintersphoto.com/#/index Dan winters is a well known photographer based in america. He takes very formal portraits of famous people.

We were unable to go and look at the studios so i had to look on their site for information about their studios.
Studio one: "Studio One offers a full production facility including a second space (5.3m x 4.8m) which can be used for production, extra styling space or as a second studio. Included is your own kitchen with espresso machine; generous self contained makeup and styling room; comfortable client area and bathroom."

Studio 1.

Studio three: "This, our largest upstairs studio is perfect for small-medium size fashion / people / food / still-life work. There is a 3m stud / ceiling height. The studio is 5x8m. The floor, and walls are painted white, and down one side are blackout curtains. This studio has a separate bathroom with shower / separate kitchen with stove, (ideal for food photography) / separate makeup-styling room / separate entrance… and it’s own espresso machine. (Including air conditioning)"

Garden studio.

Studio 3.

Studio 4.

Studio four: "The Daylight Studio at Kingsize is a stunning natural light studio space, featuring a large skylight (with black out option). Perfect for fashion, portraiture, look-books, still-life, castings, boutique events, film location, and so much more. There are three main shooting walls, with full length people shooting capability."


Garden Studio: "The Garden Studio at Kingsize is a fantastic space for Summertime shoots. We have designed this space to perfectly use the natural light in this spot. The morning is predominately shaded, while the afternoon is increasingly back lit. Soft light bounces off the main wall, creating beautiful light."

Chris Sisarich Experimentation.

When we went to Kingsize Studios Luke suggested some photography agencies, I really liked the look of Match photographers. I found Chris Sisarich on the Match photographers website I fell inlove with his 'Lifestyle' images so I have chosen to experiment with this series. Theres something beautiful and natural about his images. I like how he has used a warm filter to give the idea that its summer, the warmth in the photographs give me a sense of happiness and i really peaceful feeling. When I experiment with these photos I'm going to make sure its not too staged and the people are relaxed and actually enjoying each others company.

For my experiment I went around the student village and pretty much just told people to carry on talking or doing what they are doing and i was going to photograph them. I wanted to make the photos as natural as i could so that is why i photographed everyone in their natural and comfortable environment. At first they would be awkward and unsure what to do next but most managed to carry on and build up some really hilarious conversations. There's only one staged photograph out of all the images and that is the one of Celeste sitting on the couch, luckily she is a performing arts student so pulled it off really well. For my photographs i warmed them up on Camera Raw because I wanted to try to create the warmth that Chris does in his portraits. I then noticed that in Chris's photos theres a lot of lens flares so I went onto photoshop and tried the lens Flares on that but I didn't like them to much because they didn't look natural enough for the scene of the photographs. I then remembered an online editing site that had different flares, the site was called 'Fotor' so I used this to create some strange flares, i'm still unsure if I like the look of the flares or not but I think that is because I've never used them in my photographs before so its something new for me.

Peninajoy research.

Penina Momoeisea

From reading Penina's blog I can tell Straight away she has a laid back personality and has a a lot of creative friends who have helped her get to where she is today. She states in her blog that she started out by posting on tumblr photos of Tattoos and the stories behind them until her favourite blogger told her to make a blog because she was 'messing up his tumblr feed', and so she did. Penina is a travel agent as well as a photographer which works really well together because not only is she traveling around the world she is also capturing beautiful images of it. Penina photographs a lot of gigs, tattoo's and street art, reading her comments under the photos she always some how knows the person she is photographing, one of the people she photographed was her hairdresser. Penina seems like a real people person and sees life through her lense, obviously photography is a big passion of hers.
Penina told us when she came to tell us about herself and her passion for photography that she always loved taking photos even when she was little she had little film camera and she would take photos of everything and everyone. 10 years ago she brought a canon film camera luckily her sister had done photography in 6 form knew how to develop film in the dark room and was able to help her, Penina told us that she wanted a film camera because then she didn't have the option of deleting the photos so she had to make sure she got everything perfect before taking the photo seeing as though its  not an easy process developing film. Because Penina comes from the islands she said she never had things like 'photography' in school so she never learnt about it, she just had to teach herself... which is not a bad things because i feel you learn so much from practice! 
The church that Penina went to had a creative arts ministry, she did start off as a dancer but she was far too 'lanky' for that so she switched over to creative arts where instead of drawing she used her camera, the first project she was given was called 'Me Myself and I' which was about you and how you saw yourself, Penina showed us her two photo boards which was like a collage of her family, friends and south Aukland (Graffitied walls and road signs) she had random black and white photos throughout the board which represented her being a half cast because her mum is Pakeha and her dad is Islander.

Penina told us about her love for hiphop and how she has many friends who are in bands so she goes and photographs them when they have a gig. Through getting out there and building relationships with people in the industry she has been given the opportunity to photograph many different events and people. Penina is often asked to do promo shots for fresh Tv and Coconet.

Penina is apart of a photography group called 'The society' where they meet up in different places around auckland and photograph that area, she said its interesting because everyone has such different styles so even if they do photograph the same thing they always end up having a such a different shot. Raymond Sagapolutele is the leader of the group.

http://www.karenishiguro.com - Link to one of Penina's favourite photographers. I really love Karens work, relates a lot to what i am doing for my portfolio.

Hawai'i

Auckland.

Image Responses

I really liked Penina's concept of photographing Tattoos and telling the story behind them, so i took that idea and twisted into my own style, Penina's photos of the tattoos are more Candid photographs but because i love to photograph people i decided i would make my photographs more like portraits, i wanted to know the people i photographed so they would feel relaxed around me and i could capture that, i photographed three people from my village, here is their stories.

Josephine whom i know as Josie is originally from Samoa, she studied baking at MIT and now works full time at a local Cafe. When i asked her what the tattoo means she giggled and said "It's just my name in Chinese". I couldn't really tell how she felt about it but i know that i thought it was beautiful and i really liked where it was placed. She did tell me that it was her friend who did the tattoo, unsure if the friend was professional or not but they sure did a good job.

Ada recently moved into the village but as soon as I met her we instantly clicked, Ada is a mum of one but soon to be two, i asked her a little bit about her tattoo and heres her reply 

"It was my brothers 

friend who did my tat in 2013, I only got it because he was my first born and that I really wanted his 

name to be with me always (as much as I don't like his name) but now my son is always with me no

matter where I go. I was 20 when I had Irwin ! I regret getting it there but every time I look at my 

sons name I feel safe, loved and happy"

  

Digital Tech week 1 Gallery visits.

Lay of the lands

My favourite images from the Gallery 'Lay of the Lands' would have to be Soloman Mortimer's photo series 'Dominion road Stories'.

He has captured the people's characters in his portraits perfectly, its reality! No photo retouching just the truth which I love. I mud admit i found the presentation of his work a little tacky because it wasn't flat and it was just nailed into the wall. I feel like it should have been framed. Luckily the images are so strong that it takes your mind off the presentation.

In this series he has centred the subject and used narrow depth of field, all images are in B&W. I like how he has a black boarder around the image its a nice touch... even though i would have preferred framed. The purpose of this photo series was to document this road and the characters the shape it and make it a community.

This photograph was my favourite photo from the series because you can truly see the warm character of this man. I really like how has used a narrow depth of field because it stops him from blending into the background.

The King of wax, 2013.

Two Rooms

My favourite work from the two rooms gallery would have to be Conor Clarke's photo series 'Scenic Potential'. Conar is known to find beauty in the unspectacular, such as these old construction sites filled with piles of dirt and sand. When I first looked at these images I thought they were big hills and mountains, I even thought it looked a little fake but then I looked at the tire tracks and realised that they were actually small mounds of sand. Because she has put them into B&W it makes it harder to figure out what the hills actually are. I feel if it was in colour I could easily pick out that it was a construction site. If it wasn't for the tire tracks I think I would have thought it was big mountains and hills. She has used a wide depth of field capturing the mounds of dirt in the background. I really like the way the work was presented. It had a thick white border and then was framed with black oak framing. The presentation was very formal compared to Mark Adams photos. Heres the two images that really confused me out of all of the photos hanging. These images made me question if she had photoshopped because of the scale and vantage point she is photographing from. Very beautiful series of images.

Landscape IV, Berlin 2015

Landscape I, Berlin (2014)

Term 2- Introduction Portfolio.

Portfolio Ideas

What is your Genre? My Genre is Creative genre and my sub genre is going to be Fashion- Glamour.

Techniques? These photographs are going to require a lot of retouching. I am going to be working in three different lighting situations, one in the studio with studio lighting the next shoot will be outside in natural light and then the third photoshoot will be at night with a speed light. 

Research? To research for these three shoots I have used pinterest to get a large variety of ideas for my three shoots and then i have looked at Annie Leibovitz work and how she uses lighting and how she gets her models to pose. I also looked up poses on pinterest because i'm going for really over exaggerated poses like the photos below!

Plan

Week 1: Pull together ideas on pinterest by making a board an pinning photos to it. Research Fashion, Glamour and beauty photographers. Come up with the genre for my photoshoot and organise model for Week 2 photoshoot.

Week 2: Email model agencies and ask for models to do test shoots for week 3. I posted on facebook and asked for models and got a large response and managed to organise one of my friends for week 3 Friday to do night photoshoot. Email Hairdressing school and ask for hairdresser. Plan first photoshoot Eg: Hairdresser, Makeup, Clothing, Food and water for model.

Week 3: Photograph Model from agency on sunday the 17th, this will be the street glamour photo shoot. Then for the next few days edit photos from the two photo shoots done over the weekend. Friday the 22nd photograph final shoot of my friend, this will be the photo shoot at night using speed lights.

Term 2 Week 1 Introduction to Digital Tech.

Questions.

1) Which Genres require more retouching and why?

The creative Genre requires more editing because it is not about reality. The creative Genres are usually about creating something perfect. For example most models arnt how they are perceived in the images in magazines, there is a lot of retouching done to make them look that flawless.

2) Can you think of any photographers that fit into the Creative Genre? What sub genre? what approach do they take to their style of photography?

I can think off two, Loretta Lux and Annie Leibovitz. Annie's Sub Genre is Celebrity portraiture and Lorretta takes portraits of children in the studio. Annie's style of photography varies, She has many B&W portraits but then again she does have portraits where the celebrities are in fantasy worlds rich colours and big gowns. Loretta Lux creates very surreal portraits, she does a lot of photoshopping to a point where she even photoshops the children's heads onto bodies and gives them strange hair styles. Her photos are all pastel blues, greens and pinks. 

Annie Leibovitz.

Loretta Lux.

3) Photographers that fit into editorial Genre? Which Sub Genre? Style of photography?

Sally Mann and Henri Cartier Bresson fit into this genre. Sally Manns Sub Genre is Nature- Landscapes and Cartier Bresson is Photojournalism and Reportage- War. Sally Manns Landscapes images are all Sepia and B&W and also have Vigenette around the edges, most of the images are fairly formal. Henri Cartier Bressons War photographs are all B&W, He has captured some horrific moments, and i can see they are raw images, untouched just as they are. 

Sally Mann.

Henri Cartier Bresson

2) Where will your photography fit on these graphs?

My photography this term is going to fit on the creative Genre because I'm going for more fashion photography in the studio and out of the studio.