Street Photography- Inspired by Walker Evans

Over the last few weeks i have become increasingly interested in Street Photography and Photojournalism, quite a change considering i started the course wanting to be the next Mario Testino! I was aware that my interests would probably change as i progressed with the course and my photography but didnt think it would happen this quickly.

I like the work of Walker Evans and after seeing the Subway portraits from the collection Many Are Called, i was intrigued by the idea of capturing the private expressions on peoples faces.

 Here are some examples of his work.

Photograph by Walker Evans

Photograph by Walker Evans

This is a link to an article in the Guardian about Walker Evans' Subway portraits.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2002/sep/14/art

When he took these photos in the subway, "photographing without a police permit was illegal" according to Geoff Dyer in his book the ongoing moment, luckily for me- it is no longer illegal, not that it would have stopped me!

I went to London for Vision 09 and wanted to have time to photograph in the tube stations so i got the 1.30am coach to London to make sure i was there for 6am, giving me 4 hours before Vision started.

I wanted to try a similar approach to Walker Evans in that i didnt want posed photographs and wanted the expressions only possible when someone doesnt know they are being photographed; instead of hiding my camera (this would have been very difficult) i decided to hold the camera in my hands at waist height and try to appear as if i was simply holding the camera and catch people unaware.

One thing that i noticed was that my minimum aperture F4 restricted my photography in the lighting conditions of the tube stations, i had to use a shutter speed of at least 1/125th in order to avoid movement blur and with the minimum aperture set to F4 i had to use very high ISO's of above 1500 which i knew would make the photographs very grainy.

I decided that even though i would have preferred not to use such high ISO's and avoid this grainyness (noise), in a way it actually suited the images. To have a lens with the ability to go down to F2 for example, would have given me much more creative control and i could have then achieved the grainy effect later on Photoshop if necessary.

F4, 1/125 Sec, ISO 1600, handheld, edited in Lightroom.

This was taken in the tube station from the platform just before the tube departed.

This image has just been heavily cropped in Lightroom and changed to Black and White. The high ISO has meant that the image isnt very clear and has a lot of noise but i like it, it has an atmosphere and quite a dramatic feel to it.

F4, //125 Sec, ISO 1000, handheld, edited in Lightroom.

This was one that i took on the tube, the man with his hands crossed seemed quite suspicious of me and kept looking at me but also looking around like he had something to hide, i wanted to try to capture the shifty look he had, and in contrast the man next to him; totally unaware i was even there and content reading his paper.

I have cropped this in Lightroom and changed to Black and White. I also applied a Vignette and feathered this so it was very subtle.

I tried lots of different crops out with this and cropped tighter and tighter to isolate a particular part of the image, but i felt that this one worked best.

F5.6, 1/125 Sec, ISO 1600, handheld, edited in LR.

 

This was taken through the window of the next carriage on the tube. I liked the way the people were all engrossed in their papers and magazines, or even asleep. It has always fascinated me whenever i go to London, how people can sleep, read books etc when on the tube as it goes at such speed you are never on it for very long. I also like the different characters here.

I have edited this in lightroom by changing to B&W, cropping and also played around with it to get an effect i liked, i put the fill light and the blacks up to 100% and found that this increased the definition in the image and created more of a contrast and gave it a newspaper like feel to it.


These attempts gave me the confidence to take some other photographs whilst moving up the esculators without hiding the fact that i was taking the photos, this was as i was going up and people were going down the other side, i felt more confident as there was little chance of them grabbing my camera!

F5.6, 1/160 Sec, ISO 2000, Handheld, edited in LR.

This was cropped, vignette added, the fill and blacks increased and the vibrance and saturation decreased.

F5.6, 1/160 Sec, ISO 2000, handheld, edited in LR.

This was cropped, fill and blacks increased, vibrance and saturation decreased.

I have noticed this seems to be a pattern when edited this type of 'street portrait' i have used a similar process for all of the images on this post, mainly because i really like the effect.

I have also developed an interest in photographing the people on the streets, be it homeless, beggars or people selling something, i thought London would be a good place to try out these sort of photographs. I feel that these people are interesting to photograph, they seem to have very distinct characters that are quite transparent to the camera.

F5.6, 1/60 Sec, ISO 1000, handheld, edited in Lightroom.

I came across this man on London Bridge and i gave him some money then asked him if it was ok for me to photograph him, he was very polite and didnt seem mind at all. I took this photo just as the sun was starting to rise so it was quite low light so i still had to use a fairly high ISO here.

I edited this in LR by cropping it, adding an antique greyscale preset and playing around with the dark tones and also reducing the exposure slightly, i also applied a feathered Vignette to help frame the picture.

F4.5, 1/160 Sec, ISO 320, handheld, edited in LR.

This was cropped, a vignette applied and the fill light and blacks increased, vibrance decreased.

I think the editing has given it a cold dark feel, which i think is appropriate for the subject.

F5.6, 1/160 Sec, ISO 320, handheld, edited in LR.

I saw this man near the London Bridge tube station and took his photograph, a lady walking past commented to her friend about the fact that i took this, she was obviously appalled but clealry didnt understand my reasons for taking it.

This was cropped and the fill light and blacks increased. Previously (on the above photos) i have often decreased the vibrance and saturation, i wanted to try this without decreasing the vibrance, i think it makes it more 'real' in one sense rather than dramatising and creating a sad atmosphere, it is as it is.

I thought though that in contrast, i would also show the decreased vibrance version for comparison.

This definitely has a more depressing feel to it which i suppose is more apt for the photograph but i like the previous more vibrant image as it almost makes it so real that it seems like it is normal to live this way, perhaps symbolising our attitude toward homeless people and beggars and the way the majority of people just walk past because they are de-sensitised to this kind of image, these people are an expected part of the streets of London.

F4.5, 1/160 Sec, ISO 320, handheld, edited in LR.

This man was sat just a few meters from the man in the sleeping bag, although his situation isnt funny, ar first i found it quite comical that he was able to sleep this way and had his mouth wide open. After thinking about it, my feelings were the opposite, for him to be able to sleep this way, in the cold with hundreds of people bustling past was perhaps an indication of how deprived he was, how it is dangerous to sleep at night, in the dark and so to sleep with all these people around could be his only and safest option. 

This was cropped, a vignette applied and the fill light and blacks increased, vibrance decreased. I also applied a graduated filter to the bottom left to help draw the eye in.

History Of Image- Seminar- Favourite Photograph

Last week in the seminar Chris asked us to bring in a Photoraph that we like as we would be talking about it in the seminar.


Today we all presented our photographs and talked about them, i think that this was useful as with our 2 weekly group tutorials with John it helps us to analyse images and also gives us more confidence when interacting with each other. I enjoyed seeing the photos that other people liked and why, it was interesting to hear a different persepective.


For my photograph i chose Sebastiao Salgado's- Child being weighed as part of a supplementary food relief programme.


I wanted to record this so i have typed up a brief analysis and the photo is also shown below.

Depicting the child of the South American mine workers, it shows poverty and an obvious level of starvation.

The Denotation of the title would suggest the child’s life hanging in the balance, as does the connotation of the composition; by the child being suspended, rendering it helpless and destitute.

The form and composition create balance in one sense but in doing so loses the identity of the child, contrary to this are the earring and the necklace it wears, going against the use of the child as a symbol.

Something that adds to the rhetoric is the Symbolism present in this Photo, there is the dark space outside the doorway and in the space is a baby lamb, perhaps meaning new life and death. The measure on the scales appears to be like a stake through the child’s heart maybe symbolising the health of the child being linked to the scales and the extremely low weight of it. Another thing to mention is that the child’s hands are both in the prayer position and clinging to the material of the scales as though clinging to life, and the fact that it looks up as though looking to god.


All of this apparent symbolism could in fact be coincidence but there seem too many for them all to be created by chance. The fact that they exist only makes the image stronger and adds to its power and impact on people.


It is a shame that images like this are so easily cast aside by the western world in a bid to find a more aesthetically pleasing subject to admire, telling ourselves that it is not important because it isn’t happening to us.

Unit 1- Studio Photography-1- Lighting Techniques

Lighting techniques with a Pear

The main point with the following lighting techniques is that this is about the DIRECTION of light.
The direction of the light determines where the shadows fall on and around the subject. This also has an effect on the appearance of the subject by effecting the texture.

There are endless combinations and setups for lighting in the studio and although i want to show i have covered a lot of the variables, i wouldnt have time to show them all!

There are 5 different techniques or directions that i need to cover for this part of my brief:

1. Using a pear, employ the following lighting techniques; 45/45 degree, high key, low-key, back light and top light.

So with this in mind i booked a bay in the studio as i wanted to practice the various lighting techniques.


I wanted to do something different, when i was researching Surrealism for my A Level i came across a picture of an Apple that had a screw in the top instead of the stalk, i liked this because it was subtle and you had to look twice to notice it, my first thought was to use this as inspiration ,but after thinking more about it i decided to keep it simple and concentrate on the photograph and the lighting, then if i had time later i would experiment.
So i decided to use a pear.

When i first got into the studio i was lost! I had never set up lights or used anything in the studio before and had only watched Andy do this in the few sessions we had on a Wednesday.

Kevin was very helpful in advising me how to set up the lights and explaining how to work things and i soon got to grips with it all.

I didnt realise how much there was to learn in the Studio until this session on my own, the first thing was that i didnt know how to use a light meter. I was shown the basics and also wanted to look further into this myself so found some useful information on Wikepedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_meter

45/45 Lighting

To get this right i needed to research this first, i found a website that explains the use of 45 degree lighting


http://www.sublime-light.com/index.php/2007/08/07/portrait-lighting-for-beginners-45-degree-lighting/


45/45 Lighting encompasses two things, the angle between the camera, subject and light; on a horizontal plane, see below diagram;

 And the angle between the light and the subject on a vertical plane, see below diagram;

They may not be the most accurate digrams but i wanted to try to illustrate it myself to show that i understand, rather than using a diagram i found on the internet.


45/45 Lighting uses both of the above at the same time so there are two angles of 45 degrees.


This is also known as Rembrandt lighting as this type of lighting was often featured in his paintings;

Picture by Rembrandt- An old man in red

After researching i decided to use a more direct source of light so that the lighting technique would be quite obvious from the shadow it creates, if i used a soft box this would give more of a diffuse light and although it would still create a shadow it would be a little softer.



So, to try this out, i put my pear on the product table and set up a Bowen flash head on a stand with a honeycomb diffuser- although this diffuses the light it is still direct enough to create obvious shadows.

I put the light in position and measured the light with a light meter.


I needed to know what my flash sync speed was for my camera, i had to look this up as i was unsure what it was and how it worked:


This is a link to a website i found that explains sync speed very well:


http://www.digital-slr-guide.com/flash-sync-speed.html


Here is another website i found that explains sync speed in a little more detail and slightly differently


http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/syncspeed.htm


Sync speed basically is linked to your shutter speed, every camera has its own sync speed and this is the maximum shutter speed you can use with flash. Mine is between 1/60th and 1/250th of a second, so somewhere in between would be ideal.

F8, 1/160 Sec, ISO 100, Handheld, un-edited.

This was taken from a low angle with the camera almost being level with the product table, you can see this by looking at the shadow compared to some of my other examples.

F8, 1/160 Sec, ISO 100, Handheld, un-edited.

This just shows a close up of the shadow, i wanted to show this as the shadow is the main way of assessing the angle of lighting used and it is in a sense the focal point.

F8, 1/160 Sec, ISO 100, Handheld, un-edited.

This one appears slightly under-exposed.

F8, 1/160 Sec, ISO 100, Handheld, edited in LR.

This image has just been slightly edited by increasing the exposure minimally in LR as i felt that the previous one was slightly under-exposed judging by the actual image and the histogram i feel this one is better.

With the 45/45 lighting i managed fairly easily to achieve what i set out to do, i thought in one sense that it was almost too easy and there must have been something more i should have been doing, but on the other hand there are so many things that could have gone wrong with this shot. I had to make sure it was properly focused on the most appropriate focal point, correctly exposed and the lighting setup correct- which would be evident from the angle of the shadow.

I checked the histogram and made sure that i had 'shot to the right' and made full use of the highlights and after zooming into the photo in Lightroom i am satisfied that it is correctly focused too.

I do think that looking at it, it appears a little over-exposed, but according to my histogram it is perfect and has no clipping or loss of detail.

 

Low Key

In a low key image the dominant tones are dark, in contrast to high key the background is usually black and creates an overall moody and atmospheric feel.

Low key can vary in that it may show just a small part of the object/person illuminated- such as the eyes. Or there may be a large part of the person illuminated but the body for example may be quite dimly lit.

Here is a link to the Wikepedia page on Low Key lighting, because i don't consider Wikepedia to be the most reliable source i have included another link also below:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-key_lighting

The below link is less of an explanation and more actual examples of Low key, it is a website i found that is totally dedicated to low key photography:

http://www.lowkey.fr/

On a Low key image the histogram should be predominantly to the left, something like this:

To try out Low Key for myself, firstly i put the black cover on the product table, it had creases in it and Kevin unfortunately didnt have an iron handy! so i had to make sure the light didn't illuminate the background and show the creases as this would- in my opinion spoil the image.

I used one light with a honeycomb on it, and placed this to the left of the table toward the front.

F5.6, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, unedited.

This was one of the first ones i took, just a test shot really to try to judge the lighting. Although i used a light meter, the light meter didn't know what i was trying to achieve so it was still necessary to experiment with the lighting and the settings on my camera to get the result that i wanted.

This was over exposed for a Low Key image, so;

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, un-edited.

Here i have kept the light setup the same but simply changed my F stop number for my aperture to F8- letting less light in during the exposure and so creating a darker background and a more Low Key effect.

I think that although the background is darker, the pear itself is too illuminated and the highlights too bright for Low Key, so i wanted to try a something else;

F8.1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, un-edited.

I remembered when we did our very first studio session with Andy and Sam had modelled for us, we set up several different types of lighting, i looked up the session on my blog and re-created part of the low key set up that we did with Sam, by moving the light toward the back of the pear.

I kept my camera settings the same, so the only change here was the direction of the light.

This meant there was less light falling on the front of the pear and only a small selected part of it was highlighted, i do think this is a good example of Low Key but there is a loss of detail here as it is so dark on one side you cant actually see all of the pear.

Low Key Again

I didn't feel after my last attempt in the studio that i had properly achieved low key, i wanted to try again and maybe try a slightly different approach and try to improve the results.

F6.3, 1/125 Sec, ISO 200, handheld, unedited.

F5.6, 1/200 Sec, ISO 200, handheld, edited in LR.

This image i thought could be hugely improved with a few tweaks in Lightroom so decided to do this. I have cropped it more tightly and decreased the exposure slightly as i wanted to darken the background so it was just black rather than creased black cloth! I also cooled it down very slightly. I was debating whether or not to do this as i feel that this brief was about studio work and learning how to achieve the lighting in the studio rather than post produciton, however; i have shown many examples of my work without editing, this just shows another way of achieving Low Key. It doesn't differ from the original that much as has only been slighly edited.

Top Light

Top light, or lighting something from above "helps emphasise texture in the surfaces facing the camera and shows the form of three-dimensional subjects"- Langford's basic Photography- 8th edition.

I set up a softbox on a Boom and suspended this over the product table and placed my pair on the table and roughly underneath the light source.

From the reference photo below you can see my setup:

At this point i didnt have a light meter so decided i would try to set this myself using my histogram and a few test shots, this was the first one which as you can see, is overexposed.

F5.6. 1/125 Sec, ISO 400, handheld, un-edited.

Looking at the photo you can see this is over-exposed but also the histogram shows this as there is clipping to the highlights meaning a loss of detail, that couldn't be regained even in post production, here is the histogram for this image:

For the next shot i decided to turn down the flash rather than changing the settings on my camera, to be honest this was more experimental than anything as this was my first studio session i wanted to try out all possibilities with the lighting and learn the effect each change would have on my photo.

F5.6, 1/60 Sec, ISO 500, handheld, un-edited.

This studio session was quite a few weeks ago and at the time i had always used automatic focus, just before this session John had mentioned it was best to use manual focus, so one thing i wasn't used to was focusing each and ever time i moved. You can see that as the above image when enlarged is out of focus.

Here is another one using the same settings but  in portrait format, and being careful to focus properly.

F5.6, 1/60 Sec, ISO 500, handheld, unedited.

One thing i noticed about the images when i put them into Lightroom is that they appear quite pink (warm) and this is incorrect given that the background was white.

I wanted to find out why this was in order to correct this, i assumed it would be something to do with the white balance or temperature.

I played around with the different white balances as you can change them from the one you used when you shot the photo, to many other possibilities. I found the best one was actually Auto, which you can see here:

    F8, 1/60 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, edited in LR.

I was surprised that the best White Balance setting was Auto, mainly because Automatic, generally can be a bad thing in photography, in that the camera decides the settings and makes the decisions. But here it has cooled the image down. I checked the light temperature and previously it was 5950k and after changing the WB to Auto it is now 4700K. The WB from what i understand is just a preset and if you change the temperature and tint yourself this has the same effect as changing the WB presets, only you have complete control over the adjustment, so to select custom from the drop down box and then use the temperature slider is a better way of doing this.

I wasnt sure whether or not these images should be manipulated at all or if i should have been able to get this image without having to use any post production, after thinking about this i think the most important thing is to learn how i could have done it differently and better and i suppose to get it right in the studio would have been a little easier.

So, after reading through some of the notes where Andy explained about light temperature, and also some of the research i have done, i have come to the conclusion that if i set the light temperature on my camera to something more appropriate for the light i was using, i could have avoided this pink looking image, the white balance was set to flash but this is not as accurate as setting the actual temperature on the camera as this is just a preset.

F5.6, 1/60 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, edited in LR.

Another thing i noticed in some of the photos was that the edges were slightly darker creating a Vignette effect, i dont want this in my studio work as i think it looks unprofessional and doesnt work in favourof the image so i used the lens correction tool in LR to remedy this.

As you can see from the above image, it has gone too far the other way and made the edges slightly brighter than the restof the image,although this wasnt visible until i exported it but being a perfectionist i then went back into LR and used the lens correction slider and moved it very slightly to the left.

F5.6, 1/60 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, edited in LR.

The above image is the same photo but i have used the lens correction in LR to perfect it, although it still looks very slightly darker in the corner i think it is possible to be too fussy with some things so will look at this later if i have time once i have completed the brief.

Back Light

"Back lighting can create a bold edge line and give you a strong shape, but most of the detail is lost in the shadow which also flattens form"- Langfords Basic Photography- 8th Edition.

Back lighting creates a shadow at the front of the subject meaning that the front surface is also quite dark and has limited detail.

This shows the setup i used for the back light. The light was placed behind the product table, i used a Bowen flash head with no diffuser as wanted a more direct source of light in order to excentuate the shadow on the pear. It would have worked with a more diffuse light such as a soft box, but the effect would have been more subtle.

F5.6, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, unedited. 

This is the first photo i took and i happen to think it is one of the best ones for showing backlighting, detail has been maintained to the front of the pear although there is no illumination to the front you can still pick out the detail when viewing on a large scale or zooming in. The histogram does show some clipping on the highlights-see below:

Also i think it is quite warm so wanted to cool it down and see what that looked like.

 

Here i have reduced the exposure slightly and cooled the image down using the slider in Lightroom, see below histogram:

Both of the above images were shot from around 45 degrees so i wanted to try a lower angle more on a level with the object and here is the result:

F6.3, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, edited in LR.

Cooled down in Lightroom and decreased exposure slightly. The histogram still shows a small amount of clipping but due to the lower angle of shooting the camera here was directly pointed at the light source so it was inevitable that it would be over-exposed.

I am happy with this image, i like the symmetry with the shadow and the pear itself, i think it balances the composition and makes it more aesthetically pleasing. I also feel that it is a better representation of backlighting because the full shadow is visible.

High Key

High key is an "image with a predominance of light tones. The result is achieved using a combination of diffuse even lighting, over-exposure, selective filtration and some diffusion"- Studio Photography- Essential Skills- 4th Edition.

This technique is often used in fashion and glamour shoots and the filtration is used to reduce imperfections in the skin.

The top light images i took technically are high key but i thought it was too easy to simply use these again and wanted to at least try something slightly different, so i moved the pear into a different position.

F6.3, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, unedited.

For this photo my camera was set to the same settings from the previous backlight images, as you can see this is not high key as it should be over-exposed and there should be a dominance of lighter tones rather than mid tones.

This photo isn't focused properly, the front of the pear is better focused than the top part which is further away but still isnt correct. I used this as an example because i wouldnt learn anything posting all of the correct images, i think i learn better by seeing where i went wrong and what i could have improved.

 

F5.6, 1/60 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, unedited.

For this image i have changed the F Stop number to 5.6 and reduced the shutter speed to 1/60 Sec, it hasnt made enough of a difference to the image to be considered High Key.

Rather than changing the ISO and risking a higher level of noise i decided firstly to increase the power of the flash from 1 to 3.

F5.6, 1/60 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, unedited.

The only thing that has changed between this and the previous image is the flash power being increased, it is now over-exposed but i think maybe too much.

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, unedited.

I wanted to try a slightly less exposed image here but i think this is probably too much.

I have edited this image slightly in Lightroom by increasing the exposure very slightly to try to decrease the shadows and increase the highlight areas. This is shown below:

This is the histogram for this image to show the over-exposure:

 

High Key Again

I wasn't completely satisfied with the High Key images as i had used the same setup as for the top light i felt a little like it was cheating.

So i booked the studio again and tried different setups to see if i could achieve high key in a different way, i read the High Key pages in the Studio Photography book for some guidance and kept this in mind when setting up the lights.

I looked back at the first studio session where we photographed Sam and how we achieved a high key effect there, i tried to replicate the set up as much as possible here, the below is a reference photo showing my setup. Two lights with honeycomb diffusers- one at either side of the product table. And a light behind the product table to illuminate the white background behind the pear.

 

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, unedited.

Here the flash on the right hasn't fired, you can tell by looking at the pear as it is highlighted on the left by the flash.

I checked the switches on the back of the light and the infrared wasn't switched on so it wasn't being triggered by the other light.

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, unedited.

As you can see both flashes have fired here and the image is now over-eposed, this is what we need for high key but i personally think this is too much and aesthetically doesnt quite work, although the important thing here is getting the lighting right i still think to have a good photograph is important.

F11, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, unedited.

For this one i haven't changed the lighting but changed the aperture to F11 and according to the histogram it is over exposed, but much more pleasing to the eye and technically more accurate. The thing i struggled with is the shadows, ideally i wanted there to be little or no shadow, but this wasnt going to be possible with this setup.

F11, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100, handheld, unedited.

The settings on my camera haven't changed here but the lighting setup has been changed, i wanted to use a more diffuse light and so decided to set up two softboxes and placed them at either side of the product table- this is known as the copystand effect and was used years ago before we had the technology to scan into a computer and also used for documeting certian objects as it gives a diffuse even light which is great for accurately recording objects.

This has been taken from a fairly low angle, there is a reflection at the front of the pear as the product table has a shiny surface, i think this adds to the composition as it gives it some depth although may not be completely appropriate for a High Key image.

Looking at the above image it does look darker on the right hand side so i suspect the flash on the right didnt fire and looking at the images that i have after this it is even more obvious, also when you zoom into this it isnt properly focused so i am not happy with it for a final image.

I do have some good examles of high key but if possible i may go back into the studio to re-shoot this, however; time is running out and a may not have time to do this.

Bibliography

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rembrandt_lighting

Langfords Basic Photography- The Guide for Serious Photographers- 8th Edition

Studio Photography- Essential Skills- Fourth Edition