Research/Moodboard

It's currently March 2016 and here begins our Final Major Project. The project that will take us right to the end of this academic year. To begin with, here is my research of photographers who work in 4 different genres that I will possibly working on.

Architectural Photography

Historical

Walker Evans

Walker Evans was an American photographer that was born in 1903. He is one of the most influential artists of the 20th century with his photography. He would transform the present time into the past, his vision into art. His principal subject was expressions of people found in the road and the surrounding areas. Amongst that, he also did some work within Architecture and the image I've selected is one of the few examples. I like this image here because it's very much on the nail with the building and it's just shot as the way we would see the houses. I like the repetition of the buildings and how the image looks wide to fit the three buildings. The contrast in the image is also strong because it gives the shadows more effect and makes it look historical with the black and white colour and grey tones.

Contemporary

Andreas Levers

Andreas Levers is a photographer from Germany who works a lot with architecture. According to his biography, he is not a professional photographer and actually does it as a hobby. On the other hand, I think he has great architectural images and they are very contemporary in comparison to my historical artist. His images frequently uses brighter colours and the architecture on the buildings is all modern and new. I like this image because the patterns on the building looks interesting and the lighting makes the building reflect on the left side. The lighting and the sky makes the architecture really stand out.

Abstract Photography

Historical

György Kepes

György Kepes was a Hungarian-born photographer who had an interest in abstract painting and photography. After emigrating to the US, he taught design at university in Chicago. He then retired in 1974. This image here is an untitled piece of his work and it's a nice abstract example. It's creative in how its changing perspective because when you look at it, it looks 3-dimensional with the shadows and shapes. When I first seen this image, my first reaction was that it's a windowsill but then it looks like light boxes that are giving out different shapes of light. Regardless of what it is, the image itself does look historical with the black & white and with the grainy look.

Contemporary

Tanakawho

Tanakawho is a Japanese photographer who publishes work online. She has more than 600 images on flickr and over 600k views. Her style is to turn ordinary objects and scenery into photogenic compositions with a mixture of colours. I've selected this image here because I like how repetitive the lines across are the black line in the centre draws you in. I think it's it's a nice abstract image because the colours are simple and the close up shot makes it look more amusing because the lines are slanted. In comparison to the historical example, you can see how modern abstract photography is a lot different and there's many ways of achieving the abstract theme and close up is a common way.

Landscape Photography

Historical

Roger Fenton

Roger Fenton was a famous war photographer back in 1850's. Before doing photography, Roger studied law in London and painting in Paris. He excelled throughout the decade as a photographer in different genres such as architecture, landscape, portraiture, still life, and reportage. In this image, I like how the colours look washed away and it gives it this historical look. I think this fits well with landscape photography because it's capturing the life during that period with the war and scenery in mind, so it's capturing the landscape with context. I like how the sky is just a dark solid colour and it gives it more effect with the empty road. 

Contemporary

Adam Burton

Adam Burton is one of the leading landscape photographers and author of five books. He's been working since 2008 as a full time professional landscape photographer. He frequently works with a wide range of clients supplying imagery, and photographed five of the seven continents but mainly specialises in the landscapes of the UK. In this image, I love how colourful it looks and the quality of the image is really good. Looking at Adam's work is really inspirational and he has an amazing portfolio at the search of his name. This image looks so cool because of the smokey fog effect which was probably captured with a long shutter speed. This also differs from the historical landscape photography because there is a modern look to what landscape photography has become now with new technology advancing.

Street Photography

Historical

Robert Frank

Robert Frank became a professional industrial photographer at the age of 22, He became a successful fashion photographer for Harper's Bazaar magazine in Paris. However he felt that the scope of work was too limited so he abandoned fashion photography and explored new genres. He then became interested in street photography around 1950's and created a photographic book with a series of photographs published as The Americans. Here is an image that is part of his published book which looks like he's shot candid on the streets. I find it so interesting to look at this candid shot because it's historical and you can immediately notice the different fashion style that is portrayed. I just love how looking at old archived images of street photography is such a big difference in this century. I like how the moment is captured without compromising and amending the outcome, and the image coming from the 50's is quite impressive with the shallow depth of field. The black and white is a nice effect because it just makes it look more like social documentary photography.

Contemporary

Gus Powell

Gus Powell was born in New York City in 1974. He is a member of the street photography collective and is faculty in the MFA photography. Many of his work was included in books such as 'Street photography now' which of course is all about street photography. In this particular image, you can see how contemporary this image is compared to the historical example. It's a colour image and there's also a lot more going on in the city. I like how it captures the essence and almost the different personalities of the individuals in the shot. For example, the couple that is stood by the edge of the road, just shows how careless and in love they are. It's also a candid style shot and I think it's quite inspirational and different to shoot without asking for their consent which does raise their awareness. I like how natural the shot looks and i like the theme of just capturing what we see everyday. It would also be interesting to look at this image in many years and compare the styles and the colours in the image to what the future may hold.

Moodboards

Architectural Photography

The first moodboard is for the genre Architecture. I've selected these well composed images because they inspire me with the contemporary style and I just love them individually with the way they've been shot. Putting these together makes it look even better because you can see how well it fits the theme and there's a range of different architectural styles that work when put together such as the interior stairs and the glass structure outside. These images definitely are creative and inspires me to do this genre and create my own series of images.

Abstract Photography

These sets of images are for abstract photography. Once again, putting these together also works really well and looks very creative. I've included some black and white images to show the difference between that and colour. I noticed after putting these together that they are all close up of their subject which I briefly mentioned during my research above. I think these images put together will be influential if I was to shoot this genre. Out of all these images, my favourite is the red cabbage because the shape isn't consistent and regular with the patterns, so it's just random shapes and lines.

Landscape Photography

With this landscape moodboard, I thought of including different landscape images that were taken during different seasons. Putting these together visually looks so stunning, from the snow to the sunny views. I find these images so inspirational but it also looks like travelling is definitely a must to capture stunning shots like this. I noticed after putting these together that colour is definitely a element that is considered in this genre. It has to be vibrant and punchy with colour to really draw your attention and to look visually beautiful which is mainly the purpose of this photography genre.

Street Photography

Last but not least is my moodboard for street photography. This moodboard is a collection of my interpretation of street photography. I like how these are candid shots and it's all about just capturing the moment there and then. Meaning or not, you look at it and it visually tells a story. My favourite image from the moodboard is the top middle one of the man at the window who happens to be smoking and just realised that he was being taken photographed. Personally, whilst making this moodboard, I preferred the colour in street photography because it documents how things are and black and white will lose some of that details so I think these images here are really inspirational to what I'd want to do.