The Brief:
22nd January 2024
29th January 2024
5th February 2024
12th February 2024
Planning for my 3 shoots:
I filled out a risk assessment to get the lighting equipment for the shoot:
I was also required to fill out a young person's risk assessment as Ava is under 18:
The call sheet for the combined Environmental Portrait and Editorial Sport shoots:
19th February 2024
26th February 2024
Week 6 was formative week so we didn't do anything for our workbooks in lesson, we did two tests which were a good learning experience and I did well on. We also looked through each other's workbooks and provided feedback. I've typed up the feedback I received below.
Amazing understanding of the task and great in depth research of your sportand environmental portraits. Nice look into lighting setups and schemes. Try adding some visualisation sketches
Seems well thought out and full of detail, keep it up
In depth understanding of the brief and tasks set to complete. Positive understanding of the 3 mini briefs
Personal influence brings you closer to your photography
Shown good breadth of photographic influence
Maybe include more design through your workbook to improve your graphic design skills
Very good, consistent, stuff missing
Continuation of research like you did for still life throughout the workbook will give you more insight when analysing reference work and then your work
Good amount of research and detail. Could have more of your work and call sheets. Could put in documentation like risk assesements and schedule
Great overall research and detail as well as planning. Just need to keep going, include previsualisation as well as moodboards and mindmaps and photographer research/analysis
Shooting the Environmental Portrait and Editorial briefs:
Shoot BTS:
Took pictures of my lighting setup and the light settings. It didn't have to be that powerful to have the highlighting effect I wanted
Carrying the equipment after the shoot:
Environmental Portrait contact sheet:
Out of the photos from the portrait shoot, initially this is the one I'm most drawn to and right now is my choice for the final environmental portrait, but I'm unsure whether it qualifies as Ava's not looking at the camera. Will get feedback and choose a different one if I need to. Also the T in Taekwon-do is cut off here which is a problem.
Editorial Sport contact sheet:
4th March 2024
This week we printed out 15-20 of our images and split into smaller groups to give each other feedback. This is what people said about my work:
1 - "I like the fact that the fist is portrayed as the focal point"
I'd potentially use this one as editorial rather than action, because of the significance of the fist in Taekwon-do.
2 - "Nice use of leading lines" "Lower window lighting a little to help exaggerate the light in the studio"
I do like this one for action, but I feel that the closeup shot of the board breaking stronger and had more positive feedback from my classmates
1 - The only written feedback for this was "yes" so I'm guessing people liked it! I think it's one of the stronger action shots
2 - "Awesome close up, a little dark. Connects well with the wide" (the wide version of this shot is shown above)
"Love this as an action shot. Background makes nice contrast"
Will definitely be using this shot for action, I agreed with my classmates that the background worked well
1 - "Try to darken the background a little"
This shot is a favourite, shows Ava tying her belt properly, I don't think the background is too bright but could try darkening it a little
2 - "Unsure what red item is. Shot itself is great"
I agree that it's unclear what Ava is doing in this photo and how it relates to Taekwon-do, so I'll be leaving this shot out of my final selection. It's definitely not one of my strongest anyway
1 - "The door in the background can be a bit distracting. If you do like the way it looks you
can still experiment with it and add to your workbook"
I can see why it would be distracting but the door doesn't particularly bother me. I like this shot because of the eye contact.
2 - "Prefer this more dynamic pose"
There were mixed opinions about the environmental portrait I should go with and people liked this pose like I do, but I was advised that the forward facing pose best fit the brief of an environmental portrait, so I'll be going with that one for my final choice.
11th March 2024
Shoot BTS:
Lighting:
Hadn't planned properly for lighting either, soemthing else I'll be doing next time! The lights had to be quite powerful to get the background completely white but not too much so the foreground was overexposed.
Contact Sheet:
18th March 2024
This week we uploaded images to padlet and people were able to comment on what they liked and what could be changed
Feedback:
8th April 2024
Final selections and post production
My environmental portrait:
Settings - ISO 100, 1/125s, f/4.5
Before and after editing:
The main aspect I changed for this image was the contrast, but what really helped was creating a mask on Ava so I could adjust only her, and also a mask on the back of to Dobok to highlight the 'Taekwon-do' a little more. Before editing the photo was a little flat and the light was slightly visible but didn't have a huge effect like it does after editing in the 2nd image.
The editorial sport shots:
Top photos are the 2 action and bottom are the editorial. The 1st editorial shows Ava tying her belt, which is important to do correctly in Taekwon-do, so I wanted to show that. the 2nd is Ava bowing as she enters the dojang, which must also be done when exiting as well. And the 3rd doesn't have a significant connection to Taekwon-do like the others do, but I like the eye contact and personal connection, also the fist on the badge and Ava's fists held up in sparring gear. Fist is an important part of Taekwon-do because it is part of the meaning, which I mentioned right at the start of my workbook.
I chose those 2 particular action shots because I feel they work well as a pair. They both show types of kick in Taekwon-do, and also the consistent backgrounds match up nicely. I think it also works that one is full body whereas the other focuses on a much smaller detailof the kick, focusing solely on the foot.
The editing process for all 5 images was pretty straightforward, and I just adjusted based on each photo. I did experiment with adding grain to my photos, but after feedback commenting on the noise in the images, I thought it wasn't necessary and had no significant connection to my photos or Taekwon-do, so I removed the grain and stuck to just editing things like brightness and saturation.
The Still Life shots:
As this shoot didn't go well and I wasn't super happy with the final shots, I ended up straying from my original crops and cropping images in post production to get the best I could out of them. This is why my RAWS are really different to the JPEGS. In the future, I will plan better as I said before, so I'm happy with the original shots.
The one that took the longest to edit was photo one, purely because I had to clone stamp out the white string holding up the belt, which was also slightly complicated by the yellow tint, but I got it done without too many issues
Closeups of before and after:
The 2nd photo was easier to edit but I still had to remove some marks, most likely caused by a dirty sensor, lens, or backdrop. Was an easy fix though
The 3rd photo didn't involve much editing at all, just cropping to get a closeup of the belts lined up.
15th April 2024
With final selections made and editing doen this week, we had to prepare to print by putting our images onto A3 canvases with a CMYK colour profile in photoshop, making them more suitable to be printed by the printshop printers.
Review
Overall, this unit was a greta learning experience for me. I'm very happy with the putcomes, other than the still life shots, but this was due to my lack of planning, which I have now fully realised is an important part of the shooting process, and in the future I will plan properly to have the most efficient shoot possible and get the best images I can in my shoot time. As well as helping me to develop on location shooting skills, this unit has also made me more knowledgeable with the documents side of photography, such as call sheets or model release forms. In conclusion, this unit was very beneficial to me, and the mistakes I made during it will only help me to improve in year 2 and further down the line during my career.
