Kensington & Chelsea College
“The Internal State of Men”, “Rapture”, “In a Different Light”, et al
Last thursday was the very successful private view of our End of Year Show “Hidden Rivers“. Numerous visitors were on hand to admire the varied and interesting array of works presented by the Class of 2014, BTEC National Diploma in Photography, of the Kensington and Chelsea College. The 2014 End of Year Show Photography Prize was won by the talented and creative Gesine Garz, whom I had the honour of modelling for many times during the past year.
For those of you who have not yet visited our exhibition, I present my contribution.
This is a series entitled “The Internal State of Men”, created in 2014, a group of portraits inviting you to identify the internal state of the model.
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- Rapture
The title of this picture, inspired by the oeuvre of Sarah Moon, should speak for itself.
I also included some images familiar to the visitors of this blog, “The Dowager” and “The View, Horizontally“. The photo of “Los Espantos de Baldí” was included in the post about the colours of Costa Rica.
The final image I submitted to the Exhibition was one taken during my fashion shoot. It was created using my very own technique of rescuing photos which would otherwise be discarded. I call the photo “In a Different Light”.
If you like what you see and you are within the “neighbourhood”, stop by and visit our show.
Solarizing Liquid Light
Liquid Light is one of the most remarkable inventions in photography. It is a silver-based sensitiser and is a liquid form of the same emulsion found on ordinary photographic paper. (1) Liquid Light allows you to print photographs on a large variety of surfaces, such as wood, metal, glass and even eggs. (2)
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- The Great Picture
In 2007, the largest photograph in the world was created with Liquid Light. It took 6 artists and 400 volunteers 9 months to create the image, named “The Great Picture”. The negative was created in and took up most of an aircraft hangar in California and measures 3,375 square feet. It was created by converting the hangar into a pinhole camera, which was recognised by the Guinness Book of World Records as the World’s Largest Camera. A total of 80 quarts of Liquid Lights were used. (2) One characteristic of Liquid Light is that it develops very quickly.
Solarization is the “complete or partial reversal of tones in an exposed and partially developed photographic print when given a uniform second exposure before being fixed and further developed to completion”. (3)
Recently, I experimented with Liquid Light on watercolour paper and got the (brilliant?) idea to attempt solarizing an image printed with the emulsion. This turned out to be a difficult endeavour as Liquid Light develops much faster than photographic paper. After a few totally black prints, a few tones began to emerge after shortening the already short time of the second exposure. And finally, success! Take a look at the original digital photo, the print using Liquid Light and the Solarized Liquid Light print.
(1) http://www.alternativephotography.com
(2) http://www.instructables.com
(3) An Introduction to Some Experimental Techniques, Elspeth Ross, 2012
HIDDEN RIVERS – End of Year Show 2014
CHECK OUT OUR SHOW CATALOGUE!
HIDDEN RIVERS
End of Year Show
BTEC National Diploma in Photography
Kensington & Chelsea College
PRIVATE VIEW: July 17, 2014, from 6:30 pm to 9:00 pm
SHOW DATES: July 18-22, 2014, daily from 10:00 am to 4:00 pm
MINIMANISTA! (The Minimalist Fashionista by Emma Aparici)
A few days ago I completed my second ever fashion shoot and it was an extraordinary experience! I had the privilege of shooting a creation by emerging fashion designer Emma Aparici, inspired by the Minimalist art movement.
I had the assistance of 3 awesome fellow photographers (wow, does not that make me sound important?) Gesine Garz, Lucia Moretti and Rodrigo da Silva. My model was the supermodel-not-wanne-be-but-totally-should-be Marjolaine Costé and it was an honour for me to be able to entrust her hair and make-up to the talented Wharney da Rocha.
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- Design by Emma Aparici
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- Design by Emma Aparici
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- Design by Emma Aparici
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- Design by Emma Aparici
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- Design by Emma Aparici
This collaboration is truly a salute to the amazing talent that one gets to interact with at the Kensington and Chelsea College.
The View, Horizontally
Ever since I was a young boy, I was intrigued by the idea of perception. If something is there, but you do not see it or experience it, is it there. Obviously in your occurring world it is not. How much of the world and of life itself simply does not exist for us, because we do not perceive it? Following my typology of circles, I continued to study the idea of things which are within our view yet we are not aware of their existence. Something that fulfils that description, is the horizon. The horizon is always there, even when we do not see it. And horizontal lines are an integral part of life, even if we are not conscious of them. Inspired by the typology work of Steve Tyler, I created a 9×9 grid to present a typology exploring the view we see horizontally. Four rows were left blank to create a typology of horizontal lines. Then I took the idea even further and created an imaginary horizontal line through each row of pictures. To the sweet sound of Caribbean Soca music, enjoy the View, Horizontally
The Evolution of Photographic Portraiture
For our digital darkroom (digital manipulation) Unit, we were required to produce a series of eight related, digitally manipulated photographs. Using Adobe Photoshop CS6, I produced a series on the evolution of photographic portraiture. Starting with the very early image, through the Pictorialist movement, Solarization, the Mod Sixties, Warholian imagery, Polaroid photos and Iphoneography selfies, I ended up with an imagined photo of the future.
With special thanks to my model, fellow photographer, Rodrigo da Silva
The Colours of “Pura Vida”
Pura vida is a characteristic Costa Rican phrase. The literal translation is “pure life”. However, the expression is used to convey different meanings such as “plenty of life”, “full of life”, “doing great” and also “this is living!”. The phrase can be used in many ways and even as both a greeting or a farewell, as an answer expressing that things are goingwell, or as a way of giving thanks.
It is clearly evident in the Costa Rican attitude towards nature, which is celebrated, appreciated and protected. Therefore it should come as no surprise that the predominant colour in Costa Rica is green. In the rural area you are treated to miles and miles and miles, as far as the eye can see, of green. Many different textures and tones of green, often uninterrupted by any other colour.
Maybe to balance out all that green, the urban areas of Costa Rica, like its capital San José, display bursts of strong and vivid colours. It is an environment one would imagine William Eggleston to be very happy to work in.
Pictorialism in the Age of the Digital Darkroom
One of our assignments for the Digital Darkroom unit (Post Production of Digital Images) was to recreate images of photographers of the Pictorialist movement. According to Wikipedia (the encyclopedia of the Digital Age):
“Pictorialism is the name given to an international style and aesthetic movement that dominated photography during the later 19th and early 20th centuries. There is no standard definition of the term, but in general it refers to a style in which the photographer has somehow manipulated what would otherwise be a straightforward photograph as a means of “creating” an image rather than simply recording it”.
My best result was with an image by Alvin Langdon Coburn, taken 110 years ago. What do you think, did I nail the assignment? (Mine is on the right, just in case you have doubts!)
With special thanks to my beautiful model Etty Devereaux!
Blurry, Blurry Night
A long exposure on a very windy (and extremely cold) night can produce some interesting results.
Lightpainting by Richard John Isa 