The Museums (Research and inspiration)

London Museums (Under construction)

While visiting London on a photography trip day out, I wanted to visit some of the famous museums in and around the capital.l have visited these museums many times and know that they are a great source for ideas and inspiration for artists and photographers alike.

London is so vast with so many museums, shown on these pages are just some of the mueums that I visited on the day.

I headed for the Natural History Museum where I intended taking some motion blur shots because I knew there would be lots of people milling around with creates lots of movement.

I have included some of my images taken on the day to suppliment my course work

The Natural History Museum

These images were taken inside the National history museum a great place for inspiration and ideas. I found this the ideal location to try out some motion blur shots for experimetation for my course work.

My second subject on this course is motion blur so I tried some different shots with long exposures

Using my camera fixed on a tripod I wanted to use the natural light of the museum whch would reflect some of the natural charm and ambience of the building. I din't need an high ISO as my camera was mounted on a tripod and I wanted to keep the ISO as low as possible for clarity purposes.I didnt want to use a flash as this would have frozen my subjects and not created any motion blur,this would also have killed the lighting abience of the building. These were only experimental shots but have contributed to developing my skills and knowledge to produce this type of photography for my subjects

Link to the museum site

http://www.nhm.ac.uk/

The British Museum

I was inspired by this museum where I found a lot of inspiration which influened me to think about the different elements of photography these included: Lines,shapes,form,patterns,shadows,light and coposition. Shown below are some of my images from the day. I changed the first image to mono to vary my end results which I think has quite a pleasing effect

Link to the museum site

http://www.britishmuseum.org/

Royal Victoria and Albert Museum

This is a wonderful museum to visit and I would definitely recommend it to any photographer or artist visiting the capital. You could spend a whole day in this museum,it is crammed full ofdifferent art,treasures photography and fashion
There were numerous artists on the day sketching away,copying different sculptures and statues. There is a whole floor dedicated to photography.......................................................... not finished

Shown below is a page from the V and A museum website which shows part of the museums photography gallery. This is a part of the museum that I visited for reserch and inspiration. It lists some of the famous photographers whose work is on display in the museum

Link to the Museum site

http://www.vam.ac.uk/

This link below shows the photography gallery part of the mueum dedicated to this art

http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/photography/galleries/38a/index.html

Underground Stations

Other places I found of interest for motion blur shots were underground stations.Shown here are some of my colleagues Suzy and Pip as we waited for trains on the London underground

They hadn't a clue they were being used as models. Using a slow shutter speed of 1/30 of a sec allowed me to blur the backgroud because people were actually in motion as they walked by. My two colleagues were practically stationary allowing the forground to stay in focus because there was little movement.

     

London Streets

Shown below are some more images from our day out in London. I was particularly interested with creating some long timed exposures especially at night time. I wanted to create images which would show motion blur. Shown again in my images are some of the elements that make up photography,these included: colour,reflections,motion,lines form and texture.

Blog 27 Resouces,tutorials,video's,web pages,inspiration and tips

Resources, tutorials, inspiration etc (under construction)

Shown on these pages are some of the resources I have used for tuition and inspiration to expand my knowledge of my subjects while studying this course.

I have used various sources of research, including books, web pages, videos, and gaining inspiration from practical days out to museums and exhibitions

Shown below are some of these resources



Webpage and Video's
The screen grab below shows a photography website, "Photo Answers" a resouce which I regurlarly use and visit which shows a vast amount of photography articles, video's, tips and tuition. I have taken some extracts from this website shown below which shows a video of how to produce a low key portrait,which is my first subject I'm studying on this course. The video shows how to direct the light source onto the desired area of the subject.

I tried to emulate some of the lighting effects contained in this within this video and found it to be very educational

Click on the link below to view the video
http://www.photoanswers.co.uk/Video-Tutorials/Search-Results/Imaging-Techniques/Transform-Low-Light-
Portraits/




Website
Low key lighting is perhaps my favorite style of studio lighting. There’s just something about the mood and drama that is created when you have a dark background with the subject standing out against it. I hope to combine this lighting with some creative and dramatic posing to achieve some good results

The extract above was taken from a website called subline light.com which which gives some tips and basic tuition on lighting setups for low key portraits. Click on the ling below to view the site

http://www.sublime-light.com/index.php/2007/09/26/portrait-lighting-for-beginners-low-key-lighting/


These websites have given me some really good tips on producing my own low key photography. I was inspired by reading these sites and analysing images and tutorials contained in their pages



Exhibitions

This link below takes you to the website of the National Portrait Gallery website  in London. The gallery hosts a range of exhibitions from photographers of around the world. My classmates and I visited this gallery to view the exhibition of Ervin Penn the famous portrait photographer

http://www.npg.org.uk:8080/irvingpenn/exhib.htm

Please visit my blog titled





Website for motion blur inspiration
This website below shows some really great motion blur shots. I was particulaly inspired by the photography on this site and have tried to emulate some of the styles contained within. Click on the link below to view the website which includes a vast amount of quality photography.

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/08/24/45-beautiful-motion-blur-photos/



Shown below are some images taken from various websites which have inspired my photography. I have included some of my own images which show some comparisons of these images.

The above photo of Motion blur was taken from the website smashingmagazine.com above. I was inspired by the photography on this site. Shown below are some of my images on similar themes taken from this site

My Images

Above are some of my images taken taken on a day out to the coast in wales

 I spent a lot of the day just produceing motion blur shots. The image from the webpage gave me a source of inspiration which encouraged me to produce these images using slow shutter speeds

Website image

This shot above was obviously taken with a long exposure to produce the couloured light trails. There seemed to be an abundance of light sources which has also added to the overall ambiance of the shot

My Image

Using long exposures of 15-20 seconds allowed me to produce this night shot of a street near Big Ben in London. I tried various exposures of different lengths before I was happy with the end result

Website Image

My image

Again another one of my night shots from a visit to London. I used my camera low down in the gutter to produce this effect using a long exposure of about 10 seconds

One of my favourite images. I would like to try and emulate this kind of shot when I get more time in the studio

Another website for motion blur

http://abduzeedo.com/stylish-motion-blur-photography

Another motion blur website

http://digital-photography-school.com/blur-movement

Books

Shown below are some of the books I have read and have been inspired by which have hepled me to produce my photography on this course

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Blog 30 Bowens Lighting video's

Shown below is a really good lighting video taken from youtube. It gives tuition on studio lighting for a fashion photography shoot. Although the fashion part is not relevent to my course topic the tuition on the the lighting is excellent.


This is a very good video which shows a studio using Bowens lighting heads very similar to the ones that I use in our college studio. It details lighting diagrams with correct posisioning of lighting and positions of where your model should stand. It also shows correct exposures and histograms readings and a whole variety of other tips. An extra bonus, it's filmed by 2 english guys, not your normal american junk and yes  a british company


There is also a link to the Bowens lighting web page which has loads of good tips and guidaence on studio photography and contains a whole range of video's on studio lighting.

I have found this research very relevent and useful for my course here at the college, I hope other classmates will find this of use

http://www.youtube.com/user/bowenstv












http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2v3MrnDrQw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsUGbdT1hUc

Blog 8a Photographer Val Tourchin (Low key Images)

Photographer Val Tourchin

While researching some low key photography and photographers I came across this american photographer. His name is Val Tourchin, he's a semi professional photographer born in Russia but now resident in the USA. Some of his work includes low light/low key images and I was particularly inspired by this part of his work.
He produces a lot of studio/model work, lowkey sport and fitness photography


He did a shoot on black Basketball players and shown here are some of the results

I love the way he has lighted this particular shot. Lighted from a side elevation  he has emphasized the players face which gives the subject very good form and detail with a nice catchlight in one eye. This particular shot appeals to me, it's very interesting how much detail there is in the photograph. Lighjting this subject just from the front wouldn't have given the photograph the same impact and would not have given the same effect perhaps from using just one light source from the front.

It looks like there were two light souces used to produce this shot,one from the side and maybe just a small delicate light  in front of the face as there is a catchlight evident in the model's face

I think the low key effect shown in this photo would not have been possible using a white person as the model. With the black face of the model and the perspiration on the face gives this type of shot a lovely reflection and glow from the lighting, something that could not have been possible using a white model

Shown below are some more photos of this photographers work

Click on the link below to go to this photographers website and view his images

http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/valeriy-tourchin.html?tab=artworkgalleries&artworkgalleryid=2748