Assignment 5: The Finale

The Challenge

Black and white photography. What a thing. This project honestly didn't really give me much insight into what this field of photography is all about, but it is a start. The thing about black and white pictures is that there's no colour. I may sound foolish making that observation, but when you have a collection pixels on a screen, compiled to create something we mentally register to be a form of art, it needs to be interesting, and without color that field of creativity definitely shifts. Pictures start to become something more than colours on a screen.

Without different hues, something else in the picture is forced to be present. This is composition. This is content. This is symbolizing something through your photo. Black and white photography causes us to stop and consider all those other elements of the picture that are not colour. In this way, circumstantially, monochrome images can speak louder than polychrome images; interesting isn't it?

The biggest challenge I faced in this module was the need for something more than nice colours. I started thinking about the other aspects of the image, such as lighting and composition. I've done a lot of nature photography because it's the most passive photography, and yes, I do have pictures of branches and plants that aligned so beautifully. But most of my pictures were based off of color; the rich saturation of natural earth. All of a sudden I was lacking this main aspect of my photography, causing a forced change from passive to active photography. I needed to put something in front of my lens instead of going to the content. This improved everything about the images.

As a photographer I must consider each detail of an scene before I capture it. The more the scene is created by me, the more intention there is to the image. This causes the quality of my images to rocket. More than a challenge, it was a stepping stone to becoming a better photographer, because imagine what could happen when I combine this thought out method of designing my picture and colour! It's wonderful what this activity can do, expanding your borders and leading your mind all around. You'll start to notice beauty in the everyday; the world will come to life and you'll never be the same.

Photos

This isn't the best black and white edit, but I chose it for its details. The cloud over the sun is a pretty fantastic image. You should see this in colour, it's beautiful. Each little wisp of white is interesting too as the light and dark contrast well. The premise of this picture is seeing what light does, along with a tad of composition. Honestly, I took this picture last week and thought it might look alright converted. This means that the purpose was to capture the sunset. It was incredible. I did meet my own expectations when later editing this on my computer. The colours and power to this shot alone makes me so happy.

Metadata
Aperture: f/7.1
ISO: 200
Shutter Speed: 1/80 second

I chose these settings because I wanted a strong picture. To do this I had to isolate both the light and the shadow enough that you could tell them apart. This blew the colors through the roof. In a black and white conversion the high contrast, that is mostly natural, allows for an interesting photograph.

A Window to the World

This picture was fun. I'm quite the sucker for good shadows and soft light. This picture gave that to me. I did indeed meet my expectations, as they were to make a thoughtful shot of me, with excellent lighting. Composition did actually pose a problem. At first I wanted a full body shot, but the stuff surrounding this part of my living room isn't nice looking to me. Because of this I decided to zoom in a bit and take a closer shot. This really captivates my emotion. Also, I was hungry for a clean, sharp focus and a decent blur in the background. I didn't get much bokeh in the trees like the picture in Assignment 4. This is probably due to the high aperture, which I didn't actually take into consideration. I just wanted a darker picture to really accentuate that light.

Metadata

Aperture: f/7.1

ISO: 800

Shutter Speed: 1/25 second

Referring to that bokeh again, I realize now that I could have turned down my ISO to compensate for all the light. Ridiculously enough I was causing this problem by myself! I slowed the shutter down because I wanted rich saturation and lots of light, but not too much. Some. Lots. Much. Enough.

The Skeleton of a Peanut

I'm incredibly proud of this picture. After seeing this skeletal form I grabbed a sheet of white paper, put it on and grabbed some excess peanut carnage for the background (I was snacking). I also used my reading lamp to effectively light this, as it was already evening and winter in Alberta doesn't give enough daylight hours. Anyways, I played with the macro and took pictures every which way until I was satisfied. I actually believe I exceeded my expectations for this one. I'm very pleased.

Metadata
Aperture: f/5.6

ISO: 1600

Shutter Speed: 1/125 second

The aperture allowed for some blur. I couldn't go lower because of the room I was in. The ISO was nice and ramped, because I can do that with my SLR (without grain)! I had a fast shutter speed because I am always unsteady when taking macros. I wanted a good picture. If you'd like to see the color version, visit my Food Photography Assignment post! That's all.

"Lights will guide you home
And ignite your bones"

This is a driving bokeh I liked. I really wanted to incorporate one of these into the project but wasn't sure how. I knew it had to be composed to be interesting without color and well shot so the lights made distinct circles. I knew what I wanted, and I think I got it. Excuse the crack, that's our windshield. I did meet my expectation here as I absolutely adore this style of shot and nothing less would have sufficed. The curve and slow fade of the street lights perfects it, I feel.

Metadata

Aperture: f/5.6

ISO: 1600

Shutter Speed: 1/125

So my aperture was as low as it could go, because it was dark out. My ISO was high, also because it was dark out. The shutter speed was quicker because I was in a car. That's all. The colour version actually has a really nice dark blue color tone to the whole picture. Quite nice really. Next!

Recycling Bodyparts

This is really similar to my other macro, of my sister's eye, and I apologize. This fact is tribute to the caption. Here I just got in close and made sure I had a nice focus. I had good light and well set manual focus. I let my camera do the rest. There's not much else to this picture. I was going for a direct focus when I took this picture, and I think I achieved as much. The light gradient is direct as well and her dirty blonde hair mixes well with it. That's all I think.

Metadata
Aperture: f/5.6
ISO: 1600
Shutter Speed: 1/125 second

Here I wanted lots of light, obviously, but because I was holding my camera, and I had enough light to compensate for a quicker shutter speed, allowing a crisp picture without darkness.

Lights won't guide me home this time because I took this in my house..

I liked this one. Tea candles can be so pretty. I experimented with a lot of different angles and focuses but none seemed to work very well. This was the best I came up with. I can't say I met my expectations because I didn't quite capture the picture I wanted. Maybe next time. This though, is alright. I enjoyed the fade out and somewhat homely cupboard in the background. It creates a sense of calm with the black and white conversion. All of it ties together in the end. This is a good use of light in the black and white. #rhymes

Metadata
Aperture: f/5.6
ISO: 400
Shutter Speed: 1/40 second

So here we see some values I don't usually use. This picture was taken with specifically chosen settings. I wanted light from the candles, but not much interference from the room's light. To do this I had to get close to the candles and darken the picture. My aperture was still pretty high but I wanted a strong blur, which I wouldn't have gotten with a higher aperture. I considered heavy post-processing but decided on a naturally contrasted photo. I did still edit this, but not as much as if the picture had been much brighter.

Mmmmm pretzel sticks

So this picture! I had the idea in my head, you know, when people take end-on shots of chopped wood or large logs? This is the same premise, but I merged it with a straight on shot of coffee, because I didn't have a stack of chopped wood on hand.. I set my lamp behind the mug to give the distinct shadows you see. As the caption says, these are actually pretzelly sticks. Sticks of pretzelness. However you'd like. Our nice wooden table provides a contrasting texture to the porcelain mug. I do have to admit, this picture is twelve times better (exactly) in colour than black and white.

Metadata
Aperture: f/5.6
ISO: 1600
Shutter Speed: 1/125 second

The shutter speed was quick because I was hovering over the mug. The ISO was high because I wanted lots of directional light. My aperture was low because I really wanted the intentional field of view you can see here. It's VERY shallow.

ONE LAST POINT. Remember when I said I was hovering over the mug? Well I positioned the lamp so I could be like, standing on the mug, and my shadow wouldn't be seen. That's really critical, and I usually mess up on that. Expectation = Succeeded.

This is the last. I'm probably the happiest with this, as it's a provoking picture. The black background with white smoke really brought this home. I actually had a pretty cool setup. I didn't have any black foam or anything actually technically used for photography, so I draped a black t-shirt over my sister's music stand and that became my background! As for the smoke, I took my lamp (trusty lamp) and put it just outside the picture to catch the smoke. The challenge here is that I didn't want the background illuminated. Just looking at this now, I realize it actually came out really well. I did process it pretty heavily, but I didn't have to replace anything. This is an original with contrast and hues changed. I'm pretty proud.

Another challenge I had was putting out the flame while preserving the smoke (we don't have a snuffer for some reason). I had my sister put out the flame with her breath, but she'd blow the smoke away no matter how hard she tried not to. Eventually we got a socket wrench with a larger socket and used it as a makeshift snuffer. This is pretty lame, but it can be cleaned and it really worked! I used my camera's continuous shoot ability to capture each stage of the candle's smoke drifting away. I could make a stop motion video. That'd be cool.

Metadata
Aperture: f/5.6
ISO: 3200
Shutter Speed: 1/200 second

I needed a quick shutter to catch the smoke in mid drift but an incredibly high ISO to keep the light up.  I kept my aperture low to help with brightness. The focus didn't matter here because of the miniscule amounts of detail (smoke excluded). I just needed the smoke and candle in focus. All in all I am very happy with this photo. The next time I attempt this I will have more directional light to specifically lighten the smoke. I'll put my camera closer to the smoke, because I don't need to see the candle and the closer I am to the smoke, the more detailed it will be! I met my expectation although now seeing a fully finished product I can set my sets higher!

Conclusion

This is it. The black and white module was a very good project and I have improved by looking into a different field. There is always more to learn, but I am making progress. This is the end of my photography course. I'm alone here in the classroom, just writing my last words because I wanted to be here. I chose to try my best, to give my all. That probably doesn't sound like much when referring to photography, but it does mean I tried. This class really did help my photography capabilities. I will leave this course knowing more, and wanting more; wishing to achieve the once unachievable. I do give a big thanks to Mrs. Stoyko for all her work. No student can excel without an excellent teacher. I think this is all I have to say.

David, out.