This shoot went very wrong to begin with. I booked out a studio lighting kit that was battery powered, so I could create a more cinematically staged scene than my last shoot.
When I set up the first light, the modelling light had fallen out and I didnt know if it was broken or not so had to put that entire light away and get out the other one.
that worked fine but I soon came to realise I don't have a sync lead port on my camera, nor did my boyfriend who was assisting the shoot. This means that I couldn't actually sync the flash with my camera.
I attempted to capture the light while my boyfriend pushed the manual flash button on the lights but the timing was never quite right regardless of shutter speeds.
After about 500 shots this was the bets that was got;
It's not terrible but certainly not great either and just too much hassle.
It was hard to see where I wanted the light angled because I could never see how it would look as I couldn't capture it.
So I moved on to just using a phone torch, and I was pleasantly surprised.
It was so much easier, I had far more control and it created this almost forensic type look - you can tell I was inspired by Melanie Pullen at this point.
I also think the glare not being visible in this image makes it more dramatic than the other image as it gives no clue as to where the light is. In the first photograph is kind of takes away from the immersion because of the glare from the flash being visible on the floor.
I then took a photo of an empty toilet roll, just as I had before int the first shoot. However, this time i turned all the lights off and just used the phone torch.
We experimented with a lot of angles for the torch to be at with this one because the way the light bends round the carton really depends on where the phone was being held and where the light fell really affected the mood and tone and mystery of the image.
I settled on this being my favourite because like the food image it hides part of the subject in the shadows, yet there's enough information there for the audience to know exactly what we're looking at.
The reflections add to the drama of the image as it offers a stronger white to contrast against the blacks. While I wasn't keen on the reflections in the first image I really don't mind this because without them there wouldn't be all too much to look at.
Compares to this image form the first shoot, the toilet roll photograph from shoot 2 is definitely preferable to me. It just has so much more mystery and intensity to it.
You may not think of drama and intensity when you think of small inconveniences but by dramatising them I feel i'm reflecting how I feel in the time of the inconvenience happening. Because of this huge dramatisation I don't think it's losing the humorous undertone either, because you can laugh at how ridiculous it is for something so small to be intensified so much. Other people may relate to them less now, however I feel that that's okay. At first I didn't like the idea of something not being as universally relatable as I wanted it to be but now I realise it's okay for it to be about sharing my intense emotions.
I then edited these two images in a cinematic way, largely inspired by Melanie Pullen.
The most noticeable difference in the images are the way that they've been colour graded. I made them both more blue/green to match the work by Melanie Pullen. I also feel like this type of colour grading is very popular within 'cinematic' movies and images, which I will research more into. But them being so well known and associated with cinematic imagery allows for these pictures to be read in that light.
I also increased the contrast and exposure a little bit while keeping the black tones down. This make the spotlight effect more vivid and therefore more intimidating, especially when paired with the cold blue and green tones.
When editing the toilet roll image I was debating whether to crop out the top bit or not, however I concluded that the image felt more whole with these lines to almost keep everything in frame while also allowing for a sense of distance, which we wouldn't have without the light reflecting off the top part.
Overall i'm very very happy with this shoot and I feel like this is the way I want to start shooting all of my images.
I've been feeling a little restrained as I haven't been happy with how my last images came out and I didn't want to shoot for the sake of shooting. However now I know the style and technique that I want to use with my work I feel much more free to just get to it and continue this work.
When I set up the first light, the modelling light had fallen out and I didnt know if it was broken or not so had to put that entire light away and get out the other one.
that worked fine but I soon came to realise I don't have a sync lead port on my camera, nor did my boyfriend who was assisting the shoot. This means that I couldn't actually sync the flash with my camera.
I attempted to capture the light while my boyfriend pushed the manual flash button on the lights but the timing was never quite right regardless of shutter speeds.
After about 500 shots this was the bets that was got;
It's not terrible but certainly not great either and just too much hassle.
It was hard to see where I wanted the light angled because I could never see how it would look as I couldn't capture it.
So I moved on to just using a phone torch, and I was pleasantly surprised.
It was so much easier, I had far more control and it created this almost forensic type look - you can tell I was inspired by Melanie Pullen at this point.
The two images look very different in terms of lighting however I think I do prefer the spotlight look of the phone torch image better; it gives a more mysterious yet intimidating feel to the image and the background is just plain black. We can see just enough of the foreground to be able to tell the food is on a floor. The focus is in the middle, and being at a low aperture to have a shallow depth of field, the foreground and background bits of food are not in focus.
This simply feels much more dramatic and over the top than the other one, despite having less contrast in the actual food part of the image. I think the angle is a large part to play in this as well as the darkness of the rest of the image.I also think the glare not being visible in this image makes it more dramatic than the other image as it gives no clue as to where the light is. In the first photograph is kind of takes away from the immersion because of the glare from the flash being visible on the floor.
I then took a photo of an empty toilet roll, just as I had before int the first shoot. However, this time i turned all the lights off and just used the phone torch.
We experimented with a lot of angles for the torch to be at with this one because the way the light bends round the carton really depends on where the phone was being held and where the light fell really affected the mood and tone and mystery of the image.
I settled on this being my favourite because like the food image it hides part of the subject in the shadows, yet there's enough information there for the audience to know exactly what we're looking at.
The reflections add to the drama of the image as it offers a stronger white to contrast against the blacks. While I wasn't keen on the reflections in the first image I really don't mind this because without them there wouldn't be all too much to look at.
Compares to this image form the first shoot, the toilet roll photograph from shoot 2 is definitely preferable to me. It just has so much more mystery and intensity to it.
You may not think of drama and intensity when you think of small inconveniences but by dramatising them I feel i'm reflecting how I feel in the time of the inconvenience happening. Because of this huge dramatisation I don't think it's losing the humorous undertone either, because you can laugh at how ridiculous it is for something so small to be intensified so much. Other people may relate to them less now, however I feel that that's okay. At first I didn't like the idea of something not being as universally relatable as I wanted it to be but now I realise it's okay for it to be about sharing my intense emotions.
I then edited these two images in a cinematic way, largely inspired by Melanie Pullen.
The most noticeable difference in the images are the way that they've been colour graded. I made them both more blue/green to match the work by Melanie Pullen. I also feel like this type of colour grading is very popular within 'cinematic' movies and images, which I will research more into. But them being so well known and associated with cinematic imagery allows for these pictures to be read in that light.
I also increased the contrast and exposure a little bit while keeping the black tones down. This make the spotlight effect more vivid and therefore more intimidating, especially when paired with the cold blue and green tones.
When editing the toilet roll image I was debating whether to crop out the top bit or not, however I concluded that the image felt more whole with these lines to almost keep everything in frame while also allowing for a sense of distance, which we wouldn't have without the light reflecting off the top part.
Overall i'm very very happy with this shoot and I feel like this is the way I want to start shooting all of my images.
I've been feeling a little restrained as I haven't been happy with how my last images came out and I didn't want to shoot for the sake of shooting. However now I know the style and technique that I want to use with my work I feel much more free to just get to it and continue this work.
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