Photoshoot 3
Inspired by Niki Feijen
This photoshoot was quite spontaneous - while driving past the location in this shoot, a relative mentioned to me that this building was derelict, so traveled to the site later that day and looked at it, then decided to conduct my next shoot there. While I captured a few fairly strong photos, I feel that planning this shoot in advance would have helped me capture what I wanted to actually show - places and/or things created by man that have been taken over by nature, to show evidence of a human presence in nature. I feel that these photos do not particularly show this, and I also feel that, even though I wanted to turn in the direction of the building and human/man made side of my project, this photoshoot is weaker than my last photoshoot.
I think the photo above of an old sign behind a rusted fence is my strongest photo from this photoshoot. I feel that it is the only one, or one of the only ones, that capture what I originally wanted to capture - the nature overtaking man made objects and places. The dicolouration on this once white sign shows how nature has damaged this object - it shows how long the sign, and the places the sign leads to, have been out of use as the sign would have been replaced with a newer and more safe one if it was still in use. The pointed gate also makes this photo look abandoned as it gives the image of something behind it being sealed up and left alone for a long time.
I think the fact that this photo was taken at night time makes the photo more effective as it makes the photo more eerie - the tree branches behind it also contribute to this as it makes the area look overgrown and abandoned. When I arrived at my location, I found that it was darker than I intended - there was not enough light for me to easily take photos. This lead me to use a wide aperture to let more light into the camera, a slow shutter speed and a higher ISO of 600. These combined allowed be to take pictures with little light, and enabled me to make some of the pictures look as if they were taken in daylight. I experimented with different exposures with the sign above, and decided that I liked it best with a darker exposure as it looked dark and eerie. A repetitive theme of the element 'line' occurs in the photos of this shoot. To improve, I will choose a specific subject to focus on. I think this location was not as good as the one in my second shoot, so if I continue to photograph things in the style of Niki Feijen then I will choose a better location, or even reuse the location in my second shoot, |
For the photoshopped image above, I adjusted the exposure and brightness/contrast to make the picture more visible as the photo was too under exposed.