Lines of a Hand Exhibition

Had an exhibition today called ‘Lines of a Hand’. The process of setting up the exhibition has been really interesting and I have learnt a lot from it. It was definitely more of an ordeal than I had anticipated, but worth the hard work. We have been taught the process of mounting, framing and positioning our work and worked as a team to successfully produce a great exhibition. A long but eventful day! I will definitely take a great deal from this experience and in all honesty, find this kind of training more useful that some of the lectures, though I realise that we are taught is, in the main, beneficial though we might not always appreciate it at the time. 

Anyway, here is my exhibition photo, which I was incidentally going to submit as a black and white version of the one shown, but was encouraged by the other students to submit this colour version. I got a lot of positive feedback for it  so am really chuffed. There are also a few from the project that I liked but did not put forward for my final image. A few people told me it was one of their favourite photos and others asked if I had a website so they could check out my other work! Really needed a boost like this as it makes it all seem worthwhile. Better think about that website I suppose!
 

© Andrea Percival

Manchester Demo

I went into Manchester City centre today to photograph the demo against council cuts. I was supposed to be in the tattoo studio but couldn’t get hold of the tattooist. I had been meaning to attend a demo at some point and it is not as if there haven’t been plenty to choose from of recent. When I finally caught up with the marchers, they were at the town hall. There was a good turn out so I basically just wandered round with my Canon 40d and a Sigma wide angled lens. I set the camera on shutter priority – 250, as I knew there would be movement. I got some pretty good shots and have added them. I will have to try to ensure that I get to more events like this.

Turns out that there was also a tattoo convention in Manchester today which is why, I suspect, I couldn’t get hold of anyone at the studio. I will go down tomorrow to see if I can get some photos inside. 

 

© Andrea Percival

Barnardos Project

Meant to have put this bit in the blog earlier but have not found the time. I am taking part in a Barnardos Project with the Rochdale branch in conjunction with See Gallery involving a group of ten children. The project is about the group’s aspirations and involves highlighting each individual aspiration through photography. I have been to three different locations with individuals in order to photograph them for the project. The first one was with Lewis and the shoot took place in a garage. His dream is to be more independent and he has trained as a car mechanic. He wouldn’t be able to achieve his dream because of his epilepsy but loved working with cars so we decided that this would be the subject of his photograph. We dressed him in overalls and photographed him working on the engine and changing a wheel. The location was pretty dark and we set up a couple of Bowens lights at either side of Lewis whilst he ‘worked’ on the engine. There were a lot of fluorescent lights, which were a little annoying and space was very limited around the car, which meant that we couldn’t put the lights exactly where we wanted but we persevered. Julian the photographer took some photos then I took a series of photos using my flash card. I used their camera as it was a Canon 5d with a 24-105 L series lens, which produced a far sharper photo than my Canon 40d and 17-85 lens. I think it will be some time before I can afford a 5d. The first photographs I took of the subject positioned over car engine were probably my strongest. The next photos were taken at another end of the garage and I tried to move the lighting as best I could in the limited space but we didn’t do a meter reading so the resulting photos were very bright on one side of the subject. Even though the composition of the photo was perfect, I am not sure I will be able to rectify it using Photoshop. I am hoping that Julian has got a better version of this as the image looks really good. I know it is really important to get the lighting right in the first place and will endeavour to ensure that I do this no matter how much stick I might get from the subject!

The next kid well, young adult really, was Lee who loved going to the pub with his friends. We decided to photograph him playing pool with his mates. The location was a working man’s club which was great in that we had use of the back room for several hours but just a little dated in appearance. We decided to just let them play pool and we would photograph them throughout. The photographs I took of Lee with his mates didn’t work quite as I had planned. There was never really an instant where they were all crowded round the table without it looking too staged. Perhaps in retrospect, we should have taken this approach initially: staged the shot, taken the photographs and then let them get on with their game. The stronger images were when I focused on him alone pocketing the balls. I don’t think it matters that his friends weren’t present in the image as long as he is seen to be playing pool, which was the original idea we had for him. Julian might have some stronger images showing Lee with his friends.

The last couple of locations were with Sandra and Rebecca. Sandra’s photograph took place in a wedding shop and Rebecca’s in a Travel Agent. Julian brought along another photographer and initially it looked as though we were going to each shoot in different locations as time was really tight. The other woman went into the Travel Agent and I remained in the Wedding Shop with Sandra and Elaine, the Barnardos Team Leader. We only had one sync lead though and I though I tried to set off the remote flash using the built in flash on my camera, it didn’t work so I had to wait until they had finished in the travel shop before I could begin to take photos. In the meantime we got her in a beautiful dress ready for the shoot. Once they brought the sync lead, I was able to take quite a few photos before the other photographer asked if she could have a go. The subject, Sandra was not quite in full flow and no matter how hard we tried, we could not get her to smile naturally. I had wanted to take more as the other photographer had sole input into the Travel Agent shoot but when she asked again, I felt pressured to allow her to take some photos though I hadn’t finished what I wanted to do. As her shoot was in a different location we moved all the lighting and she actually spent quite some time taking photographs. Though I managed to get a few more photos in, once again she started to take over the shoot and almost treat me as her assistant. I realize that we have to get good photos out of this project and no doubt, she is a better photographer that me which is fine, but I had been involved in this project from the beginning and want to be able to show my photography in the exhibition, not be fighting for a place amongst a group of photographers who are more experienced. I was pissed off at the time but after thinking about it, I have decided that it is a lesson to be learnt. It is a dog eat dog world out there, particularly in the field of photography and I will need to be more assertive when in that situation again and clarify with the organizers, who is going to be the main photographer on which shoot. Having three photographers on location is not ideal because everyone wants a go and the subject ends up posing for a longer period of time. Perhaps we can organise it that there is only two photographers for the remaining five sessions (one subject might not be participating). Next week is going to be full on as the exhibition date is looming so we need to move quickly in order to work within the deadline period.

I won’t publish any of the photos on the blog yet as most of the kids are still considered minors but I should have no problems once the exhibition has taken place.

Daniel Meadows

Last year I went to a talk by the photographer Daniel Meadows. One of his early projects from the 1970s took place on a bus, a 1948 double decker - JRR 404 - costing £360. It became his home, his gallery and his darkroom: The ‘Free Photographic Omnibus” (Omnibus is from the Latin meaning - For all the people). He traveled in it for 14 months taking photographs in 22 different towns and cities, photographing 958 people in total. He states that the documentary element of photography holds that we are all unique individuals and cannot be studied as representative types. The Daily Mirror described the project as ‘The Great Ordinary Show’. He repaid his subjects with a copy of their portrait that he’d developed on the bus overnight. He did not take names of the subjects, so when he came to revisit the project some 25 years later, he had to resort to the press in order to try to find his original subjects.

The talk he gave was very interesting and the concept of his project stuck with me. It wasn’t too dissimilar to the Irish Identity project I did last year but I had accompanying text with the photos, whereas though Daniel Meadows didn’t appear to have text alongside the photos, he did record the subjects on tape. The fact that his subjects were ‘passing through’ so to speak is similar to the Open Brief project I am doing at the Tattoo Parlour. My subjects are passing through: not all of them want to participate and some are easier to work with than others. That is human nature though and I will have to find the most effective way of getting the best out of my potential subjects. More recently, Daniel did a project entitled Digital Storytelling where he worked with a group of individuals and helped them, with the aid of a photo album and stories from their past to make a short video of a subject of their choosing, some of which are shown on his website. The site is interesting to browse as it covers a 30+ year period of the working practice of a photographer, highlighting both the history and the changes in the craft. It is definitely worth taking a look.  

The web address is http://www.photobus.co.uk

 

© Daniel Meadows

Medium Format Camera

I decided I wanted to try out a Medium Format Camera as I have seen the quality they produce and knew that portraiture was the perfect opportunity with which to experiment. I borrowed a Bronica ETRS and a Mamiya 645 on separate occasions in order to see which one I preferred. When I first tried to borrow a Medium Format camera, I took it to one of the tutors so that he could show me how to load the film. It wasn’t long before it became apparent that the camera wasn’t working properly so I took it back and exchanged it for the Bronica. I was glad that my first experience was the Bronica as I found it very straightforward to use. I had actually videoed the tutor loading the film so that I wouldn’t have any problems when I loaded it myself later – a good idea even if I do say it myself as I would have been buggered otherwise! I ran a few films through the Bronica as I was only able to borrow it for 24 hours. I developed the films the following week and was very pleased with the results. Considering it was the first time I had ever used a Medium Format, I think I did ok and though I haven’t yet done any prints, only the contact sheets, I was really amazed at the quality. I borrowed the Mamiya for a weekend and took it along to the Tattoo Studio. I managed to take a few shots whilst I was there, though not as many as I had planned. I had set the camera up on a tripod and took the shots after I had used the digital camera. The time factor was a problem as mentioned previously when talking about my first experience in the Tattoo Studio. As I had not time to get to know the subjects, it was difficult to get them to hang around for too long after having being tattooed for many hours, so I was only able take a couple of the subjects with the Medium Format. I am not sure it will work for my independent project but never say never, I will see how future shoots go.

I developed the films from both cameras on separate occasions and have included the results. I was very pleased with the Bronica shoot as previously mentioned but the Mamiya shots were not so impressive. The first negative taken from in the Tattoo Studio was very thin and though I used a proper lighting setup and a light meter in order to ensure the exposure would be spot on, something obviously went wrong along the way. I suspect that I had mistakenly set the meter for the wrong ISO setting but I am not entirely sure. I will try to work with the negatives but am not sure they will be of high enough quality. I also had problems with the next shoot with the same camera. I decided to photograph my nieces and nephews in their house. I set up the camera on a tripod and used a light meter in order to achieve the correct exposure. When I posed the subjects however, and looked through the viewfinder, I did find it hard to focus the shot. I kept fiddling with it but couldn’t seem to get it right. There was a small hole in the middle of the viewfinder and I was trying to focus the subjects through this. I think this was a mistake as you can see in the resulting contact sheets, the subjects are totally out of focus. The exposure seemed ok this time as shown with the second contact sheet. Anyway, the whole experience of using this camera was not so positive as it was with the Bronica. I will borrow it again now that I am aware of my mistakes, to see if it was my inability to get to grips with this model, or a case of a few fundamental errors on my part, with setting up the shots, I have since bought a Bronica as I had such a good experience with using it and have run some films through in order to see if I achieve the same kind of shots as before. I will definitely continue to experiment with the Medium Format though as I still love film photography, particularly black and white. 

 

Inspiration

I borrowed The Fuji Association of Photographers Assistants’ Awards books, 1995-1999 from Andrew Sanderson, one of my tutors, to browse through for inspiration in portraiture photography. They might be over a decade old bit I think that portraiture is never outdated. I love black and white photography particularly and found quite a few photographs in the brochures that I liked and some ideas that I might well use. I liked Alan Clarke photographs though quite a simple concept, they imply movement and I have experimented somewhat in this field and want to explore it further. I also liked the stark, almost inmate style photos by Rik Pinkcombe. I particularly love the portrait of the old couple by Jonathan Andrew. It is almost as if the lighting has been set up specifically in order to photograph as many people as possible and the couple were just passing through! Love it! Also included the photograms by Kirsty Mackay as I found the idea really interesting. I am intrigued to know how she did them. 

© Alan Stone

© Anthony Hill

© Caroline Molloy

© Helen Marsden

© Alan Clarke

© Dinu Li

© Hussein Burra

© James Lampard

© Rik Pinkcombe

© David Woolfall

© Kirsty Mackay