The document provides an evaluation of the student's photography project. It summarizes the key aspects of the project including the technical and aesthetic qualities of the images, the skills learned, and the production process. The student aimed to show how technology influences art through glitching, repetition, and pixelation effects in their images of everyday urban scenes. They struggled with some technical aspects like blurry photos but learned new editing skills in Photoshop. The evaluation reflects on what they achieved and possibilities for future improvement.
2. Visual LanguageMy work features colour repetitive patterns, geometric shape, and some watery textures.
In this photo I have used colour and repetitive shape
to show how technology can enable us to discover
beauty and excitement amongst boring everyday
scenes. Over the majority of the picture the colours I
have featured are grays and browns, though in one
small section of the image where I have glitched it
the colours are bright and varied. Rectangle shapes
are featured repeatedly across this image to make
the building seem more dull and endless. The way I
made sure that the image looked repetitive and
endless also was by cropping one segment of an
image of a building and repeating it over and over,
rather than using one solid image. I wanted to keep
the imperfections in this image such as lines not
perfectly joining up together as I wanted to make it
clear than this was actually a tiny image copied and
pasted. I wanted to make this obvious to show how
technology has influenced my work.
3. Similarly to the photograph above, I wanted to make my influences
clear by having imperfections in my editing. To create this image I
copied and pasted the same image several times, and each image
would be smaller than the one before, sort of like a Russian doll effect.
The images are not arranged perfectly and evenly inside one another to
define each image, and so the images did not integrate too much with
one another. By using a lot of copying and pasting in my work I tried to
show how repetitive real life is, though by having the smallest image in
the centre of this image looking far away is to show again how
discovering interesting exciting things amongst something mundane is
possible, especially in art. Again, most of the colours I have used in this
image are dull. It only features grays and browns throughout most of it.
I have tried to make this image look as if it is of a reflection in water. To
do this I have used colours and textures. I decreased the vibrancy of
the colours in this image and I distorted around the lamppost to create
the look of ripples. I wanted to create the look of rippling water in this
image to represent how editing photographs using technology such as
photoshop is only a distorted reflection of reality. All the contents of
my images feature everyday scenes for people who live in urban areas
of England, further showing how technology can effect how we view
everyday scenes.
4. This image has every single pixel separated into
individual squares. I did this by cropping a large
picture down to a tiny picture and zooming in. To
keep it at the size I wanted it I had to screen shot
the image, otherwise the image would shrink back
down to a tiny image and the pixels would not
show up individually. I wanted for all the pixels to
be separated into individual squares to reveal the
image as more of an arrangement of colours. I
wanted my audience to discover how a camera
sees and captures our reality, compared to how
we see it, and discover the colours of our world
down to its bare structure.
5. AudienceAs the theme to my work has been strongly technology based, I think my audience would be a
younger generation. People into computer programming or IT may be interested in my art also
for the technical side of things. The contents of my photographs are of built up areas, meaning
I may attract people more into urban living. The main audience I am attracting though will
people into modern art, photography and people who enjoy attending art galleries. Typically
people into modern art and photography are a mixture of young men and women aged
between 17-27. I think many people of this age range attend art galleries, and so would have
access to viewing my work.
6. ContextAll of my work has been influenced by modern photographers. The two key photographers that
have influenced me are Michael Wolf and Rob Sheridan. Wolf photographed content that I
wanted to photograph also, such as people from far away and densely packed buildings.
Sheridan glitched his images, though I used a different technique to do so his work inspired me.
They both used colours and tone in their images that influenced my work, Wolf using natural, if
slightly dull lighting, and Sheridan using a vibrant range of colours. An example of how I have
used this combination of natural and vibrant light is shown below, where the outer images are
slightly dull, and the very inner image is vibrant with lots of random different colour.
Here is an example of the
work of Michael Wolf that
has inspired my work.
This is an example of one of Rob
Sheridan’s pieces that also
inspired my work.
7. Realization of intentionsI slightly changed the content of my images. I was going to focus much more on people than on
architecture, though I only ended up with 1 final image of a person, and many of buildings. This
was due to the areas I was photographing in, they were both completely deserted buildings
where people didn’t go very often. However I stuck to everything I intended to do for the post
production process such as glitching, distorting and pixilation of my images. While taking my
photographs I originally intended to slightly distort the images by using zoom an excessive
amount to get a more pixilated image, however this was not the case as when I zoomed in on
things I wanted to photograph it only made it blurry, this was partly due to zooming in and not
lowering the shutter speed. Another thing I had to change was the original method I intended to
use to glitch my images. Originally I wanted to edit the HTML code of the image, though I had to
change my method as editing the images code was a lot more difficult than I had anticipated.
Another thing I originally intended to do was get inside of high up buildings and take pictures of
other tall buildings in order to take the photograph from a better straighter angle rather than
having to look up from down on the floor. However I was unable to do so, and had tomake some
sacrifices in terms of the quality of my photographs.
8. Fitness for PurposeI intended my images for art galleries or books. My work is fitting for this purpose as the images
serve no purpose, but to express an emotion or to put a point across. They would be useless in
many other contexts as the images are too distorted and glitched, they do not give a true
reflection of the content I was photographing. I can see a few of my pieces making it into a
gallery as glitch art is becoming more and more popular and respected. I also think that some of
my pieces are thought provoking and interesting to look at.
To demonstrate how my images would look in context, I created a book for them.
Here are a few example pages. I think my images are good for a boom is because they work
together very well, they all run on the same theme and tell a story when they are all put
together.
9. Technical QualitiesI had some technical difficulty with my images, as I had left the shutter speed quite slow when I
zoomed in on things many of my images came out blurry. I kept the f number fairly high, as I was
sometimes taking photographs from a distance I did not want anything closer to the camera
obstructing its view. The majority of work I put into these photographs went into the postproduction. One of the main technical aspects to my post-production process was glitching my
images. I did this by converting them into a photoshop raw file format and lowering the pixel
width and height. Though this method was not what I originally intended, it was very easy and
efficient. On images that had blurred slightly I tried to sharpen them, which reduced the
blurriness but only slightly. I worked on the curves, levels, saturation, brightness and contrast to
get the colours of my images to the way I wanted them. On some images I wanted to make the
colours duller, so I lowered the saturation and played with the curves to get it to the right tone.
On my glitched images I wanted the colours to be as bright as possible so I raised the saturation,
contrast and the brightness. I also used the dodge tool on some parts so make the bright colours
seem as if they were almost glowing. Though the amount of images I finished and was happy
with was the amount intended, if I were to do this project again I would probably do more.
10. Aesthetic QualitiesHere numbered below are my 2 favorite images that I created during this project. I like the
combination on dull and vibrant colours in number 1. I worked a lot with natural light during this
project but I think the lighting worked best in this particular image. I really like the imperfections
in the image, such as each image not being places evenly inside one another. It sort of adds a
human though to such a technology influenced piece. Though I did want it to be heavily
technology based I did want some natural elements to come through, as I made more apparent
in the book that I created.
Image 2 was also one of my favorites. I glitched the image, and I really like the way it turned out
with brightly coloured windows some bright lines, though still with a more natural browny tone
to the bricks. The best thing about this image though is the way using a square wave created
1
dislodged look to it. It looks as if I have split the original image up into strips
this
and reassembled it.
2
11. Skills and Knowledge GainedI have learned how to create glitch art a simple way through photoshop. I have learned about
camera settings such as DOF, shutter speed and white balance which has enabled me to tailor
my images to how I want them rather than taking photos on intelligent auto. I have learned
about more of the tools available on photoshop. One tool I experimented with and learned
about was the wave tool.
This photo here is an example of what I created
with the wave tool. I altered the wave length
and frequency dramatically to create this
beautiful pattern. The original image has now
completely been distorted leaving me with
beautiful waves of different shapes and colours.
Though the image below differs from the top
one in so many ways, I also created it using
the wave tool. I altered the same things, though
in a different way to the one above. One thing I
changed however was the shape of the wave,
instead of using a classic wave shape I used a
square shape.
I also now have a much better understanding of
the artists that inspire me from studying them
prior to taking my own photographs.
12. The Production ProcessSince starting the module I have learned more about how important the composition of the
content of the photograph is to the over all look even if you plan to edit the photograph a lot. I
have learned more about what content and camera angles make a good photograph and what
does not. On this particular project I managed my time very well, despite not having all my
photos taken on time. Initially I had all of my written work finished and up on my blog on time,
then I managed to catch up very quickly on photo editing. Because I had all of my work finished
prior to taking my photographs I had the freedom to focus on my photographs and post
production of the photographs allowing me to put the time I needed into idea generation.
