Poras Choudhary

Of course color is the main focus in this photograph. I like the way he shot warm colors against a cold blue.

 It is a very nicely balanced composition as well. The expression on the kids face makes one wonder what's going on since he has a plane background he is taken out of context.

Here is the context that was absent in the first one. Besides the crazy colors there is a pattern of similar shapes going on. Most of the people are sitting down except for the one woman. It just seems surreal.

Here the image is a little more personal, he caught the emotions that will disappear in the next fraction of a second. Nice composition with the guys touching at least two edges of the frame. I like that the background sill has some of the original gray color. I wonder if the green or blue was enhanced because it seems a little teal.

Just beautiful, the cold teal against the warm pattern of the people.

 I wish  could experiance this one day. It looks like soo much fun.

Ian Crawford

 

Yes, this photographer splashes his models with paint water or sand. He has a fascination for freezing time and there is this element of chance in a otherwise controlled environment. I love the way the paint brakes off and flings everywhere. In general I'm not a fan of fashion photography. I don't like how all the models look the same and have this cold and empty look in their face. It's so unnatural they look like robots. I guess, as an art form I'm ok with it, what i don't like is that this is what society believes we need to live up to. All in all, I like the natural pattern the paint makes.

 It seems really hard to figure out how the model is positioned. And how did they splash her to get that look like that? It's so geometric. I like the big shapes. The robot is even more present in this model.

 

This is just a mistory to me. Is it very fine sand or is it mist? I could't figure it out. I like the simplicity of the big shapes and the dramatic lighting. I'm not sure which is more powerful: the color or the texture. Her ear is natural looking. :)

  

I added a couple more. Here the texture seems more importent then the color. I think leaving the hair pin visibale was a bad choise. But i like the way the hair melts in to the pattern in the water.

 This one doesn't look too comfortable.

Sometimes I'm not sure if everyting is done in the studio like he clames to do. Maybe the head was photoshopped in there later. I just can't believe he gets this in one take.

Jim Goldberg

This photo is very emotional. The person in the front (I'm assuming Elchuco) does not seem to be posing for Goldberg. Where as the person in the back(Manny) is posing. The writing says a lot about their relationship, but also leaves much room for interpretation. It appears that Goldberg showed the picture to them individually. My imagination says that when they saw the picture it had the impact on them to see the reality for what it is: a crumbling relationship.
Setting all emotion a side, the picture has beautiful lighting, I'm assuming day light through the window, and perfect composition. Even the unexplained shadow is doing the job of anchoring Elchuco's elbow.

 

This picture looks like it's a daughter with her mom in the background. The writing makes me think that she has just lost her father and that maybe they went bankrupt after that. It's funny how again the person in the background is looking content, here even smiling for the camera, and the person in the foreground looks worried. I'm not sure if Goldberg used any other lighting sources besides daylight. It's quite possible that this room had two windows. Nice composition again, everything has a job. It almost appears like a set on stage or from a movie. I mean, just look at her clothing. She looks like she lives in the 18 hundred's, but this photo was shot in 1982!

Wow, this woman Elizabeth can write. She may be icy/hot on the outside like in this picture or even in the look of her geometric hand writing, but the content of her writing is soft. I wonder if in this case the writing came before the picture? It just seems to perfect how she is placed rite in the middle of the couch as if in limbo. And what about those two paintings on the wall? One looking like an iceberg and the other like an elongated son? Ehww, she does not look like a comfortable person to be around. I think that Goldberg chose this distance from her not just to capture the environment, but to add to her detached character. But, I could be wrong. How do you feel?

Ivan Padovani

Ivan Padovani is all over the place. His work goes from commercial, to sports to documentary. One would think that he would be atronger in one area, but that doesn't seem to be the case for him. The quality of his work is equally strong in all directions. It has this sence of clairity. My interest though lye in the documentary field. Wile reaserchimg I had trouble uploading the images, especially the documentarys. And those were the ones I wanted to talk about, but insted I managed to get these. It's a shame that these images don't show the clairity as much that I wanted to show.

For that rason these are the only one pictures with a person in it. And I'm prity shore that I saw another one like the first one, but cropped tighter around the person that included the house number and  not the window. I think I liked that one better, because the shadow of the lamp and cable post wasn't in there. Still I like the geometric composition and the persons hand gestures touching the hat casting a shadow on his face and the door. The color of his hat matches the wall perfectly and the red of his shirt just pops out of the noutrals. In the second one I like that he decided to make the kid blurry leting ous know some of the motion. Now the kid is swinging rather then just hanging.

The sports pictures were more assesible. Here is my favorite sports image. I love all the blue, the vanishing point and the perspective Padovani chose. Even though I can't see the athlete's face I can very much imagine his smieling face, heavy breathing and sence of acomplishment. His gesture also sais: "I'm free."

This is one of his commercial photographs. I like that he chose to make it symetrycal (well, aproximate symetry), because I see lots of base. The fixture on the wall represents the sound waves and to me it looks really loud, which I like. That the model has his eyes closed adds to the feeling of him being engulfed in the music and drifting off in to another world where time stands still.



Joel Sternfeld

This image is from the Stranger Passing series that was published in 2001. It is compiled of portraits that Joel Sternfeld took over the past 15 years while traveling. The images are united by the person being photographed at full body length, always having eye contact and generally outdoors at the same distance to the camera. Although most of his shots look like candid shots, that is not exactly what happened. Sternfeld does rearrange items and directs his subjects, but he possesses a finesse to still keep it from looking staged.

Of course the first thing that popped out to me was the color red since most other colors are muted. I now also believe that the red t-shirt was arranged by Sternfield. It helps to connect the carts with him as if they are a visual example of how chaotic his brain is rite now. I like the graphic repetition of shapes and their varying sizes as they go into the distance. Looks like a perfect overcast day.

 

On the other hand this photograph looks like he didn't direct her at all, although it is possible that he told her to angle her "power chair" that way to make a better composition. I think he cropped this image perfectly with the pattern of the floor going directly in to the right bottom corner and the cart touching the base as if it is resting. The top left corner ends with the roof and the right top corner with the top of the door. Repetition plays a big role here as well. Just like the carts in the image above the columns retreat in to the distance changing their size. I love the smile on her face, the wind in her hair and how her dress appears to have similar patterns as the food in her cart.

 

Now this picture not only has the repetition and variety of shape, but it also ads the element of juxtaposition. The newly wed young girl next to the old and obviesly used seats speak of virginity. Even the truck in the background is old.  I'm not sure if this image that I found is just a bad print or if the blown out sky and floor are supposed to give her the look of an angel on a cloud. The uncertenty of the whiteness is what makes it the least succssessfull of the tree.

Alec Soth's Flicker Party Assignments

In fall 2010 Alec Soth started to give assignments to his followers on Flicker. He told people to get out in to the world and interact. Soth is trying to guide the participants to find their own process. He says finding your own process is just as important as the subject matter.

Assignment #1: Treasure Hunt

The photographers had to find 10 different subjects that were given to them at the beginning of the quest. The subjects were: pilots, amateur paintings, unusually tall people, museum guards, sleeping children, neighborhood bars, supermarket cashiers, sheep, sedans and suitcases. 

 

I thought this picture by Simon Bates was extraordinary! What are the odds that he found this. And that only because he was told to find sheep. Actually I don't think it's a sheep, it looks more like a ram. I like the way the photographer included the tall grass, giving it a clearer location. It wouldn't have been the same effect if he cropped it tight around the body. I think another part of why I like it so much is because it reminds me of my dad's dinosaur dig. Simon Bates found a real treasure.

Assignment #2

Requirements were to find and photograph a stranger, ask them to show you something and then based on what they show make another series. The idea was to tell a short story. This assignment was inspired by Soth's "From Here To There".

This picture that I'm having trouble uploading was shot by Benjamin Borley. He was the winner of this assignment and shot the spastic lady with the beautiful blue eyes. I picked him, because he did a great job at telling a story and I picked this image because I like the way her personality comes through. The gesture of her hand, the expression on her face, the beautiful light and all that blue. The fact that she is standing on a bridge and that Borley included the railing in to the picture helps to build the setting for the of the story.

Assignment #3

Here the photographer had to go beyond their comfort zone. The idea was to photograph a non-photographer and then letting them photograph you. The two pictures are then put side by side. Alec Soth was asking himself "why are amateur photographers so damn good?"

Breno Rotatori was the photographer that Alec Soth claimed not even trying to make a good picture. After looking at all his entrees I thought that Soth picked the worst ones. My favorite combo is where the picture on the left displays a family portrait and the picture on the right a grandma taking a picture. Then my eye jumps back to the family where I have to search for Rotatori. I find him at the bottom of a V shape formed by two columns of the building, then I recognize that the picture of his grandma also has a V shape formed by the surrounding family members. I also see that him and his grandma had lots of fun playing camera-tag. This process does give the images a new dimension, sort of like in a film where it flips from one persons p.o.v. to another.

Assignment #4


Alec Soth told everybody to plan an encounter. The assignment was to meet someone on Craig's List and find the highest place in town to go for a 8mile walk. Then they had to document the encounter and combine the images with text. He said that the writing has to be visually compatible with the photographs. Soth also mentioned that less is more in this assignment.

Pavel K. Hailo, the winner of this assignment did a great job narrating his experience in his "Hide and Seek". I love that he used a notebook and his own handwriting, it is as if I stumbled upon someones journal. It's like I can hear the tone or the rhythm of his voice. The image I picked was of the drunk 14 - 15 year old lying in the snow. I can relate to what he said about being to shy to get any closer, I wish he did. I have photographs of those moments as well. At the bottom of the page he added that he left her there in the snow, that comment rite there is a perfect example of documentation of the encounter. By telling me what happened after he took the shot. The only thing he didn't do was to meet a stranger from Craig's List, but that doesn't bother me since he did photograph strangers after all.

Pieter Hugo and Permanent Error

"The UN Environment Program has stated that Western countries produce around 50 million tons of digital waste every year." states Pieter Hugo's website.

In this image there are elements of our world disappearing into the gray of nothingness. Like a faint memory of of the past history. At this angle at which Pieter Hugo photographed the keyboard it appears to be the view rite in front of my feet. As if this is a view in to the future.

 For the past year Pieter Hugo has been photographing the people and the landscape of an electrical dump in Ghana.

This landscape is far from romantic. Where we know cows constantly eating fresh, green grass, there is none here, here they just vegetate on the gray ashes of trash. And instead of a blue sky all we see is smog. But jet there are people walking around, going about their business. The only color: a blue dress instead of the blue sky.

The electrical waste was shipped there to help reduce the digital divide and create jobs. But the fact is that the only value to the parts is the metal, which can only be extracted though burning the plastic off.

 All this waste and burning is of course contaminating the ground, air and water making it poisoness. In this image Hugo included several people reminding me somewhat of a flee market. One can see some electronics being burnt, perhaps a microwave. There are slight inclusions of color manly red and green.

This image is a great Juxtaposition in subject and color. This man probably didn't travel to Italy on a vacation and purchased a bag as a souvenir. Us westerners take many things for granted.

Pieter tends to but his main focus rite in the middle, this reads to me that all he is doing is stating the reality and not trying to make a personal statement.

A. Siber on Stephen Shore

By browsing through Stephen Shore's work I noticed that most of his images are landscapes. Usually places looking quite familiar, but this photograph just struck out to me as being really refreshing. The billboards I am used to seeing are constantly in my way of the beauty of the nature. Where as this one adds to the landscape in a harmonious and even humorous way.
The billboard is perfectly centered in the image, while the clouds seem to radiate from it. Even the fence starts to read as if it is being pulled to the vanishing point in the center. The colors of the two blue skys are almost unreal how they match. I have one last question that persists: Did Shore block out the letters of the commercial in Photo Shop? If so did he choose the colors to do it with? I wish I had seen it in real life.

Like I mentioned above, Shore appears to do more landscapes, but among them there are also some portraits, witch I prefer. The people here seem relaxed in their own home. I love the way he included some of the surrounding furniture giving it a bigger scenery. Wen I shoot, I tend to isolate my figures from their surroundings by cropping them tightly. This is giving me a new way to look. Instead of the static straight on shot he angled the camera and made it more dynamic, which adds to the mood of the subject. He also used a limited range of colors that is very affective for giving an image a unified look. Most of the colors are warm except for the pillow of the main subject. By this contrast of color it adds to direct the viewers attention. It's also funny how with help of the color and shape, my eye keeps comparing the woman's butt to the chair.

Personally, I have to admit, I am not impressed with most of his landscapes. This one here is my least favorite. It looks like the view of a person that is about to cross the road. Or as if all his focus is directed to a point where something or someone might have stood at some point in time, but is not there anymore. That point to me would fall rite in front of the small car. There is so much empty street and dull colors. The most interesting part of the image to me is the blue shape of the sky and the jagged edge of it against the roof tops. But that alone does not win me over. The most respect here goes to the architect of the building on the left.

 

In relation to John Szarkowski's article

A. Siber on William Eggleston

As I was researching William Eggleston's photoraphs, the first thing I noticed was his relentless attention to design. He is very much aware of the edges of the frame. The images have either limited elements including one main shape, like the cold drink on the air plane, or an apparent pattern of shapes, like the two men sitting at pin ball machines. The elements are all in an order and have a purpose to create a visually balanced and pleasing effect.

 

Another powerful tool of his is his use of color. Many of his images include complementary colors or a more or less analogous color scheme. For instance the orange trophys with the blue background; a woman sitting in a diner with green seats and a red brick wall, or  a naked guy standing in his bedroom flooded with red light.

His subject matter is surprisingly common. I say surprisingly because when I look at his images it is as if I am seeing the ordinary through a new pair of glasses. His work is random with a touch of humor. My favorite is the granny in the floral dress, on the floral couch, before the floral background. In is use of design and color he captures a seemingly normal scene and turns it into a world of wonder.