Work Diary & Progression- 'Stereotypical London' Photo Documentary

Evaluation:

We went on a trip to London and we were given the task of photographing what we wanted to- I chose to focus on photo documentaries. I then took pictures based on 'stereotypical London', and how a daily commuter, or tourist would view London. I liked the freedom what we were given as we could shoot whatever we wanted. 

This is my best photograph of the day, as I like how its run down appearance creates more texture, and contrast in the photograph. This image is unedited, as I do not believe it needs any editing. The glow of the light catches your eye as it's slightly brighter than the rest of the image. This fits into my photo documetary of 'Stereotypical London' as the underground is widely assossciated with London, and you can see the universal sign for this in the image. Line is executed well in this image through the bricks in the background, moreover shape is too executed efficiently as there's various different shapes (rectangles, squares…) 

This is my worst image of the day as I should have adjusted the camera settings, I shot this image on exposure 1/100 seconds, ISO 200, and F/9. This was the wrong settings, as it highlighted the sign in the foreground; whereas, the background is too dark. This is too much of a contrast and it looks unrealistic.  

However, I do like the sky in the image and the colours shown across it. 

Progression:

London Photography Trip - Photo Documentary

Whilst being in London, and viewing the exhibitions, I also photographed my surroundings, I decided to include these in a photo documentary about 'London.' I wanted to capture London through the eyes of tourists, and commuters. 

Below are my images which make up my 'Stereotypical London' Photo Documentary:

This is an iconic figure of London (the telephone bow), however what makes this image special is that the colour of the bow is black, not red, therefore this image is significant.

The red postbox is an iconic figure in London life, many tourists associate these with London, I wanted to capture the bright red colour, in order to make it almost 'pop' out of the photograph. 

This image would be a usual sight for a commuter to work. The old lights and tall buildings would be seen daily by them. 

This image creates the sense of chaos, therefore it shows an essential part of London- the business. 

Street art is frequently seen in Trafalgar Square, therefore I had to include this in my series, many tourists will visit London to see the various street acts in Trafalgar square.

The national art gallery is an iconic building centred in Trafalgar square. May tourists will visit here, consequently this is why I included this image in my series. 

This man is a street performer in Trafalgar square, you can frequently see all types of acts here. Many tourists visit Trafalgar square and see these attractions, subsequently I included this in my series of images. 

The lions in Trafalgar square are known world wide, therefore many tourists would have viewed these and want to visit them if they ever came to London, therefore I included this image in my series. 

This is a waterfall in Trafalgar square, with a statue beautifully placed inside. You can frequently see statues like this around London, therefore they're an essential part of London life.

This image shows how London is home to many buildings of an older style. I like how I also captured the red bus, and the iconic lion in the image. Personally, I believe this image shows London life off effectively. 

Red buses are a well known iconic landmark of London, therefore I had to include these in my series. 

This image is of the National Art Gallery at night, I decided to include this as it gives a perspective of what London is like at night. 

This image again highlights what London is like at night, also you can see in the background the London Eye which is a vital landmark in London, along with the London underground sign. 

This image shows what it's like waiting for a train at the London underground, may commuters would like this reality daily, therefore I felt it was important to include this photograph. 

I photographed during the day, and night to reflect the different aspects of London life, when photographing at night I was following in the style of Luxemburg (an artist I had previously researched), as they're photographs of urban landscapes. Moreover, some of these images are photographed at night, similarly to Luxemburg. 

Below are some contact sheets, which show all the images I photographed on the day: 

London Photography Trip - Exhibitions

Trip to London:

We visited the science museum in London, to view the exhibitions of Alec Soth, and Julia Margaret Cameron. These are both photographers of different periods. We could take photographs in Alec Soth's exhibition; however, in Julia Margaret Cameron's we could not, therefore I only have photographs of Alec's work. 

Alec Soth was born in 1969, he is an American photographer, and has a variety of series of photographs including: Sleeping by the Mississippi, The Last Days of W, and Broken Manual. Soth uses a large format camera, so he can get wide frame images. He has won awards such as the PhotoVision award in 2008, and the Santa Fe Prize for photography in 2003. 

Julia Margaret Cameron was a British photographer, known for her portrait photographs of celebrities of the time in the 1800's. Julia was born in 1815 and died in 1897, aged 63. Her technical involved using a soft focus, as she saw photography as an art form, as well as a science. Her closely cropped portraits affected modern photography, showing how influential her work has been even to this present day. 

I liked this image as it creates an wary atmosphere, as it makes the viewer question why the man is standing alone in the forest? The wall in the exhibition compliments this image well also as it's dark too. A wide depth of field is evident in this photograph, which creates depth in itself as you can barely see through back to the end of the forest, implying the trees are dense. 

I liked this image also, this image is similar to the image above as it creates a natural feel as they're both linked to nature. In addition in both the images there's a single man standing in the middle of the images. The colours in this photograph all compliment each other well as they're all muted colours. 

This was my favourite image of Alec Soth's as I admire how there's two different photographs which combine into one, even though they're separate this is evident. This image is interesting as it's unique because you rarely see a house in a mountain. This image creates a slightly industrialised feel, due to the building. 

In the Alec Soth exhibition there was also some of his inspirational sources. A few of these are shown in the images below:

Julia Margaret Cameron:

Julia Margaret Cameron:

Julia Margaret Cameron also featured at the exhibition, next to Alec south. We were not allowed our cameras out in this exhibition, so all of the images below come from the Internet. 

Julia was a British photographer, known for her portraits of famous people at the time, she was born on the 11th June 1815, and died on 26th January 1879. Julia took up photography late in her life at the age of 48, when she received a camera from her children as a present. Julia manually manipulated her photographs, for example framing them with flowers. She'd often take her photographs close up to the individual, as she saw this as a rejection of the norm, she wanted to focus on emotive photography instead of structure portraiture. 

Some of Julia's work is shown below: