Welcome to Steam

It’s always exciting when the opportunity comes along to carry out practical work - even more so when the work is for an outside client and will result in a book.

A local steam railway museum has asked the second year HND group of which I am a member to take photos that depict the atmosphere of the facility.

The museum has commissioned photography from the college in the past, but this previous work has had a different emphasis - focusing more on the minutiae of the exhibits. I think our task is particularly challenging because it demands creativity and a mastery of certain techniques to pull off effectively.

Today was our first visit to the museum, so we were given a look round and the opportunity to take test shots.

The pictures I have posted simply display scenarios I would like to explore further. I have in mind using off-camera flash and models, but today was not the day to experiment with these. Nevertheless, I was excited by the potential presented by some of the settings.

Frith Wood

I couldn’t resist getting out with my camera this afternoon. I had the intention of taking some of my own black and white images after being inspired by the Lacock exhibition a few days ago. 

However, when I experimented with cyanotone and sepiatone settings, I decided I liked their effect more than straight black and white. The image above, taken in Frith Wood, near Stroud, has a hint of sepia.

One important lesson I learned was that it was pointless selecting the camera’s own monochrome settings if shooting in RAW format. Once the image is imported into Adobe Bridge and opened in Adobe Raw Converter it appears in full colour. The camera’s monochrome effect is applied after the shot has been taken and the colour information already stored.

I also took my shots with the aperture too wide open, making focusing awkward. Another lesson learned (hopefully) was that in these scenarios it is important to have a small aperture, long shutter speeds and the camera on a tripod - otherwise you risk wasting a lot of shots. Oh, and to meter for the light.

Try this...

Film Episode 15: Old Penitentiary (first aired on framednetwork.com) 
This is a great episode from the ‘Film’ series on framednetwork.com, which shows how to use location, light, posing and lots more to get breathtaking shots.

There was added value for me because some of the photographers were using the Mamiya RZ67 - a camera I bought recently and am learning to use.

Framed Network has a number of different video series - the most popular of which are called 'Film' and 'Framed'. They are hugely entertaining and educational, and they are very professionally produced.

I am always recommending Framed Network to people because I have learned so much from watching the programmes. If you tune in, make sure you watch the earlier programmes, too - they have a wealth of information.

What they said...

"Although the world comes in colour, there is a feeling that black and white is closer to something real"

― Anthony Jones

'Arrangements in Black and Gray'

I am becoming more and more interested in, and enthusiastic about, black and white photography and a visit yesterday to an exhibition at Lacock Abbey, Wiltshire, provided plenty of inspiration.

Entitled Arrangements in Black and Grey, it featured the work of six photographers, who use a wide variety of equipment to capture their images.

The photographer who impressed me most was Mark Voce, of Yorkshire (markvoce.com). The top four photos above are by Mark and they show the wonderful tonal qualities of monochrome. As Mark says in the exhibition notes: “Without the use of colour the photograph, in order to be successful, depends upon the use of, and the relationship between, form and texture”.

He also says that black and white photography is “one step away from reality” and “allows a greater amount of freedom and artistic interpretation to help capture the true feeling of a particular scene”.

I like this enhanced ability to convey mood and feeling, which can also be seen in the photo of Versailles by Nettie Edwards (bottom right) and even in a still life by Trevor Ashby (bottom left). Interestingly, all three photographers use different techniques - Voce a digital SLR (and sometimes large format film camera), Ashby a film camera and Edwards an iPhone plus various apps.

Tony Ray-Jones & Martin Parr

I had never realised the debt that Martin Parr owed to Tony Ray-Jones, a photographer who died of leukaemia when aged just 30 in 1972.

Ray-Jones was a brilliant documentary photographer who often packed huge complexity into his observational photographs. The top image is by him and was taken at Eastbourne in 1968. Close inspection will reveal several narratives within the one image.

Parr is famous today for his highly saturated colour photos of the British at leisure, but earlier in his career he took black and white photos that were very reminiscent of Ray-Jones’ work. The second photo is a good example - showing the besuited Tom Greenwood cleaning in 1976.

But even Parr’s later colour-saturated images are strongly evocative of Ray-Jones. His famous seaside photos have strong echoes of his predecessor’s Eastbourne picture - capturing the quirky side of life and including different narratives within the same frame.

What they said...

"I was an amateur - I am an amateur - and I intend to stay an amateur. To me an amateur photographer is one who is in love with taking pictures, a free soul who can photograph what he likes and who likes what he photographs."

― Erwin Blumenfeld

Hello

This blog has two key functions. Firstly, it is a requirement of my HND photography course - a place where I introduce and analyse items related to photography that influence my specialist practice. Secondly, it’s for fun. I have long wanted a place to store my thoughts and file my discoveries in photography - whether photos, news items, links… anything! Now I have one.

The title ‘Eye to Eye’ not only invites the reader to agree (or disagree) on my writings, but deliberately references my current favourite photographer, Erwin Blumenfeld, whose posthumously published autobiography went under the same title.