Aperture - Jan Groover

Jan Groover was an American photographer born in 1943. She began as a painter but decided to pick up a camera as her tool of creativity. She made still life arrangements in her kitchen, out of everyday household utensills; knives, forks, spoons, pans etc. and shot them in a way that really exaggerated the reflections, lines and shadows that the metal objects created. 

     

I find Groover's cropped close ups really interesting and abstract. She really brings out the warm colours in the metal and i think the images almost look like abstract paintings. She used aperture and shallow depth of field for creative effect. I like her work because she managed to turn mundane objects into something quite lovely and makes me see them in a totally different way!

Aperture - Diane Arbus

Starting some research today on Photographers that demonstrate depth of field. We were given a list of photographers to check out and share our views on.

The first one is Diane Arbus, who was an American photographer, known as 'the photographer of freaks'. Rather harsh, but she did like to focus on people who were on the edge of society's norms (freaks, loners, dwarfs, giants, nudists, circus, transgender people, 'ugly' people) in a direct and simple portrait style. She wanted people to see them how they are and not how they wanted people to see them.

I can safely say that I'm not a huge fan of Diane Arbus' work, simply because of the morbid feeling these images give me when i look at them!! I find them really disturbing and dark but that's just my opinion. I suppose she wanted to show different ways of life and expose people who are ''different''........ and maybe because she felt like an outsider herself.

Arbus even photographed people in institutes who were mentally ill. She apparently waited for the moment of fullest expression of disability which I just find a little bit immoral.

In portraiture, the subject is obviously the main focus so this is where aperture comes in and a shallow depth of field is often used. The person will be in sharp focus and the background blurred. If a small aperture is used, the background would also be in sharp focus which is distracting and takes the main focus away from the subject.

Aperture & Depth of Field

In yesterday's session with Sian we experimented with depth of field and how we can control focus by using it. Aperture is how big the opening in the lense is, which determines how much light hits the sensor or film. The eye is tuned to focusing on that within the frame which is sharp, therefor, by using a shallow depth of field and wide aperture, the photographer is selecting a subject in which they think is significant in the image and forcing our eyes straight to it.  It's a bit confusing because the wider the aperture, the lower the F number and a lower F number means a shallower depth of field and more light is let in through the opening. For example, the 18-55mm lense i was using yesterday had a widest aperture of f3.5 which gave me a much shallower depth of field than f22 . The narrower the aperture, the higher the F number which gives you a larger depth of field and lets less light into the opening.

We had a little experiment around the campus, to demonstrate this. I was using my Canon EOS 500D with my 18-55mm lense and had it set to aperture priority......

This one (above) was taken using 1/60sec f/3.5 ISO100

This is showing a shallow depth of field......the middle section of the image is in focus.

                                             This one was taken using 1/40sec f/20 ISO100
                                   Showing a larger depth of field as all of the image is in focus.

Another one demonstrating shallow depth of field. The closest part of the chair arm is out of focus and so is the building outside in the background but the furthest part of the chair arm is in focus. 

1/60sec f/3.5 ISO100

               
            And the same image demonstrating a large depth of field where everything is in focus
                                                                   0"6sec f/20 ISO100



In the following posts, i will experiment more with aperture and post some of my images. I'll also research some photographers who used a shallow depth of field in alot of their work.

HELLO!

Hi!! I'm Holly and this is the first blog I've ever done! I'm 22 and from just outside of Warrington. I work at Venture Photography in Warrington which i love and have previously worked in another portrait studio. I've always done Art related subjects throughout school and college and the latest one was about 3 years ago where I did a Level 3 BTEC diploma in Fine Art.

  I've just started this Level 3 Photography course............day 2 in fact, and I wanted to do this because I'm really interested in Photography but i want to explore other aspects rather than just portraiture. I've just got my new Canon EOS 500D and it's frustrating me a little bit but i'll get there!!! I enjoy taking snaps of landscapes and flowers and just random objects i see round and about but i want to be able to put my own stamp on the images and create something unique! (which i guess everyone wants to do). I'd love to try some fashion photography at some point as well because i love fashion and I think it's a form of art also.

 

 

That's all i can think of at the moment........I'm not very good at writing things.........I'd much prefer to just say things with images!

Bye for now!!!