Jan Groover

I have researched upon a photographer called Jan Groover. She is one of the most highly recognised still life photographers. In this video it shows how she manually edited her images using lightroom techniques. I am not fully focussing upon this but the types of images she produces are ones that interest me.

For example at the end of this video it shows how black and white and even sepia images can be very effective with texture, detail and especially depth of field.

Portraiture Shots

To get the best out of my portraiture photography, I decided to go and shoot a friend's band. This was on the 29th of December when they were releasing their E.P! They were very welcoming and grateful for the pictures. Also after looking up some techniques at this website i had the confidence to shoot the band in full manual.

Therefore I took my Canon 600D to shoot with and my 4GB SDHC Memory card and two lenses. These were my 18-55mm IS Canon lens and my 70-300mm IS /Macro Tamron Lens.

I had to be aware of quite a few precautions such as slipping as it was in a pub with many drinks, tripping over wires, being pushed into the band. Also i chose not to take the tripod as there would be too many people and not much space as the camera would've been pushed over.

Therefore i ended up taking around 565 pictures within the 4 hours. These were of 2 bands - The 5 Days Of November & Dizzy Missile. Then when I had came back home, i had narrowed the lot down to 74 images. Then I had a try and edited them to give them a vintage look. But they did not suit the theme of it being a band shoot so I just kept the originals. Then I narrowed the selection to 33 images Here are a few of those images...

I edited these pictures using photoshop cs5 using a mac. Some of the techniques i used to edit these were: adjusting the curves, adjusting the vibrance, adding a fade around the close-ups, cropping and changing the saturation. But i chose not to keep them like that because I would have lost out on the band style atmosphere and colours.

This image is a good portrait i shot as it shows the musician in a glaze at the crowd and also because he is toned and exposed correctly at the scene and with the theme. 

This is also a good shot I took because The composition has the rule of thirds involved. It has the fans on the sides whilst having a viewpoint of behind the crowd.

I thought this photograph was a well structured shot too because you have the guitarist focussed and the drummer out of focus at the back but you also have a very good angle to the shot.

This was one of my favourite shots because it has the lead singer in full focus and then the composition of the two other guitarists concentrating. This again, has the rule of thirds in place.

I thought this was a very good portrait because the shot included motion and a very dramatic shot of the lead guitarist. Also the background of the scene was fussy which suited the theme.

I thought this was also a very decent shot as the drummer was in full focus where as his kit was out of focus. The back wall also added the nice touch of filling the scene.

This shot of the lead guitarist is excellent because he has full focus on his face with perfect lighting of the atmosphere and also you have the motion of his hand struming the guitar. Not to mention the composition includes the microphone.

Seeming to be a very characteristic shot, this photo shows the band culture with the highly recognised converse pumps but also you have the wires and leads of the amps wiring around his feet. 

Marcus Maschwitz

 Currently living in London (United Kingdom) he specialises in Music and Band Photography including live music photography, portrait photography as well as album photography that can be used for artwork as well as marketing.

This is one of the type of photos i would like to capture when I do some band photography. This is because it features a large concert-like atmosphere. To create this there would need to be varied colours of lighting, floating fog, a good camera angle and also a great band leader shot that would pretend to bring the crowd up.

This is another type of shot tat i would like to achieve as it displays the band in a concert-fame type of form where they're all playing and singing. This shows the real band aroma. Not to mention that it is a black and white shot but you can still judge the atmosphere by including the lights in the shot and all of the equiptment.

I am aiming to attain a shot like this if I cannot do the others as it is a typical lead singer shot... it shows various effects. For example there is a good use of depth of field and also there is the Black & White feature. Also showing that the background of the scene looks as if the band was shot at a pub, this gives it a good look as the audience read it as it being a gig and the band being available and also gives the scene some more atmosphere. As the band shoot that I will be doing will be in a pub, I will be able to grab some shots like these too.

Eve Arnold

Eve Arnold, FRPS (born April 21, 1912) is an American photojournalist.She joined Magnum Photos agency in 1951, and became a full member in 1957. Famous people she has photographed include Marilyn Monroe, The Malitia in Inner Mongolia and she began to seriously use colour as a medium for photography. She began to seriously use colour as a medium for photography.

These shots release a sort of reportage or story behind the picture which is a key element which i want to ensure that i include in my photos. The Black and white effect also suits the image very well. Therefore I am going to aim to take a couple of shots like this where I can have more dramatic efffects.

This too also shows a key element to the modern day world and also expresses emotion, society. It works well with the grayscale effect too. Whenever I go on holiday I will aim to take pictures of characters that are engrained in the modern age news and our generations... for example here you can tell that there is still poverty and ill health in the world. Let alone it being a great photograph. I also would like to include the depth of field feature to my images like this one.

In this image Arnold has created a surreal environment. She has achieved this by adding a very characteristic old woman into a pitch black background so really the only visible part of her is her face. Her clothes and headwear are black so it makes her pale skin stand out even more. Also the woman is showing a very distressed emotion and since she looks slightly eastern/middle eastern it could show a story of war or other horrible stories in her country of origin.

Looking through her images I have understood that Eve Arnold goes for images that she can show the world. For example she takes photographs relevant to the time and the headlines.

Nicholas Nixon

Background Information
Nixon attended the University of Michigan, graduating in 1969 with a degree in English. He went on to earn an M.F.A. from the University of New Mexico in 1974. Nixon preferred the format because it allowed prints to be made directly from the 8x10 inch negatives, retaining the clarity and integrity of the image.His first solo exhibition was at the Museum of Modern Art curated by John Szarkowski in 1976.


His Style
Nixon has said "When photography went to the small camera and quick takes, it showed thinner and thinner slices of time, [unlike] early photography where time seemed non-changing. I like greater chunks, myself. Between 30 seconds and a thousandth of a second the difference is very large." Recording each of his many subjects close and with meticulous detail facilitates a deep connection between the viewer and the subject.

Here this picture shows emotion, tells a story, shows history and has many other characteristics. This is one of the features I aim to achieve.

I also aim to bring in features like this were i have extreme close-ups that can show, for example this picture shows less than half a face but it gives hint of emotion which tells a story and also gives the iage character.

Philip-Lorca diCorcia

Background Information
Philip-Lorca diCorcia (born 1951) is an American photographer. He studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Afterwards diCorcia attended Yale University where he received a Master of Fine Arts in Photography in 1979. He now lives and works in New York, and teaches at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.


His Style
DiCorcia alternates between informal snapshots and iconic quality staged compositions that often have a baroque theatricality.His photographs would then give a sense of heightened drama to the passers-by accidental poses, unintended movements and insignificant facial expressions. Even if sometimes the subject appears to be completely detached to the world around him, diCorcia has often used the city of the subject's name as the title of the photo, placing the passers-by back into the city's anonymity.

As you can see in this picture diCorcia captures so much character in this mans face by just taking a photo of them without them wanting/knowing it. This is a good technique as it reveals the true person behind them and shows great expressions. This was one of diCorcia's talents.

This again was taken by a hidden camera (one of diCorcia's)  but shows such a good image like it was modelled for. The shot shows true character and story, for example it shows true gentleman-ship and love. Not to mention the culture of the place behind showing maybe a holiday trip.

This is another image where the person was not ready for the image and was instead focusing on what he was doing. This is what diCorcia does best, he realises the moment and captures it immediately. This could be handful for me as it displays a unique type of photography where you really do capture "the moment.

Another very typical image for diCorcia shows the many ways people can look at images depending on their initial views on these topics. For example, in this case the man could just be looking to his left, or he could be a very rude and dirty man... diCorcia lets the viewer decide upon the stories behind his photographs. This is one feature i would love to present in my images.