Liam Drury's ART 240 Blog

 Anthony Goicolea's works of composites, including self portraits, crazy looking scenes, and story telling have all been an inspiration for my own works I've done for the most recent assignment in making compositions. He uses a technique where he puts the camera in a single position, and snaps tons of pictures of himself doing many different actions, poses, and facial expressions. This first image titled Feastlings  is of him in uniforms, having a frantic feast in a rather elegant setting. He makes it looks like quite a messy scene, conveying chaos with the many hims in the picture. The way he positions himself to be interacting with another version of himself so well tells me there must be assistants that he uses in order to place his hands where they should go, then positioning himself again where said placeholder was. There had to have been at least 10 or more images layered and cut over each other to make such a scene. This piece, titled Backshed  consists of himself ...

 Robert Mapplethorpe's still life photos are mostly done using very dramatic lighting, and I would argue most of the time singularly focused on one object, or maybe a couple at most. His backgrounds are simple, or have nothing at all to them, and are often very dramatic, and very direct. This piece, titled Tarantula was done using what looks like a direct light shining directly at the tarantula, seemingly coming to a close the further back it goes. It looks as if it was taken from a dark room as a door way opens slightly, letting in a bit of light. Mapplethorpe probably used a similar technique to get his lighting this way, of course here it's done artificially, blocking off two sides of the light, making a sort of doorway like structure in front of the light. Not the best way to describe it I suppose but I see how he did it. It seems rather direct too rather than shining on top of the subject the way the shadows go directly behind the spider instead of being under it. This mak...

Philip Lorca-Dicorcia's work is heavily involved in street photography, mostly used to imitate or exaggerate the effects of natural light in a certain image. His technique seems to involve heavy use of strobes, as well as gels in order to create colored lighting. Often times his lighting is very faint, making it look natural rather than being very direct and abrasive like that of most portrait photographers.  In this piece titled Brent Booth, Lorca-Dicorcia uses a late night scene as his backdrop, and sets up Booth at a table with a classical looking pepsi carton alongside an old wagon, giving the photo vintage vibes. The blueish light shining on booth isn't super direct, and is a blueish tone as if to convey he sits under a streetlamp, or a large fast food sign, or maybe he sits outside of an establishment with wide open windows and the lights on inside. The point is, he looks like he sits somewhere just based on the way the light hits him. The lights solely point out the peps...

 Annie Leibovitz is a world famous photographer who is well known for her celebrity portraiture, as well as creative style. She is often known for being very specific and demanding when it comes to putting what she sees in her head into a photo. Being such a difficult person to work with is what makes her such an incredible photographer, not afraid to tweak the smallest and most annoying things to make the shot perfect. She is known more recently for doing work for Vogue, doing cover shots as well as content photos.  In these two images, Leibovitz demonstrates to the actress, Jessica Chastain, exactly how to pose for the image she sees in her head. She acts sort of like a film director, except for just one frame. The use of photoshop and almost a sense of fiction is very present in her staged images like this, as capturing a moment like the one shown in the top would be a lot harder while obtaining the desired effects Leibovitz is going after.  I personally prefer her Vog...

 Trent Parke is a photographer who works with light manipulation. Many of his photos range from images that are blurred due to long exposure, as well as images with absolutely beautiful lighting. Many of his images require special equipment like underwater cameras. One thing all of the images have in common though is light. He says "I am forever chasing light. Light turns the ordinary into magical." He displays so in his images, showing off his eye for colors, beautiful yet not overdone contrasts, and spectacularly composed images.  The first image of his I want to look at is this one, which seems to have been taken while making the shutter open and close multiple times, capturing both the seemingly odd flash while still having the people seem clear as day in the image. How did he do this? Did he take half of the image at night and the other part during the day? It's extremely mind boggling how he does these images, and truly shows his understanding of light and how to us...

 David Levinthal is a photographer who works in forced perspective and illusionary photography. His ability to make small things look big and toys look like real people seems to be the main attribute of his work. Most of his photos are given a rustic look, making them look like old images of soldiers in the heat of war, or on a movie set. He most likely uses a micro lens (I believe that is what they are called) to capture the high detail on the figures. He also occasionally uses blurring images to his advantage to give the effect of an armature photographer not capturing the features of a soldier's face when in reality, the toy soldier has no face to show. In my own photography, I am using much larger figures and putting them in natural environments rather than staged settings in studios. He also uses lighting to give a dramatic effect, which is something I myself have also taken into account in my own images.  One Technique I see in his images is figure modification to pose t...

 Arno Minnikin's work as a self portrait photographer seems to use his own sort of poetic license when taking his pictures, as rather than displaying the human face, he displays other things like arms and legs, often submerging himself in water, or somehow hiding the rest of his body. The extraordinary amount of detail/crispness of his images stands out to me too, as proper focus is a very difficult part of self portraiture, and is something I myself have struggled with immensely.    Minnikin's Porttaits often feature subjects or backgrounds of nature. The obvious desire for extreme contrast is apparent here, but in some of his other shoots, he tries to make himself seem as if he is part of the scene. His ability to sort of conform to the landscape makes for some astonishing photos too.   His ability to sort of set scenes with parts of himself, relating to either experiences or the background itself is all part of his art. Rather than using his surroundings to make h...