Photo Essay

This photo essay explores the idea of how an acorn not only can provide sustenance for animals but also can stregthen people's spiritual lives.

Photo Essay (continued)

Assignment: Ordinary to Extraordinary

The photo on top was taken at the Basilica by the organ pipes, which can be seen in the background. I thought this photo was successful in capturing the shadows cast by the relief, but I thought it could be taken to another level using Photoshop and its filters. The bottom photo shows the finished product after alterations using Photoshop. I cropped the organ pipes out of the photo. I then adjusted the level of lighting by using the 18% graycard so that the warm color tones did not interfere with the impact of the photo. I originally used a flare in the middle of the dove, but I thought it was too distracting, so I decided to change my idea. Under "filter" and "render," I chose the "five lights up" filter in order to place the focus on the dove.

This photo was taken by the pillars between the law school and the Pryz. It reminded me of the photo assignment from a couple of weeks ago in which shadow had to be the subject matter. I think shadow makes the photo much more dramatic, especially the leading lines it forms.

This scene near Union Street in Alexandria caught my eye by the way the light was reflected underneath the structure of the bridge. This photo serves as an example of how architectural elements can be enhanced depending on the lighting.

This photo of McMahon Hall was taken on Saturday, Nov. 14, 2009. I thought the fall colors on the trees were quite striking. I altered the original photo by calibrating it using the 18% graycard since it was very cloudy that day.

These photos were taken at Benedict's in Monroe, CT.
Since Thanksgiving is drawing near, here's a photo to help get into the spirit of thanks.




















A family of owls, which is actually a bunch of stones that can be used for a front entrance walk.

Here's a statue of a couple of frogs. I thought it was a unique statue and other statues around it provided a good background to use as a setting for it.

This series of photographs is a different take on "the unseen." The picture to the left shows a before picture from the point of view of Broadway and Exchange Place before the Yankees tickertape parade started on Nov. 6, 2009. The picture below that shows toilet paper streaming from the overhead flagpoles, which is not a usual sight in NYC.

This photo also shows toilet paper and all sorts of other things used as confetti thrown onto the streets of NYC during the parade.

The Unseen

Here are some interpretations of "the unseen." I think the shape of the lights form an interesting shape, which looks like an arrow.












The reflection in the window of the Fairfield University library almost looks like a mirror. This reflects a similar idea explored in class last week of including the photographer in the photo. I think it's unique that one of the outside lights was showing on one of my legs, which indicates that there's something about the photograph that's unexpected.

Here's another similar photograph which shows a mirror-like effect in the window of the desks and chairs.

Assignment: One Shot

For my assignment, I had to capture "light building". I thought of different ideas that included finding buildings that were dramatically lit on the outside, but then I realized that there was a perfect opportunity to capture "light building" on campus. The structure of the Pryz is such where the light that shines on the inside can also be seen on the outside at night. This allows it to be a more inviting building at night because of the light that emanates from it. I often have noted over these past weekends that it has been unfortunate to have to shoot pictures in the rain, but I found that the reflection off the sidewalk from the rain worked to enhance the photo. This gives further emphasis to the subject, "light building".





I decided to see what alterations could be done using Photoshop that could give the photo more character. First, I flipped the photo 180 degrees, then applied the watercolor and smudge functions. This gives it a more dramatic feel I think, inspired by the waterlilies of Monet.

Here's a picture of some flowers on campus. The top picture is the original and the bottom picture has been altered with Photoshop using the watercolor function. I think the bottom picture is more successful in placing focus on the subject, the flowers, than the top one is because the detail of the soil is not as sharp in the bottom picture. The detail in the soil distracts the eye from the flowers. There is a stark contrast as well between the red and yellow of the flowers and the soil, which further places focus on the flowers.

The top picture is the original. The bottom picture has been altered using Photoshop. I used the midtone dropper to achieve the desired grayscale of 18%. I then altered the midtone level by adding more highlight. I liked the leading line formed by the flower bunches in this picture surrounding the subject of a bigger thistle bush.

Thoughts of Spring

These pictures were taken by some flower bushes outside the Basilica. With these pictures, I tried my hand at nature photography. I wished I could have gotten some better angles of the bee, but it didn't stay in one place for too long, so it was difficult to capture it at a good angle.

Light and Shadow Assignment

This picture was taken in Sleepy Hollow, NY. To place more focus on the shadow of the house as the subject, I could have cropped the picture, but I thought that it would add more interest to include the house. Since the top of the house is cropped, the shadow allows the viewer to see what the house top looks like.

This picture was taken at Sunnyside, Washington Irving's home in Sleepy Hollow, NY. I like how the light was shining through the trees so that it was highlighting some of the tops of the plants while others remained in shadow.

Here is another picture which places more focus on the plants receiving the light from the sun.

I took this picture using an aperture of f/5.6 a and shutter speed of 1/40, which allowed for more focus on the subject, the leaves in the foreground. I like how the settings on the camera were able to be manipulated in this way. It allowed for more flexibility to create the image that I wanted to capture.

This picture was taken in Connecticut. I think it shows a perfect fall setting, but the photo could be improved with more focus on the horse.

Fall in New England

Here is a picture taken on October 23, 2009, of an actual pumpkin, grown in western Pennsylvania, that weighs 570 pounds. I couldn't believe how big the pumpkin was when I was up close to it. Its magnitude is obvious with the other smaller pumpkins overshadowed by it.

I like the contrast that the light creates in these two pictures taken in Connecticut of a river. There is a bridge overhead, so it was blocking some light from reaching the river and cast a shadow. I think the bottom picture shows a lot of texture to the water, so it could be argued that the bottom picture is more interesting than the top picture. The top picture, however, has a lot of texture in the rocks, which occupy half the space in the photograph. The top picture from this standpoint is successful as well.

10/19 sunny

The top photo is the original taken of the altar inside the Basilica. The picture was taken on October 19, 2009. It was a sunny day and the only light source for the picture was the light from outside shining through the stained-glass windows. There was minimal tungsten light inside the Basilica. The bottom picture was altered using Photoshop. It is much more successful than that from Oct. 18, 2009, since the walls behind the altar are less warm in tone. The colors of the walls match better to how they should be after the calibration using the highlight dropper.





calibrated

10/18 - cloudy

The top picture is of the altar in the Basilica. On October 18, 2009, it was starting to get dark outside and it also cloudy, so the light that is visible in the picture is mostly due to the lights in the Basilica, or tungsten light. The bottom picture has been altered using Photoshop using the highlight dropper in order to calibrate it. The top photo has a lot of red, yellow, and orange in the photo. The bottom photo is much improved in terms of allowing the true hues to show. However, the limitation existed in determining what white to choose to base the other colors off of due to the risk of losing too much information. More should probably be done to eliminate the yellow tone to the walls, but it would have to be done carefully so that more information in the picture is not lost.

10/19 sunny

The top picture is the original picture taken on October 19, 2009. The lighting conditions were different from the day before since it was a bright, sunny day with few clouds in the sky. The bottom picture has been calibrated using Photoshop. There is only a slight difference between the original and the calibration in the tone of the stone material of the Baslicia has less blue in it. More work would need to be done to improve the calibration, but it was rather difficult to calibrate the original photo since any true white tone that was chosen caused the picture to lose too much information. In this sense, it was advantageous to do as little as possible with the photo to alter it.

10/18 - cloudy

The picture on top is the original while the picture on the bottom has been altered using Photoshop. This picture was taken on October 18, 2009. It was a cloudy day. While some information in the photograph of the sky has been lost in the calibration, the structure of the Basilica is more true to life in its tone since the stone does not have as much of a blue tone as the original does.

These photos are the product of an experiment I tried using tungsten as the setting in the top photograph versus daylight as the setting in the bottom photograph. Tungsten does not adjust well to the light of the sun as it casts a blue haze on the photo while under the same lighting conditions daylight gives the subject more natural color tones.