Darkroom - Developing film and printmaking

Developing film 

I was lucky enough to have been able to use and learn about the darkroom rules in college, so i was quite familiar with it. But it was good to refresh my mind with everything. I was a bit torn at first because of being shown two different techniques of developing, but i guess i just went with the technique i felt more comfortable with.

 

  

Like these pictures shows, you measure 75ml of developer and dilute that with water to 300ml, pour in to dev tank. With a thermometer check the temperature, it must be 20°c.Once the temperature is at 20°c pour the developer in your dev tank, agitate for a minute and let it rest for 10 second do this for 20minutes. Then through the developer away after the 20mintues and pour stop bath in the dev tank, i don't really measure this i just pour it in until i think its enough. Agitate this for 20seconds but i sometimes leave it in for longer for maybe a minute or two. The stop bath and fixer can be reused so once the 20seconds or longer is up pour it back in the bottle. Then pour the fixer in, again i don't really measure how much i put in. I leave this in for about 5minutes, agitating it for every minute until i need to pour it back in the bottle. And wash the film in clean water for 20minutes i normally leave it in a little longer just to make sure all the chemicals have washed off so about 25-30minutse i don't leave it in any longer then that.

 

Over all I've actually developed four strips of film but only two of them came out, well one and a half the picture on the right, only half of the film developed. I'm not quit sure whats happened, at first i thought that i put the film in my camera wrong but then i was told that maybe I've over exposed my picture but i thought when you do that there's still some sort of out line of your subject on the negatives and not just a blank strip but I'm not sure.

Weirdly enough its still been fun getting it wrong, even though its also frustrating because you've lost all of your images. 

  

Printmaking

With printmaking you would use the same chemicals as you would when developing film, only your experimenting with an enlarger and using test trips to help you determine what exposure is the correct one.

With this process i've learnt new ways of enhancing the contrast of my prints with filters and my hands (Dodge and Burn). Although i haven't actually used the technique with my hands yet, I've been experimenting more with the filters and seeing the different effects i can get, i think its a very hands on technique (see what i did there?). I think that's what makes the darkroom process so magical, you wouldn't get the sort of creative self editing you could say, with digital. Your putting yourself in the process of developing your prints, which is kind of cool :).

Print 2

Print 1

Final print

 So this is one of my prints, as you can see print 1 is over exposed its on 15 seconds intervals and i didn't use any filters on it. I was happy with the blacks being exposed for 15 seconds but the whites where just blown out so i lost some of the detail. Print 2 was also exposed for 15 seconds but i used a 00 filter which helps to enhance the whites and bring the detail back. First exposing my image for 15 seconds without the filter then exposing it for another 25 seconds with the filter. You can see that some of the detail is starting to come back but its still over exposed, so i went up another two stops and got 35. Again exposing my image for 15 seconds without the filter, then with the filter for another 35 seconds and i got my final print. (the corner still looks over exposed on the picture but i think that's just off the scanner)     

I do like my print but i think i could have work on it more and made the contrast more stronger. On its own it look good but put next to this print it doesn't look so good any more. 

I used the same technique with this print as my other one, using the 00 filter. The first print i did of this images was the wrong way and i didn't actually notice until i had the right amount of seconds for the exposure (bit embarrassing).

 The same with this print as well i didn't notice i printed it the wrong way until i had everything right for the exposure.

 

I'm happy with my prints so far, I'm excited to develop more and see how they turn out. I think I'm going to keep the theme I've stared and try to expand on it.

 

 

History of Street Photography

"Street photography is a tradition that dates back to the invention of photography. The invention of photography in the early 20th century coincided with the urbanisation and globalisation of the world.

Therefore the first photographs ever taken were generally done in the streets. So the start of photography was the start of street photography." - Eric Kim

http://erickimphotography.com/blog/2013/03/04/timeless-insights-you-can-learn-from-the-history-of-street-photography/

Jacob Riis

Riis, (1849-1914) spent the majority of his work photographing and documenting the lives of poor immigrants in the slums of New York City. He is well known for his book 'How The Other Half Lives' published in 1890. Which documents the tenements of New York. The book was meant to make the upper classes of New York aware of the conditions and show how the poor lived.

I read that the title for his book is a reference from a sentence wrote by french writer Francois Rabelais, who wrote "one half of the world does not know how the other half lives".

 

The Tramp 1887 Jacob Riis

Riis was in and out of poverty and employment, i think this is a big part of why Riis was trying to get people aware of the slums because he had experienced something similar and wanted to help and make a change.

Riis was one of the first American photographer to use flash photography. Ive noticed that in most of Riis' photos his subjects are looking at him, whether he asked them to or if their just looking because their intrigued at what hes doing I'm not sure. But i think it makes his photos more meaningful and adds to the sadness.

Bandit's Roost by Jacob Riis, New York, 1888

 
Riis had a talent of writing which landed him a job at the local news paper. He eventually worked as a police reporter for the New York Tribune.

Its been said that this photograph was used as inspiration for one of the opening screen shots in the film 'Gangs Of New York'

(But i haven't seen the film so I'm not sure if this is true.)

The dedication Riis shows in his work and him trying to show awareness of the poor is quiet inspiring. I think it pushes you to help more if you've experienced something similar or the same as the person your trying to help. It gives you motivation to try change and make something better. 

Overall i think that Riis is a really good photographer, his images capture your attention and make you ask questions. Each one tells its own story and are intriguing to look at.

     

Eugene Atget 

 Atget, (1857-1927) was a french photographer who documented all the architecture and street scenes of Paris. He ignored the new, modern buildings set out to capture the character and details of the mature streets.

He tried painting and acting but choose photography as his profession and supported himself by selling his work to painters as studies.

Atget referred to his work as documents instead of photographs or images, he seems like a secluded photographer his work is quiet and there's not a lot happening in them. It looks like hes the only person at the locations hes capturing. There very eerie, bizarre in a way. Why aren't there any people there?

Atget's style is interesting, he captured the old and not the new. Usually when you hear that something new and big has been built you would want to go and photograph it but he ignored new things its quite strange.

I wonder if he had to wait in the streets then capture them when there wasn't anyone around... 

 Paul Strand 

Strand (1890-1976) is an American photographer who's main focus was different cultures and people.

                                        

Paul Strand
The Family, Luzzara, Italy
1953

Paul Strand Wall Street 1915

From the work I've seen of Strands, he has two sort of themes if you will. One being very abstract and natural the other being more formal in a way. Ive picked these two images of Strands because i thought they best showed the themes. You can see in 'Wall Street' that this image is more abstract and quite natural. With the building and people to the shadows and composition. I think the contrast is a big part of this image, it brings everything together. You can see the detail on the building and even some on the people. I think its a really interesting image. Then with 'The Family' its more formal not because of their clothes you can see their poor, i guess its because of there stances and attitudes maybe. I don't know maybe I'm using the wrong word to describe this. Its just you can see that this image is very different from 'Wall Street'. Its quite sad actually, obviously their a family the mother and her sons. But they don't look very close or happy, they seem like they have better things to do then take a family photo. Their facial expressions are quite grim they have on connection with each other like they have no interest with one another. I do still like the image, i still find it interesting it makes you ask questions and think, its just intriguing because its different and quite unusual.

  

Paul Strand - "Look at the things around you, the immediate world around you. If you are alive, it will mean something to you, and if you care enough about photography, and if you know how to use it, you will want to photograph that meaningness. If you let other people's vision get between the world and your own, you will achieve that extremely common and worthless thing, a pictorial photograph".

Ive also seen that Strand has many ranges of subjects from portraits to landscapes, abstractions and machinery. To me Strands work of portraits and his abstractions are the strongest, his portraits show emotion and character the contrast within his images are really strong. His abstractions look to be around the theme of shadows and lines which i find is a common thing for photographers to take an interest in.

Strand also took an interest in film making, he and Charles Sheeler created a short film Manhatta in 1921 which looks to document the city life. The movement of people, water, boats and other things. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qduvk4zu_hs

Umbo 

Umbo/ Otto Umberhr (1902-1980) was a German photographer. Throughout the 1930s and early 1940s, Umbo worked as a freelance photojournalist, travelling to North Africa and Italy on assignments. 

 

Umbo
[Mystery of the Street]
1928

Umbo looks at photography in a different perspective, he uses unusual camera angles. Like Strand, Umbo works with shadows. In these images the shadows seem more real then just a shape on the ground for me there the first thing i notice when i look at these images even though there just silhouettes they have so much detail and stand out from everything else. I like Umbo's creativity with his work, hes defiantly one of the photographers i like from this project. 

Walker Evans

Evans (1903-1975) is an American Photographer, who inspired many Street Photographers such as Lee Friedlander, Diane Arbus and Robert Frank. Evans is most famous for his work for the Farm Security Administration, documenting the effects of the Great Depression. 












After documenting the Great Depression Evans turned his attention to the subway in New York City capturing shots of subway riders. He tried hiding his camera in his jacket but in some of his images you can see some of the subjects are looking directly at the camera. Its quite humorous actually, Evans basically snuck a camera on a train and took pictures of people with out them knowing resulting in him capturing real, everyday pictures.

 
 


I find this image interesting, there's so many different characters at different ages but there all brought together by the hats and fur which creates a relationship you could say with each subject.

In 1966 Evans published the book Many Are Called, collaborating with James Agee which documents his work on the subway. Agee wrote the introduction for Evans book and wrote,

Those who use the New York subways are several millions…They are members of every race and nation of the earth. They are of all ages, of all temperaments, of all classes, of almost every imaginable occupation. Each is incorporate in such an intense and various concentration of human beings as the world has never known before. Each, also, is an individual existence, as matchless as a thumbprint or a snowflake. Each wears garments which of themselves are exquisitely subtle uniforms and badges of their being. Each carries in the postures of his body, in his hands, in his face, in the eyes, the signatures of a time and a place in the world upon a creature for whom the name immortal soul is one mild and vulgar metaphor.

Again like Riis' work i think Evans images are intriguing to look at, they show history and character, show narrative and are appealing to the eye. 

                                        

What is Street Photography?

Street Photography,

Many people think its about the candid image, capturing people at their more vulnerable state. Some, capture only the streets showing the crisp detail of the buildings. Others go out only to try capture the perfect decisive moment. Something that only comes round once, and is gone in seconds. From researching the subject I've come to understand it more. My original thoughts on what Street Photography is where quite close minded, i thought that for an image to be a street photograph it had to be candid, on a street with people. But from looking at street photographers and their work I've become more open minded. Ive learnt that street photography can be anything, within reason. It doesn't have to necessarily be on the street, it can be anywhere that's open to the public. And it doesnt have to be a candid image for it to be seen as a street photograph.