Final Piece Preparation

For my final piece I have decided to use what I have learnt so far from my portraits photography and produce a group of pictures of a single subject. I will use a variety of angles and I am hoping to use an interesting backdrop - such as a forest - rather than a simpler studio backing. Having seen what can be acheived with both natural and artificial lighting I will use a combination of both for my photos, mainly dependent on the conditions when I take the photographs. Due to the current weather artificial light maybe to needed, in which case I will opt for LED lights as they provide a more neutral blue light than say a tungsten bulb, which gives a very dominating but more intensive orange light. I will try and get some darker moodier photographs which can be aided by the weather. Using artificial light will allow for a lower ISO and a sharper photo will much less noise.

Zooming In

I decided to experiment with styles and this is a technique that has been wildely used and experimented with. For this shot I used a slightly slower shutter speed and an ISO of roughly 400/800. By using a 40mm - 150mm lens I was able to zoom from around 55mm closer to 150mm whilst the photograph was being taken. I like the finished result although I decided to compare this image to what photoshop could acheive with the Radial Blur tool.













There is quite a difference between these two pictures. The one accomplished manually (top) with a camera zoom has far more highlighted streaks and there is much more clarity of the surroundings. The photoshop one (bottom) however has a consistant blur around the subject, possibly as depth of field affects blur focus on the camera shot. Overall I prefer the manually taken shot as it is less blurred and still retains a depth of field with identifiable features in the image.

Macro Portraits

These portraits of the human eyes were acheived by using roughly 2.5" of macrotubes combined with a 150mm zoom lens. By using macrotubes the lens' zoom became the method for focusing.
Getting the focus correct on these photos required numerous attempts as the depth of field was so small. These two are part of a small group of images that came out with the focus in the correct place. I am very proud of how they came out, especially the brown eyed shot, as it is looking directly into the eye.

Natural Sunlight 3

This photo I took uses the sunlight to highlight one side of the face and throw the otherside into deep shadow. As this was candidI couldn't control the angle of the face although and I feel that if the subject was looking towards the camera the constrast would be more noticable. By using a large f/5.6 aperture a clear depth of field has been captured draw the viewer's attention to the face.

Natural Sunlight 2

This photo was taken at the same time as the previous shot but with the subject at a different angle. The skin looks paler and with the light coming from behind the subject there are slight shadows across the face, but instead of being a nuisance ot helps enhance the curvature and gradient of the face. The depth of field superbly highlights the face whilst throwing the background out of focus, greating a clear focal point.

Natural Sunlight

I took this photo using natural sunlight to provide the lighting. It was taken candidly and I think the end result is quite good. The orange sunset has complemented the complexion of the subject to provide a warm feeling to he photo. The light also provides some glint from the tinsel but not too much as to distract the eye.