Michal Giedrojc

I found Michal looking on the blog, 500 Photographers. He is a Polish photographer who just started showing his work in America. Usually work like this frustrates me because I like the simple way of making photographs minus the fake manipulation but his Dreams series really interests me.

I chose these three images because they all have this emotional quality to them that makes you feel what each figure could be feeling. The compositions in all of his images seem to be centered like these three and usually they don't interest me, but here they seem to work. The manipulation is not done too far either which keeps me interested because too much doesn't keep me focused.

Phillip Toledano

This week, I decided that I wanted to post some portraits that interested me. I don't lean towards portraiture as an interest usually, mostly because they aren't something I like to shoot. When I found Toledano's work, I was very drawn towards his series on his father who has lost his short term memory.

I chose these two portraits because I think he portrayed the emotion him and his father were feeling very well without explanation. The facial expressions he captured were perfect and the colors add even more to the feel of the portrait. I would have cropped the one on the left differently but it was still captured well.

Michael Kenna

I chose Michael Kenna for my blog this week after looking at his work and realizing his photography is a great example of what I want to do with my work.
He has many different series based on different places and things all around the world. I enjoy his work because he is very aware of light and space and his abstractions are beautiful. I also feel as if it relates greatly to what I was planning to accomplish with my mirror/window assignment.

This is a photograph Kenna shot in China. It appears to be a fence in a field of snow. I really like how he divided that space in this because it isn't split perfectly down the middle or to the side. I like how he framed it to start off to the side and zig-zag across the page to the background into the horizon. It really interested me how abstracted but simple and real it is.

This was the main picture on Kenna's website and being the first thing I saw, captured my attention immediately. Again, Kenna has a very strong sense of light and he knows how to use it to his advantage. He has each tone so perfectly and beautifully on the page it keeps me looking at it to figure out what exactly it is and because it is so beautiful and well executed.

Taken in France at a wool factory. I thought it was something completely different before I read the title. I assumed it was taken in nature and was some kind of outdoor element. I love the light behind the object and the way it consumes the space from all angles. I wouldn't have used depth of field the way he did, because I would have been nerveous as to how it would come out; but it looks beautiful. I also like his use of the borders up top. It adds to the photograph making it uniform all around.

Anita Calero

When it comes to different types of photography, I tend to be very stubborn with the types I'm attracted to. I never really found photographs that were set up to be interesting but when I attempted to shoot one myself, I began to see what really goes into a set up and how long it takes to create a really good photo without the spontaneous aspect.
I found Anita Calero online, and I found her setups to be obviously planned but very well executed.

The above images were made on her personal time for her own collection. I couldn't find what they were actually shot for or the reasoning behind them, but to me they portray death and beauty after it. I love the birds because they have this lively quality with the strong blue color but show death with how they lay and where they're situated in the frame. The butterfly wasn't my favorite of hers, but it caught my eye when relating it to the other photographs in the series.

This image was for an advertising campaign. It was obviously set up as well, but the composition and colors show the meaning of the campaign and it gets the point across with little chaos and a lot of interesting details.

Bill Brandt

I chose Bill Brandt as an artist that relates to my mirror/window assignment because his ideas for 2 of his series relate closely to mine. Brandt is widely known for his high contrast images of nude bodies and landscapes. I like that each image makes you look closer at it and really think about what it is; which is what I'm trying to accomplish with my mirror/window assignment.

This image of the Grand Canal in England reminded me of one the images I created and I loved how similar they were.

The above 2 images are both photographs of nudes abstracted in a way that makes you glance back multiple times. If I had photographed the hands above, I would have cropped closer in to maybe give the viewer more possibilities of what it  could be. As for the bottom image, I think Brandt really captured the body in a beautiful way and I wouldn't change the composition or anything else about it.

James Wojcik

I stumbled upon this really interesting photographer, James Wojcik, who photographs everything from bottles and pipes to jewelry and fashion. His interests span widely but stay strong when photographing them.
The series of his that really interested me the most was his food series. I tried over the summer, to photograph different fruits and vegetables by manipulating them and cutting them to reveal the insides with a light from behind and most of them came out pretty well but these photographs inspired me more.

I love the vibrant colors and the back drop behind the red cabbage. The tones and detail in the lettuce leaf are really interesting as well. Maybe if he cropped the red cabbage in a bit closer to show more detail in a smaller space, it would improve the image.