Semester One Portfolio

Basic PhotoShop and Camera Controls

Triptych/Diptych/Kaleidescope

I chose to make this triptych because I decided that the central image, the lightpole, would work well with a horizontally cropped image. There is also an idea of texture contrast here, with the rusty metal in the 'background' and the newer metal in the foreground.

This triptych demonstrates the idea of different "kinds" of trees. In the background, or the images on the side, the tree-branches are showing a lot of contrast, whereas in the middle image, the background behind the tree is simply a grey building. The comparison of these two types of foreground-tree images makes the back image much more vivid.

This is another example of texture contrast, with the diagonal stripes of the wood above and the horizontal stripes of the wood below. The colors remain the same, only the texture changes, both in the wood itself and in its direction.

This diptych represents the idea of how different something can be when seen from two different angles. One of these images, I took while looking upwards into the sky, and the other one I took while looking through buildings straight into the sun. Although the light from the sun creates an uncomfortable vertical line, it does show how much brighter it is compared to the horse statue, and makes the horse statue much darker in comparison.

In this kaleidoscope, the cyclical pattern demonstrates the idea of color contrast. In the foreground, we have the bright golden shapes, and in the background, we have the bleak black glass building.

This kaleidoscope does not demonstrate any kind of contrast, however, the way I edited it by accentuating the color of the berries and blurring out the background gives an impression of depth behind the image/

Grids

This grid is from a photo I took during a previous project. To make the colors in this grid complementary (red and green) I adjusted the colors to change hues of orange to red, and hues of yellow to green. This way, instead of appearing like a combination of red, orange, yellow and green, it has only red and green, which are complementary colors.

This grid is composed of photos that I took during a snow day. It depicts a rugged sheet of ice, and clearly conveys a colder feeling, as it is, by definition, a picture of a cold thing. To accentuate this feeling, I put more emphasis on blue hues, which is a naturally cool color.

This grid is also one that I took for a previous project, but did not use. It depicts a close up/filling the frame of potatoes, which, since they are quite uniform, functioned easily for a monochromatic picture.

This is a grid that depicts warmth. To make this grid, I used emphasis on red and orange colors, not only through saturation, but also luminance. Since these are warm colors, this grid conveys a feeling of warmth.

This photo is one I edited to show mood. Since it has vibrant red colors in the focused foreground, it conveys a very warm and positive mood, but since the background is white and cool, it also has a slightly contrasting background mood. This is important because it makes the mood of the foreground more accentuated, as there is something drastically different to compare it to.

Color Wheel

Project 2-Framing and Composition

This photo is one that I took while walking near the Farmer's Market. I saw the way that the sun shone off the head of the horse when I looked at it from a certain angle, and decided that the way the light from the sun creates a line could be a very interesting way to illustrate the Rule of Thirds concept. In this photo, I tried to accentuate the contrast between the lights and darks, as well as cropping it so that it conformed to the Rule of Thirds.

This is a photo that I took in the courtyard of the Portland Art museum. I decided that the way that the head of the horse reflected onto the glass table was interesting, as the texture of the horse statue is very unique, and lends to no misunderstanding as to the identity of the reflection. When editing this photo, I used the "brush" tool to increase the vibrance and saturation of the actual reflection, while slightly decreasing that of the statue. This creates a difficult to notice surrealism to the picture, as well as making the actual table the focal point of the image.

This is a photo of a "Chinese Lantern" that I found in my yard. When taking the photo itself, I set up the object dangling in front of a mirror with a flash on my camera in order to make the lantern look like it's glowing, but also so there is a subtle reflection of the object, as seen in the above image. When editing, I used the "Color Saturation Tool" to modify and increase the Saturation/Luminance of Reds and Oranges in this photo, as well as using the brush tool to make the backdrop completely black, in order to further increase the contrast and "glowing" feeling of the subject.

In this photo, I used two techniques: Bird's Eye View and Rule of Thirds. When I took this photo, I had in mind the idea of the concrete "walling in" the vegetation, and I kept this idea throughout the editing. For this reason, I used the brush+feather tool in order to make the concrete walls completely unsaturated, and to let that lack of saturation "bleed" into the plants and foliage. After that, I used a combination of the selective color tool and the brush tool to increase the saturation on the "inner" plants, which shows an ardent contrast as opposed to the "outer" plants.

When taking this photo, I decided that I wanted the image to look like it was seen by a "bug" going up the tree trunk. When editing in, I used increases saturation on Greens and lowered saturation on Oranges in order to create a lot of contrast between the moss and the tree trunk. 

This is a photo that I took near the Farmer's Market it demonstrates leading lines. The combination of the diagonal roof of the church and the lamp post focuses the attention of the viewer to the small golden shape on top of the building. To create this, I lined up the lamp post when taking the picture, then used specific line-based effects to draw the attention to the center, notably the two parallel trees on each side with higher saturation.

This photo, which I took in the Pearl District, demonstrates the framing technique of "Diagonals". The way that I emphasized this technique is that rather than making the two diagonals symmetrical or parallel, I decided to make them different angles altogether. I emphasized this by using several editing techniques to brighten some colors, as well as modify the hues of different ones. I also made the two sides opposite brightness-es (i.e. light and dark) to emphasize their differences. 

This is a photo that I took at one of the stalls at the Farmer's market. I chose to photograph this object because I felt that it was very bright in contrast with the dull cement around it, and that therefore it should be able to "shine on its own" and not have the cement darken the image. For that reason, I used the technique of "filling the frame" for this image, to show the brightness of the winter squash. When editing this photo, I used a combination of Saturation adjusters, Hue adjusters and the brush tool to bring more focus and vibrance to the center of the image, while keeping the frame clearly full of a single entity. 

CONTACT SHEET:

Project 1

I edited this photo by making only the tree in focus as well as adjusting the saturation in order to 

add color and vibrance to the picture, while not making it surreal.

I wanted to make the "veins" in the stem more visible, so I adjusted some effects to make the photo more red, and thus add emphasis and contrast onto the green.

I made this picture seem more professional and "alive" by dramatically increasing the saturation and sharply increasing the contrast.

In order to make the orange-red on the leaves seem more red, I increased the saturation and decreased the warmth, thus allowing the deep red to contrast with the icy sky.

This photo I simply wanted to make more jovial and luminescent, so I increased the saturation and brightness, reduced the contrast and sharpness.

With this photo I wanted the center to be on the bottom, so I created a focus point on the neon sign in order to make the backdrop blurry and hazy, further encouraging the warmth of the picture.

With this photo I tested out some effects and settings to see if I could make a "boring" picture interesting.

In this picture, I attempted to make the entire picture black and white except for one point, and ended up just reducing the saturation to not make the contrast seem too unnatural.