EyV Part 3: Traces of time

Page 3 - Exercise 3.2

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Project 1, The frozen moment - Exc 3.1 - Quality - Project 2, A durational space - Exc 3.2 - Project 3, What matters is to look - Cartier-Bresson, The Decisive Moment - Exc 3.3 - Asg 3 The Decisive Moment

balloons - coin #1 - newton's cradle - wedding - window #1 - window #2 - window #3 - coin #2

Exercise 3.2

Start by doing your own research into some of the artists discussed above. Then, using slow shutter speeds, the multiple exposure function, or another technique inspired by the examples above, try to record the trace of movement within the frame. You can be as experimental as you like. Add a selection of shots together with relevant shooting data and a description of your process (how you captured the shots) to your learning log.OCA, Photography 1: Expressing your Vision, p.66

Images taken 15th August

Comments

The images used in Exercise 2.1 (perspective geometry) were taken at a family wedding. While not wishing to trivialise war, or, on the other hand, compare the marriage to a battle-ground, some of the other photographs taken at the event came to mind when looking at Robert Capa's Omaha Beach photographs.

Most of these images were rejected at the time for having to much subject and/or camera movement (particularly in fig. 3 where everything is blurred) although the first and last were used as the movement adds to the images. I have no explanation for the exposure settings for the last two images: I might have just have swapped lenses and not had time to set the aperture when the couple emerged: ultimately, it turned out to be ideal, capturing the movement of the hands and whatever they were throwing in the place of confetti (I would have set a wider aperture had I had the time to think about it). The framing on these two is poor as I was shooting blind, at arm's length over the heads of the crowd, but otherwise, they work well. Frames have been added to all the images for consistency.

Note: the wedding photographs were taken during the course but not intentionally as part of the coursework. Only the images shown above have been included in the contact sheets but the full set of images is available if required.

Exc 3.2 exhibit 2

Mondrian Window

[5Oct18] By contrast, this task tries to capture the passage of time by observing the rays of the rising sun as modified by a stained glass window. As a devotee of Mondrian and an occasional chromoglassicist, most of the windows in the house have a Mondrian painting rendered in stained glass. From sunrise until around 9 or 10 o'clock the sun shines (when it shines at all, that is) through our B217, Composition with Red, Blue and Yellow (top left in the inset image) and the image it creates gradually moves along a wall. Over several mornings (3rd - 5th October), I have tried to photograph this as a time lapse sequence. With mixed results.

Clearly this would have been better done in the summer, but I will persevere and display the best outcomes.

It can be argued that this is rather deritative of the Alasdair Gill work shown in the course material [EyV p. 64] but, in my defence, the windows were installed precisely to create this effect and I have been photographing the results for several years (though this is the first use of time lapse).

Comments

[6th Oct] The first session (3rd Oct) is shown as that was was the most successful so far. The video from 5th showed no variation whatsoever - although the sun rose and the gloomy, grey day became a little brighter, the camera adjusted for the lighting levels resulting in several hundred subjectively indistinguishable images: they have been deleted.

While the result is far more pronounced with bright sunlight, these images give a flavour of the effect and thus a satisfactory result. The first video (as shown) started too early and runs too quickly and so any future attempts will be set to 10-second intervals. This exercise flattens the camera battery and so a mains power supply is on order. A rerun will be scheduled when the weather forecast improves.

Note: to keep the contact sheets to sensible proportions, only the images shown on this pagehave been included.

Exc 3.2 exhibit 3

Comments

[8th Oct] I missed a day (Sunday) with a poor weather forecast which turned out to be bright and so set the camera up for this morning (Monday). As noted the interval was changed to 10 seconds to slow the "action" down, but there was not a great deal of that.

The forecast is poor for tomorrow (Tuesday) but good for Wednesday so I will set up for that as the last run as the forecasts thereafter are bad.

I thought I might try some long single exposures with an ND filter if there is any early morning sun before I finish this part of the course.

Exc 3.2 exhibit 4

Comments

Day 3 in the MondriaanHuis (there is such a thing). This is much better: 2 hours of not very much with a brief firework display at 8:18:15 (fig. 3.2Z). If there's another sunny morning in the near future, I will try one more shot on manual exposure using the fig. 3.2Z values of 1/60 sec; f/8; ISO 400 and that should achieve darkness to Mondrian-ness.

The next two projects have been used to illustrate both exercise 3.1 (see above) and exercise 3.2

Exc 3.2 exhibit 5

Comments

The background to this task is given above in exercise 3.1. The shutter effects from 1/3200 sec down (or is it up?) to 1/8 were explored there. These images are at the long end of the spectrum are shown here. They show that the movement of the coin, although inconvenient to photograph, actually created an unexpected and delightful aesthetic effect. The overexposure of the subject was discussed above and corrective post processing has been applied to the last and most complex image.