Shoot 3-Nature reserve (Parndon wood)

Shoot 3-Pardon wood nature reserve

Plans for shoot

For this shoot, like i did previosly with my second shoot improvng on my first shoot, i want to do that with this shoot, so i want to imrpove on the quality of the ptos that it took in the last shoot that were highly influenced by the artists that i had researched. I also thought that it would be different to shoot at a nature resevre as they are created to protect and preserve nature, which shows that people are trying to imrpove the environment and not just destroy.

AO3: Record ideas, observations and insights relevant to intentions, reflecting critically on work and progress.

I think with this shoot i have clearly showed progress from previous shoots and clear links to those shoots and the artists that i have researched, and part of my intentions for this shoot was to increase the quality of the photos that i took that had a clear influence from the artists. Also as this shoot was based in a nature reserve, i did have intentions to capture photographs that would show the preservation of nature. So i think that i have shown progress from my previous shoots, especially my second shoot, because i have used the same artist as influence on my work, Heather Angle, so i think that its clear in my photographs that i have taken photos with similar intentions and by using similar  angles or perspectives. So a common perspective in my work is looking up towards the top of the tree or the sky and i think that in this shoot that was a common perspective as i took numerous photos from that perspectives of different trees. I think that in this shoot the quality of these types of photos is better compared to my second shoot, as whilst taking them i focused more on the camera settings so that i could achieve photos with the best exposure that wasn't to bright or dark depending on what the photo is of. However, i found that with this shoot i dint take as many photos as my second shoot, so there is a smaller selection for my straight images. Even though i do have a smaller selection of straight images, i think that the straight images that i have chosen do show the progress that i have made from my previous shoots.

Straight images

Images to improve

I think that this photo could have been improved because the whole photo has a hazy effect to it, i think that this happened because the sun was just above the ears that i was taking and so i didn't change the camera settings to suit the new lighting that i occurred. The settings that i used was an ISO of 200 because the day was bright and it was still early so i didn't require a high ISO, an aperture of f/5.6 and a shutter speed of 1/50 seconds. So the aperture that i used was too big and so not all of the photo is in focus where as if i had used a smaller aperture when taking the photo like f/22 then more, if not all of the photo would have been in focus. So to improve this photo I would try to improve the contrast so that the haziness of the photo isn't so visible.



I tried to improve the photo above so that the haze that was visible in the original because of the sun was less visible. So I edited the photo on photoshop by firstly decreasing the brightness and contrast, then i edited the levels and curves adjustment so that the photo was generally darker, so that the haze wasn't so visible. I think that the edit has improved upon the contrast and brightness of the original photo, but focus of the photo is still not s good as it could be and because i have know decreased the haze in the photo the out of focus areas are more visible and eye-catching.

With this image i wanted to use framing as a technique, so i thought that the bird watching hut would be perfect to try out framing. So i insured that the framing of the photo was out of focus because the photos main focus was the area inside the frame, however i don't think that the framing of this photo is as good as it colour be, this is because i think that the framing needs to be more square and equal. I think that because i zoomed in quite a lot the zoom then effected the amount of framing that was shown, but the main focus of the photo is not the frame. So to improve this photo i would have to re-take the photo and make sure that the faming is equal along the top and bottom of the photo, instead of being slanted. 

AO2 Explore and select appropriate resources, media, materials, techniques and processes, reviewing and refining ideas as work develops.

With this shoot, like my 2 previous shoot i didn't use a tripod and i shoot in jpeg file, the camera setting that i used for this shoot was an ISO ranging from 200 for the majority of photos but some photos i took with an ISO of 800 because they would be of the ground or an area that was heavily covered by trees, so the lighting would be limited causing me to higher the ISO. I also used a shutter speed ranging from 1/50 to 1/250 seconds, but mostly 1/250 seconds as i wasn't able to have a faster shutter speed because i didn't have a tripod with me and so if i had increased my shutter speed it would have effected the general exposure of my photo, but by using a shutter speed of 1/250 seconds I was able to successfully take photos without experiencing blur 

I edited this photo with the idea that I would use it as part of my computer experiments and so i anted to be experimental with photoshop, however I still needed the edit to be relevant to my work, so while I was editing this photo I had the idea of colouring the photo as if the trees were on fire, as recently around the world there has been an increase in forest fires, which has been argued to be an effect of global warming, so I though that this idea would be relevant to my project, so I changed the hue and saturation adjustment on the photo. However even though I think that the colour of the leafs represent fire, the colour of the sky in the photo should be more dark and grey so that it represents the smoke that would occur from a forest fire. So to further improve this photo I would re-edit the photo so try and edit the sky with more of a grey tone. With this edit I also used an extrude effect so that the photo consisted different levels,  I used this effect to show how some nature is being broken into pieces, for example some towns/cities have a very limited amount of nature within them and so the natural landscapes are broken up into segments.

AO1: Develop ideas through sustained and focused investigations informed by contextual and other sources, demonstrating analytical and critical understanding.

(Heather Angle)



This photo is one of my favourites, because i love how the trees are shown in this photo. Even though the photo is just looking up at the trees like we do all the time, its from a lower height, almost at an ants eye view, but its also got quite a wide angle allowing quite a lot of trees to be visible. The effect of the tress leading up to the sky and the leafs at the top covering the sky is really good, and not all parts of the sky is covered there's cracks which has then brightened up the photo, if the whole canopy layer covered the sky then photo could have a completely different tone to it, it would be much darker. To me this photo reminds me of a race to the top, as all of the trees, due to natural reasons, are racing each other to the top to get the most light. So it reminds me of people trying to get the best things in life, as nearly everything is a competition e.g education. I do ant to try and mimic this style of image in the majority of my rural shoots, because I know that if I just position the camera looking up into the sky when I'm in an area surrounded by trees. To correctly reproduce this style of image, it would be best to use a tripod as low as possible so that I can capture the majority of the tree length.

I took this image at first because i thought that the photo that i took on my last shoot that was inspired by Heather Angle was not the best photo that i could take that shows how her work has influenced mine. I also thought that it was a good idea to take numerous photos of the same style throughout the majority of my rural shoots so that i could develop and improve upon this type of angle as i think that photos from this angle show an interesting perspective and detail. Last shoot when i tried to take a photo from this angle i struggled with the exposure and found that the whole area of the frame that consisted of the sky was white-washed, which greatly effected the quality of my photo. So with this photo i used an ISO of 400, a shutter speed of 1/250 and an aperture of f/9. I think using these settings helped with exposure of the majority of the sky except the left corner, however i think that the fade effect of the white-wash fading to the true colour of the sky suits the photo. So my biggest problem with this photo is how big of an aperture i used, as i was taking a photo of the whole area i should have used a smaller aperture of around f/22 so that more of the photo was in focus, the effect of me using a big aperture is that the trees that are in the foreground of the photo are more prominent and stand out more, and so the trees and leaves in the background are in less detail and mild together. So to further improve my images that i take in this style i would pay more attention to the aperture.

AO4: Present a personal and meaningful response that realises intentions and, where appropriate, makes connections between visual and other elements

I think that from this shoot i achieved what i intended to show from the collection of photos that i took. As initially I wanted improve upon my artist influence, because in previous shoots i didn't show properly how the artists that i have researched have influenced my work and if i had taken photos that showed a clear to artists work, the photos were not the best quality that i could take. So with this shoot i intended to take good quality photos that clearly linked to my researched artists work. So for this shoot i think that Heather Angle's style of photography is clearly showed throughout my images, as i took numerous photos from the same perspective, looking towards the sky. I also wanted to show how people are trying to preserve and protect the environment, which i think i clearly showed with images that i had signs up signalling what to do, like no entry or keep to the path. So i do think that i achieved what i intended to show with this shoot, which was the preservation of nature and showing a better link to my researched artists work.