In the 1920's, Sergei Eisenstein created the idea of 5 types of montage. They were: 1. METRIC MONTAGE: cutting based on the length of the shot compared to one another, therefore shortening the time the viewer has to observe the information in each shot, creating an increase of tension. 2. RHYTHMIC MONTAGE: This is based on the visual continuity of the shots. It focuses on on the time and tempo of the shot. 3. TONAL MONTAGE: This considers shadow,shape and lighting rather than length within a shot. This creates an emotion within the shots. 4. OVERTONAL MONTAGE: This form of montage combines metric, rhythmic and tonal montage - It is how sequences play against one another. It mixes pace, ideas,and emotions to invoke the desired reaction from the audience 5. INTELECTUAL OR IDEOLOGICAL MONTAGE: This is used to express abstract ideas by creating relationships between two opposing concepts.
At the end of the first world war, film was being used as a way of mass communication in Russia. However, most film makers were driven out of Russia for being capitalists, this left Russia with little access to a small amount of cinematographers within the Moscow film school. Their aim was to create propaganda film supporting the Bolshevik political regime. In contrast, Lev Kuleshov, one of the schools founders, had a particular interest in the theory and psychological processes of film. Kuleshov had his own class in the Moscow film school called the Kuleshov workshop especially aimed for those students who were innovative students with more radical ideas. Perhaps the most impact full experiments conducted by Kuleshov which created a huge within photography and the psychological side of it was known as the Kuleshov Effect'. Kuleshov placed the same image of a man with an Expressionless face in succession with a range of other images- a bowl of soup, a body in a coffin and a seductive woman. Viewers of the clips noted how the man showed a range of emotion even though the mans face stayed consistent throughout. By placing the images in this order the 'expressionless face' was able to portray hunger, sorrow and lust without changing. This experiment proved that the meaning and tone of an image can be manipulated by those surrounding it.
Diptychs
Photozines
in class I looked at some artist photozines and phonebooks. We then tried to create our own Zines through photoshop. As a class we looked at the photebook 'Black Light' by Keld Helmer-Petersen. He was a Danish photographer who was inspired by Albert Renger-Patzsch. He is well known for his colour photographs but he also published several books of black and white images showed dramatic tonal contrast. In a lot of these images all mid tones have been removed. He used a mixture of his own images and images that he found, he used both cameras and scanners to achieve his desired effect.
My response.
In response to the book 'Black Light' I created my own photo zine using a lot of blank space like Keld Helmer-Petersen. Although I was not completely happy with the overall outcome of this first photo-zine I knew how to create strong contrast images and also consider the blank space within an image.
What is a Photobook?
Photobooks are books that consist of photographic works by one or more photographers. While the style or layout may differ between books, the overall idea of photobooks is quite easy to detect. Photobooks can be documentative; like Anna Atkins 'Photographs of British algae; cyanotype impressions' on the other hand some can be more abstracts like Lyle Rexe's ' Edge of Vision'. Nowadays anyone can get their own photobooks made through online websites like snap-fish and photo box. people can make books of anything like family memories easily and cheaply electronically.
Making my own Photobook.
HIROMIX
I started at looking at existing photobooks by photographers that inspire me and also new photographers who's style suited my own interest. I realised that I really liked documentative photography however I preferred documenting insignificant things and events. I feel like the things in life which are often overlooked for example sitting and eating dinner with family could also be made a big moment through photography. even if theses photos might not be the most aesthetically pleasing the sombre, insignificance of them really attracts me. After deciding that this it the theme that interested me the most I started looking into relative photographers. I first looked at a contemporary Japanese artist called Hiromix (Hiromi Toshikawa.) she combines self portraiture into her photobooks as well as mundane everyday objects. Her use of self portraits really intrigued me as I have never considered thirst idea before. her photobooks "Girls Blue' and "Tokyo" really inspired me and I decided that I liked the look of using a film camera instead of a DSLR. I also had the idea of using a cheap, disposable camera and I could mirror the homemade, family photo album look.
Motoyoko Daifu
Sticking with the idea of taking the types of photos kept in family photo albums, I looked into another contemporary photographer called Motoyuki Daifu. his imaged in the photo book "lovesody" he documented the life of a single mum and her son. the raw and visually unedited images beautifully portrait the real life of this woman. I was really inspired by his work and decided to incorrect it into my own. I also really liked that the images weren't overly posed and even if they were it was done I a way that seemed natural.
Cindy Sherman
while looking into non-contemporary photographers I discovered Cindy Sherman and her photo book "untitled film stills". although this was vastly different to the other two photographers I had looked at I was intrigued by the faces of the subjects within the stills. this gave me inspiriting about some self portraits I could possibly take.
William Eggleston
As he is one of my biggest inspirations and also his practice to photograph the mundane, I decided to look in to some of William Egglestons Photo books, particularly "Election Eve" and "For Now". I particularly liked his use of colour within these pieces as I had decided that my photo book would be in full colour to mimic images taken by a family on a disposable camera.
Alfred Stieglitz
I also looked briefly into the work of Alfred Stieglitz as his photographs inspired me because of the intense amount of information within them. There is so much to process within his images that they are increasingly intriguing.
Creating my own photo book
To start my photobook I first had to compile all of the information and inspirations I had found in order to refine and simplify it. I decided that I would focus mostly on the work of Hiromix, Daifu and Sherman, taking inspiration for colour from aggleston and the idea of filling all of my shots with information from Stieglitz. I really liked the idea of creating a photo book reminiscent of a family photo album or scrapbook. I decided the best way to achieve this would be by displaying all of my work using Japanese paper binding. I then looked for inspiration about my presentation by looking for examples of photo albums and scrap books and also looked at ones my family had. However after i started to compile a few older images and also taking some new ones, i realised that i would be unable to produce a piece of work that i would be proud of if i continued with this idea. i found that i was unable to find enough images that i was happy with and i felt that the scrapbook layout may be impractical. due to this realisation. i continued to look into some different areas in photography. while browsing i descovered a photographer named Edward Honoker who, in his series book I and II, illistrated his experience with anxiety and depresion. i really liked his images as i felt that the edited portraits we somehing i had not previously tried.
During my research process i discovered the photographer Kirst Mitchell and her photobook titled Wonderland. her images were very fantasy based and had a very magical feel surrounding them. Although i wasn't initially very inspired by her images her story intrigued me. she had picked up photography late in her life, after her mother passed away. She used photography in order to create a new world for herself, seperate from the crazy, unbearable world around her. after reading tis i looked back at the images and saw them differently, i now saw then as an extension of reality. this related to my previous idea of peoples subconscious thoughts but also incorporated my love for portraiture and colour photography. these fantasy based images as well as the title of Wonderland made me think of the story of 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' by Lewis Carroll. To me, this book epitomised the idea of subconscious fantasy and magic. it was these two sources that inspired me with my final idea. my final idea for my photobook was 'Alice fell down the wishing well' i wanted to create the feeling of a storybook by putting my images in chronological order. the story started with the subject living a boring, plain life (similar to the start of Alice in wonderland) and then will follow her below ground into the underground train networks-which mirrors the Rabbit hole. through taking this journey, she is thrust into a beautiful, colour filled world. this world is the metaphorical 'Wonderland'. i originally look images of nature and also 'mad hatters tea party-inspired images', starting and ending the set of images with ground level images of grass stalks. My teachers and I teacher agreed that we liked these images and i knew that i wanted to include them in my final book.
final outcome/reflection
my final book was bound simply which i first liked as i gave a simple, handmade appearance which i aimed for. However, upon refection, i found that the book would have benefitted from a more professionally bound style and a sturdier cover. if i had redone ths book i would have used an online sevice in order to make the appearance of the book more stylish and neat. overall, i was happy with my series fnimages as i felt that they accurately showed the narative i was aiming for. however i was not completely happy with the final production of the book and i would preffer if i had made it using an online design. my final imagesincludedna ot of portraits which i realised enjoyed taking more that other subjects. this inspied me to take a deeper look at portraiture and fashion photography as i continued my persna ivestigation.