Shape Work Diary

How I Made These Images
To Photograph these images, I used a studio setup for the majority of the photos. For one of them I used my iPhone to see how it would come out. I like the outcome of both methods and therefore decided to stick with a range of images from both methods. To experiment with shape I altered the positioning of the lighting, the subject within the images and also the position of the camera to gain a range of different outcomes when it came to the representation of shape.

Critical Evaluation

As there wasn't a range of things to photograph within the studio I was limited to the images that I could edit and annotate.

I chose both of these images to critically evaluate as they were not as well composed as the others. The lighting and framing were also not as good as the other images.

The first image I feel is too dark for the subject matter. The framing of the subject is also not as good as it could've been as the shadow of the item is out of frame.

The second image also has the same issues. The lighting of the unedited image is too harsh in my opinion. The subject is, again, out of frame and I feel like this makes the image look unprofessional. 


Progress

To edit these images I use a range of editing tools on Photoshop.

To edit this image I use a range of tools. I began by cropping the image so that there was less background in the image and more of the subject. The lighting on the original image was very bright and intense. I felt as if this made the bottle look 2D and so I intensified the shadows and increased the contrast in shading to highlight the shadows and highlights which made them more prominant.


This next image us of the same subject as before, however it was composed differently. The framing was different as this time there was no background visible. The lighting was also toned down which made the shadows standout over the bright highlights and reflections on the subject. I felt that the original image, unedited, captured shape perfectly which is why I chose to leave it unedited.


This next image is my least favourite of the top 5. I feel that the final edit looks odd and uncomfortable to look at. Despite this, it does capture shape. To edit the image I used a crop tool to crop out a majority of the background, the shadows and highlights adjusters and also the contrast tool. I used the shadows and highlights adjusters to change the overall lighting of the image. I also used the Curve tool to help me do this. Finally, I used the contrast tool to make the highlights and shadows bounce off of each other to create a defined shape.

I chose to edit this image in this way because I wanted to have the shadows and the reflections in the image. The subject is placed just outside the left third and because of this the image is awkward to look at. In the future, I will be sure to have the subject directly in a chose third and to also compose images correctly so that they don't look awkward.

This next edited image is one of my favourites. I originally didn't like the starting image however the edit changed my mind.

This was a very simple edit as I only used two tools and one editing technique to accomplish it. I began by using the crop tool to cut out the background and the clear dome-like plant shape. This left me with a close-up of the plant. I chose a section of the plant that had many shadows on it so that it stayed true to the shape subject matter. I then used the Black and White editing technique to change the colours to black and white so that the shadows and highlights would be the main focus of the image. I then finished off the image by adjuring the contrast so that there is a clear contrast in the shades.



This image used a large range of tools to alter the lighting, contrast and the size of the image.

I began by cropping the image so that there was less background and more subject within the frame. I then began altering the curve levels to change the lighting to make the image seem like it was taken with an increased aperture. I did this because of the subject itself. As it's a product, I chose to change the light levels to brighten the image as a lot of makeup products are capture in bright lighting. After that, I altered the contracts so that there was a clear cut of two contrasting shades of black and white. As the product wasn't a brand new product, I used the  spot healing brush tool to edit out some of the scratches and marks on the product to make the subject as attractive as possible.