These are my portfolio prints from advance techniques. Some turned out well and other could be improved, I have printed certain photos to compare against one another. Whether it is types of paper or the editing.
Photo 1: Tray Print
Photo 2: Tray Print - Burned
Photo 1 & Photo 2: These photos are from archival printing, created from negatives that I took on the large format camera. The actual shooting process was easier than expected, and the photos came out really well, getting the right places in focus and also getting the right aperture and exposure time. When it came to developing, negatives got stuck together, causing the black marks and scratches which I knew I couldn’t get rid of in this sort of technique and would have to scan my negatives in and edit on photoshop. In the tray printing I first of all did normal time developing. But when they photo was finished, I felt the sky was to bright, so decided to dodge in the sky a bit, which means making it darker. This is done by expose just the sky for slightly longer than the rest of the photo. I exposed the sky for 12 seconds in total. After I did that, I felt the sky went with the rest of the photos. I prefer the burnt in sky for this photo, as there were no clouds, so the sky has no detail, so it being bright would not look right on the photograph.
Photo 3: Edited Tray Print
This photo shows my photoshop skills. I decided to use my Epson scan, as I felt I could sharpen it to my desire, instead of It being automatically sharpened. As you can see, I used the same photo as I did for tray developing, I did this, so I could compare both the photos, especially once edited how much of a difference getting rid of the marks and scratches makes. For this I used the spot healing tool mostly, and also the clone stamp tool. I felt like it was harder to correct the water, as the waves repeated may have looked weird but using the clone stamp tool, I could make waves longer, so it didn’t look fake. I prefer the edited inkjet print a lot more, I believe this is because I was able to sharpen the photograph, so the details were more prominent. I also really like the composition of this photograph, which is the same in both photographs, but the I like the railings being across the front and you almost have a line across the photograph constantly throughout the photos, from the ground, to the building’s in the background. I feel like the different types of paper really effects the photo, in showing certain shadow and highlights off. I feel like the archival prints have a lot less shadows, it is almost just one colour, whereas the inkjet prints have more shadows give more depth to the photograph, I feel like the archival prints are very flat.
Photo 4: Imacon
Photo 5: Epson
Photo 4 & 5: These photos are from the Epson and Imacon scanners, and are of the same photograph, taken on the large format camera. I have edited the scratches out of these photographs to make them more portfolio standard. I prefer the Epson scan as the Imacon scan gets over sharpened in the process, making the photograph look more fake. I also feel the Epson creates better shadows and highlights, whereas the Imacon scan I feel is very flat this is similar to the tray print vs inkjet. I found it a lot easier to scan in the Epson scanner, and felt it didn’t need any editing apart from getting rid of the scratches, whereas the Imacon I feel I could have darkened some areas as it was all very one tone. Overall, I found this process easy, with the scanning not taking a long time and already knowing the photoshop skills helped with the process being quicker. To improve I would work on the Imacon photo more.
Photo 6: Inkjet
Photo 7 : C-Type
Photo 6&7: These photos were for comparisons of printing, to shows how different paper and printing ways effects your photo. I decided to go with Inkjet printing and c-type printing to show how different paper can make your photo look. After doing this I found that the inkjet printer gave the photo more vibrancy and giving more detail to the water. Even though the colours are more improved in the inkjet, I prefer the way to print a c-type print I find it a lot easier and rewarding, and sizing is a lot easier, as with all my inkjet prints, I found it hard to properly size them on photoshop, with them sometimes coming out too small. Overall with the c-type print I would have edited the photograph a bit more vibrant as this was my first photo, I printed this way and after realised it does make the photo duller, so it would have the same or similar look as the inkjet print. I also find that the inkjet paper is slightly glossier that the c-type paper.
Photo 8: Still life Landscape
Photo 9: Still Life Portrait
Photo 8 & 9: These were my studio still life photos, taken on a Hasselblad using studio lights, including soft boxes and spill kill reflector heads. I used a white background, and tethered the camera to the computer, to view my photos easily to see if they were in focus and to look at shadows. I really like how these photos had turned out, this was my first time shooting products like this and at first found it daunting using a new camera and trying a different type of photography, but I really enjoyed it focusing on different aspects of the products and then in photoshop compositing different photos to get different aspects of the product in focus or different shadows and lighting on the bottle. The only thing I wish I could have done is over exposed one of other photos by using the flash to make the background more seamless, all the way through, and also would have sharpened the photo more it photoshop as feel it could have had a few sharper details and I forgot about that step before printing them. I shot the photos, so they could be edited from a3 to a4 creating landscape and portrait photos. I really like how these turned out but do prefer the a4 photo just because it has less white space around it focusing in more on the products.
Photo10: C-Type
I decided to once again experiment with the c-type printing, but this time with the still life photos, to see what a studio shoot would look like with this sort of printing. I did have to turn down the stop by 5 to get it to this, as the photos were printing very bright. Even after putting it down 5 it was still bright. I asked and this could have been to do with the processor rather than my photo editing. So I decided to still keep it in my portfolio. I do like the outcome of this on the c-type, but still prefer it on the inkjet as I feel the colours are better.
Photo 11: Mamiya
Photo 12: DSLR
Photo 11 & 12: I decided to do a comparison against the digital medium format camera a Mamiya, and a DSLR; a Canon 5D Mark II. I decided to do this not only to compare what they would look like when printed but also how it was shooting on both cameras. Overall I preferred shooting on the Mamiya, because of how the photo came out, I did edit some of the photo making parts slightly darker and editing out irrelevant things under then bench, but overall I prefer the colours in the Mamiya photo over the Canon photo. The one main thing I would do is try more lenses on each cameras to get different focal lengths, as you can see on the Mamiya it is a lot more close into the bench, whereas the Canon photo has more background around it, which I really do like, and would like to retake the photograph on the Mamiya so I have the quality of the Mamiya but with the more detail around the bench.