UNIT 2 - TOWNS & CITIES - AO1 - Vivian Maier

Hello! Unit 2 has now officially started I am going to start this off by talking about what I am intending to create during the next couple of months.

As you may know I concluded unit 1 with light painting I still intend on shoting this medium, but not for this unit. I may delve into long exposure photography in town however that is yet to be decided.

When given the exam questions I was split between choosing "Towns and Cities" and "Reflections". After resaerching I have decided to do Towns and Cities. However, I plan on shooting reflection photography for this unit as Street and Reflection intersect each other often.

So my first Photographer is Vivian maier, who is she?

(Born 1926) Vivian maier (Shown fig.1) was a enthusiast photgrapher in New York during the 1950's she shot over 150,000 negatives over her life time until she died in 2009. She specialised in Street Photography and often focused on reflections during her life time. Maier's Street photographs often highlights on couples or single people (shown fig.2/3) showing their differences with those around them.

Reflections: Maier often took Self portrait photographs when she went shooting. She would often be subtle with her photographs. When I was looking at the album, I found myself trying to actually find Vivian in the photographs which was quite fun as it gives the photo two messages instead of one. For example, in fig.1 we immediately notice Vivian's face reflected in the mirror however when we pay more attention to her surroundings we then notice that shes in a barbers as the mirror is a barber's mirror. The photograph is incredibly natralistic which I love as she doesn't look as if shes even taking a photograph.

As I've said before Vivian's work is incredibly natralistic. Almost all of her work somehow captures a moment of time as if she wasn't even there. That may not be true (see fig.3) however I believe it works still.

So how do I recreate Vivian's work?

Well you have to take the elements that make up her photographs this includes:

Being subtle - Shoot when people are not looking and don't be obvious. Ask them if its ok afterwards till then shoot away! if you don't it will totally kill the natralistic theme of the photo.

Shooting in a square format - This was because of the camere she was using at the time (Rolleiflex 3.5T)

Shooting Monochrome - Yes she did shoot in colour for some of her shoots however for most of her work she shot in monochrome.

Shoot street photographs not urban! - It can be easy to think they are the same but they're not! Street focus on people whereas urban focuses on the architecture.

After going out of multiple shoots heres what I have produced:

For figs.4 & 5 I focused on the natralistic themes of Vivians work.

With Fig.4 I am particularly proud of due to the lighting, composistion and contrast between the man and snow! it makes the figure very bold compared to his surroundings.

With Fig.5 I focused on the composistion. framing the disturbed boy in far right of the frame allowing the thing that he is looking at to be concealed allowing the viewer to speculate "whats the problem?" which coincidentally is what the girl next to him was actually saying and expressing.

With Figs. 6 I deviated slightly from some of the techniques that my chosen photographer uses. My sister wasn't happy with me "shooting" people without them knowing . I argued that this is how street photography is achieved however she said I had to take photos with the subject knowing. So whilst in St.Pancras station in london I noticed a lone pianist playing away as people walked past, almost ignoring. So I went up and asked if I would be able to take a couple of photos and he went sure. The problem was he kept looking and smiling towards the camera. After taking multiple shots I finally caught one that I was wanted to get. Adapting the new rule of asking I got a shot of the pianist looking towards the camera, not smiling, whilst people walk past without noticing him. This in essence actually represents how these musicians are treated in public.

And finally with Fig.7 I wanted to take a self portrait in the style of Vivian Maier. I found a motorbike and took a shot of its mirror. I'll admit that the mirror is quite a bit bigger than others she has taken a self portrait through however this is due to the lens I was using at the time. Because my cameras sensor is a 1.5x crop of the standard 35mm size it means that the focal point of the lens is 50% zoomed in when it is on my camera compared if I had put in on a Full Frame DSLR or film camera. For example the lens I used was a 50mm f/1.8 however on my camera it would actually be a 75mm f/2.7. Same thing for the kit lens, its actually a 27-82mm f/5.2 lens.

Conclusion:

I am thorughly proud of the photographs I have taken for this study. The composistion and lighting have worked really well. I used the techniques and style that vivian maier used during her photographic career.