Introduction
This assignment explores the issue of technique and ethical choices which are made in photography by designing and producing a photographic image illustrating an imaginary magazine. During the exercises and assignment work, I had the opportunity to clarify my thoughts and question my beliefs on whether alteration should take place and if so, what is acceptable and how tolerant are the viewers?
Context
During November, the Dukeries Rally passed though my local forest (Sherwood Pines) and I watched a couple of stages. Whilst there, I experimented with a few photographs. When considering a subject to study for this assignment, I recalled the event and dusted off my son’s radio controlled rally car. I planned to juxtapose it against the forest as a background to make it look like it was in the World Rally Car (WRC) series. We had other models of remote control cars which I could use to insert into the cover of my imaginary RC Car Monthly – a magazine for radio control car enthusiasts for a piece on restoration. I considered my plan a challenge to my manipulative Photoshop skills so decided to make the magazine cover something which would develop and enhance my skills.
Other themes I pondered were monster trucks, mountain biking, and food. An internet search showed there were about four international radio control car magazines already on the market. By looking at magazines online and on sale in the newsagents, I had several ideas in my head.
Research on existing magazines
The entire collection of car, radio control, bike and food magazines I looked at had a front cover in portrait orientation. There were various designs for car and radio control covers; some used a bird’s eye view, some juxtaposition where a whole car or part of a car was set against a realistic background and a few had a plain background (shiny or dull). Magazines either had a large single picture, more than one car on the cover, or one car and an insert picture. Car(s) were positioned on the whole on the diagonal and one magazine had a couple of covers where the car was more of a triangle shape. Backgrounds either took up the whole of the page or were designed so that the writing was placed in the sky. Different types of cars had different characteristics of placement – for example most Porsche and race cars had four wheels on the ground, dirt buggies and monster trucks were on rocks and when one or more wheel was off the rock, a shadow was present. Most of the cars looked stationary with very little wheel motion and no spraying dirt.
Background Image
First of all I needed a background in which I could juxtapose my car. Considerations were orientation, scale, balance and colour. My original rally images were taken in landscape and I saw from this that I needed to take a background with portrait orientation.
I planned on paper how I thought the final image would look and decided to divide the frame into thirds. My idea was that the car, when positioned, would sit off centre on a diagonal and I would be able to alter the size of the car to fit.
I walked through Sherwood Forest looking for tracks and surroundings where an imaginary WRC rally may have taken place. Colours had to complement a red and white rally car, and trees in the background would add contrast to the final image. I wanted to leave space for positioning the title, subtitles and an insert picture.
I thought this was an acceptable background to place a rally car. No major changes were made at this stage – only checking colour temperature and a slight tweak in curves. I opened the image as a background in Photoshop CS3 and built up layers and vector masks on top of it.
The rally car image
Version 1
I thought (at the start of this assignment) that the car would have to be positioned in roughly the same angle that I wanted it to be in when cut out and pasted onto the background. In this image, the car was propped up on yoghurt pots. I cut and pasted this onto the background and realised that I could use the transform tool. I took the car outside to look at what the effect of natural lighting would be on the car.
Version 2
The lighting outside reflected the trees onto the bodywork. Although my image contained trees, I felt that the reflection was unrealistic. I liked the yellow colour of the lights rather than silver to give a shining effect. After cutting and pasting this image into my background, I decided to change the direction of the car.
Version 3
With the car direction changed I decided to take the car indoors again as the paintwork showed too much reflection.
Version 4
Car now facing the correct direction, lit from a window rather than tungsten lighting. No reflection visible on bodywork. Black velvet used as a base because there was enough definition between wheels and material to enable polygonal lasso to work effectively.
Amalgamated image
Space left at the top for a title, space below right for insert, complementary colours (red / green), car positioned on track.
Exploration of areas of adjustment and manipulation to make a successful image
I cut around the car using the polygonal lasso tool and cut and pasted it into Photoshop CS3 as a new layer. Using the eraser, I removed the excess background. I cut and pasted the antennae across separately and attached to the car so that I could work at a different magnification. I cut and pasted the headlights across and fitted them using the transform tool to scale them in place. Using the transform tool again, I moved the car around, changed the scale and the perspective a little to make it look more natural on the page. I added a drop shadow gradient to this layer.
Tools used so far: cut and paste to combine two visual elements in one photograph, erase, transform scale, rotation and perspective, addition of drop shadow gradient.
Justification for using these tools was that they were necessary to make the car blend into the background and still look real. To have taken an image of an RC car in the forest would possibly involve a forced perspective to which one could still question the reality. By cutting and pasting an image and erasing the background to tidy it ensured the image fitted in to the background as I wanted it to.
I questioned the use of the eraser when my image would not quite fit in the white frame I created for the magazine title. I shaved off a little of the bumper and thought that it was acceptable because it was not a distinguishing feature. I could simply have resized the car without altering it.
Transform, rotate and change perspective were tools that I discovered which made manipulation so much easier. This cut down the work which I thought I was going to have to do by hand with re-positioning the car. So from this point of view, I thought it was acceptable because time taken to create an image must also be considered.
I applied a drop shadow layer style to the car which I considered as acceptable because in reality the car had a shadow. Because I had used black velvet as a base, the shadow did not show up. The background was taken on an overcast day, but even then shadows are still visible.
Considered area of adjustment
I applied a gradient to the whole background image before starting to add titles to see if by toning down the brightness the image was more acceptable. I tried several types of gradients before removing it.
I debated whether to add a rectangle with a gradient behind where I was placing a title or subtitle. I did not think this looked effective either for my image, although some magazines appeared to use a technique similar to this.
At this point I was still considering the position of the title and whether to retake the background shot with more sky so that the title was not distracting. I recalled Kit Car magazine which I used to read had quite an expanse of white / pale page at the top. This was similar to a copy of a Canon EOS magazine I had.
Insert photograph
I used tungsten lighting to light the battered box and old model to illustrate a seasonal project for the winter. I adjusted the white balance in Photoshop and did a small amount of cloning and patching on the mini. I left some burnout and reflection visible as it was a “home project”. I cut around the shape and erased the rough edges after importing onto a rectangle shape layer on my Photoshop image. For the purposes of this document, I imported the cut out shape into a new blank page and changed the colour to one similar to that used on my original image.
Tools used: Cut and paste to combine two visual elements in one photograph, erase, transform scale, rotation and perspective, addition of drop shadow gradient, clone and patch. I felt there was too much burnout from the overexposed area on the roof and bonnet of the purple mini so replaced some of the pixels using clone and patch to enhance the image. I changed the background to give more of a studio effect which I thought was acceptable as space was at a premium. I had taken an image with tools laid out too, but thought the image was too cluttered.
I opened the image in Photoshop Elements 5 and made some finishing touches such as a band across the bottom and changed the font styles.
Finished cover
Ethical Justification
I like to produce realistic, acceptable photographs that inspire others and can be used for teaching or storytelling. I think surreal images are acceptable but they have to be believable. For instance, one of the collections that inspired me at Focus on Imaging Derby 2013 were photographic images of plants by Putput which when viewed from a distance looked realistic but actually contained household objects such as spaghetti servers and body polishers. I was reminded of this work when researching photographs of Sian Bonnell. I felt that in keeping with the type of magazine I had chosen to illustrate I needed to keep my image real to attract the readership, although my final cover had combined images. I reconsidered my cover and whether I should have chosen a different type of genre, and the more I thought, the more ideas I came up with. I think that for where I was at the time with learning how powerful Photoshop is and what it can do, it was good to start with something quite realistic because I knew what I wanted to achieve and reached a point where I was satisfied. I think if I had created a surreal image, because it is not my type of image, I would still be left wondering if it was successful.
The ethical impact of the magazine on the environment is about encouraging recycling. I decided to include a photograph which could carry a restoration story in light of the fact that Christmas had just happened, children receive shiny new toys and old ones are sometimes put to the back of the cupboard. Perhaps their old, broken toys which need recycling or mending could become projects in the long winter evenings, so it seemed appropriate to include this on the cover. I used a natural environment to encourage people to go outside with their RC cars which could be seen as encouraging a healthy lifestyle.
The other consideration for my magazine cover was whether it would sell or just sit on the shelf. I tried to pitch it in the middle of magazines; not elite and not a weekly edition. I imagined it being made of reasonable quality paper and being kept by the reader for some time as a reference magazine.
Conclusion
This assignment investigated the issue of adjusting and manipulating an image and still making ethical choices when producing a photographic image illustrating an imaginary magazine cover. During the exercises and assignment work, I was able to clarify my thoughts and question my beliefs on whether alteration should take place and how much was acceptable. I think my imaginary readers would find this magazine cover acceptable as it is not too far removed from the truth.
Key learning points from assignment
· My initial point for using Photoshop for manipulation rather than enhancement at the beginning of the exercises and assignment work was virtually nonexistent. I took a logical approach to researching how to make things work and gradually built up skills which after some practice became second nature. I found some processes relied on trial and error to decide which methods worked for me. I was able to look at an image taken previously and decide which methods of manipulation would work.
- I began to understand how layers and vector masks worked which is an area I knew needed development.
- I felt a sense of achievement of being able to do more creative work in Photoshop.
- I was able to explore how I felt about altering images and question the reality of images in magazines and adverts I looked at.
Areas for further development
- Use the available tools in Photoshop to become more creative. Now that I have completed this, it feels quite “safe”. However, at the beginning of the assignment, I found the task very challenging.
- Improve (faster, more efficient) work flow with Photoshop.
Bibliography
Clarke, G (1997) The Photograph, Oxford University Press, UK
Fox, A, Caruana, N, (2012) Behind the image, research in photography, AWA publishing, USA
Gulbins, J, Steinmueller, U (2011) The digital photography workflow handbook, Rocky Nook, USA
Wells, L (2009) Photography, a critical introduction, Routledge, UK
http://www.putput.dk accessed 16/1/14
http://www.sianbonnell.com/ accessed 16/1/14
