For this assignment I decided to use a more modern photograph. I chose an image of me in front of my jeep. I felt this created some sense of irony since the first “vehicle” was not invented until 1886 (aka the time of wet plate collodion photography). I thought it was also appropriate because I was using the jeep as a sort of prop for myself which most wet plate collodions used some sort of prop in portraits since the exposure time was so lengthy. I first made a clipping mask and removed the saturation and then added a vibrance filter to make it a more warm, yellow, aged photo. I used brushes and different blending modes over the entire photograph to make it “lower quality” as well as added a white glare and also some blacked out areas like it was introduced to light too fast. Additionally I added scratches and scuffs to distress the image. Around the edges I added a rough black around the edges as well as vignetting. Over the majority of the photo I added water/wet spots. Finally, I added a crack across my photograph from a LOC image so it looks like it was broken at some point in time.
The work shows Nikole with her Jeep and shown behind is a mural in the background that is located at Two Scoops Creamery. There is also another car parked by her. Nikole is also not directly located in the middle of her Jeep or the image which allows viewers to see a portion of the mural. The image is also a portrait rather than landscape which seems typical for Wet Plate Photography. The first step she took was to adjust the saturation and vibrance. After doing so, she then added textures such as white glare, scratches, scuffs, and wet spots which targets the project goals.
ReplyDeleteAt first glance of the work, I can tell that the theme was about modernization from the car in the image and the fact that wet plate photography is an old process. In Nikole's description, she expressed that the first vehicle was not invented until 1886 whereas wet plate collision photography was introduced in the 1850s through the 1880’s. I believe that the image already creates the irony within itself and by adding treatment to it adds more depth to the meaning.
As I am watching the GIF, I noticed you placed the white glare first before adding the crack at the end and it happened to be in the right position. I would have liked to see more Sepia because as you were adding more texture to the piece, I feel that it got lost in the process. Another fun idea to add would be written text, maybe saying first new car or something along those lines to add more onto your idea of irony. Maybe this was an image you already had but I felt like it would be interesting to compose the image in a different view.
By working in non destructive layers, Nikole was able to demonstrate her approach to wet plate collodion techniques in her image. Although you used most of the original techniques of Wet-Plate Collodion process, some of the textures could have been used less since the focus gets slightly lost.