My concept for this project was to take all my photos at the airport overlook in Charlotte. I wanted to experiment with a lot of the light sources I found there such at light posts, planes, and the view of the airport and incorporated those into this composition. I took all these photos separately at different exposures and depth of fields to have more flexibility in the final outcome. While capturing my photos, I wanted to keep in mind the idea or movement and warmth while also making something vaguely nostalgic, as the airport overlook was a place I went to a lot as a kid. To push the idea of movement and warmth, I asked my friend more help to flick a lighter and overlapped another image of that to make it more dynamic. As I felt that the light behind the plane, almost looked like a sparked lighter. I also had her use a flash light and circle around in different ways to create the light trail in the background. Additionally, while capturing my photos I used a high ISO for my camera settings as I was taking pictures in the dark resulting in a grainier look in some of my images. So I decided to push that look even further and did a layer mask of one of the grainiest pictures I had over the entire composition. Which I also felt like created another element of subtle movement when looked at up close. All photographs were taken by me, no generative AI was used.
For this project, I thought the airport overlook would be a great place to experiment with lighting and movement. Especially since there are many light sources such as lights illuminating from the airport, headlights on the planes, street lights in the parking lot, to the lighting of it being sunset to fully night. I simply captured everything I saw the 2.5 hours I was there to capture different shots, times of day, use different shutter speeds, etc. Which led to me having over 400 photos to look through an sd card. I also took photos of the same composition but with different depth of fields as I felt having photos that were super sharp or blurry would be interesting to experiment with especially with how light looks on camera. I originally wanted to get images of the planes in motion, however I had to scrap that idea as the images didn’t come out as I imagined. I also played around with using a tripod vs holding my camera to experiment with different angles and possibilities.
ReplyDeleteFrom an outside perspective, I would probably pick up on the ideas of flight and planes at night. Based on the warm color palette and balanced composition, it gives off a warm calm aura as the plane is moving through the night. Especially as there are different sources of lights such as orbs, flashes of lights following the plane, light trails, a horizon with lights, and flame from a lighter. As a viewer, I would probably be confused yet intrigued as to why there’s a giant hand trying to spark a lighter. However the use of different paths and trails could lead to the idea of a journey.
Based on the project parameters, the work does appear to address light and darkness in a transformative way. Long exposures were used to capture the light trails, while I used a combination of different exposures to other elements of the composition but combined them all together using blending modes. I think I could’ve incorporated more uses of the long, bright light trails as it creates a nice point within the composition and pushing that even farther would be interesting. I also wish something more was done with the orbs at the top to make it really dynamic and maybe adjusting its hue and saturation to be warmer to fit the rest of the composition.
The work appears to exist within our larger culture as planes are a common form of transportation for traveling long distances. Planes represent this idea of traveling and usually a long journey to get from one place to another. They are able to safely travel anywhere where the light reaches whether it's daytime or a well-lit runway strip. Even when you’re looking at a plane from a distance at night, you usually don’t notice the body of the plane but the lights coming from it first. Beyond the aesthetics without light, whether from the environment, on the plane, or anything related it would create chaos as lights are crucial for visibility and safety for aircrafts. Which is why I composited a calm atmosphere when making this rather than one of chaos.
I found a few works quite exemplary such as Aliyah Valcin’s “Light Angel”, Ximena Alvarado’s “Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo”, and Liz Garcia’s “Night Prowler”. They all stood out to me from the way they were using light exposures as the motions captured in them were really beautiful. They also hone in on one primary subject and emphasize it really well, which I could take inspiration from. They also incorporated color into their light sources rather than a bright white which pushed their works to create a mood, which I did in my piece but now wish I elevated it even more.