Today as I was printing I got to thinking about a book I saw at Larry's on Monday night. The book was the large format portraiture (at least it looked that way) of a phototgrapher whose name I forget. His work was printed in Turkey so he might be Turkish in origin. I loved the simplicity of his photographs, vertical portraits that included the whole body and feet of the subject, from what I remember mostly portrait pairs of farm style dressed students. I loved the way he incorporated the entire figure including the feet in a vertical portrait. To often I tend to cut off parts of the head, body in my composition there is a traditional beauty and simplicity in shooting the whole figure with available light in a rural setting. The great photographer August Sander made a career out of shooting folks this way.
I keep thinking about how I want to do my 5x7 large format portrait work next trip. I planned on shooting horizontal family groups in front of their shack homes, that is what my grant submission request was about. I am now thinking of also doing many vertical portraits that include the whole figure in their environment as well. The 5x7 format works so well vertically, better than a 4x5 or 8x10 the dimensions of the neg the (7 inch length) fit a person standing.
I need to do some work in the coming days with the 5x7, I am unsure which lens will work best. I think with large extended horizontal family portraits the 120mm lens might work best, but am sure how that will look with a single person vertically, how much distortion will it create? I want to limit the amount of gear I take to Thai, the simpler the better. If I can go with 1 lens I will but for now I will test 2 lens the 120mm and the 235mm. If I can travel with 1 lens, 1 camera, 1 meter, 1 tripod and 1 reflector I should be doing well. One advantage of the 120mm would be that I would be physically closer to my subject when making the portrait and as a result of that the reflector would have more impact bringing brightening light to my portraits shadows. Sometimes if your to far away my smaller reflectors do not seem to do much to the photograph.
Update: Here is the photographer I mentioned, I guess she is not Turkish. Here is her website:
http://www.vanessawinship.com
and the book which I just ordered:
http://www.vanessawinship.com/projects.phphttp://www.amazon.ca/Sweet-nothing-Winship-Vanessa/dp/2849951293/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1394043101&sr=8-1&keywords=Vanessa+Winship
and some of the photos that inspired me:
http://www.vanessawinship.com/gallery.php?ProjectID=157
I keep thinking about how I want to do my 5x7 large format portrait work next trip. I planned on shooting horizontal family groups in front of their shack homes, that is what my grant submission request was about. I am now thinking of also doing many vertical portraits that include the whole figure in their environment as well. The 5x7 format works so well vertically, better than a 4x5 or 8x10 the dimensions of the neg the (7 inch length) fit a person standing.
I need to do some work in the coming days with the 5x7, I am unsure which lens will work best. I think with large extended horizontal family portraits the 120mm lens might work best, but am sure how that will look with a single person vertically, how much distortion will it create? I want to limit the amount of gear I take to Thai, the simpler the better. If I can go with 1 lens I will but for now I will test 2 lens the 120mm and the 235mm. If I can travel with 1 lens, 1 camera, 1 meter, 1 tripod and 1 reflector I should be doing well. One advantage of the 120mm would be that I would be physically closer to my subject when making the portrait and as a result of that the reflector would have more impact bringing brightening light to my portraits shadows. Sometimes if your to far away my smaller reflectors do not seem to do much to the photograph.
Update: Here is the photographer I mentioned, I guess she is not Turkish. Here is her website:
http://www.vanessawinship.com
and the book which I just ordered:
http://www.vanessawinship.com/projects.phphttp://www.amazon.ca/Sweet-nothing-Winship-Vanessa/dp/2849951293/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1394043101&sr=8-1&keywords=Vanessa+Winship
and some of the photos that inspired me:
http://www.vanessawinship.com/gallery.php?ProjectID=157
