3,000 Word Essay: CONTRASTS

‘Contrasts’ is an interesting topic to study for photography. Unlike Multiple Imagery or Fashion Photography, ‘Contrasts’ is not a specific genre or technique associated with photography; it is “the state of being strikingly different from something else, typically something in juxtaposition or close association” or, in terms of photography, it is “the relative difference between light and dark areas of a print or negative.”1 A theme of Contrasts in photography can be explored in a variety of means; it is all down to the imagination and creativity of the photographer and being able to justify an idea or development. The theme of Contrasts can also come from the simple ideas of ‘opposites’ or ‘differences’ most children are exposed to in primary education – the two different sides to something and juxtaposing them, they can be as simple as short and tall, fat and thin, boy and girl. The theme of ‘Contrasts’ is not just an important topic in photography, but in society too. Without contrasts in our everyday day-to-day life, everything, or everyone, would be the same – life would be much more boring and unoriginal without them. For example, in terms of colour, if there was no contrast in the world, everything would look the same colour and nobody would be able to see anything as the colours would just blur together. In terms of people, everyone will be the same – it will be like everyone is mass-produced, just like robots – either we’ll be all male or all female; we’ll look identical in terms of weight, height, shape etc. and nobody will be able to express emotions because there would be no difference between happy or sad. Without contrasts, there is no diversification, and diversification is essential for us in this day-and-age, otherwise we wouldn’t know how to interact properly with people and we wouldn’t learn about the world we live in and the different cultures that surround us.

Whilst exploring the topic/theme of Contrasts, from a photographic point of view, this can take on a variety of forms. For example, with fashion photography, the idea of contrasts might be looked at by researching the very origins of fashion photography in up-market fashion magazines and brands such as Vogue, Chanel and Dior, where all images would have been processed in black and white – the most basic contrast widely used within photography. Or alternatively, the physical content could be contrasted, such as male and female fashion, someone wearing a purple dress with bold yellow makeup, vintage fashion and modern fashion etc. With fashion photography in mind, contrasts are important to make the actual image more vibrant, or more eye-catching, often encoding specific messages or meanings, to encourage purchases of that particular fashion, product or brand.

Landscape photography is also often very reliant on the theme of contrasts, whether the images are in black or white or in full colour. Black and white, a very common contrast technique, will be used more for architectural work, or dramatic scenery to make the landscape have a certain mood or tone. More modern landscape photographers may alternatively use a technique known as HDR (high-dynamic range) photography. HDR photography is used to “capture a greater dynamic range  the between lightest and darkest areas of an image than current standard digital imaging methods or photographic methods.”2 Although not technically a method of enhancing the contrast within an image, it does increase the contrast between the dark and light areas, like stated above, which would be important to any photographer, let alone landscape photographers as it adds mood and tone to any photo, making it much more appealing and eye-catching, thus helping to sell more of that particular image whether it be used as part of an advertising campaign, within a book, or just a simple print or canvas. It becomes more important to study the art of

1 http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/contrast2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-dynamic-range_imaging

HDR photography as more and more people in society get the technique so badly wrong, that it no longer looks professional. At one point, this stunning technique was sought out to be just a ‘fad’ amongst photographers as it was often over-used, creating ‘grungy’ effects, which is not the purpose at all of this technique.3

As previously stated, there is no real genre as ‘Contrast Photography’, and so the history of this topic comes from individual styles of photography which visually undertake Contrasts, such as Black and White Photography. Black and White Photography is one of the most classic examples of Contrast in imagery, as of course, at the very start of the history of photography in general, there was no developing in colour, and everything was shot and printed in black and white. Technically, ‘Black and White Photography’ is referred to as monochrome photography – where the camera captures a single hue – normally greys – rather than a whole colour spectrum, whilst the development of Full-Colour Photography only really came into perspective in the middle 20th century. The idea of photography commenced in 1790 when Thomas Wedgwood invented and developed the camera and the idea of creating permanent images. Since this very early start in the world of photography, there have been lists of photographers who have made an impact on the way we operate as a society and the media as we see it today. Toni Frissell was a female American photographer, famous for her work on fashion photography and World War II portraits – all of which were developed in black and white. She lived from 1907 to 1988 in New York, working for big-name-clients such as Vogue in its earlier days. She later also photographed for Harper’s Bazaar, but most notably are her fashion photos of evening gowns, as she unusually shot in outside locations, emphasizing the active lifestyle of women. Although obviously not out of choice, the use of black and white imagery actually made Toni’s work all the more dramatic, and especially in her War works, it made the tone all the more serious. Also as a War photographer, Toni was left, not out of choice, to pose these much like her works with fashion, as at the very start of photography and the development of the camera, exposure times were typically a lot longer than how we know them now, and so this made ‘action’ or ‘movement’ pictures impossible.

However, with the development of technology in our society, it wasn’t long before full-colour cameras were developed. With the first colour-cameras, the colours captured weren’t all that true to life, and so it was often that photographers chose to stick with Black and White Photography as the images looked all the more professional than

those that were off-colour. Colour photography was first attempted in the 1840’s where inventors began looking for a ‘chameleon-like substance’, which would assume the colour of the light falling upon it. However, it wasn’t considered a good-quality success until the mid-20th century, where the use of colour-capable cameras became more and more common with the development of new photographic styles and techniques, such as HDR photography. Although first experimented with in

the 1850’s, HDR photography didn’t become desirable until 1980, and this was due to the recent improvement of computer technology, which is now the main method of creating this technique. In 1850, Gustave Le Gray, who was considered to be the most important French Photographer of the 19th century, first made HDR

3 http://www.ianplant.com/blog/2012/09/12/hdr-images-the-importance-of-preserving-relative-luminosity-tones/

Photography possible. The luminance of the photographing world was always too extreme to be able to cope with the rendering of exposures needed to produce the HDR effect, so Le Gray used one negative for the sky of a seascape he was working on, and another with a long exposure for the sea, and combined them both into one positive. Between the mid-20th century and 1980, the technique was improved once the technology was developed by applying the concept of tone mapping to cameras, so that it was possible for a Photographer to capture different exposures at once and combine them into one image.

Two current photographers you might place under the category of working with ‘Contrasts’ are Mary Ellen Mark and Mark Laita. Mary Ellen Mark is an American photographer best known for her portraiture, photojournalism and advertising work. Mark focuses mostly on children, exploring themes such as homelessness, addiction, prostitution etc. The photograph on the right shows a child, Amanda, and her cousin Amy. Although the photograph typically shows the visual contrast of black and white in the image’s toning, the picture clearly shows the contrast between adult life and childhood in this modern society we live in. The dramatic themes of this photograph force the viewers to consider the humanity of our modern society and how the media is having strong implications on the youngest generations. The girl in the foreground is dressed in skimpy clothes, smoking and is positioned in a manner that makes her appear to be superior to the girl in the background, who is noticeably larger, fully clothed and appears to be quite vulnerable. This immoral contrast shows just how strong of an impact modern media can have on younger children, as they grow up believing that acting like ‘adults’ or bullies, will make them the stronger, better people. Although initially quite disturbing, the real-life contrasts of society that Mary Ellen Mark presents to us are truthful and tell a shocking story of what direction our society Is heading in contrast to how our ancestors would have grown up. Mary Ellen Mark also presents this idea in various other photographs of hers, including this image of

two circus performers on the left. Again, aside from her use of visual contrast in the form of a black and white image, which I feel is to add drama and emotion to the tone of the photo, the encoded messages also hold strong contrasts, which viewers should also listen to. The overall contrast here is that of the distinct differences between the animal and human kingdoms. However, what is particularly shocking

about this photo of Mary’s is that she is also highlighting the similarities here, and therefore shows how their should be contrast between these two different kingdoms in our society, but there isn’t. The two people pictured in the photo are dwarves, and the use of costume and setting of the tents within the background would suggest that they are being used as circus performers. This idea should in fact shock viewers into seeing that these two human beings are being treated like animals just because they are physically different from what is deemed the ‘norm’ in our society today. Mary Ellen Mark highlights this issue by showing that they should be treated like normal human beings by having one of them holding a puppy in the cradling position, insinuating the idea that they should be free to have children too, but instead they are given the chore of looking after animals and performing instead.4

4 http://www.maryellenmark.com/

Another interesting modern development into the world of ‘Contrast’ photographers comes with the combination of current art and design techniques, such as in the form of photographer Danielle Tunstall. Danielle is a graphic design and horror photographer from the UK. She likes to incorporate the graphic-design part of her life with her photography work, making good use of her excellent and eye-catching Photoshop skills. With the increasing use

of modern technology, we now have the advantage of being able to apply unique and creative elements to photography, in comparison to the limitations they had decades ago. Danielle evokes the idea of ‘Contrast’ in her work by visually implementing the idea of gore and horror within the most innocent of all of today’s generations – young children and babies. Without the modernization of technology and photography, this wouldn’t be made possible as Danielle uses a combination of dramatic makeup and costume technique and layers and overtones in Photoshop. This photograph on the right shows contrast through the important use of props and makeup, like stated before. The symbolic use of flowers and brighter colours of blue and pink suggest purity and beauty, whilst accompanying skull-makeup and darkened levels and curves suggest to the viewers that the model has a darker, twisted side. This is an effective technique to employ as it forces the viewer into becoming confused on how to express emotions over the photo, as the imaging creates a mixed-up tone of feelings and expressions due to the visual contrasts. 5

I feel I have so far worked quite well under the theme of ‘Contrasts’ as I have explored it both visually and in a much more complex manner where I have attempted to encode the ideas mentally to be decoded and interpreted in various ways by different viewers.

4. How does your work fit in to this

Include a couple of samples of work you have already shot and discuss them. Here you are allowed to write in the first person.

5. The future

Bearing in mind the technological development how to you see this aspect of photography developing in the future.

6. Conclusion

Just wrap it up summarising the main points that you have made.

Bibliography of all sources used

5 http://www.behance.net/danielletunstall