Critical study- Documentary Photography

My work this year has been based around documentary photography, but I have explored street photography. Street photography results in many out of focus images, relying on fast shutter speed and quick reactions to achieve the clear crisp images that capture the decisive moment of a story. Also I had to get very familiar with the composition of my camera, as it is shot from the hip. I then started to work with documentary, using different media in the form of mixing pictures with audio. I have chosen to expand on 3 artists that have influenced my work during my studies; Garry Winogrand, Dorothea Lange and Henri Cartier-Bresson.

(Migrant Mother- printed in 1936 on Gelatin silver print)

Dorothea Lange is most famous for her work in the great depression. Her most famous picture was titled 'Migrant Mother' and it featured a portrait shot of a mother with her two children. Her work was used to expose the issues posed by the great depression and were shown all over the news to spread the word. She shot in 4x5 negatives, so her images are in black and white and very detailed. The migrant mother has had the most influence on my work as it shows raw emotion in the subjects without the need for word, their faces explain the image.

(American Legion- printed in 1974 on Gelatin silver print)

Garry Winogrand is most famous for his street photography. He studied painting at the city college of New York and then later studied painting and photography at Columbia University were he also took classes in photojournalism. Winogrand set out to capture and fix moments of everyday American life in the post war as this was a stressful and depressing time for many. His pictures often feature violence of antisocial behaviour, making them stick in the viewers head more, to leave a message that Winogrand was set out to deliver. Winogrand strongly influenced my street body of work, with composition and general style of photography.

(Seville, wall hole- printed in 1944 on Gelatin silver print)

Henri Cartier-Bresson was born on August 22, 1908 in Chanteloup, France. He specialised in photojournalism, and was famous for his street photography. Cartier-Bresson travelled the world with his camera taking photos of each environment and immersing himself in his surroundings and become one with the crowd. Cartier-Bresson created his photography work using a film camera, all in black and white. Cartier-Bresson is the middle grounds in regards to his influence in my work, his images focus on a more calculated and framed form of street photography. This is done by using the decisive moment, which is largely a judgment call from the photographer where the photographer sets up his frame and wait for the perfect moment to take the photograph.

Chapter 1: Dorothea Lange

I

have chosen to analyse one of the most iconic photojournalism pieces of all time, Migrant Mother by Dorothea Lange, taken of mother and children in 1936 in Nipomo California. Nipomo has one of the largest Mexican land grants in San Luis Obispo Country. The Pacific Coast Railway came to the town in 1882 and trains would run through Nipomo until the Great depression, which is when Dorothea Lange did most of her famous work. Dorothea Lange shot in black and white on a Graflex camera, which shot in the formats 4×5 negatives. The Graflex camera is a large format camera that shoots black in white but captures the most detail of the film types. The Graflex exposing a negative image onto photographic glass plate which can be loaded two into the camera at any one time. Like all film this then has to be chemically developed and then have the colour inverted to create a non negative image.

As well as photographing people, which she mostly did post World War I in the Great Depression, she also photographed buildings and places. This is both sides of documentary photography I would like experiment with both of these genres in my own work, to find which I enjoy doing the most. At this stage personally I feel the human side of things will be more interesting as you can explore deeper meaning in the image, whereas the places side of it I like because it creates more of a sense of mystery.

The image I feel shows excellent composition. The use of the two children to form symmetry really draws the attention to the center of the image of the mothers face. This I feel is the strongest point of the image as it shows the true emotion of the great depression which she was documenting at the time. There is also slightly narrow depth of field allowing the background to be blurred as to not distract form the subject of the image. The way that the boys heads are tuned also I feel gives the image strength as it doesn't clutter the image, keeps is simple and yet still very powerful. The use of pure black and white as appose to a more sepia toned image I feel adds to the strength of the image by giving the viewer less distractions from the subject. This has to be one of my all time favourite images from both a photographic standpoint and from a personal one.

The photo gives me an appreciation about the world, how everyone’s lives are so different and on top of this they are all happening simultaneously. Using Migrant mother as the example here during the great depression, much of the focus was towards the stock market crash and the working class being out of the job. While many were unemployed the richest of the rich saw little to no effect and that left the people in the migrant mother’s situation, the homeless. As a result of the great depression many people became nomadic travellers travelling across the country looking for jobs. In Lange’s photo the woman and children were found on the road in a group of nomadic travellers. The fact that this is all simultaneous is amazing to me and it is the same instance with today’s society, were 3 billion people are in poverty and 2 billion have access to the internet, all happening at the same time. The image makes me think on a large scale and how the past follows the same patterns as the present.

Lange strongly influenced my portrait work, especially with my final piece: Life of Clay.

The image that I feel Lange has particularity is as the portrait of Clay Lowe smiling, the closing image of my short documentary. It was the first portrait shot, and it has inspired by what I learned from Lange, both on a technical level and on an emotional level. I used a slightly narrow depth of field this image as well as it being taken in the subject’s natural environment, the same concept as Lange’s. Also the photo has meaning behind it and I feel concludes the story in a way that best describes the mood of the documentary. His image was a natural smile which I captured rather than forcing a pose to make it more natural and powerful. Also I shot in black and white because all most all of the photographers I had been studying shot in black and white, so making the format black and white made my work more closely resemble the artists I was studying. As they are both forms of documentary photography, the subjects being in their natural environment is important, so this includes the use of natural lighting and background. Both the backgrounds are blurred due the depth of field but they are still important aspects of the photo, showing that the images have a natural feel to them.

Chapter2: Gary Winogrand

Winogrand’s work influenced my street photography during my course. Street photography took up a large proportion of my coursework so Winogrand played an important role. Winogrand’s work was done post World War II so he was capturing the depression and impacts that the war caused. The image I have chosen to evaluate is of a war veteran who lost his legs in the war, which was the focus of Winogrand’s body of work. Because it is street photography Winogrand will not have known anything about the subject when he took the photo, because street photography is about capturing what’s there and not disturbing the environment. This being said it appears that the veteran has spotted him, probably because Winogrand was waiting for the optimal time to take the image. This has happened to me on many occasions and I feel that it does actually add to the impact of the photo on the viewer, giving the subject more connect ability. I feel the message of this image was to show the impact the war had on the people that were directly affected by it. The image show that the man has had little care for the accident, he does not have a wheelchair. Also the fact that no one is even looking at the man

shows that people are not paying attention, in fact most of the people in the image appear to be paying more attention to Winogrand than the man.

The image is in black and white, as this was the only available format of camera available at the time, because of this I chose to make street images black and white too to make them more comparable. There is a high contrast in the image with very prominent blacks and whites, which I think was done to direct more attention to the man, as he is one of the few people that doesn’t have a very dark tone to his clothes. This image also very strongly follows the rule of thirds, where the main subject of the image is in the bottom left focal point when it comes to the rule of thirds. All of the people stood up are on the same plane, which creates line in the image leading to the man with the cigarette looking at the camera. The viewer is drawn the man, then follow the line of people to this man. The photo was taken outside using natural light as street photography must be done as to not attract too much attention and because of this the image was probably taken sometime between 9am and 6pm as this is when the sunlight is best for film photography.

Winogrand’s work strongly influenced my images, aside from the meaning behind them, but the technique and the concept are the same. My image is more focused on two individual but is part of a body of work that includes more than two people, a wide range of street photography. For my shot I also used the precise moment technique, where I waited for the opportune moment to take the picture. I chose to take the picture when they were crossing each other and near the frame of the window, as this creates line to the person on the left, similar to how line works in Winogrand’s image. I also followed the rule of thirds; I just used the top right focal point of this technique. Both images were taken in the streets using natural light for the same reasons as Winogrand: not drawing attention to myself as a photographer as this would remove the natural element.

Winogrand’s images gave me a sense of how people act when they are not being photographed, making it one of the most natural forms of documentary photography, and Winogrand captures this very well in his work. Winogrand stands out for me above other photographers because lots of his photographs were released after his death, as he had around 2,500 frozen undeveloped images. The fact that lots of his images came out after death enforced my belief that photographs are very powerful, they capture a moment and keep that moment forever locked in time. Because of this Winogrand’s is my biggest inspiration towards making photography my form of media.

Chapter 3: Henri Cartier-Bresson

Cartier-Bresson was a photojournalist that focused on street photography creating perfect framing he achieved the angle he wanted he generally attracted attention to himself so most of the people are looking at him in his photographs. Cartier-Bresson was taken prisoner of war in 1940 and escaped in 1943 and subsequently joined an underground organisation to assist and aid other prisoners escape. He did a lot of surreal paintings in his early days, but later on in his life he turned to photography, keeping the images realistic representations of what he was documenting. Cartier-Bresson focuses very strongly on precise moment as well as the perfect composition of his images, which creates his strong street photography. For his work he travelled all around the world photographing people from different cultures which I feel makes for good comparisons. My body of work is similar but focuses more on a national level rather than international, but I do hope to expand this one day. My work shows different cultures and styles in different places in the UK, but Cartier-Bresson across the whole world.

Cartier-Bressons image I have chosen to analyse shows a group of boys in the streets of Spain from his travels around the world. The boys are just playing in the street and Cartier-Bresson must have seen the hole in the wall as a good frame and the children as an interesting documentation, but because this is street photography, Cartier-Bresson will have no relation to the subjects. The image like all street photography is taken using natural light, so as to not draw attention to the photographer. This keeps the people acting more comfortably as many people act differently in front of a camera. The image is in black and white due to availability of film camera technology. Cartier-Bressons used a Leica camera which is a 35mm film camera and he used this to capture and many photographs back to back as possible to help get the precise moment. Although 35mm is the smallest of the formats of film cameras and captures the least amount of detail, you can around 30 photos onto the film reel, where as large format cameras can usually take 2 photos max before they need changing.

To compare my work more accurately I made my image black and white as well. Cartier-Bresson uses quite low contrast in his images in comparison to Winogrand’s, and the tone of the image is generally lighter. The hole in the wall creates a line which frames the image very well as the wall is white so it appears one of the boys is exceeding the frame. With regards to the rule of thirds technique Cartier-Bresson has focused one of the boys in the bottom left focal point, the same as Winogrand. There is also use of line from the path that goes into the background, with most kids on either side of the road, creating a more framed path. Then to top of the symmetry there is a single boy in the centre of the end of the pathway. It is because of a collection of all these things that Cartier-Bresson has inspired my work throughout the years. He has strongly influenced my consciousness of framing in my images and showing me how important the composition of an image is and requires a lot of practice and familiarity with the camera you are using. When Cartier-Bresson got a new camera he would test it for 3 days and learn its ins and outs before he would use it properly which helps considerably with framing. Cartier-Bressons also had a purpose behind his image, showing the joy of children even through tough times. I use the idea of having a specific purpose for an image and reflect it in my own work, the meaning behind my photo was to create a photo of a stranger and make it look like a knew them. I did they by taking the Image in a place that is familiar to me.

This photo makes me think about how all kids, regardless of culture and background are very similar. The way that they are just hanging out and playing in the rubble of a building resembles how all kids play outside in groups to have fun, the only difference is the actual scenery. I find it amazing that despite how similar we start off, we all mature into such a wide range of people.

This image gets me thinking about how the world and how at the core we are all the same, but we all have things added on to us to make up unique, which I feel is the most beautiful part about humanity.

In conclusion I feel that from this years work has inspired me and set me down the path I wish to travel. These 3 photographers have inspired me the most, but there are many others who have inspired me as well along the way. I feel by studying their photographs and themselves as photographers I have got myself more familiar with the various techniques used by documentary photographers such as composition, camera angles, subject matter and timing the photograph. Timing is one of the key things I have picked up, as it is present in all of my images showcased in this essay. The first two of street images are the most obvious as street photography requires the precise moment to get the correct composition. But the final image of the portrait shot also uses the decisive moment as it was taken of a natural pose that I had to capture the perfect framing and moment in very little time to enable the production of a natural powerful shot. They have also helped me get a stronger understanding of the career and lifestyles of the people in the industry I wish to pursue , so it has given me great insight into my future, not just from the photographic standpoint but also from the lifestyle and career path.