Pydale figure

[JMRead]

Hello all,

Pydale wood in November, I took the pic with the space for a figure on the right. This is my first attempt at a legacy image. I see in my mind Claude Lorrain's images and Turner's early one's, in his will Turner asked that two of his paintings should be shown next to two of Claude's so that people could see where Turner came from, they are still there in the National Gallery. 

The other part of the legacy is the work of Anne W Brigman who posed nude in the landscape for a self portrait called 'The Soul of the Blasted Pine' in 1908. A wonderfully evocative image of her stretching to the sky with all the tautness she could muster. 

Everyone has to start somewhere and I'm no exception, I began this with the light which I brightened even to drawing a yellow circle, yellow looking brighter than white. I wasn't happy with just that so added some stained brown paper under the sky and trees bit, tried a few blend modes 'Color' worked and I used a Reveal All mask to improve the sunlight. I used a partial Paint filtration to give the trees on the right that feathery look and brightened the foreground with the Clonne tool.

The lighting on the figure was the wrong way round I have to pose in a one position in a room and use a couple of speedlights so I had to darken the right and do the rim lighting on the left.

Every time though I learn a little bit more and now have a better idea of what to do.

Cheers

 

[FUJI]

A very interesting experiment.....I’m all for that Jem.

Anyone who stretches the boundaries of Photography/Art has my vote every time.....

I too am an Artist before I’m a photographer, so I can fully understand where you are coming from.....currently I am creating Watercolour versions of a number of my photographs but with a very strong Impressionist twist and colour palette.

Keep them coming please.

FUJI

Edited January 25, 2018 by FUJI

[kev7d]

I like it.  There are lines on the ground that seem to “point” towards the figure.   

[Korky]

Your images certainly make me look and think, Jim, they really do, and this one is no exception. TBH, though, I'm not sure that I actually like this one. I simply can't figure out what it is you're saying to say. Is it simply the juxtaposition of a strangely clad figure in a situation where such a figure wouldn't normally be seen? Or is it something more complex that my addled old mind can't quite grasp? Dunno!

I know that you feel the image is of far greater importance than the 'tools' used to create it (me too!), but I'm dying to know what photographic tackle you use to make your images. Pray tell.

Korky

[Ryewolf]

I must admit to have never heard of Anne W Brigman before, but after a bit of a Google I found I really liked her work and found it very compelling and adventurous considering it was done in the early 1900's. There is a but in this, I'm not sure I like the image... after looking at your legacy sources Lorrain, Turner and Brigman, I don't think you've quite captured any of the qualities of the source materials...

I'm wondering if duplicating the pose from Anne Brigman's The Soul of the Blasted Pine might have worked better along with a less fussy background and the whole thing being in monochrome...

But it's really nice to see something different and people having a go at experimenting, so still a thumbs up from me.

[JMRead]

Thanks for the interest all,

Thanks Fuji, Nice of you to say that, like you I love experimenting.

Hello Kev, The wood was at one time filled with 4WD idiots until the farmer fenced it. Those lines coincided with the sun and made it just right for what I wanted.

Hello Korky, There is a (hidden?) history of the figure in the landscape, where the figure is part of the image and not just its subject, I pose as my characters Everyman and Everywoman, I've been doing it now for 6 years and got used to the idea although it's 500 years old. I use Ps CS6 it's the fastest one I've come across I used Ps7 2002 and Ps4 1994 prior to that.

Hello Ryewolf, I think Anne has had an enormous influence on photographers perhaps as much as JMC, photographers today have no idea whose images they are emulating there seems to be dreadful lack of historical photographic knowledge. The worst thing about it is that it's much easier to find now that it ever was, the photographers of the pivotal photo secession are well documented all over the web.

In this image I was not trying to make anything like Claude, Bill and Anne but trying to find out if I could get someway into creating the light and how to do it, the brown paper worked quite well. I can only use my own source materials and what's between my ears, the problem I faced was using light pouring into the image which would render a figure almost as a silhouette and I wanted both lit so I had to 'cheat' in the same way Claude and Bill did. That is the beauty in stepping away from the single image and into a creation of my own making I begin to understand what they did and how difficult it was.

Cheers