Karl Blossfeldt
I needed to research some more photographers for my venture into Patterns. I was informed about the work of Karl Blossfeldt.
Blossfeldt took photos of flowers, leaves and other natural forms using a homemade macro lens. Blossfeldt made a macro lens because he wanted to get some really close into the subjects. He clearly wanted to bring out the detail. The textures, the lines. |
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Threshold close ups
When I got back from half term I decided to make some Photograms with these threshold images.
Half Term
During the half term, I really wanted to get photos in a style very similar to Blossfeldt. I came across this video of how to make a DIY macro lens with a toilet roll. I really wanted to try this but it just wasn't working for me.
So I decided to take photos of objects likes flowers and prickles similar to Blossfeldt. However I'm using my Sigma 70-300mm Macro lens, then I would crop them down. Blossfeldts homemade lens would of been a much bigger magnification. After I took these photos I put them into Photoshop and along with cropping them, I dramatically changed the Brightness & Contrast, that way it really brings out the texture of the images and the textures tend to create patterns especially in the leaves. I also decided to put the photos in B&W, then again to bring out the details within the textures. |
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Photograms
Back with the Threshold images I made before half term. I wanted to make some photograms. However I wanted to zoom in on a particular section of the image. So I would place the image in the film slot on the enlarger that way the projection would be just like looking through a micro scope at an object. That way I will get a very nice pattern which would work well on a photogram. However the image is very dark. Despite the fact it is only black and white. Below are a couple of photograms I made which are under exposed because the lighting was too dark.
So after this technique didn't work. I decided to go back to Photoshop and crop the images down to a certain point. These images were 15.9 mega pixels so I could crop them down quiet a lot without them getting pixelated.
Response
When I was making photograms. I decided to revisit a technique that I did during Surrealism. I decided to develop a couple of the photograms as if they were Rorschach's. So I would drop some developer onto the photogram with a brush. Then I would fold it so the developed areas should be symmetrical however I knew this wouldn't be completely true. This is because when I fold the paper the developer is prone to moving around.
So I have made a normal pattern into an irregular pattern. WWW.
EBI.
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