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for all those who have taken a class in photography, i have a question
my teacher gave us an assingment to take 15 high contrast pictures with a light( sun) either behind or infront of the camera. now, my probelm is that, by the time i come back from school, theres no sun!.....so can i take some cool pictures with some other light source?

By Wcolsher (Wcolsher) on Wednesday, December 17, 2003 - 09:18 am: Edit

YES!

Hi-Con portraits can be stunning (e.g. www.mapplethorpe.org mature content)

Even more "artsy" are pics of just part of the human body, in very sharp focus; say just the curve of someone's neck for example. Fill the frame & limit depth of field so you eliminate "background noise".

"Still life" type shots are pretty easy as well. Years ago I did a group of "dirty dishes" shots. B&W shots of one day's used dishes stacking up in the kitchen sink. The "essay" ended up being 7 shots (out of about 100 taken) titled with the time, e.g. 06:22, 09:58, etc. I moved my lights so the shadows related to the time of day. (Hey I was 17 and it sounded cool to me then!)

Bright lights, sharp focus, limited palette, ideally B&W IMHO.

Good luck!

By Becks777 (Becks777) on Wednesday, December 17, 2003 - 06:50 pm: Edit

what does limited palette mean?

By Wcolsher (Wcolsher) on Thursday, December 18, 2003 - 09:19 am: Edit

Limited palette means limiting the range of color in the image. Obviously trickier in color photography.

One of my friends once took a series of limited palette photographs of a squashed cardboard chocolate milk carton on the cement windosill of a beige stucco building. It was amazingly cool; the bright sunlight created very high contrast shadows, and everything was in shades of gray and light brown. He did it using just time of day and exposure, but you can also have fun in the darkroom by manipulating processing times.

Cheers,

-bc