Environmental Portrait - Page 2.

Photographing - Attempt 1.

For my first attempt at an Environmental Portrait, I took a photograph of my grandfather who is currently living with me and my family, due to ill health. 
He sleeps the majority of the day, so it was difficult to take a photograph of him while he wasn't asleep. I did want to use my grandfather for my Environmental Portrait, but a few days after this photograph was taken, he was taken into hospital, so it would have been very difficult to photograph him.




Photographing - Attempt 2.

My first attempt of an environmental portrait consisted of photographing my 12 year-old sister in her bedroom. at that age, I felt that her room was the most appropriate place to have her situated. Her room is also pink and purple, which I felt highlighted the fact that she was very young. It's full of toys, but it's also full of electronic gadgets which I found highlighted our modern world that she has been raised in.

Some of the images did come out quite well, but I wasn't 100% sure about it. The photographs did come out very dark as well, considering I was using portable studio lights.

Photographing - Attempt 3.

For my second attempt, I photographed my boss, David, who is a chef in Eddy's restaurant on the Gower.
I really enjoyed photographing in the kitchen, the lights from the counter and behind gave a very nice controlled lighting look, even though it did give everything quite a yellow glow. I began by photographing David, attempting to catch him busy at work, so he wasn't looking at the camera in a number of the photographs.

This was one of the images I wanted to use as my final piece, it was taken at a relatively fast shutter speed but at the same time it captured the movement of David busy at work. It's quite dark for a final image. He isn't looking directly at the camera, and after close consideration I decided to go back and photograph David looking at the camera.








 For the last few photographs I got him to look at the camera, and as soon as he realised he was having his photograph taken, he began posing and all sorts, so I had to choose an image which wasn't too comical.

Here is my final image, in JPEG format, unedited. I am quite fond of this photographing. Knowing David quite well, it was nice to see him unstressed and rather relaxed. I think that the surrounding metal gave a nice sense of how hard his work is, in a strange way.


I didn't edit the final image too much. I like the warm glow of kitchen, I felt it highlighted the heat of all of the cooking equipment.

I tone done the warmness of the image slightly, and I bumped up the contrast and tone. I am fairly fond of the way the lights shine directly onto David, it gives him a nice almost glow. 
Perhaps I should have cropped the image a little, or maybe taking the photograph at a lower angle, but overall I am relatively happy with this photograph.