Artist - Person At Work

To find a subject for my first 'People at Work' shoot, I walked through Falmouth town centre and dropped into a few shops that seemed unique and interesting to photograph to see if I could shoot in them. One of the first shops that caught my eye was a painters gallery. All his work that was on display was of local areas and the work was all produced there. I spoke to him to gather infomation about him and his businesses and show an interest before asking to photograph him at work.

One of the main reasons I chose this shot was because of the lighting that was created from the light just in front of Nick's head. This gave the photo an unique aesthetic feel. Also, the angle of the shot allows you to see exactly what he is working on and the detail of his work and almost see from his point of view as it is over his shoulder. The complexity of the work is intruging which engages the viewer in the photo. Looking back at the image now, I would like to have shot it slightly less tight to show more of the drawing/painting. I feel that it is suddenly cut off in the bottom left of the shot.

One part of this image I do not like is the lack of contrast. Although this is only technical and does not affect how the image shows a person at work; in my eyes it is a weaker image due to this. This is a very simple fix in lightroom and if I choose to use this as my final 8x10 print I will ensure I do this.

 

I chose this picture to put in my final 3 because I love the depth of field with the table dropping away in the foreground and the focus primarily over Nick's hand. The shot being taken so close to the table enhances the impact of he shallow depth of field and shows the precision of the work. Also, I converted the picture to black and white because I felt that the detail in his hand looked much better this way making it a more interesting picture. It shows how much concentration is being put into is work.

I would have liked to framed the photograph more tightly but in the brief it stated that I couldn't do any cropping which means there is a little too much 'blank space' which would be my main critizism. Also, the contrast isn't quite as strong as I'd like it to be making the image seem a little flat.









 I chose this as my final image because it showed more of the area that Nick was working in as it is not such a close up. It shows some of this other work in the background and the prints he sells to enable him to paint as a profession. Also, much like the first image, I love the yellow light highlighting the painting that he is working on. This is why I chose to keep the image in colour rather than black and white because although the background is quite flat and fairly uninformative, the main subject of the photograph is lit very aesthetically. This angle again shows almost his perspective of the work and shows the image that he is replicating in front of him. This helps the viewer to see what is involved in this kind of work.