PHot 205:

Digital Photography

Week #1

When deciding what to photograph, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. Since I am also a writer for the Globe here on campus, I thought I would kill two birds with one stone by taking a professional picture for one of my stories this week. This not only uploads content to my blog, but also illustrates what my story is about.

Week #2

For this week, we took a field trip across the downtown region of Pittsburgh, near Point Park’s campus. We went to multiple locations I haD never been TO before and gave me multiple opportunities to set up great shots for my camera. I was able to capture moving shots, still shots, vertical and horizontal shots, and so much more. These shots here are the unedited versionS that follow various different rules of good composition. The first image captures the building in full detail. With the aperture and the shutter speed equaling out in the middle of the ratio, this image is practically perfect. The architecture and color of the building is what drew me in to take its photo. In the second image here, I attempted to create a blurry effect of the moving subway. To do this, I turned my shutter speed down, creating more space between each shot, and my aperture down, to create more light. This combination created an amazing image. The last image, follows the rule of thirds, with the ledge lying on the bottom horizontal line of the 9-line grid. Creating beautiful composition.

Week #3

For this week, There was no new image capturing, but showing our skills IN editing the images. During the editing process, I HAD a lot in mind. I looked at each image and determined what was lacking or what was over extenuated. In the first image, the original brick was hard to SEE as the sun was very harsh on the wall. So, I decided to turn down the whites and brightness and increase the blacks and shadows in this image. I also increased the contrast and made the image even more detailed. It allowed for more detail to be seen and focused the subject on the staircase. For the second image, I did not change much, but it made a nice difference. In the original image, there is not enough sunlight coming into the staircase due to buildings and other interferences blocking the sun. This time I turned up the brightness and increased the whites in this image. I also turned down the saturation to make the images appear CALMER and paler. In this final image, I wanted as much detail as possible. I turned up the contrast, turned up the saturation, AND brought out the whites and blacks, making them each compliment each other. This turned out for a beautiful image that captures all of the detail presented on this building in Downtown Pittsburgh.

Week #4

For this week, we were tasked with capturing a moving shot. For this, I knew exactly what I wanted to shoot. Across from my apartment is a direct shot of THE boulevard of the allies and the george rowland white performance center. for some of my shots, I wanted to capture the busy streets of cars leaving and coming onto boulevard of the Allies. In the performance center, there are multiple dance studios, and the bottom studio was filled with dancers practicing, which also made for an amazing shot. Each shot is different, some lighter and darker than the rest, but they all tie together nicely.

Week #5

For this week, I was tasked with creating a portrait shot of individuals. For this shoot, I did not really have a plan or subject. I knew that anyone I captured had a story in their facial expressions, so I wanted to capture different ones. In the first, I told my first subject that I was taking their photo. They were on board the entire time and gave a neutral, relaxed grin in the first image. IN the second image, my subject was not told I was going to take a photo of them. With this shot, I was experimenting with the warmth and coolness of the white balance to alter my shot. As you can see, the subject was pretty caught ofF guard. I liked the vulnerability candid shots can provide, making them more realistic and humanistic. The last shot is the same subject in shot one. This time, I was talking to them and trying to produce a real smile from them. In this last image, you can see that I did. I wanted to capture genuine happiness instead of the generic “say cheese” smile.

Week #6

So this week, I was tasked with working with lighting, which for photographers, is extremely important. It basically sets up your shot, so I knew I wanted to challenge myself. So my partner, our roommates, AND I went to Point State Park to capture the Aurora Borealis that was going on during this week, SPECIFICALLY on Thursday. Since my original idea went downhill, I knew I had to work with what I HAD! So, in the first image, I focused on the church in Mount Washington that everyone in downtown Pittsburgh sees. Since there WAs lighting on it directly, I knew that would be mY subject, and all I had to do was turn up the brightness in post-production. During the second image, I wanted to use light to capture my subjects, so when I was behind everyone, I used the pole lights to capture everyone. Turned up the brightness, shadows, whites, blacks, and almost everything so that they could be captured even more. My final image was oF a bicyclist on the bend. Although it is hard to see, there is a biker in the image, creating the circular light towards the top right of the image. Since my ISO was on high and I was capturing as much light as possible, I only had to tweak it minorly in post-production, just TO help his figure be seen more.

Week #8

For this week, I was tasked with capturing abstract images and equivalEncies. So, I decided to take multiple different approaches. In my first image, you can see I angled my shot at around a 45-degree angle to create a cool shot of my surroundings. I captured the trees, abstract tile flooring, and the buildings in the background. For post-production, I increased the contrast to enhance the details in the shot. For the second image, I thought it was abstract due to its nature. You can see a woman viewing a statue, with that stATUe being two odd figures embracing in a hug. This is abstract due to its creativity. You would not typically see this structure capturing the live reaction of the individual in the image. For post-production, I lowered the higHlights and enhanced the shadows to reduce the amount of lighting. For the final image, I captured a close-up shot of a tree. it is that simple. But I tried to capture as much detail as possible, so I was as close as I could be to the tree, making the image abstract. I was practically hugging the tree trying to get this shot. For post, I wanted to enhance as much detail as possible. I increased the contrast, details, and shadows to show every aspect of this tree. I used a shorter depth of field to capture less of the background, as the tree is what I wanted.

Week #9

For this week, we were assigned TO CAPTURE nature, with one of the shots being a High-Dynamic range. THe first image was taken at Point State Park. I thought the way the fountain was positioned in the frame, with the tree on the right, was perfect. For post-production, I turned up the exposure, contrast, and darkened the shaDOws to enhance the quality. I also increased the amount of detail seen. For my next shot, I used multiple exposure to enhance my surroundings. Since my camera was able to set this shot up for me, all I had to do in post-production was to edit the amount of detail seen. I increased the exposure and contrast, again, turned up my highlights and turned down the shadows to enhance further details. For the final image, this is where I set up an HDR. My camera, when shooting, had the ability to bracket itself, so this made creating an HDR very easy. Once I got into post-production, I realized that this was my best shot and used it to edit. I increased the exposure, contrast, details, texture, and highlights to increase the amount of detail in the shot. Since it is set up underneath a bridge, I wanted to focus on the detail in the water and the detail in the trees in the background. I further turned down the shADows to increase the depth of the shot.

Time Lapse Project

For my time lapse sequence, I knew I wanted to capture the vibrant life of Downtown Pittsburgh. Since I happen to live at a busy intersection, Boulevard of the Allies and Wood Street, I knew this would be perfect! So I set up my tripod, selected the timed interval I wanted, and created this video. During this photoshoot, I set-up my camera for an hour and a half, with a five-second interval between each image. This set up for a video that would be around 18 seconds in length. Overall, I think my time lapse is interesting and showcase how busy of a city we live in!

Final Portfolio

AI Experiment

The first image, in the top right, is mine. So when I entered my image into the prompt generator, it came up with this: “a tree with a bird on the branch in the middle of the tree, looking up at the branches, Dennis Ashbaugh, naturalism, shallow depth of field, a macro photograph.” It created the first two images with the random birds. I obviously wanted to remove this, so my next prompt went: “remove the bird, more angled shot, more detail of the tree itself.” this created a nice set, but it wasn’t until THE last promp that I was finally happy: “more angled shot, more detail of the tree itself, and remove the white outline around the tree.” Now, IN my opinion, I THINK AI is scary, but IT is something we need to embrace. It was created as a tool for helping humans, so if it is utilized properly, it will be perfect. there are bad eggs in the world that will BE USED for bad, but ultimately, I am ready to embrace this new future. We truly can’t run forever. I think for photoGRAPhy, it is pretty easy to tell what is real and fake, but in the future, that might change.

FInal Project & Artist Statement

These pieces are part of my series "Just An Elevator.” This series features one distinct subject in every single image: an elevator. Throughout the photos, though, you will see elevators and different ways of expression. The images contain bright and beautiful colors, as well as simple black-and-white pictures with incredible detail. Staircases are something we take for granted, not recognizing the amount of creativity and expression they truly hold. I wanted to showcase just some of the expressions visible in Downtown Pittsburgh