General Ideas

For this project I was initially struggling for ideas of what I wanted to do. However, while creating the moodboard a couple of ideas came to me that I thought would be quite interesting to pursue for the project. Brief explanations of these ideas can be seen below.

Idea 1

I was thinking of alternative printing methods for a landscape project when I recalled a exhibition I visited many years ago. It featured a set of photographs that, when viewed using special glasses, could be seen in 3D. I can't remember where I saw the exhibition or the photographer that created it, but I do remember the work. It was a simple set of images on a gallery wall, each having its own pair of viewing glasses, that could be seen in 3D. The images were each depicting a different bridge. The images themselves were fairly straight forward, but because of the way they were being viewed, in 3D, they stood out from the rest and were quite rememberable.

This got me thinking about my own project. Last year I had my landscape images printing and mounted on the wall like any other photograph, all well and good, but perhaps not that rememberable. So when thinking about ways of displaying this years work, this idea came to me, as something more unusual is more likely to get attention. And so I started to look into 3D imaging and ways of displaying it.

Stereoscopy

Stereoscopy, or 3D imaging, is a technique for displaying 2D images and making them appear 3D. This is done by enhancing the depth in a image. A typical stereogram are two offset images individually viewed by the left and right eye, the brain then combines these images giving the appearance of only one image which is 3 dimensional.

There are several ways of doing this, one of the most common and original ways being a more mechanical method of using a stereoscope to physically separate the images for each eye, but there are other methods independent of such devices, such as free viewing.

There are many different ways of creating 3D imaging, using a single camera and moving it around, using two cameras to simultaneously take several images from different perspectives, to dedicated cameras that have built in 3D capabilities. Each will be looked into in more detail if I was to continue with this idea.

Promenade, Brooklyn BridgeFrom the Robert Dennis Collection, New York Public Library

The above image is an example of a early stereogram, it demonstrates the idea behind them. Two similar photographs depicting the same scene but from slightly different perspectives. The images would then be viewed together through individual eyes as mentioned above. 

Tending wounded Union soldiers at Savage's Station, Virginia, during Peninsular campaign

This next image demonstrates a stereogram using a single image. To create the 3D effect with a single image the colour layers of the photograph have been offset to give the appearance of several photographs. This technique requires a special pair of glasses to view the images in 3D.

This is just one of my current ideas for this project, further research will be done into this field if I was to continue with the 3D imaging notion, for now I'm keeping things vague and generally explaining each concept while I decide which to pursue. 

Idea 2

Another idea that came to me was that of moving images and gif files. I was looking at the work of Julien Douvier, and how he had embraced the moving image. A lot of his work, whether it be advertising, fashion or general photography, a lot of the work is animated. While its not conventional photography, it still carries with it a lot of its characteristics. This got me thinking and thought it would be quite a interesting twist and would work quite well for my project. I think it would fit in quite well with landscape work, and would even work with my previous project, which was based on the modern landscape, the moving image would fit as a modern way of displaying the work. Of course the work would have to be displayed electronically, but with how photography is at the moment, that wouldn't be much of a draw back. 

Some of Doivier's work can be seen by following this link. 

Idea 3

The third idea I had was a project similar to my negotiated project in some respects, being that it would be based on landscape and resulting in fine art prints at the end. However while looking through a lot of landscape work, and while creating the moodboard, I found that I was more drawn to the surreal looking landscapes. I found the photographs that made you look twice to be of the most interesting. I found the work of Martin Vlach to be particularly interesting. Theres something about the unusual that draws attention, and his work definitely stood out from others.

While looking at Vlach's work I came up with this third idea. Landscapes that featured something that was out of place, something that perhaps you might not notice on a glance, but catches your eye so you have to look again and study the image to check what you are seeing, to make sure it was actually there. Landscapes which perhaps feature some anomaly, the final work would be a set of prints maybe telling some narrative, or maybe no relation at all except the unusualness.

Martin Vlach

I will be looking into each idea in more detail to pick a direction for this project. The surreal landscapes and 3D imaging are the favourites at the moment, more details to come.