Toning

After developing my black and white negatives and then exposing these negatives up to prints, I then wanted to add some colour into the photos to make them more interesting and effective. To achieve this colour I used toning of a black and white film.

To tone a balck and white image you have to follow a few simple stages; 1. Soak the print into a water bath so that the papers' glossy surface is loosened slighty meaning that late on the bleach and toner can soak into the paper and not just wash off. The print needs to be left in the water for around a minute.
2. The next step is to put the chosen print into a tray of bleach. This lightens the print slightly so that the toner has more of an effect on the print. The longer the print is left in the bleach, the lighter it becomes. Around thirty seconds is a susal time but it is dependent on the print and can go up or down.
3.The last step in the toning process is to put the print into a toner, these come in a range of colours. Similarly to the bleaching, the time that the print is left in the liquid for depends on the print itslef and also the depth and vibrancy of the toner colour that you want to achieve on the final print.

There are also other way that images can be toned. Digital toning using programs like photoshop to create the same effect as well as toning using other media like felt tip pens and paints.

Poster art

Using Photoshop I have been creating a piece of poster art using different efeects, layers and tools. I started off with a set of standard images which I then opened in Photoshop and selected the areas in each image which I wanted to use and cut them out from the rest of the picture. I then simplified the picture by turning black and white and then adjusting the levels so that a lot of the details in each of the pictures are removed. To highlght certain areas in the pictures I burned certain details I wanted to highlight and got rid of the grey tones. Next I used the stamp filter to give the image a bold poster effect. I did these processes for each of the images I wanted to put into the final poster. Next I added colours and effects to the images using the different brushed and fill tools. Gradually building up of effect and colour. The attached picture is my first attemt.

I like some of the effect that i created and I am going to try this again using some of my own images.

staged photography

My chosen title for this section of my Photographyphotography A2 level is Staged . Staged photograpahy as a concept is a performance played out before the camera usually by people within a carefully selected and arranged environment or in some case just a scene created by the photographer for them to photograph. This type of photography is used and can be seen in many different aspects of media and art. From photojournalism to art to fashion and product promotion.