Jonathan E. Andrews Student Blog

New Blog

2011-02-03T10:32:00.003-05:00

www.deprofundtastic.blogspot.com

2009-05-06T15:07:00.000-04:00

Tear Sheet Emulation

2008-02-25T08:42:00.002-05:00

This was an assignment for James' class. We had to pick out ads to copy. This effort was for the ad featuring a product. I chose this because I thought it might be challenging. The lighting was fairly straight forward, but I forgot to remove the label on the back of the bottle.

D200, ISO 100, 60th @ f/11

Soundslides Project

2008-02-25T08:33:00.006-05:00

This is a wall of photos at a house in Chapel Hill. I took pictures of these photos to use in my soundslides project. It is a pretty impressive wall to behold in person.

D200, ISO 100, 60th @ f/8

Model

2008-02-18T09:56:00.004-05:00

This shot was an attempt at mirroring a tear sheet. The ad I copied was a shot featuring a model. Emulating the light was the easy part. I had to stand outside the doorway to line up the shot with the longer lens. To position her in front of the window I had to have her to left in the frame whereas in the ad the model is to the right.

Nikon D200, ISO 100, 60th @ f/11

Lamps!

2008-02-18T09:52:00.004-05:00

This lovely lamp was shot for James' class. We went to Kreber Studios and were granted access to bays and equipment. The studio there is huge, 200,000 some square feet in fact. The class was split up into groups and each group was given an assignment. My group was instructed to shoot lamps. Someone was smiling down upon me when I found this gem.

Chuck

2008-02-08T14:14:00.000-05:00

This is Chuck, the instructor for the commercial concentration. We students were given the assignment to shoot a portrait of Chuck. We had to create our own lighting setup. I wanted to use a hard light to make the portrait a little more dramatic and I wanted to just barely highlight his shoulders. The photo on the bottom is Chuck after he had been informed that it was supposed to hail that night. He was surprised to hear that. I liked his expression.

2008-02-05T11:02:00.000-05:00

The zoo is a noisy place. I had fun making this soundslides project and the results are ridiculous. Be sure to listen for Lucy's impersonation of a bear.

More Critters

2008-01-31T21:17:00.001-05:00

Here are some more of Ariel's sculptures I shot for the photographer/ graphic designer joint project. Ariel will be responsible for using the image in an ad or poster and for adding text to the image. The lighting for the frog was tricky due to the shiny glaze, but the pig and the dog were comparatively easy. The pig seemed to come alive when lit a certain way.

Sinar Digital Back, ISO 50, 60th @ f/4.0

Joint Project

2008-01-31T20:52:00.000-05:00

These alligators are part of a joint project between the RCC photographers and graphic designers. Ariel Vernon sculpted these pieces and she was also my partner in this project. For our idea, we thought we would treat these as works being donated to the Humane Society for auction. I took the photos of her work and she will use them to design posters, ads, and covers for either a catalog or a dvd cover. The lighting was particularly hard. The alligators were as reflective as glass, but I also had to be concerned with direction, detail, and tone. I used a careful combination of hard and soft light.

Leaf Aptus 17, ISO 50, 60th @ f/8

Chapel Hill

2008-01-25T14:10:00.000-05:00

These were very difficult shots. They were taken at Mansion 462. I was told to get a few shots of the band, but the light was very low. I also wanted to get a picture of the audience around the band, which was near impossible. I had to do a long exposure and hope no one moved. Eventually I tried using two flashes in tandem, one pointed at the band and one pointed at the crowd. The backs of people's heads can only be so interesting. When taking pictures of the band it was tough preserving the interesting blue light that was cast on them. I could use flash and lose the blue light, or take a long exposure and have a blurry picture. I used flash, but played with the color temperature in the camera.
Nikon D200, various exposures, various ISO's

Mansion 462

2008-01-25T13:50:00.000-05:00

These photos are of a fairly new bar on Franklin Street in Chapel Hill. The owner wanted pictures of his bar's interior and exterior. It is a very big interior, with lots of nice furniture and decorations. It was a challenge to shoot because the lighting was very subdued, which lends itself well to mood but poorly to photography.

D200, ISO 200, 10 sec @ f/11

Internship

2008-01-18T14:53:00.001-05:00

This is some of the work I did while on internship at Viewpoint Studios. I got to shoot a lot of silos, abstracts, and a few vignettes. While shooting silos may not be the most exciting of jobs, it certainly offers a good chance to learn the basics. While on the key I got much better at setting up the camera and focusing, which is a lot harder than it sounds. The digital sensor is a lot more sensitive to the tilts and swings of the view camera than film is. All of these were shot with a Sinar with a Phase One H25 back.

Dessert

2008-01-18T14:12:00.000-05:00

The assignment that prompted this photograph was to shoot a picture of dessert. Within the photo there had to be a sense of time and place. I chose to go with cookies, because they are a simple and hardy dessert, so I placed them in this robust outdoor picnic scene. I tried to simulate sunlight by using both soft and hard light sources.

Hasselblad with a Phase One H10 back, ISO 50, 60th @ f/4

This is a picture of my setup.

Chapel Hills Arts

2008-01-11T15:26:00.000-05:00

As part of the Chapel Hill Arts Council Library and Town Hall Exhibition Series, I was granted the opportunity to display work in the Chapel Hill Public Library this past November. It will remain there until February 6th. My work is being shown along with Gina Gibson's, a recent graduate of UNCG's MFA program. It was a great experience and I've met several interesting people as a result of this show. http://www.chapelhillarts.org

combination of 35mm and medium format cameras, Fuji color film, various ISO's

Table Top

2008-01-11T14:49:00.000-05:00

This was a table top I had the opportunity to shoot at Viewpoint Studios. The purpose of this detail was to capture the intricately designed inset. This composition was ultimately rejected, because it did not show enough of the table. A more centered shot that also featured the table's base was agreed upon by those in charge of the shoot. While this shot is more interesting, it is too vague to be practical. This was lit with a single light to the right with a fill card to the left. The table top had a lot of character, which made it very photogenic.

Sinar F1 with a Phase One H25 digital back, ISO 100, 60th @ f/8

Self-Promo 5

2007-10-11T16:04:00.000-04:00

For this shoot I thought I might try and light glass. It was rather difficult, because I wanted only a sliver of a highlight on the glass and then the rest black. To block out all unwanted reflections I had to build a box around the glasses out of gobos. To get the highlight on the glass I placed a cookie behind the cups and shined a light on the back wall to reflect through. Glass is a bear. I enjoyed shooting it though.

Nikon d200, 55mm micro lens, ISO 100, F/4.0

Jewelry

2007-10-05T14:50:00.000-04:00

This was for one of James' assignments. Carolyn, David, and I were given the difficult task to shoot jewelry, which in this case was this lovely ten dollar watch. Our instructions were to make it look classy, but also to accurately portray its features within the image. We worked hard on the reflections and tried to make them as clean looking as possible. Carolyn's red shirt certainly didn't make the shoot any easier. We ended up using a bevy of fill cards and gobos, but only one light. The setup shot is posted below.

Nikon d200, ISO 100, 1/250 @ f/2.8

A Brick

2007-10-04T20:16:00.000-04:00

This was my favorite picture from the final client assignment. We had to illustrate an event that made us who we are today. Mine was about the addictions of television and the happy day that the cable was cut off and I was free. This was the first image in the series and I like it because it is kind of odd. I shot this with a flash behind a pillowcase set up to the left of the TV cabinet. There was another flash positioned just above my hand.

Nikon d200, ISO 100, 4s @ f/4

Client Assignment #5

2007-10-04T18:36:00.000-04:00

These three shots were for client assignment #5. We were told to pretend that we had been hired by a model to shoot his or her model composite. We needed ten images with varying locations and dress and we had a week to do it. I had an Alien Bee blow up on me also. It was a very traumatic shoot. I'm happy with some of the shots, but the post-explosion ones could be better, but I was a little distracted at that point.

Nikon d200, ISO 200, 1/8th @ f/4.5-5.6

Self-Promo 4

2007-09-27T19:56:00.001-04:00

This white, rectangular building was once a school house. That's why there is a bell in front of it. It was rung to let the little children know that class was beginning. It was quite a challenge to shoot. I had to carefully compose so that a square, colorless building looked interesting. I think that is why I was drawn to it, because of the difficulty in making the subject interesting.

Sinar F1, Ektachrome 100g, 1/25th @ f/8

Self-Promo 3

2007-09-27T19:40:00.001-04:00

This shot here is for self-promo number 3. I think it could work well within a series, but they are kinda 'blah' without context. This was not intended to be a diptych, but I arranged it as such for reasons unknown to me. I found these concrete bleachers in Hillsborough at the old historic speedway. Trees had taken over, but there is a cleanup underway.

Sinar F1, Ektachrome 100g, 15th @ f/32

Tear-Sheet Assignment

2007-09-20T16:50:00.001-04:00

This was a group assignment. This is not an original setup. The lighting and composition were all copied from a magazine. The point was to work in a group and study the original in order to figure out how it was shot. We studied the shadows and the highlights for clues. It was an enlightening experience.

Phase 1, ISO 50, 1/4th @ f/2.8

This is a picture of the setup. In order to achieve the proper angle we had to prop the back legs of the table up on bricks. We used a reflector card over the metal to cover the reflection. A scrim was used to block off some of the sunlight and cut down on the specular highlights. An ascent light was used to create a controlled splash of light across the plates.

Client 4

2007-09-20T15:52:00.000-04:00

This picture was for a lifestyles assignment. The class was instructed to photograph a person on a computer, interacting with other people or pets. I took a six photo series from various angles and heights. It was an impromptu shoot and I had only one flash, no tripod, and very little sunlight. I positioned the flash by the window to simulate sunlight and I softened it with a bed sheet. Maintaining an even color temperature was difficult with the sunlight, flash, and the tungsten bulb all present in the scene.

Nikon d200, ISO 800, 1/40th @ f/5

Client 3

2007-09-13T16:00:00.001-04:00

This assignment required that we create a photo that would illustrate intolerance in America. The forms of intolerance that had to be considered while creating this photo were pretty diverse. I thought the best way to tackle this assignment was to start with a symbol that had a very broad meaning. I wanted a clean, graphic quality to my photo, therefore photoshop was heavily used. The flag itself was pieced together from two different photos, then digitally cut apart and torn. The color was removed from the right side and the saturation increased on the left.

Leaf digital back on Mamiya 6 X 4.5, ISO 100, 60th@f/11

Client 2

2007-09-13T15:09:00.001-04:00

This picture was taken for an assignment that required a head and shoulders shot, a clean white background, and no flare. It was a fun shoot.

Ektachrome E100g, 6 X 4.5, 60th @ f/8

This was the setup for the above shot. The lights in the foreground were responsible for the white background in the resulting photo. They were set to be two stops brighter than the soft box that was pointed at the model. That is the soft box peaking around the panels, over the stool. The light to the right is the hair light. The panels are there to block any stray light that would cause flare.

Self-Promo 2

2007-09-06T15:38:00.000-04:00

I found this thing in Hillsborough, NC. I was there shooting on old schoolhouse, but I noticed the tip of this structure jutting above a hill. I thought it was really interesting, like the roof of a house with a door built into it. It is actually an old ice house that has recently been rebuilt. It is surrounded by trees and hills so it is constantly in shade. I thought the specks of sunshine added interest to the scene and complimented the odd structure.

Sinar F1 4X5, Ektachrome 100g, 8th @ F/32

Self-Promo 1

2007-09-06T15:22:00.000-04:00

This photo was taken at a lake in Orange County. I was standing on the lake bed, surrounded by what was left of the water. In the distance was a dock, which was closed due to the low water levels. I chose mid-afternoon so that the light would be really harsh and emphasize the heat. It was a very treacherous shoot because the ground was really soft.

Sinar F1 4X5, Ektachrome 100g, 15th @ F/45

From the Archives

2007-08-30T17:23:00.001-04:00

While I am waiting for my self-promos to be processed, here is a shot from Small Format. This particular 'weekly' was the only time that our instructor allowed us to pose our subject. The word we had to consider while shooting was "yellow". I wanted flowers with a big, goofy bee in the middle of them, so I made a bee out of a lemon and clay. It look a lot of takes to get this shot because it kept blinking during the flash.

Nikon D200, ISO 100, 1/4 second @ f/5.6

Client Assignment #1

2007-08-30T16:51:00.000-04:00

The assignment was to shoot breakfast with an emphasis on time and setting. It had to be cropped to the same dimensions as a full page magazine ad. The light was made with two kinds of gel for that golden morning light. While I like the setting and composition, it was pointed out during critique that concrete does not really communicate delicious. A remedy that was suggested was to wet the concrete down, which would make it less gritty looking.

Nikon D200, ISO 100, 1.6 seconds @ f/13

Best of Last Year

2007-08-24T09:12:00.000-04:00

This photo was taken for a design assignment where each photograph could only contain certain colors. This one in particular only has analogous colors and neutral gray. I thought it was a good photo, especially considering the restrictions. This picture was taken on my front porch towards the end of the day.

- 35mm, 100 speed,
Fuji slide film
125th @ f/8 -ish