Introduction
I have been working on this assignment for a while, trying to let it develop organically. As I have said before it’s the streets that have inspired my photography, but it wasn’t until I undertook the artificial light exercise that I fully appreciated my love of this type of light.
With this assignment, I have tried to develop my style to include more city scenes rather than just focusing on the people and everyday life. Creativity can be my downfall and I guess like a lot of students, I’m more confident with my technical skills than the artistic.
Inspired by Brassai’s quote “The light I have at night is magnificent. I even prefer it to natural light. You should come one night to see it.” And the beautiful images by Sato Shintaro of the neon in Tokyo I decided to photograph what I see on an average day as I’m making my way home from work, in the early Hong Kong evening.
As it says in the course notes white balance is crucial and that is where I want to focus, by shooting in RAW format and adjusting the white balance afterwards in post-production to fit what I consider being the main light in the image.
Process
Daylight disappears quickly at this latitude, sunset is around 5 and sky’s are almost entirely dark by 5:30, particularly at this time of year, by the time I am leaving work the night is starting to set in and the world is starting to be bathed in a mix of artificial light.
So shooting mainly with a Mirror-less Canon M3 with fixed 22mm (equiv. 35mm) F2 and occasionally a Full Frame DSLR with 50mm. I chose to document the early evening mainly in the area I walk through on my regular commute from work to home or dinner out.
The shots were hand-held and, therefore, shot at high ISO and wide aperture, to combat slower shutter speeds and shot in RAW format using Auto white balance.
Post-production, of the images, while not excessive was a vital part of this set of images, as the overall white balance of the shots was crucial to the look of the shot I wanted to achieve. Each shot was bespoke processed with the use of Exposure, Contrast and Highlights sliders in Lightroom. The overall colour temperature was set using the White Balance Eyedropper to highlight the source of light dominating the scene in my eyes.
Image 1
Here a typical early evening scene, which would be so ordinary in the daytime (or my current preferred medium of Black & White); but the colours of the lights give a greater depth. The temperature is balanced for the light on the walkway, and this has allowed different temperatures to come through e.g. the tungsten orange on the buildings and the various tones in the apartment windows where different homes are using different lighting.
Image 2
Here the direction and angle of the light add depth to the picture. The colour temperature is balanced for the bridge allowing the different tones in the apartment windows to show through. The overspill of light gives depth to the shadows the under the bridge. The overall light brings a sense of loneliness to the image, even though you can see the commuters on the bridge.
Image 3
Here the direction and angle of the light add depth to the image, the colour temperature is balanced for the bridge allowing the different tones in the apartment windows to show through. The overspill of light gives depth to the shadows the under the bridge. The light overall imply loneliness to the image, even though you can see the commuters on the bridge.
Image 4
In this scene, it struck me that while you see an old man at a traditional street-side stall, he is watching an iPad (or equivalent). This is what drew me to the scene and I felt It was appropriate to highlight, from the mixtures of light, the cool electric blue tones. Perhaps illustrating bringing the old into the modern world?
Image 5
The mixture of lights here keep the image cool and the direction of the light and its overspill accentuate an extraterrestrial feel in the picture. The light wraps the central yellow construction as if it is rising from beneath the ground. I like how if reflects giving long diagonal shadows.
Image 6
Here I like the high contrast the light is giving, the red almost like a glow of warmth from the restaurant, as the people stand around facing down towards the cold blue light in the distance. It feels almost as if they’re avoiding stepping further into the cold night.
Conclusion
I have enjoyed working on this set; I think it hangs well together. I have pushed myself to use the colourful light as the subject of the images, as Brassai said the light at night is magnificent. While the direction and angle of the light are crucial in all the pictures and how much overspill there is I think by concentrating on the subtlest colour balance of the pictures I have added to their creativity. The exercise called for a series of shots illustrating the different types of light, I have tried to use same types of lighting and just play with its dominance in the images.
Is the overall assignment creative enough? I’m not sure; however, I have achieved what I wanted to illustrate.