What are selfies?
Selfie is short for self portrait. selfies started online with famous people following the trend and popularising it.
A selfie is when you take a photograph of yourself - my definition
A selfie is when you take a photograph of yourself - my definition
Group definitions:
G1 - A photo or art piece of your own face or body
G2- A self portrait
G3- Photo which evolves from the internet, social media and technology
G4- A selfie is when you take a photograph if yourself
G5- A way of capturing your characteristics shaped by technology
G6- A photograph you take of yourself (usually your face) to express your feelings
G7- A picture someone takes of themselves
G8- A picture of the creator.
G1 - A photo or art piece of your own face or body
G2- A self portrait
G3- Photo which evolves from the internet, social media and technology
G4- A selfie is when you take a photograph if yourself
G5- A way of capturing your characteristics shaped by technology
G6- A photograph you take of yourself (usually your face) to express your feelings
G7- A picture someone takes of themselves
G8- A picture of the creator.
The two selfies:
1st selfie:
This first selfie is a picture of a young girl dressed up and taking an image of herself in the mirror inside a colourful room. This is a 'typical' selfie that is seen a lot on social media. These types of selfies are less about personality, themes, ideas and character and more about material possessions and status. |
2nd selfie:
This is a picture of a man hunched over on the ground , possibly sleeping, with a dark brown background. This selfie is closely linked to the original selfies and early years of photography. The selfie explores themes or humanity and ideas of homelessness, inequality or other ideas. The reason i believe this is because of the lack of material possessions and the distinct lack of colour. This forces us to focus on the person and the persons emotions as well as the context. |
Why do people take selfies?
I believe that taking selfies is about exploring your own ides and thoughts as well as viewing your own body and image in different. Selfies can show to everyone your status, lifestyle, personality and equally expose you for following trends or lying about who you are.
Vivian Maier: |
Vivian Maier was a photographer who kept her photographs a secret. She was lonely, secretive and mysterious however her street photographs captured unique moments.
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A BREIF HISTORY:
Self portraits:
The Tate Modern describes self portraits on their website as the following: 'A portrait is a representation of a particular person. A self-portrait is a portrait of the artist by the artist'
Self portraits first took form in art as far back as 1484 with artists such as Albrecht Durer. Then further on a century and a half later, Rembrant Van Rijn, an artist who created over 100 self portraits during his lifetime.
Later on in history we have the famous Vincent Van Gogh who painted over 30 self portraits between 1886 and 1889.
Later on in history we have the famous Vincent Van Gogh who painted over 30 self portraits between 1886 and 1889.
Self portrait photography:
Louis Daguerre invented the Daguerreotype which was an early version of photography and extremely accurate way of capturing images in the late 1830s. This became a very popular device and was used mainly for portrait photography.
Robert Cornelius was one of the first recorded people to have taken a 'selfie' in history. He wrote on the back ' The first light Picture ever taken. 1839. ' |
Selfie:
Selfies became extremely popular in the 21st century and became the Oxford word of the year for 2013. It is a term that means 'a photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smartphone or webcam and uploaded to a social media website'.
Now a days, almost every one in the modern world has a digital camera on them. A smartphone. And as well as this, we can now instantly share our photos all around the world to almost anyone. Social Media. Further more, this means famous and influential people like celebrities can share things that many people might be inspired by. These three factors have boosted the self portraiture culture into the modern world and transformed it into a 'selfie' culture.
Selfies on social media can also be used to share experiences and events to others as well as subliminally suggesting materialistic views and the ideology of possession and competition (very capitalistic).
Three photographers:
Vivian Maier:
- Her photos were taken in black and white.
- Her photos were taken using film.
- She is a street photographer, meaning she took photos in her free time around the city and streets.
- She is confident and takes pictures of random people as well as self portraits and this reflects in her work. Her work is very bold and up close to capture peoples emotion.
- She was very secretive and kept all of her photographs (negatives) hidden away.
- Her photos were taken using film.
- She is a street photographer, meaning she took photos in her free time around the city and streets.
- She is confident and takes pictures of random people as well as self portraits and this reflects in her work. Her work is very bold and up close to capture peoples emotion.
- She was very secretive and kept all of her photographs (negatives) hidden away.
Isle Bing
- She uses the framing to only show bits of things (objects, setting and people). Leaving us questioning what we see.
- Her photographs are specifically composed and have a staged feeling since they usually involve mirrors and objects.
- She uses shadows and blur to distort her photos making us question them.
- She is a german, self taught photographer and started using a Voigtlander camera in 1928.
- She takes photos of architecture due to her interest as she started a doctorate on the Neo-Classical German architect Friedrich Gilly.
- Her photographs are specifically composed and have a staged feeling since they usually involve mirrors and objects.
- She uses shadows and blur to distort her photos making us question them.
- She is a german, self taught photographer and started using a Voigtlander camera in 1928.
- She takes photos of architecture due to her interest as she started a doctorate on the Neo-Classical German architect Friedrich Gilly.
Lee Friedlander
- Began photographing the American social landscape in 1948.
- He uses complex shadows, shapes and designs to mess with the viewers perception.
- He was famous while he was alive as his work was in many exhibitions, galleries and also newspapers.
- He takes images in black and white.
- His photos often include mirrors to distort the photo.
- He uses complex shadows, shapes and designs to mess with the viewers perception.
- He was famous while he was alive as his work was in many exhibitions, galleries and also newspapers.
- He takes images in black and white.
- His photos often include mirrors to distort the photo.
My photos
WWW: I was able to complete the task and i felt like my images were really good because i was able to catch different reflections without a mirror. I looked around the school and felt that my photos were best when it was very sunny.
EBI: i could have experimented with mirrors a little.
Favourite images:
1st image(top left): I like this because i was interested in finding reflections in places other than mirrors and the camera lens managed to do that.
2nd image (top right) : I like the second image because it was taken from really far away on the walk way and i used the zoom to its max and created a blurred yet nice selfie.
3rd image(bottom left): I like the third image because it uses shadows in an interesting way and there is a small window of light that bleeds light into the first and second third. i am in the third third and not directly centre which is what i like.
4th image(bottom right): I like the last image because it is in front of a large warm light, also i positioned my hand specifically to show edges and shadows that contrast to the blank background.
2nd image (top right) : I like the second image because it was taken from really far away on the walk way and i used the zoom to its max and created a blurred yet nice selfie.
3rd image(bottom left): I like the third image because it uses shadows in an interesting way and there is a small window of light that bleeds light into the first and second third. i am in the third third and not directly centre which is what i like.
4th image(bottom right): I like the last image because it is in front of a large warm light, also i positioned my hand specifically to show edges and shadows that contrast to the blank background.
Bad images:
I personally don't like these images because in the first image, you only see my shoes and i don't think it represents the 'selfie' idea. I don't like the second because the reflective surface i took the image on was blurred and had marks all over. Therefore it wasn't what i had planned. I don't like the third image because i think that it was very plain and there was no colour, design, interesting edges or shapes.
Image 3
I think that these images didn't work out well because i could not find any way of developing the original image. I didn't cut out holes in the image because there were no patterns and colour to make it abstract and interesting. Therefore i chose this image because the task was to improve on the worst image, however if there is literally nothing in the image, I find It difficult to improve it so i decided to create an 'abstract' self portrait. My idea was to show a self portrait by mainly looking at my mind and the outside world. The contrast between inside my mind and outside is represented by the abstract colours and shapes in my shadow and outside is represented with dull muted colours or words.
Image 1 :
WWW: I like that i was able to improve an image i didn't like and add colours and shapes.
EBI: i think if i had more time, i would add more colours and different layouts as they are all very similar.
EBI: i think if i had more time, i would add more colours and different layouts as they are all very similar.
Obscured selfies
I used mirrors, reflections and shadows to create my self portraits and i obscured the images by using objects and clear papers with designs on them.
I was inspired by Richard Hamilton since he obscured his face with paint and colour.
I took different images to him as he took an image with a plain background, and used colour in the foreground but i used colour and texture in the background and obscured my face with black and white things.
I was inspired by Richard Hamilton since he obscured his face with paint and colour.
I took different images to him as he took an image with a plain background, and used colour in the foreground but i used colour and texture in the background and obscured my face with black and white things.
This was my original obscured selfie idea. I like it because i blended both shadows and reflections to create one selfie. I intended for the reflection and shadow of my head to easily blend into each other but the sun and my distance to the mirror made that difficult.