Alex Holder and her boyfriend reenacted some classic Harlequin Romance Covers in this Mills & Boom photo shoot for an International Women's Day Exhibit. She bought the clothing from vintage shops and painted all the backdrops herself. The photos were taken by Oli Kellett, Alex's colleague and artistic partner (a partnership I'm totally obsessed with after reading this self description).
Photographer Michael Wolf has an telling series of photos called Tokyo Compression, photos of commuters being squished into the crowded Tokyo subway system. The photos are all taken from the outside of a subway door, looking in. The door's window becomes a frame for a portrait of the commuter pressed against it. The condensation aspect of the photos is fantastic.
George Benson is just finishing an exhibit as part of the West Midlands Open 2010 at the Birmingham Art Gallery & Museum. The series shown was called Colour of Music. The photographs in the series feature collections of records arranged by colour instead of genre. The effect is quite beautiful. In the words of the photographic artist:
"The photographs create a rhythm of colour, light and shade that resonates with its musical content."
Fred Lebain's photographic series A Springtime in New York features his own photos, inside his own photos. He took a bunch of beautiful, but mundane photos of New York and had them printed on large, glossy posters. He then returned to the setting of each photo and took them again, but this time with the print out of the original photo inside a wider shot. Each photo has its own unique imperfection to hint at the photo within the photo.
I like this concept a lot. There is a stupidly simple brilliance that makes it captivating.
The thing about math is that, beyond the basics, I always found it hard to see real, everyday applications. Nikki Graziano's Found Functions has broadened my perspective on the natural beauty of math. She superimposes math functions on top of photos of nature.
Note to self: get to know more photographer/mathematicians. They have a uniquely beautifully calculated view of the world.
The thought of taking photos from inside my mouth has absolutely never occurred to me. Maybe it should have, as the results are actually pretty amusing. Justin Quinnell has created a gallery of perspectives from inside the mouth. He calls the series Mouthpiece. The photos were taken using a pinhole camera.
My imagination is filled with the logistics of taking photos from inside a mouth...
This beautiful video by Charlie McCarthy captures the flight patterns of bugs, hovering around a street light. Fight Pattern was shot at long exposures, essentially visualizing the motion of each light bathed bug. The photos were strung together into a video of the ongoing movements.
Jon Rawlinson shot this beautiful video at Okinawa Churaumi Aquarium in Japan. The video is of the Kuroshio Sea, the aquarium's main tank, the second largest in the world. The tank holds 7,500-cubic meters of water and is home to rays, sharks, and fish.
This video is so relaxing. I could watch if for hours.
Is there such a thing as happily ever after? According to photographer, Dina Goldstein, the Disney notion of happily ever after needs a little reality check. Her series, Fallen Pricesses, shows fairy tale pricesses in real situations that women are faced with. Repunzel is dealing with cancer, an elderly prince is waiting for Sleeping Beauty to awaken, and Belle has self-image issues.
I think this series was intended to put me off of the idea of Disney pricesses, but in a lot of ways it made me see the need for them even more. Thoughts?
About once a month I come up with some great reason I should buy a Polaroid camera. This month, I found Polaroid inspiration in the photography of Grant Hamilton. He uses Polaroids to capture colourful geometric patterns. His collection, Geometries, has been building for 3 years, and it is stunning.
Leigh Beisch is a food photographer, with a beautiful personal series called Bodies of Land. The photos are blurry and full of light and colour. They capture an emotion instead of a scene. Like many good photos, they are a glimpse into a much bigger story. In this case, a story that you are mostly free to fill in yourself.
Fabian Schlichting has created some photo magic to place German car engineers right into their work. The Autolandschaften photos were taken as a calendar for the research department of a German car manufacturer. The make the researchers look like miniatures, inspecting every little detail of the wheels, airbags, headlights, etc. Fun idea, well executed.
Lurking is an art project that is intended to challenge your perception of reality. The project is a series of photos hung behind translucent red films. The films distort reality by removing the people from the images.
According to the artist, David Garcia, Lurking is meant to make observers think about what they see or fail to see and to appreciating the reality behind the perception.
Audry Corregan creates photos where you don't actually get to see the subject. She gives you a hint at the subject, but just enough to get you working hard to fill in the blanks. My favorite series is called Family Pictures. Only the back of the photos are shown. Some with dates and captions, some with nothing at all. The responsibility is on you to become the creator.
My friend Jason (obviously an avid One Floor Up reader) is feeding by miniature obsession with these tilt shift videos by Keith Loutit. Tilt shift is a photography technique used to make real life photos appear like scaled models, or miniatures. The technique distorts the depth of field through blurring, making the image appear as though it was taken using a macro lens.
Keith Loutit is one of the best at applying tilt shift to video. He actually combines tilt shift with time lapse photography to tell miniature stories. He has his own dedicated Vimeo channel. Most of the videos are part of a series called Little Sydney which features a new video each month, all shot in Sydney Australia. (Thanks Jason!)
Stephan Zirwes is a German photographer who specializes in aerial shots. His photos are so beautiful. Part of their beauty is that they are shot directly downward. The other part is the subjects of the photos. Stephan shoots football fields, airfields, industrial complexes, construction zones, leisure areas, and competitions in progress. Wunderbar.
Ari Versluis and Ellie Uyttenbroek are a German photographer and profiler, who have spent the last 15 years studying the dress codes of social groups. They have published a book and website featuring their photographs and findings, called Exactitudes (Exact + Attitude).
Members of the same social group are photographed in similar poses. Juxtaposing their similarity with their desire for individuality. Providing "an almost scientific, anthropological record of people's attempts to distinguish themselves from others by assuming a group identity".
The FWA recently launched a daily photos site, FWAphoto.com. They have a neatly designed, minimalist website, that features a new photo ever day. So far, they have featured some beautiful photographs. The content is also available as an iPhone app or a Lightboxer screensaver.
Branislav Kropilak photographs pretty much the dullest things you can think of; garages, factories, billboards. He somehow manages to breath life into incredibly static subject matter. The billboards are my favorite. I've never seen billboards look as beautiful. (Found through Pan-Dan).
Is This Your Luggage is a website which documents lost luggage, and its contents, through photographs. The luggage is bought through auction (after the airline diligently tries to find its rightful owner - of course), the contents are photographed, and the posted on the website. My favorite part of the site is this justification for collecting lost luggage - "It's a little odd, but not as odd as stamp collecting, just a little harder to find storage space." - Ha.
I wish I had thought of this idea.
