Brooke Edwards Crit 2 Color/Passion

 

 

For this week’s Recipe I have chosen to discuss photo #14, my self-portrait in the foggy mirrors. While this photo did not receive any votes, it was however, discussed more than any of my other photos (even the voted photos!) Perhaps what makes it interesting is the strategy behind it.

I am still using my IPhone 5c iOS 7.1.2. What happened was, I had just gotten out of the shower and the bathroom was very foggy. I tried to capture a shot of my window with the curtain to see what kind of effect I would get. It was really cool to see how the photo took through the fogged lens. Unfortunately there wasn’t subject matter in my bathroom that would make for an interesting photo, otherwise I would have tried to shoot more. Instead the fog began to dissipate and I moved to my mirror that was all steamy with condensation. I was only to see myself slightly and I decided it might make for a good self-portrait.

I took a couple shots but I did not like any of them. Since my mirror is actually a set of three separate cabinets, I opened one side at an angle to capture my profile as I looked straight ahead into the center mirror. It was awhile before I actually got something I liked. What I liked most about it was how my reflection on the left was looking over at my reflection on the right. And when I look at this photo it feels like I am looking at my one self, looking at my other self.    I see a confident figure on the right and I skeptical figure on the left. I think a lot of us have experienced a clash like this before. I think that a combination of the fog and the angle of the mirrors really gave this photo depth, other steps made the photo more visually appealing.

The following steps included filtering this photo through apps. I used two apps for this photo, first I used Afterlight 2.6 (Same app used in last week’s POW) then I used Snapseed 1.61 to tweak fine details. The photo was taken in the morning when light fills my little bathroom. With the only light at the time being this natural sunlight the original photo was somewhat dark. I used Afterlight to brighten the entire photo then I used Snapseed’s selective adjustment to focus on specific areas including dark shadows or over highlighted areas. By brightening the photo it gave the steam on the mirror a thicker look (not as flat).It improved even more when I used the sharpening tool in Afterlight. The sharpening brought more texture to the fog and also distinguished my figures from blending too much into the background.  

I like how this photo turned out but I wish I had done some things differently such as making better use of color (I don’t particularly like how my skin tone blends in with the door in the background). I would have also made an improvement with the overall composition of the photo. Thank you to all of those who left feedback!