ALICE

Author: ALICE (page 1 of 4)

8. Final

December 11, 2025 / ALICE / 0 Comments

My statement of intent emphasized the seriousness of today’s world’s teenager’s mental health, and how we are under such pressure and high expectations that stresses our mind. I focused on high clarity and eye level point of view to highlight the empathy the photograph gives.

This photograph is a close up shot of the girl’s face. The girl is in the right side of the photograph with the left side having nothing but a dark space, leading the viewers attention directly towards the girl. Same as the first photograph, the girl’s emotion is directly viewed with high clarity; empty, stress, sad. The general mood of the photograph being dark also contributes on the statement of intent of showing the seriousness by creating a low, mysterious mood. The photograph also has an eye level point of view to show the real life situation in a more effective way as eye level view point is how we actually view our real world. In this photograph, I feel like the metal bad on the bottom left is a bit distracting the whole mood as it seems to have no connection with the girl, which is the main subject. Also, the metal is getting the light, which is a bit odd as it isn’t the object that emphasizes the serious and dark mood. In this photograph, I feel like the usage of light isn’t direct nor natural. As Yousuf Karsh, a photograph that influenced me with his deep, high-quality photograph, mentioned, there are millions of ways to use lighting in photograph, it isn’t just limited to direct and natural. Therefore, I believe that this photograph contains highlights instead of lighting. As mentioned above, the metal part has the most contrasting view of the highlight, while the girl’s face remains within the dark mood. However, the girl’s forehead and nose seems to look lighter than her other facial features, which makes her look more natural as there is some light and dark parts mixed. The viewers of this photograph will also feel how it focuses on the monotone mood with the girl’s face being zoomed in, which evokes the message of how the girl is under huge pressure that is eventually changing her emotions to the negative side.

I believe that this photograph highlights my statement of intent and the dark atmosphere, showing all the deep parts of the girl’s emotions. If I get another chance to look deeper on portraiture, I want to try on focusing on other social issues that differ from the topic I chose for this unit. I’m curious how a photograph will turn out with an intent of children’s innocence and hope, using light, bright color tones. Also, as this topic focused on the empathy with the girl’s feelings, which eventually led to having an eye level viewpoint, I want to explore some other various point of views and how they show different feelings such as how a high point of view shows dominance. Overall, I feel like I successfully further elaborated on the basics of portraiture and I believe that my photograph’s improve throughout my studio practices shots all over to the final shot.

+ Studio Practice

December 9, 2025 / ALICE / 0 Comments

The first photograph was taken with us, 4 people including me, jumping around in different areas. I believe that the contrasting movement above and below the middle line increases the interest of the photograph. The top part of the photograph mainly shows our upper body moving, which doesn’t show a lot of movement. However, the bottom half of the photograph shows dynamic movement, showing a circular, or triangular shaped loop. The shutter speed of the camera was pretty slow, and I think that’s what made the photograph really capture the different movements in a quite clear way. However, I realized that we’re only able to see Emma, who wore a bright colored t-shirt. Next time, I would like to have people who’s wearing various types of bright colored clothes to take photographs together.

The second photograph shows the word, love. Each person was assigned to a specific alphabet, and tried to draw that alphabet in the air for a few seconds in order to capture the movement showing the alphabet. We made a few tries and as time went by, we were able to realized how the shutter speed matters a lot, and it decides how much it’ll show about the movement. I was trying to show the alphabet ‘V’ and I knew that constant, accurate movements leads to a higher clarity in the final photograph. Also, the alphabet ‘e’ was the most challenging one as it takes the longest to repeat the alphabet and at the same time, it requires more movements. Therefore, I was able to understand how minimum action leads to a clearer movement shown in the photograph. Next time, I’d like to try the same thing with another word, or using other tools such as paint or crayons instead of my hands to increase the engagement.

7. Set 2

December 8, 2025 / ALICE / 0 Comments

These three photograph’s were my set 2 photographs. The photographs are in focus of teenagers life, and the stress, and the pressure, and everything that’s bothering out lives. I aimed to convey the message of the seriousness of the rapid increment of teenagers mental health issues due to the people surrounding us.

For these three photographs, I focused more on capturing the right angle that leads to a higher empathy of my intent. As a result, I decided to focus more on the normal viewpoint, or the eye level view point. I believe that this view point increases the deep mood of the photograph as it’s the same as our real view point. However, I feel like high view point may also blend well with my intent as a high view point shows dominance and the feeling of being under someones control.

The first photograph is taken in an eye level point of view with the girl sitting in front of a vivid, red wall. I feel like the photograph shows the natural moment, but with the deep meanings inside. The girl covering, or hiding her face leads to the idea of wanting to hide from today’s society or wanting to get rid of it. Also, the red background matches well with the basic dark tone of the photograph, increasing the unity as well as the smooth view of the photograph. The lighting is also pretty interesting as there is not direct light, but we can see how the girl seems to have some light affect while the background has some darker mood with some dark spots. This leads the attention to the girl with the background adding extra depth. However, I feel like the girl’s hat is a bit distracting the overall view with its logo, so I’m considering of trying some similar vibes later on.

The second photograph is a bit higher than an eye level view point. The light on the top of the photograph is what makes the photograph interesting. As my intent was to show the seriousness of teenager stress, I wanted to use the light and a bit of hope in our lives, saying that even though we’re under such pressure and life seems like a dark room, there is still hope, nothing ended yet. Also, the girl is looking up towards the light, which emphasizes how teenagers wants and are looking for those bit of hope and light in their lives. Seeing closely, the girl is surrounded by some worn out, dark blocks, which can refer to the harsh obstacles in our lives. All the objects and mood in this photograph wraps up to a further version of the ultimate theme, teenager stress, but with a strip of light, and hope. I feel like I could’ve improved this photograph by focusing more on the right side of the photograph as their is nothing on the right, while on the left, there are some blocks and a bit of red seeking through.

The last photograph shows a girl taking a photograph. It has a really dark mood, but the background and the subject blends well with the darkish colors. In all three photographs, the girl is covering her face with the hat. However, in the last photograph, we can see the girl’s smile peeking out of the hat, which we can refer to how the second photograph shows the bit of hope in our lives. I feel like all three photographs are connected to each other with the first one showing the seriousness, second one showing the hope within the serious situation, and the third one showing how that hope is working. The mixture of dark colors with the girl smiling can seem odd in some views, however, I believe that this point makes the photograph more interesting. However, next time, I want to focus more on the lighting of the third photograph rather than the overall mood.

6. Set 1

December 7, 2025 / ALICE / 0 Comments

These three photograph’s were my set 1 photographs, titled “Whisper.” The photographs are in focus of teenagers life, and the stress, and the pressure, and everything that’s bothering out lives. I aimed to convey the message of the seriousness of the rapid increment of teenagers mental health issues due to the people surrounding us. These three photographs are all in perfect clarity, providing the opportunity for the viewers to feel high empathy with the girl’s emotions; her hollow eyesight, zero laughter, and the seriousness blended in her emotions. Many view adolescence as an innocent, joyful step of growing up, however, I wanted to show that the inner part of teenagers life isn’t like those crystal stairs full of luxurious, stable life, instead, it’s like a staircase that’s worn our due to the challenges we face.

The first photograph is a really closed-up shot, capturing all the emotional details given. The girl is staring at the camera without any smiles, somewhat looking really serious. The girl looking directly at the camera with the minimum extra space also makes the viewers think that she’s staring at herself, making the photograph more intense. The shutter speed of the camera was also really fast, so I was able to capture a clear moment. The photograph also shows how the left half of her face is covered with the dark light, and the right half is covered with hot pink color, showing symmetry. Sometimes, pink symbolizes positive aspects, for example, inner peace and comfort, or sometimes, innocence. It relates to how the right part of her face, the inner peace and the innocence of a young girl, faded away and became the left part of her face, close to black, which symbolizes sadness and seriousness. The light’s position of gradually getting darker greatly deepens the depth and mysterious mood of the photograph. Additionally, the dark background makes the subject stand out. Also, some may say that the seriousness shows the current situation as the girl is just looking straight ahead. Also, the eye level view point increases the feeling of empathy and realness as it’s the view point we actually view the world.

The second photo is a again a photo of a teenager, but this time, her face is covered with a skeleton’s skull, and the focus is on the skull, not the girl. There is quite a lot of blank, black spaces, which makes the main subject more isolated. The shutter speed of the camera was also really fast, making me able to freeze the subject in one position.This photograph makes the viewers question, “Why is the skull the main subject of the photograph?”, “What does the skeleton symbolize in the photograph?” The skeleton represents how teenagers are tired enough, or too much. In real life, skull represents a waring to a dangerous substance or object, or sometimes freedom and individuality. In the photograph, it represents warning towards society, warning to give freedom to the teenagers to live their own life, doing whatever they want. The girl holding the skull in front of her face, or covering her face, tells us how she also wants to hide from the harsh pressure and expectations. The bit of pinkish light seeking on the right part of the skull that gradually goes away as we go to the left part shows the sweetness of her childhood going away. In the second photograph, the position of the skull and the bit of light on it makes the viewers question about the purpose of the photograph.

The last photograph is the girl viewing the society with an eye-level point of view, which can also question the viewers, “What is the girl looking at? What is that so interesting on the left side?” Once again, I set up the camera to have a high shutter speed. The dark background with only having the girl staring at a random place increases the mysterious and curious mood. Some way interpret on the photograph by saying that the girl is looking back at the time when she was younger, the time when she was innocent, the time when everything she did was just hanging around and sleeping. Looking at the left, meaning the past, and looking at the right, meaning future; the girl is looking at the past. The view of the right is quite heavy while on the left, there’s a lot of black blank spaces, this contrast also makes the photograph more curious. The last photo is the closing mark of the photo set, eventually representing how teenagers these days are missing the past, missing the freedom, missing their smile.

I really liked how the photograph turned out as how I intended it to be; high clarity and the usage of darkness. As this was a set taken in the studio with color lighting, on my final set, I aim to convey the same message, but in a more natural way, without using those set-up lights given. Also, I would like to use more objects that can add on the meanings and interest of the photograph, for example the skull. I still want to focus on the high clarity and zooming in on the girl’s face to increase the empathy and depth, while also having some mysterious mood with the over all dark atmosphere. I would also like to try some new angles and compositions that could make the set more interesting as this set just as one point of view.

5. Statement of Intent

November 25, 2025 / ALICE / 0 Comments

The title of my final set will be “Whisper.” Whisper can be defined in various ways; speaking quietly, a whisper as a small portion of something, gossips, and so on. Among these definitions, I decided to define it as a small portion of hope in our lives, teenagers lives. These days, globally, one in seven 10-19-year-olds experiences a mental disorder, accounting for 15% of the global burden of disease in this age group. The consequences of failing to address adolescent mental health conditions extend to adulthood, impairing both physical and mental health and limiting opportunities to lead fulfilling lives as adults (World Health Organization). I want to convey the message of how teenagers are under such stress, but that’s not it, there is still hope in our lives, and the hope is the whisper. To show the hope, I aim to use some lighting in a dark background; the black showing all the pressure and stress, with the whisper of light giving the mood of hope, and dream. The basic mood will convey the message of darkness of life, with the addition of my subject’s facial expressions. I decided to take photos of Emma, my peer, who is a teenager, who is in the targeted age of adults high expectations, who is actually experiencing the situation. I also aim to focus on her facial emotions; sadness, emptiness, weakness, etc. Besides the usage of color and light, the viewpoint matters, too. I plan to use a normal viewpoint, a viewpoint that allows viewers to actively engage with the photograph and feel real empathy with it. I got my inspirations from Yousuf Karsh, a photographer known for his portraits of notable individuals. He has been described as one of the greatest portrait photographers of the 20th century. His monotone based photograph’s with close ups and clear focus helps convey the hidden message behind the photograph, which I also aim to do. Most of the subjects in his photograph aren’t smiling, or they even look like they don’t have any emotions. Also, they are not viewing directly to the camera, but somewhere else, increasing mysterious and curious mood. These characteristics combined together is my aim.

4. Mood Board

November 25, 2025 / ALICE / 0 Comments

This is my mood board, and my focus is teenager life. The major tone is monotone, which includes variety of shades of black and white colors. The white color grab the viewers attention with its contrasting lightness with black, and black can show the depth and dismal atmosphere as black symbolizes death, mourning, and evil magic. All of the photographs in my mood board are taken by Yousuf Karsh, a photographer who influenced me to take these close-up portraits. I also really liked the idea of using additional objects to deepen the mood of the photographs, for example, using smoke for the top right one, and using a paint brush for the top middle one. These objects can also convey a message with the symbolism of the object; same as the usage of color. I feel like these close-up shots really deepens the empathy of the main subject’s emotions, which is one of the most important part of my intent. I also want to focus on some natural lights that naturally leads the focus to the subject. For example, I really liked how the photo on the bottom left gives the feeling of having the light behind the subject so that it centers and gives the focus on the main subject. As the main color focus will be monotone colors, I’m looking forward to see some contrast between the light and the background as I feel like it will increase the interest and also deepen serious atmosphere by showing the level of lightness in black and white color tones.

3. Finding a Focus

November 13, 2025 / ALICE / 0 Comments

The context hidden behind the photo matters a lot in deciding the quality of a portraiture besides how much the visual is attractive and really grabs the viewer’s attention. It shapes how viewers interpret the subject, mood, and the photograph as a whole. Having a clear context can convey a clearer message with an increasing engagement. The composition, light, color, frame, background, or even some objects within the photograph can increase the specific atmosphere. For example, a photograph that captures a person’s face, expressions, or emotions leads to the idea of personality. A photograph with various matching color tones or shapes with just one contrasting feature can represent independency that stood up among contrasting elements, or an idea against unity.

I wanted to focus on a photographer called Yousuf Karsh, who mainly captures portraits with monotone colors. Yousuf Karsh usually intents to create a collective visual memory of 20th century’s influential figures, such as artists, musicians, actors, and celebrities, and so on. Some of the famous photograph’s he took includes Winston Churchill, Ernest Hemingway, Albert Einstein, and others as the main subject. Most of his photograph’s are in eye-level point of view with the main subject not looking directly at the camera, which makes his photograph’s more interesting by having the viewers think, “What is the main subject looking at?” I really liked how his photograph’s look really natural but intended at the same time with the mysterious usage of lighting. Also, the monotone color usage grabbed my mind with how it deepens the overall mood.

The subject of the photograph is this guy named Humphrey Bogart. We can see that he is holding cigarette with smoking going up. His eyes are towards a point out of the frame, which increases curiosity, and the smoke coming out grabs the viewers attention with its contrasting color with the background and the fading texture. The man seems kind of confused in my perspective, which also makes me question, “Where is he looking at? What is he looking at” I feel like photograph’s that questions the viewers are actually unforgettable and interesting. The time period of the photograph taken was in 1946, and the antique mood is illustrated in the photograph with the monotone colors and the bit of grainy feelings. There is no direct lighting in the photograph, however, we can observe the light parts in the photograph, for example the smoke and some parts of Humphrey Bogart’s face as there is color contrast between black and white. However, I feel like it’s a low contrast as it naturally shows the difference in color as there is a contrast making some parts look even lighter, but overall, the monotone colors blends well with each other.

In the photograph, maybe Humphrey Bogart was smoking while Yousuf Karsh was taking multiple photographs of him as we can observe the smoke from the cigarette. I believe that the photograph fit within social or historical context with the interpretation of the cigarette. In the past, lots of people were addicted to drugs, such as tobacco, which is the main component of cigarette. This leads to both social and historical context of how in the past, when the photograph was taken, in the 1900s, there was a social issue of tobacco addiction, which is shown directly in the photograph.

The photograph has an eye-level point of view, and the viewer’s attention is drawn towards Humphrey Bogart’s face first, and then, it leads to the smoke. The usage of the cigarette really increases the interest and engagement of the photograph, especially with the lines used. The white color of the smoke showing contrast with the plain black background leads the viewers attention and the bit of movement blended in the fading lines increases the naturalistic mood. Besides the cigarette, we can also see the shadow in Humphrey Bogart’s face, especially on the left side, which we can guess that there was some light on the right side, outside of the angle, and that bit of light created shadows.

The overall mood, lighting, colors, shapes, texture, and the subject makes me think deeply on once again some historical context, and the facial expression of Humphrey makes me think of the seriousness as he is kind of frowning at something. The monotone colors and minimal lighting also leads to a low, dark mood. The intended effects of the photographer’s choices were mainly about the lighting. He wanted to convey the message of various types of lighting and how there isn’t just two simple concepts of direct and natural lighting, instead, different lightings can lead to different messages and moods, influencing how the viewers feel, think, and believe about the photograph.

2. Mindmap

November 11, 2025 / ALICE / 0 Comments

1. Introduction to Portraiture

November 4, 2025 / ALICE / 0 Comments

To define the vocabulary “Portraiture” in my own words, I would say that it is a genre of photography that focuses on capturing a person’s identity, personality, mood, and some features that reveals something, both external and internal part, about who they are. Portraiture may focus on the top body of the person, bottom half, just their face, or many other parts of them. With the lens of portraiture, it captures a story of the person with the usage of composition, color, and frame as well.

photograph taken by Annie Leibovitz really captures the person’s facial features with the usage of greenish color’s with the addition of perfect clarity, leading to a better completeness of the photograph as a whole, too. The texture of the skin with the brush marks creates a mood of a not perfect, flawless photograph, but rather one that contains deep meaning within that texture. As the color green represents nature, growth, and freshness, I feel like the photograph focused on the human’s nature, which can relate to natural moments with natural brush marks. The lighting feels really natural, I believe that there is a bit of light on the right part of the subjects face, which makes the viewers look deeper at the photograph.

This is also Annie Leibovitz’s photograph that focused on blue tones. Comparing to the photograph above, it shows 2/3 of the woman’s body with some paintings in the background. As the color blue symbols calmness, peace, and stability, but also sadness and coldness, I feel like the photograph was meant to kind of represent the sadness and coldness as the woman’s emotions seems to be worried and anxious. Also the background seems creepy in some views as it looks like a museum, but a really empty, hollow one just with some large images. Also, the lighting isn’t really direct, I feel like there is halo light which makes the overall mood deeper and more mysterious.

Blog 8: Class Selection

November 3, 2025 / ALICE / 0 Comments

Our class selected eight photograph’s in total, dividing it in half of colored and black-and-white photograph’s. I believe that all individual photograph’s has its potential of street photography in various perspectives, atmosphere, features, etc. The selected photograph’s are based on how they blend well with each other, how the mood is matching, and how it shows similar textures. The main topic of the selection refers to “the daily life in China,” therefore the photograph’s capturing natural moments of people, streets, architecture, food, and culture. Not only including various traditional features, but also the usage of frame, composition, color tones, and light grabs the viewers attention, which leads to an increase of engagement. At last, the selected eight photograph’s represents the very definition of street photography with its unposed moments creating an eye-catching scene.

First, the colored photograph’s with its naturally colored color tones represent not only China’s historical element, but also the busy life in every corner of the Hutong’s. To point out the photograph that captured the moment of the yellow food store, the photograph significantly caught the blend of the natural movement of the lady inside the store, the bit of sunlight joining the frame, and the steam of freshly cooked food. The lady’s movement relates to the definition of street photography-a skill of photography that focuses on the natural, daily moments with the sense of beauty in our life.

Besides the store photograph, all four of them creates an inclusive atmosphere, especially with the eye-level composition, natural movements, warm color tones. The eye-level composition greatly represents how street photography is taken in unplanned, or immediate situations. The natural movements of various populations increases the daily mood with some excitement, adding some engagement as well.

Next, for the monotoned photograph’s, they deeply captured the texture and depth of the Chinese culture. The various contrast of light and dark colors increases the depth, which leads to the long Chinese history. Focusing on the street photograph that shows the different agricultures and populations in China, the photograph deepens the shadow created by the natural light.

"I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious" - Albert Einstein