xi huang artist analysis
xi huang artist analysis
xi huang artist analysis
for my third artist i decided to focus on the work of xi huang. xi huang is a photographer who specializes and concentrates on black and white surrealism photography through experimental portrait photography and film photography.
experimental photography is using non-traditional techniques and methods within photography.
xi huang takes his photographs simply using his phone then edits the images using a photoshop brush. after this he proceeds to print these images out onto polaroid prints.
i chose to specifically focus on his work because i find it so intriguing how he manages to capture the idea of surrealism and hidden identity within his alluring portrait photographs. i also chose him to be my third hidden identity
based artist as his work methods and techniques fortunately link back to my first and second artist using the black and white effect.
" i use concise and poetic image language to reveal the spiritual side behind reality. "
one thing i like about the appearance of his work is how he creates a warped perception and effect of people, which i find alluring as it somewhat relates to the concept of hidden identity and identity.
i also really enjoy the additional polaroid effect, which i used for my second hidden identity based artist, francesca woodman. the polaroids make the photographs look more old and overall make the
photographs look a lot more outstnding and appealing. this technique also links back to the same style used for my second chosen photographer, francesca woodman.
it creates an old, worn out effect and makes the photographs appear a lot more unique. i also like how the photographs where he added the polaroid effect to, seem more grainy and the filter on it makes the photographs appear a lot more old and worn out, making the polaroid effect seem more realistic.
considering xi huang does not actually take the photographs on a polaroid camera, except he takes his photoshoots simply on his phone, the polaroid effect it either edited on after the photograph has been edited or the images are printed out and re shot on a polaroid camera or edited onto one, to make them appear a lot more realistic.
i generally enjoy his method of experimental photography and how he edits the photographs to make the subject / the people in the photographs blend in together and with the background of the photographs.
i also find the filters of his work really interesting. his work mainly consists of black and white photographs, however some of them look more saturated than the rest, creating a sort of worn out effect, adding onto the old fashioned filter.
some of them still have colour present in the photograph, however, they still appear dull an desaturated, adding onto it's worn out, old effect in the photographs. they look grey in a way that makes the photographs look like a picture from out of an old movie, and i think that it makes his work pieces look more antique and makes it ideally suit the dull and mysterious mood. besides the color filters apparent on his work, i also think that the, in a way, grainy texture and filter, along with the use of over exposure in certain photographs add on to the alluring effect of the photographs and contrast significantly well with the dull and plain background.
i think that this style and theme links back to my first photographer, elena oganesyan who i also followed the technique of using black and white experimental photography for my developments where i blended the persons face with the blemish tool. this is something i want to follow / i want to use this same technique for some of my development edits as i think it was a greater successful area of my developments.
i plan to use the blemish took over the persons face in certain areas for my development photographs and also use the blemish tool to create a stretch between the two faces, and then blend them in with the background. i generally want to do this because it was one of the areas of success for my first hidden identity photoshoot following the style of elena oganesyan. i also admire his use of the polaroid effect as well as the actual editing of the filter.
this is also partially the reason i chose xi huang as my third hidden identity based artist, because his use of the polaroid effect is similar to the technique used for my second chosen photographer.
i believe that the general idea of xi huang's photography pieces is so captivating and can capture the overall concept of hidden identity in the form of photography so interestingly while his work creates an aesthetically pleasing and alluring effect. i think that xi huang's work successfully captures the concept of hidden identity through his warped portrait photographs which he creates with experimental photography using photoshop.
i also admire his capability to be able to turn such simple photographs and turn them in to an alluring piece of art, with the use of editing through photoshop, turning simple portrait images and editing a black and white filter and warping the faces and blending them.
his use of lighting also adds onto the alluring effect of his work. within the background of xi huang's photographs, it is completely dark and toned out, making the subject, which in this case is the people, and making them stand out significantly more in the photographs.
the subject seem highlighted and brightened to create more of an outstanding effect and contrast a lot more drastically with the dull, empty background.
his artwork / photographs show portrait photographs of people warped and blended in with the background which is pitch black, without capturing any light, which to me creates a symbol of mysteriousness, something similar to a void in which i personally find alluring, especially because of how the faces fade into the background hi, or blend out into the background, and managing to captivatingly capture the concept and art of identity, specifically being hidden identity and life and energy throughout his art pieces.
i think that his warped photographs, for example in the images where the faces look stretched and blended into each other seem like life and energy being captured through his photographs, and the faces look like an illusion which i find really interesting and the black background makes the overall subjects of the photographs stand out and make the images seem a lot more unique by highlighting the subjects which, in this case, are the people and the faces.
it makes the subjects seem dream - like and surreal, contrasting well with the plain dark background.
i also really admire his other work such as his photographs where the person is blended in with the background, which i also think kind of creates something similar to an illusion - like effect, making the photographs seem dream - like and surreal. i think that because his background is usually just plain pitch black, it contrasts extremely well with the over exposed, highlighted subjects, which, in this case are the people in the photographs, and creates and even more eye - catching, surreal pieces of work and makes them stand out more. i find this captivating especially in the sense that it is correlating with the theme and the concept of hidden identity.
photoshoot plan
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idea
idea
sketch / plan
sketch / plan
main challenges of the shoot
main challenges of the shoot
my general idea for my photoshoot is to take multiple simple portrait photographs of a person and then edit them in photoshop to look similar to xi huang's work pieces.
i want to take the photoshoot in a room with a plain white or black background as the background is not the main focus of the photoshoot. the pictures will be plain and simple portrait photographs, similar to the photoshoot i took for my elena oganesyan inspires photoshoot / work piece; however i will be using artificial lighting instead of natural lighting, and for this photoshoot the photographs will be a lot dimmer and there will be a lot less light.
my main challenges for this xi huang inspired photoshoot will be mostly about the editing, rather than the photoshoot iteslf. however i think the main challenges for the photoshoot will be successfully capturing the lighting and camera angle ideally.
lighting
lighting
i want to experiment with using artificial lights rather than natural lighting as for my first and second identity based photographers have used natural lighting. i also want the lighting to be dim and the background will be burnt out / no lighting captured. the images will be taken at a preferably later time or when the room is darker so that the lighting, (artificial lighting) will capture the subject better.)
camera angle / position
camera angle / position
i want the camera angle to be mainly upright and facing directly towards the person. i plan for the photoshoot to be simple portrait photographs but i also want to capture different camera angles.
inspirations
inspirations
the inspiration for my photoshoot will be to follow the work / technique of xi huang , ( most specifically work similar to his 6th picture in my xi huang artist analysis. )
contact sheets + analysis
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for my first xi huang inspired photoshoot, i experimented with portrait photographs as his specific work that i am focusing on revolves around portrait photography. i explored mainly with taking photographs of a person rather than a certain object or landscapes to portray his work more.
his work is commonly experimental photography, meaning it includes the use of photoshop and editing. because of this, i chose to keep the photograph simple, with a plain background and no thing that made the photoshoot seem too chaotic, this made the developments easier to edit and the photographs appear more ideal to the style of xi huang more successfully.
a large proportion of the photographs were portrait / photographs of a person and some of the photographs were of hands, aside from the idea that xi huang's work mainly consists of portrait photographs and photographs of people.
as the photographs were plain and simple, i also focused of having a simple background as it would make it easier to edit it using the burn tool and burn out the background.
the photographs turned out to be somewhat successful however i planned to take significantly more portrait photographs and experiment around with / adjust the camera angle and lighting. for my photoshoot, the lighting was one of the most significant areas of my photographs. i think that this was one of the more successful elements for my first photoshoot.
the camera angle for the photoshoot was facing directly towards the subject.
this was similar to the artist however i still wanted to experiment and explore with different camera angles and camera placements in the future. the poor camera quality also ending up making the photographs appear with a grainy texture which i think adds on to the effect and the general concept and mood or theme of the photoshoot. some of the photographs appeared under exposed however i could adjust this in photoshop.
different from my first and second artist, where i experimented with motion blur in some of the photographs, this photoshoot captured less motion and less movement, as it would make the photoshoot less ideal.
this is also because i plan to create the warped / stretched face affect using photoshop and the general plan was the keep the raw images / photo shoot simple.
my photoshoot intentionally lacked colour and saturation and i tried to only capture dull colours and a proportion of the edits / developments will be in black and white, or highly desaturated.
i want to experiment with different camera angles to make the photographs appear more successful and ideal, which i plan to focus of for my next xi huang inspired photoshoot.
the photographs were shot in a dark room using artificial / camera light instead of natural light which is a difference between my two other artists who worked with natural lighting.
my general intentions for the photoshoot was to replicate his warped photographs, the pieces where the faces appeared stretched and blended into each other, i planned to do this by taking two sets of photographs that i would edit together and blend into each other.
developments + analysis
for my developments for my first xi huang inspired photoshoot, i planned to follow the same technique and method of experimental photography similar to my chosen artist. i wanted to keep the photoshoot simple as it would make the developments a lot better to edit and make them more successful. the camera was facing directly toward the subject for the photoshoot and i did not experiment much with the camera angle, which i plan to do as an improvement for my redraft photoshoot. the lighting was dim with artificial light, ideally as what i planned for in my photoshoot plan.
i took two pictures and used the select crop tool to crop out only my face or body. i did this for only one of the two photographs i picked and pasted in onto the other.
after adjusting and moving it to where i wanted, usually next to the first pictures face, and clicked 'merge down' to merge the two layers down into one. i did this in the adjustments section in photoshop.
now that the images were merged together, i was able to edit it. this was so i would have two similar faces together to create the effect.
due to xi huang's work revolving around the technique of experimental photography, the editing was one of the most complex parts of my overall photoshoot which was why i originally planned to try and keep the raw images / photoshoot simple.
the background was a plain white wall, however it the background did not significantly matter during the photoshoot as it was going to be faded out during the development edits.
to make the backgrounds be faded out into black, i decreased the brightness and increased the contrast, this made the subject, in this case the person, stand out more brightly and more highlighted amongst the rest of my photographs.
i also increased the exposure which also highlighted my face more significantly and made the background stand out a lot less. i also used the blur tool over my face which i found successful made the photographs seem soft, ideally capturing it's dream - like and surreal theme that i planned to in my photoshoot plan. after this i used the burn tool to actually begin to fade out the background.
i used the burn tool repeatedly over the background, making sure not to use it on the actual subject of the photoshoot, until the background was fully hidden and pitch black.
after this i started to replicate the similar method xi huang used, where he made the faces looked stretched and blended into each other i did this by using the smudge tool.
i used the smudge tool and smudged the faces too make a flowy effect similar to my chosen artist. i smudged the two faces to make them look blended into each other and used the blemish tool to correct any parts that did not look ideal.
i think that this was a particularly more successful area of my developments, as i expanded on what i did for my developments within my previous chosen artists. i also used the blemish tool over the persons face to look like it is faded and blended in or smudged into the background.
i did this for my redraft developments for my first artist, elena oganesyan, and i found this one of the more significantly successful areas / techniques i used for my developments and i decided to expand on that for this artist.
overall i think that i have somewhat made my developments ideal and similar to the style of my chosen artists and managed to create developments ideal to my photoshoot plan.
to improve, i want to create more or a significant difference between the images and camera angles and also add a sense of originality to my photoshoot developments. i also want to try and experiment with the polaroid effect that he uses in certain pieces of his work.
highlighting success
i chose this two as one of my more successful developments out of my general photoshoot. this was the second development i made and edited. after getting used to the technique and method of using the smudge tool to blend out the faces, i think that this was one of the developments where it turned out the most effective. for the picture on the right, i used the same development photograph and used the spot healing brush tool to blur out the persons face and erase it into the plain background. this was one of the methods i followed for my first artist, elena oganesyan, and it was one of the techniques / areas of my developments that i found the most successful, and so i wanted to follow the same method for my developments for this artist photoshoot. again, i think that this was a successful area of my developments, both appearance wise and i think that it also captures the general concept of hidden identity to me as the persons face / identity is blurred out and faded. i also think that these two photographs / developments followed the concept of xi huang the most successfully and overall turned out most successful.
further developments
+ analysis
for my further developments for this shoot, i wanted to experiment with techniques outside of the method following my artist, xi huang. the specific pieces of work that i decided to focus on inspired by him were plain black and white photographs that portrayed the concept of hidden identity successfully. i wanted to exemplify onto this concept and create photographs that look faded, or hidden, following the idea of hidden identity.
i wanted to recreate the polaroid effect that not only follows the same technique of xi huang but also links back to my last artist, elena oganesyan. i think that the polaroid films are something that i generally like about my work as it makes the developments seem less plain. the general editing technique of my photographs didn't change, however i added on to the developments. by this i mean i expanded further onto my developments to create even more changes to my edits from the original photoshoot. instead, i used a filter to add the scratches onto the photographs. i got this from a template of the internet that i copied onto my photographs. i wanted to print out my photographs so that i could make then look worn out, faded, hidden etc. this was so that i could expand and experiment even further onto the concept of hidden identity.
i wanted to do this in ways such as burning the photographs, crumpling the paper, or re creating the polaroid effect and writing over it. i think that this made the photograph developments seem less plain without crating any drastic changes that did not fit the over all photoshoot and photoshoot plan. the polaroid effect gave the photographs not only a sense of an old fashioned theme, but also the polaroid effect correlates to my chosen artist, xi huang, who also printed out his work onto polaroid film. this was one of the more successful areas of my further development edits.
not only that but it links back to my second artist, francesca woodman, who also used polaroid prints and film to display her work.
i also wanted to use a colour filter, to add a tint of colour or somehow to step out side of the idea of following the same plain black and white technique of the artist, the slight blue tints of the photographs make the polaroid prints seem a lot more realistic as if the photographs were taken on a polaroid camera.
for all three of my artists, i experimented with lack of colour for my developments, mostly experimenting in black and white and very little colour for developments such as making the polaroid films seem more realistic. i planned to burn the polaroid photographs or somehow experiment further with creating the hidden and eerie mood for my developments even more successfully.
overall, i think that for my first xi huang inspired photoshoot, i managed to capture the theme following hidden identity and also create development edits that were similar to the method and techniques used by my chosen artist. for furture improvement i want to try and experiment with different camera angles to make the developments seem less plain, and also use brighter lighting as the dim lighting made the developments appear grainy.
redraft contact sheets
+ analysis
for my second xi huang inspired photoshoot, i think that in some areas it turned out to be a lot more successful than my first, however in certain areas, the photoshoot was less successful and could be improved, like for things such as lighting, camera placement and overall attempting to create more difference between the two photoshoots. for my second photoshoot, i took significantly more photographs than taken with my first xi huang photoshoot.
one thing that was similar between my two photoshoot was the camera angle and camera placement. for both, the camera was facing upright and facing directly towards the subject of the photoshoot. although i originally planned to explore with different camera angles and camera placements, i still think that the simplicity of the photoshoot was successful and experimenting with different camera angles was not a significant area of development for me.
for my second photoshoot, the camera was more further away from the subject and the person was more close up to the camera in the first one. another similarity between my first and second xi huang inspired photoshoot was that the background was still plain and simple as i still planned to burn put the background again.
however, because the subject was set far away from the background it made some areas of the developments different in comparison to my first photoshoot but it was still ideal. the plain background made editing significantly easier and made the background for the edits more ideal and successful.
one of my least successful areas of my second photoshoot was the lighting. the lighting and time of day was not ideal and the photographs turned out to be dull and not bright enough to edit successfully.
as the lighting was one or the most significant areas of my photoshoot and to due the poor lighting it made editing a lot more difficult, and the over all developments turned out to appear a lot less ideal compared to my first development edits.
however this was one of the only areas of improvements for my second photoshoot.
over all i think that the photoshoot was successful to some extent however for improvements i want to explore with better lighting as it would have made the developments and editing process significantly easier and more ideal.
developments + analysis
as an improvement, i took significantly more photographs than i originally did for my first xi huang inspired photoshoot, which was one of my more successful areas. i wanted to keep the photoshoot simple, similar to my first photoshoot. i also wanted to stick with following the same method and technique that i used for my first photoshoot development as the main editing process is what created the xi huang inspired photographs. as it would make the developments a lot better to edit and make them more successful.
one of my less successful areas of the second photoshoot was the lighting, specifically the lack of lighting. for my photoshoot i did not manage to capture great lighting like i managed to do for my first photoshoot, and as a result the photographs turned out dim and more grainy, overall being one of my least successful area of the photoshoot.
the camera was facing directly toward the subject for the photoshoot similar to what i had did for my first photoshoot however in my second one, the camera was further away from the subject. my original plan for my photoshoot was to explore and experiment with different camera angles however, i did not experiment much with the camera angle, even though i planned to do as an improvement from my first xi huang inspired photoshoot.
for the actual development edits, i kept following the same method and technique that i used for my first developments as this was what created the xi huang inspired experimental photography technique, creating this in the adjustments section with the use of photoshop. " i took two pictures and used the select crop tool to crop out only my face or body. i did this for only one of the two photographs i picked and pasted in onto the other.
after adjusting and moving it to where i wanted, usually next to the first pictures face, and clicked 'merge down' to merge the two layers down into one.
now that the images were merged together, i was able to edit it. this was so i would have two similar faces together to create the effect. "
similar to the first xi huang inspire photoshoot the background was a plain white wall, which still did not completely matter during the photoshoot as it was going to be faded out during the development edits using the burn tool and the spot healing tool to blur out certain parts of the background.
" to make the backgrounds be faded out into black, i decreased the brightness and increased the contrast, this made the subject, in this case the person, stand out more brightly and more highlighted amongst the rest of my photographs. " i followed this technique from my first photoshoot as it was one of my more successful areas of the developments.
keeping the photoshoot simple was a successful area of the general photoshoot as it made it easier to expand onto the developments in my further developments edits.
further developments + analysis
for my redraft further developments i decided to continue using the same effect technique, i used a filter to add the scratches onto the photographs. i got this from a template of the internet that i copied onto my photographs, as i did for my developments for my first photoshoot, playing with themes of collage. it makes the photographs look as if they were printed out and scratched off as if it is fading away, creating and old photograph effect. not only does the grainy, old polaroid film effect follow the same mood and theme of xi huang's work, it also expands deeper into the concept and idea of hidden identity.
i think that the general photoshoot turned out somewhat successful however there is room for improvement in certain areas.
after this i also decided to add a colour filter onto the developments, using this idea from my second photographer to merge the two ideas together, since for my second photographer, adding the coloured filter appeared to be one of my more successful elements of my developments for that chosen photographer.
i added a slight tint of green, however this time is was much more dull and less tinted, almost invisible making the photographs still seem black and white, however still creating a bit more difference between the two developments.
due to the photoshoot overall being simple, i wanted to keep it simple and not overdo any of the developments as i would not want it to look too chaotic.
the developments make the photographs look similar to shadows, the burnt out and completely void background expands onto this eerie and mysterious effect, adding a sense of ambiguousness into the photographs. another thing that shows this is the blur of the persons face which i think is one of my more successful areas of my developments as it explored deeper into the concept of hidden identity with the hidden face and face blurred into the background. i also wanted to create a polaroid effect similar to what not only my chosen artist, xi huang, had done, but also what i had edited onto for my second photographer, who also used polaroid film to portray a collage theme for the photoshoot developments.
overall, i think that this photoshoot and my overall work on this artist was successful as i managed to capture the artists technique and methods he used and also i managed to successfully capture the concept and idea of identity and hidden identity in my photoshoots and their developments.
for the development edits, i think that my second photoshoot turned out more successful because i took a greater quantity of photographs compared to my first photoshoot so that i could explore with different edits and more unique developments, however for my second photoshoot, the lighting was one of the least successful areas and i captured the lighting more successfully in my first photoshoot.
to the development edits for my photoshoot, i think that my first photoshoot turned out to be the most successful as the editing process, for example the background, turned out to be more successful than my redraft / second photoshoot development edits.
another reason why i think that the first photoshoot developments turned out to be more successful than the second one if because of the lighting. for my developments and general photoshoot, the lighting it on of the more significant parts of the technical materials for photography and the success on the photoshoot depended mainly on the lighting.
since the lighting was not ideal unlike my first photoshoot, it made the editing process a lot harder and made the photographs appear more grainy textured.