Photo Manipulation: Capturing the reality

In the beginning on January, I went on a little road trip with my family, we drove all the way to Montreal to have some fun and visit my Aunt. After resting for one day, the next day we drove to Quebec City to walk around. I have never been to Quebec City before; therefore it was all very foreign to me. The moment I saw the centre of the beautiful city, all the buildings, streets and little boutiques I was amazed, because I love looking at old buildings. There is so much history about every single one of them; it is probably the oldest city in North America.

This first photo is Old Quebec City (where I was on a small slope when I took this picture), I have added several effects. First, the old paper look, because I want the picture to look like it just got printed out and where back then there was not any good quality paper like today. I added a sepia tint to make it look like the photos back in the days where there are no colours, just to give that vintage edge to it. I also sharpened this picture by a little, so that it gives more details on the buildings. The highlights of this picture has been darkened, because I think the sky is too bright and this darkened highlight is just the right tint to balance in this picture, now the buildings would not look to dark. The last effect I made to this photo is that I gave is a faded look, from dark to bright (a colourful centre) this captures the centre of the city and focuses mainly on that part.

(Original)

(By Anna Yu, Old Quebec City, Jan 2011)

(Edited)

(By Anna Yu, Old Quebec City, Jan 2011)

When we were leaving the city, heading back to Montreal, we are on the road and I saw this gorgeous scenery from the car. I just had to stop the car and go down to take a picture right away. However, I was restricted to go in the parking, or else I would probably have a better view. I had to take the picture where there were these fences/bars, but I still caught a good view.

In this second photo, the scenery of the Saint Lawrence River, I did not do much editing to the picture because I do not think that it needs too much enhancements. I played with mainly the colours, from saturation to hue, to temperature, to tint. Adjusting a little of this and a little of that, the image ended up looking like this. I wanted the colours to stand out more and making the snow whiter to make this picture warmer. Because the beauty of this photo is the landscape and there is not much to do about.

(Original)

(By Anna Yu, Saint Lawrence River, Jan 2011)

(Edited)

(By Anna Yu, Saint Lawrence River, Jan 2011)

Although, the pictures that I captured are not like most photographers in the past, where they “capture the reality going to dangerous places including wars” (Gordana Icevska, Course notes week 5). Images captured in the past are “important because they were first images taken in a combat zone, which were used for propaganda” like Roger Fenton (Gordana Icevska, Course notes week 5). However, I believe that my work is also important (even if I did not take part in the civil war to take pictures) because my pictures represent what is now present. Reality does not necessarily mean only the dangerous places are real, where we live now and what we do is reality. Reality is a part that plays the main role of our life and to capture this moment, every second we live in is something memorable and needs to be captured.

Sources:

Gordana Icevska, Photography: Shooting the truth, Module week 5 - capturing reality