Happy new year! In this volume, I write about photography, negative space, and the importance of paying attention to context.
24.42
Hi architects,
Consider the two photos below. What were the first things you noticed about each photo? Try to be as specific as possible. If you transported yourself into the venue from the perspectives in the images, describe what you see and hear around you. How large is the venue? How loud is it and what kind of personalities stand around you? If you’re not familiar with the artist, what does the music sound like? Start with the obvious and work toward the implicit. Paint an image before reading on.
Last October, I was assigned to cover an Arlo Parks concert at The Independent, an intimate, divey music venue tucked in a busy stretch of Divisadero. It was my first time at this venue. Past the ticket booth and foyer was a long corridor, dimly lit and decorated with framed portraits of artists and celebrities who’ve walked through here before me. The hallway felt like it stretched on for longer on my way in than on my way out.
The venue’s unique challenges—dim lighting, dense crowd, and immobility—were clear from the opening act. An hour and some hundred shutters later, I faced the same challenges when Arlo Parks came on. I was so focused on nailing my first assignment of the season, I didn’t notice my knees stiffening until a few songs in. I usually only get the first three songs for show assignments, but at The Independent, I had the entire set. This gave me space to manage these challenges and notice what was happening both on stage and off the stage.
Halfway through her set, I put away my camera for a few songs. I noticed a couple standing in front of me—one who had memorized every lyric and the other appearing much more entertained by their partner’s enthusiasm than the show itself. Around me, some younger crowds of friends filmed on Snapchat and a few older concertgoers who seemed very familiar with the venue rooted along the edges, taking occasional sips from their cocktails. I could never imagine this mix of people crammed into the same room, but Arlo Park’s r&b ballads melted the eclectic crowd into a layered sea. I alternated between blending into the audience and capturing instants of when the lights, my framing, and Arlo Parks’ expression eclipsed.
In photography, "negative space" refers to the space around and between the subject of an image. You can think of it as the background, or context of a photo. The negative space forms shapes that share edges with the positive space, helping define the boundaries of the foreground and balance the composition of a photo. How would you describe the composition of the unedited photos from earlier, and how would you edit them to tell a more vivid story?
In addition to exposure, color, and tone, subtle composition edits can enhance your photography in powerful ways. I was able to get an unobstructed shot of Arlo Parks singing in the blue (left) image so I wanted her portrait to dominate the image. I cropped in the top and sides of the image so that she can take up most of the composition. The flowers, drum set, and other background objects were distracting, so I blended them into the background. Then, I exposed and graded the image to create a sharper contrast between her and the background while still protecting her skin tone. The tight composition and intense lighting highlight her impassioned performance.
When I saw the raw yellow (right) image, I almost deleted it with my other underexposed shots. Instead, I decided to keep her silhouette to represent a more emotional part of her setlist. I centered her silhouette, illuminated the guitarist on her left side, and obscured the rest of the image. Unlike the blue image, I decided to keep the negative in the upper half of this photo to make the image feel as dynamic and tangled as some of her poignant songwriting. The negative space in the blue image focuses on Arlo Parks’ emotional performance and that in the yellow image focuses on her show’s atmosphere.
How do these edits rebalance the subject and background in the above images and how do they affect what’s conveyed about the show?
Framing and composition are indispensable skills in photography. They are the two concepts I would encourage any beginner to focus on before anything else. They apply to all forms of photography, whether you’re taking a photo of a person, landscape, or object. They are simple to grasp and difficult to hone. If you understand how to compose your photos, you can easily capture beautiful images with the camera already in your pocket. But, if you grow aware of and control the negative space in your photo, you can produce images that tell the story you want.
With the power to turn stills into stories, photographers need to be aware of their own biases. Photographers are better storytellers when they are sensitive to the context of their work—the most beloved or controversial art is often the one that bends conventions to convey the creator’s perspective. Multiple photographers capturing the same event, model, or sunrise will carry different perspectives that influence their end creation. Some differences are purely aesthetic, but many are social or political. The only truth a photographer can tell is their own.
I do have my own personal convictions and values, and I live by those. But as an artist, as a portrait photographer, my job is to tell the truth and to capture someone's spirit on a certain day. And it's never the whole truth; it's the truth I experience in a very intense and intimate fashion.
Platon
Negative space is a valuable concept for both the artist and the viewer. Photographers express it as the background; musicians express it as periods of silence; poets express it as empty spaces or line breaks. Next time a photo, song, or piece of writing resonates with you, consider the elements the artist used to connect with you. When art upsets you, look for the employed or neglected elements that provoked you. Whether through appreciation or criticism, we, as the viewer, can engage with a subject more meaningfully when we foster sensitivity for the around and in-between. Invert your focus on the positive space and then ask yourself again—what do you see?
Contextually,
Brandon
📚 On the Origin of Species
On The Origin of Species and Other Stories by Bo-Young Kim
What the Gods feared most was not their physical death but rather the possibility that no one would remember that they had existed at all. They wanted their history and civilization, the art, music, and literature they had created, and the vast knowledge that they had accumulated to be remembered. And that task fell to us robots. The Gods bestowed upon factories the power to create life and recycle matter, and with that, the factories' great billowing fumes took away our creators' final dying breaths.
Loved this book! While some stories were slow at times, their imaginative and introspective narratives more than makeup for it. Central themes explore faith, different kinds of love (not just romantic), and what it means to be human. I found myself empathizing with time travelers, robots, and even dragons. It’s impressive how much humanness Kim Bo-Young can pack into such mythical, posthuman, or otherwordly stories.
Also, the paperback book quality is *chef’s kiss* and a very nice touch.
December 2021, 9/10
& other reads from the end of 2021:
Dune by Frank Herbert
October 2021, 7.5/10
Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
December 2021, 8/10
📷 Winter 2021 Concerts
My concert photography portfolio
This past winter, I covered ten artists and my first mini-festival (compared to the one photo pass I received in my first two years breaking into concert photography). A few things I’d want to accomplish in the music industry this year include: become a paid photo contributor, direct+shoot a private artist photo session, and go on tour (stretch goal)! Between this and my studio photography, I have no idea what’s in store for my photography in 2022 but I’m very excited about it all.
+ this TikTok montage took me way longer than I wanted to spend on it. It may only have 6 likes while I write this, but 1/6 of those likes came from Tinashe so… that’s a W to me.
🎶 VOL.12 Playlist
That’s all for this volume! If you enjoy bluprint, please subscribe, share it with a loved one or write back to me. You can also find me on Instagram & Twitter.