Connecting essay 4

Artist- David Shama

My image- Easter Family

Shama's image has square dimensions and features a women standing in it's centre third holding her purse in front of her.  There are buildings behind her which contrasts with the natural imagery of the lake directly behind her and the trees and grass surrounding her.  The black and white photography used as well as the subjects clothing gives the image an older appearance making it look historical opposed to contemporary.  The image has a wide depth of field allowing for large areas of the image to be at an equal point of focus this allows the viewer to more clearly view the objects such as the buildings in the images background.

My image in contrast has a landscape orientation with a shallow depth of field meaning that the images subject is at it's centre.  I feel that this draws better focus to the images subject and enhances the fact that she is in the centre of the image allowing it to be clear that she is the subject of the image.  This is important due to the fact that there is a crowd of people around the subject.  The image has a black and white colourisation with increased contrast this allows for it to appear very striking due to the high levels of tonal contrast featured in the image.  My image also appears to be very modern this can be seen through the subjects clothing and the cars featured in the image.

I feel that both images contain similar aspects such as subject positioning and image colourisation.  Other aspects are different however such as depth of field used and location used as Shama's image takes place in a more secluded area with large buildings in the background however my image was shot in a small but busy village on Easter Sunday in the countryside.  The historical appearance of the image also varies with mine appearing modern and Shama's appearing older.