Amy davis graphics essay

Have recent advances in computer technology effected story telling within artwork?

Over the past few decades technology has dominated our lives and the possibilities today are endless, especially with computer editing software. Recent advances in technology have allowed artists to expand their work creating more imaginative and surreal images. I am fascinated by the endless techniques we are now able t0 do when editing and creating artwork. Computer technology has evolved in many ways, especially editing software created by Adobe, which is constantly being updated. For the current generation technology has never been so accessible. There are so many different editing softwares now available to everyone with a computer, which nowadays most people have.

In my essay I will be investigating how artists have used current technology to create stories within their work in the recent years. Also comparing how technology has evolved. As editing software has advanced, surrealism and photo manipulation has become more convincing and realistic. Many artists and graphic designers create surreal images as a way of telling a story, with the help of modern day technology.

To answer my title question I will be looking at the artwork of Lissy Elle, Kyle Thompson and Dan Mountford. I am also personally inspired by these artists and how they create their work. The artists I have chosen to analyse are all modern day artists who each try to tell a story within their artwork.

Storytelling through modern technology When talking about a story you may instantly associate a story with a book or a film.

However in the present day a story can be shown in many more ways than just a book/film. Today many photographers and graphic designers aim to tell stories through their artwork. One image can allow many people to create their own ideas and feelings and interpretations towards that image. The use of words is not necessary to tell a story, in fact in some ways it allows a more personal response and each person will have a different assumption.

Artist research I am now going to analyse some modern artists who I feel are relevant to my research. All of these artists achieve their amazing work through the use of modern technology. All of the artists work is created through edited and if the technology we have today didn’t exist, it wouldn’t be possible for these artists to achieve their work.

Lissy Elle Lissy Elle’s work creates a story and I am really inspired by her work. Her artwork has a real dreamy and mysterious effect which is achieved through photo manipulation. She is a modern photographer who takes full advantage of the technology which is now on offer. A lot of her work is captured in the woods with props as well as inside rooms.

Lissy Elle is a fine art and surrealist photographer from Canada. On her website she states what her aim to do in her photographs is: “I want to portray a world that’s beautiful in its tragedy.”

She wants to portray a story to the audience that within the bad things in the world there are still good. Her photographs create a fantasy feel and almost like a fairytale, very surreal and beautiful. She wants to hide the evil, almost like the world through a childs eyes, everything is happy.

This photograph is called ‘Get back into your book Alice’. I have noticed that Elle likes to connect to the fairy tale story of ‘Alice in Wonderland’, using a lot of teacups and books, but with her own personal take on it.

In an interview with Lissy Elle she talks about how she was home-schooled and became interested in photography when she was about 13/14. This particular piece was taken in her early career where she would photograph herself for her work. As she became more confident with the camera she began to photograph her friends.

Elle does a lot of work with levitation like the photograph above and also the images below, it is quite common to see a girl floating in Elle’s work.

The idea of floating links to what Lissy Elle is trying to achieve. As a child the idea of flying is a fantasy and something we would all have wanted to do. In an interview she was asked to in one sentence describe her entire collection to which she replied: “A living, breathing, ever-changing dream.”

I really like the way she has described her work as a ‘dream’. A dream is a story in many ways and it’s almost like she is bringing dreams to life through her work.

Elle was home-schooled since the age of 8, so she was self-taught in photography and any inspiration she had for her photography was through other artists. When she first became interested in photography she was inspired by Tim Walker whose work is also very surreal.

In some of Elle’s work she uses props and in others it is complete photo manipulation. Either way modern day technology is essential for her work to be at the level of surrealism that it is. All of her photographs have a clear style; the lighting is soft and ‘dreamy’; there is no use of typography and the colour range she aims for contain a lot of pale pinks and blues, and also cream and white. Colour is very important for Lissy Elle’s work to achieve its fairytale dreamy effect. Thought each image different in many ways each one is a narrative and tells a story and raises questions of how the girl may be feeling and why she is doing what she is appeared doing in the photograph.

What I get from the first image of the girl with her face in the book is that with all the modern day distractions reading can be a way of escaping the harsh reality of life.

Hence the title ‘Get back into your book Alice’. Relating back to the title, modern day technology has most definitely affected story telling with artwork. Lissy Elle’s work shows this is that with the advanced technology she is able to create surreal photographs that would be extremely difficult if not impossible to achieve 10 years ago.

Kyle Thompson

Much like Lissy Elle, Kyle Thompson’s work creates a story of surrealism, achieved by modern day photography. Thompsons work would not be possible without editing software such as Photoshop etc. There is not one piece I have found in Thompsons work that has not been digitally manipulated in some way.

Kyle Thompson is a graphic designer and surreal photographer from Chicago. Nearly all of his work in on location and a self portrait. He tends to use elements of water and fire in his work which create an element of fear which I find quite interesting.

When asked in an interview about what inspires Thompson he said; “I rarely remember my dreams, but i’ve taken photos based on dreams a few times.

I like to make my image seem dream-like either way thought.”

Much like Lissy Elle, Thompson wants his work to be portrayed as a dream.

The above image is very surreal, obviously if your head was set on fire you wouldn’t be standing calmly posing for a photograph. I like how he incorporates the earth’s elements into his work such as fire water and air, it just adds to the surreal effect.

The use of fire could be reflecting how he could possibly be feeling at the time, maybe he could be feeling angry. I say this because anger is the common emotion related to fire because it is destructive. I do believe that most of Thompson’s work reflects how he was feeling at the time, hence why he uses himself in the photographs. Who better to portray your own feelings than yourself? As opposed to a model that would rarely be feeling the same emotion. What I also like about his work is that even thought he using modern new technology to create his work his photographs are edited to a vintage effect. His photographs seem to have a clear style which he uses for each photograph; the lighting is soft and the background usually blurred. He must blur the background so the audience isn’t distracted by the main subject which is usually him in the image. The colours he aims for are usually quite dull colours like greys and browns with hints of orange and blue.

His images are mainly shot on location which adds to an endless amount of possibilities. Each photograph can be so different just because of location the photograph was shot. He has edited his photographs so well that they don’t even look like they are made up of separate images, but just one single photograph. They look so believable and make the viewer believe that what is happening is real. In some of Thompson’s photographs he captures arms and hands and legs but with no body or face on show. In an interview he was asked why he does this: “I love the mystery. The idea of simplifying the human form and focusing just on details. I just love the ambiguity in it; you don’t know who the limbs are attached to. I love being able to tell a story in an image without creating an identifiable character. Anyone could relate since there aren’t any characteristic to distinguish them.”

He clearly thinks about his photographs a lot before taking them and what story he wants to portray.

After looking at the work of Kyle Thompson I feel like recent advances in computer technology have helped Thompson achieve story telling within his artwork. The use of Photoshop has shown to be essential in the creation of Thompsons work. I am personally inspired by his work and I feel like it could be very easy for others to have the same feelings. This is because the feelings he is portraying in his images are very relatable; everyone in their lives has felt a sense of anger or sadness as well wanting to feel ‘free’. Everyone has their own struggles in life and to me Thompsons work shows a feeling of escaping it all.

Thompson and Lissy Elle both want to portray their work as a dream, however in ways their work is very different. Elles work is more fairytale and dreamy, Thompsons work is almost like a nightmare with the burning and drowning, although not all of his work is like that, there is a dreamy feel to most of his work.

Both artists create their artwork in similar ways, which would be difficult to do with without computer technology.

Dan Mountford For my next artist I’m quite interested in finding an artist that does not need the use of modern technology to create their work. I came across Dan Mountford who doesn’t use Photoshop to manipulate his photographs. Instead he uses double exposure on his camera to create his visuals.

“From this experimentation I’ve discovered how to isolate parts of the image in camera without the use of photoshop. I am very pleased to present to you my journey through this technique. The series is a visual journey though our minds by calm and tidy means which the reality of everyday life does not show” His work is very interesting because he doesn’t need modern day technology to create his amazing artwork.

Dan Mountford is 23 years old graphic designer raised in Bedfordshire, now currently living in Brighton, England. He freelanced for about three years with several notable labels, publications and corporations from around the world & also held a solo exhibition in Paris, France.

When I first saw Dan Mountfords work I instantly really liked it. I love the how he edits his images together; I think it is so creative. The way he uses black and white in his work have an effective way of bringing out the detail and shadows in the images.

Each one of his images are slightly different, for example to first image above on the left shows a silhouette of a man with a background off boats on the water. By adding this ‘dot-to-dot’ effect he has created what looks like a brain and that the man is thinking, making us wonder what could he be thinking? Maybe this place means something significant to that person or maybe even Dan Mountford. Maybe all the places the models are photoshopped with mean something personal to them. If so, that in itself creates a narrative. The same with the image on the right, is that place significant to the model? The dot to dot effect has clearly been added to the photograph through editing; however it’s not a technique that requires advanced technology. Part of the girls face has been erased, almost like a loss of identity. It’s like Mountford doesn’t want the audience to know who the models are, making his work more relatable. From looking at other photographers I’ve seen this done before, where the artist takes away the models identity. They do this so the photograph can be more relatable, in my opinion it works effectively.

Dan Mountford experiments with in-camera double exposures to create his images.

All he then needs to do is adjust the tone and remove imperfections from the image, which any basic editing software can do. No advanced technology for photo manipulation is needed. The use of black and white photography makes the merging of the two photographs almost seamless and perfect, as there are no colours, only tones and shades.

When looking into how Mountford achieves his work and how double exposure works, not only is it a ‘hit and miss’ technique, it is also quite expensive as well as time consuming. It can take a lot of experimenting to capture the image you’re hoping for. Mountford didn’t begin taking photographs of people till he was more experienced in this technique. The photograph above is from his earlier work, which

shows a bridge combined with a forest. At first it look like a bridge with leaves on, until you look closer and see its separate images. I really like this technique as it’s like a story within a hidden meaning and you have to look closer to see it.

It was interesting to look at an artist who doesn’t use photoshop to create their images and it was quite refreshing. When initially look at Mountfords images I had no idea Photoshop wasn’t involved, I thought it was achieved through editing. It was really interesting to see how he achieved these images. I wondered why he doesn’t just use Photoshop; wouldn’t it be quicker and easier? When in fact, no it’s not, editing can take a very long time, and why spend more time editing when you can capture that end photograph in a few shots.

Conclusion In conclusion it just goes to show that you don’t need highly advanced technology to create amazing artwork that portrays a story to the viewer. Sometimes all you need is a camera and some imagination. Obviously this method doesn’t work with every editing technique and photo manipulation needs Photoshop. It all depends on what effect you’re trying to achieve, whether it’s in the style of Lissy Elle and Kyle Thompson or Dan Mountford. However Dan Mountford is just one technique that shows how you don’t need advanced technology to create artwork that tells a story to the viewer. Not every artist is able to achieve this without the help of modern technology. But this doesn’t mean that advanced technology is useless because it is essential for nearly all artists in today’s society. Photo editing has evolved immensely since photographers have been editing their photos. Before any kind of Photoshop was available artists would cut their photos and lay them on top of another by hand.

Editing has changed so much since then and there are unlimited editing possibilities which I have shown examples of. It is clear to see that no matter how a photograph has been edited, whether it’s through editing software or just purely through techniques in a camera, the way stories are told through artwork has significantly changed through time.

In my opinion I personally prefer editing methods from modern day technology. I feel like there are more possibilities for story telling through advanced computer editing software that there is through basic editing software. The increase in narratives created by artists through modern technology is constantly increasing, and especially has over the past decade. There is art everywhere that we see throughout our everyday life, however not every piece of artwork is noticed. I think that the connection that a viewer has between themselves and the art is extremely important.

I also think that advances in computer technology have helped make that connection stronger. To conclude I do think modern technology has become a very important factor in creating artwork that tells a story to the viewer. I can’t wait to see how much further technology can develop in the next decade and what we will eventually be capable of doing.

Personal Responses This is my response in the style of Lissy Elle I have tried to create that ‘dreamy’ effect by included a white vignette around the edges of the images. I have also kept to a pale pink and white colour scheme which Lissy seems to use. I have used a selfportrait and manipulated myself to look like I am falling because of the way my hair and dress is flowing.

This is my response in the style of Dan Mountford From what I can see about Dan Mountfords work is that his models never look directly at the camera. I think this might be to add to the emotion. Like Mountford I chose a place that is symbolic to that person, in this case New York. It almost looks like my model is missing that place and I have tried to capture that emotion like Mountford does. Also by using a black and white edit the merging of two images looks clean and professional.

Instead of using the double exposure technique I used Photoshop to achieve the same effect.

My two responses I have done shown above would not be possible to do without the use of modern technology. Or it would be quite difficult to achieve the same effect.

Technology has benefited modern society in many ways, especially in artwork. The possibilities are endless and technology is constantly evolving.

Bibliography

http://www.lissyelle.com/ http://ezramagazine.com/2013/12/02/interview-lissy-laricchia/ http://hifructose.com/2014/09/19/exclusive-interview-kyle-thompson-discusses-hishaunting-photography/ http://www.emptykingdom.com/featured/ek-interview-kyle-thompson/ http://1xrun.com/runs/Self_Pavilion http://cargocollective.com/danmountford