Connecting Essay - Suzanne Cummings

This is one of my images from my fifth preparatory shoot. This has a very narrow depth of field, with only a small section of the wires in the image being in focus and the focus dropping out for the rest of the image. There are several red and black wires shown in the foreground of the image, and the background displays a black surface to the right and a red plug adapter to the left of the background. Since the composition consists of almost entirely black and red, a duotone style effect is created, in which red presents light tones and black presents dark tones. The red could create connotations of love, while the black creates connotations of hate, meaning this image could be a metaphorical representation of what the person who uses this work space feels about their work; part of them loves it and part of them hates it.



Above is an image by Suzanne Cummings, as part of her "Be Still" series of still life photographs. This has been heavily edited in photoshop, using a filter that makes the image appear as if it is an oil painting. Some scratches have also been made across the image, creating an agitated mood. The lighting in the image is low key has been positioned behind the subject, meaning the subject of the image, which is a fruit bowl, casts a hard shadow in the foreground of the composition. Tone has been used effectively throughout the composition of this image, with there being strong dark tones featured in the foreground, further creating a dark atmosphere and a dark representation of everyday objects.

My image bears some similarities and connections to Suzanne Cummings' image. One example would be the use of tone; Cummings' image presents a strong tonal contrast between the light and dark tones of the image, which is something I carried into my image, using the red and black, as well as the hard shadow from my camera flash. Cummings' use of blur is another part of her composition that I attempted to carry over to mine; she used motion blur to blur the image and create a sense of motion, while I used depth blur to eliminate background detail and keep the focus of the image as the wires in the foreground.