Photographic Painter

I am a 'Photographic Light Painting Artist'(!) merging the two disciplines of Painting and Photography to portray images in the same sort of way an artist paints. 

Photography has been my hobby for over 50 years, but painting an image is a whole new way for portraying what one sees. 

I want to capture light in all its glorious subtleties,
texture in its infinite tactile qualities
and the human form in all its evasive beauty
- I am attempting to do this by sculpturing light as I paint on 'film'.

Early experiments in the 1850s and later the Pictorialism movement introduced emotional intent into the viewer's realm of imagination in preference to an exact representational copy/documentation of a scene. In the early 1900s, the American Photo-Secession movement was started that promoted photography as a fine art in general and photographic pictorialism in particular; they held the then controversial viewpoint that what was significant about a photograph was not what was in front of the camera but the manipulation of the image by the artist/photographer to achieve his or her subjective vision.

This art form faded out after the second World War, but I am leaning towards this visual style and love how light can transform an image. 
I am also inspired by the Caravaggisti movement of the late 16th century.

Conventional photography is representational and is about seeing and capturing scenes in an instant, where as photographic painting evolves over time and portrays what one imagines or sees.

I use a handheld light-source as a brush on digital film just as an artist uses a paint brush on paper. 
Strokes are made by carefully manipulating the balance of texture, strength, hardness, movement, size and position of the light source (which is the brush) during a number of 2-3 second exposures. 
The final image is then created by combining and layering parts of these brush stroke exposures together to portray the image as seen/imagined by my eye rather than as the camera recorded it; this last phase can take me several hours!

How the light falls on an object can completely transform how that object appears to the viewer.
Think how different a floodlit building can look compared to the daytime, or how shining a torch up under your chin can make one look all spooky! 
If we can control this light, then we can decide how to portray each individual element of a painting or picture to give our personal view in the picture.

Here are a few examples to show how light can make a real difference to a picture.

Light painting is all about controlling the light in each bit of the scene independently of other parts of it.

 

Painting people becomes much harder as they can not stay perfectly still for very long - but the results can be great.

I did not want to see the background as it distracts from the experience of gonging

Ditto, the background is not relevant - this is a model posing during a drawing session

This shows how the light can be placed anywhere and from different directions without upsetting other areas,
this is not done using clever photoshopping techniques - just painting with light.

Looks like it is representational, but it is not and it is not possible using studio lights

It is hopefully not too obvious, in all the above pictures, that the lighting is actually impossible to reproduce in real life;
it is one of the marvellous things about this genre - one can change the look and feel of each piece of a scene...

see how just the lighting can change the proportions of a completely stationary model
(the images switch view ever few seconds)

By the way, did you know the word "Photography", (originally) means "writing with light"!

 

You can see further examples...

Still Life here  

Model reading - different renditions

or click on these different Photo Painting images of Art Nude examples
    that were created from a single pose
    (you can cycle through 14 variations of a session)

Demonstrating how painting with light
alters/changes a (nude) stationary model

Portraits 

Scenes (some nudes)

Art nudes...

    Classical       Pensive    

    Frontal         Lotus    

    Bottom         Lying   

        WrappedUp

 

Should we meet, then this self portrait will help(?) you recognise me

 

PS If you love churches as I do, then here is a collection of photos from over 300 of them in alphabetic order.

 

Only read the rest if you are interested in early photography

Pictorialism

There was an artist/photographer called Henry Peach Robinson whose pioneering work in 1850's started this movement.

This is his "Fading Away" image, which is actually a composite of 5 photos/plates - not an easy thing to do then, or now, and would be impossible to take in a single exposure.

Oscar Gustave Rejlander produced the montage "The Two Ways of Life", composed of 18 images, which Queen Victoria loved and brought for her husband; it created quite a stir!

and here is another version - just spot the differences

I am in awe of the creativity of these people and would love to be able to create just a small part of what they could do.

I've actually learnt things from reading the books they wrote in those days; and just like them all my work is done using manual settings without modern features or exposure meters etc.

So I am going back in time, but the rewards just lift my soul.

 

While you are looking at images, how is your screen?

If you see a band down the middle of the columns, then colours are not true as your gamma is not at 2.2 (best for the web and most cameras) -  notice how it changes as you move your head around.

Now looking carefully, close up, you should be able to read the numbers 248 and 252 in the top right corner of the white bar and the numbers 8 and 12 (even 4 if you have an excellent screen) near the red/green bars in the lower black horizontal bar.  The background and the grey patch should be neutral grey.

If you cannot see these numbers, then your screen is not showing shadow and highlights properly.

 

 

 

Pages
12thNov 2021 ideas
Apr2022 2022 ideas
Bottom 2018 Su pose x16
ChairPose 2022 Christina pose x7
Churches around 300
Classical 2019 Amarissa pose x12
DeeGrapes 2022 Dee pose x18
Flying 2021 Megan pose x10
Flying/Faith 2021 Faith pose x8
FullBreasts 2019 Georgia pose x14
GeorgiaPensive 2019 Georgia pose x14
GeorgiaSitting 2019 Georgia pose x14
InterTwingle 2021 Lisa xN pose x16
IronB Reading 2022 IronB pose x 12
Jenni23 2023 shoot thoughts
JenniToes 2022 Jenni pose x17
JJ51 2020 What Lighting Painting can do
Levels 2021 examples 1-5
LotusPosition 2019 Georgia pose x12
Lying 2021 Megan pose x13
MeganNude 2022 Megan pose x16 with Layers
PaintingLayers 2020 Car in garage example
Poses/K-12thJune.htm
Poses/Mar1st.htm
Poses/Feb2022Dee.htm
Poses/5in1pic.htm
Poses/Feb2022c.htm
Poses/GracesX3.htm
Poses/LifeModelling.htm
Poses/Feb2022b.htm
Poses/Feb2022Pippa.htm
Poses/Feb2022.htm
Portraits.htm
Poses/5in1.htm
Poses/Graces.htm
Poses/Multiples.htm
Poses/Cello.htm
Poses/ToeTouch2.htm
Poses/ToeTouch.htm
Poses/index.htm
PreShoot/MirrorSenses.htm
PreShoot/Frankie.htm
PreShoot/Frankie-1.htm
PreShoot/8thMay2021.htm
PreShoot/8thMay.htm
Reader 2022 Christina pose x7
SareePose 2022 Painting example
Sense 2021 calling idea
SuperiorWomen 2022 calling idea
Threesome 2022 Christina pose x6
Triangle 2021 Megan pose x5
WomanSense 2022 Call + List.htm
Scenes painting examples
ArtComposition.htm what one can achieve
Lu.htm teacup
Faith.htm ideas
StillLife.htm painting examples
Christopher.htm