Macro photography
I think that these experiments were successful. I adjusted the brightness and contrast slightly to give the images more detail. I think that the ferns worked really well as it gives them more detail that you may not notice unless looking at it up close which allows us to appreciate it more. Throughout taking these photos I struggled with getting the main focus of the image to focus making a lot of it and even some of the plant look blurry, but this did help to emphasise the main focus of the image in most of my photos, for example, the ones with thin stems that would typically be quite hard to see. I prefer the photographs of the leaves as I think that they have more detail, however, I did not try many flowers, or other aspects of undergrowth, such as mushrooms, so to further my experimentation I will try taking macro photos of those and seeing how they will work in correspondence to my project.
I think these images visually look nice, however, I don't think they fit the theme of undergrowth as undergrowth can typically be seen as quite dark and unusual, so to progress my macro photos I will focus more on forest floors. Another problem with these is they are quite basic as they are things you would typically see in everyday life and from my project I want to focus on rare unusual things that can be overlooked.
The frost aspect covering the leaves in these images brings about an extra layer of detail and beauty to these photos. These photos, in my opinion, respond to my title of undergrowth, especially in a time when the undergrowth is quite sparse and dying due to the cold weather but it shows how it looks as an after-effect of the weather, as some leaves are still alive, nicely covered in frost but some are dead and crisped up due to the frost. However, I would still like to go down a darker route of undergrowth.
These are some of my most successful pieces. I think that the lighting and blurring in the background helps to emphasise the moss falling from the tree branches and add extra detail to the moss, it also helps to focus the drops of water eger to fall of the branches, and I feel asthough I could play around with more images like this and test how different lightings can affect how the moss looks and you can see this in some of my later moss photos. Moreover, I think these pieces strongly respond to my title of undergrowth as moss is often overlooked and often thought of as quite plain and simple, but in reality, it can be quite facinating and beautiful.
My mushroom photos are my favourite pieces as I feel asthough a lot of mushrooms are often overlooked and either branded as "ugly" or just not noticed in general, I believe mushrooms as quite unique pieces of nature that should be appreciated more. I really like how in a lot of my photos of mushrooms they are quite textured and "wet" and you can clearly see this, this is because I used a macro lens, and used the ring light on the lens to bring more light to the mushrooms to make them stand out more against the background while still keeping the images quite dark, as the undergrowth of most forests is quite dark and hidden away and less noticeable.
I like how these pieces look. I think that the similarity between the brownness of the leaves and the wood helps to bring the pictures together, the darkness of the pieces also helps to give it an eerie feel, which portrays the dark and ominous feel I am trying to create with my pieces. These photos also remind me of an apocalypse and infection due to the darkening on the leaves.
I feel like these images improve on my earlier images of frosty leaves but these are in more detail and have a more icy feel to them. Moreover, with the images only being centred around one of two leaves and the background being blurred placing the main focus on that one plant helps to bring out the detail within the drops of water and frost, and even highlights the detail of the leaf underneath the ice and water. Overall, I think these are highly successful pieces that respond the my title of undergrowth.
These mushroom/fungus growing out of log images are some of my most interesting pieces as although they don't look "pretty" or "easy on the eyes" they are quite fascinating to look at overall, mostly, the contrast between the black infected log and the fungus. I think these sets of images particularly the black log ones look almost extraterrestrial or apocalyptic and not something you would regularly see, or particularly notice even, and I think that is the best part about these images. Moreover, I really like the detail of the fungus and the wood within these images and to take them I used a macro lens to really help pick up the detail within these images.
