Monday, March 15, 2010

Retouched Photo


This is portrait of my great-grandmother, taken sometime between 1910 and 1915. On the left is the original and on the right is the retouched version. When I started I was really trying to remove the yellow age spot on her dress and Ms. Russell suggested that I change the print to black and white. However after changing it I found the it didn't look quite right, it was a little to blue, so I went back and added some sepia tone to begin the brownish tone back into the picture. After doing this most of the age spots have been removed, however it still has the antique look to it. I also did a lot of blurring of the background to remove the lines and creases.

"The True Meaning of Pictures"

While watching this film I thought that some of the pictures were very graphic, like the one of the slaughtered pig. However, some of the shots were a little subdued also. One of the things that I noticed while watching this film is that Shelby Lee Adams was able to show how harshness of the lifestyle the people in rural Kentucky live, but he also showed that they were happy. I found the fact that he only showed prints that were approved by the subjects of the photo interesting. To me this shows that he wasn't taking advantage of the people as some of the critics were saying.

"Stranger With A Camera"

I found this movie to be very interesting. It was a good history lesson about an area of the country that I know little about. The main thing that I got out this movie was that the life of a coal miner in the 1960's, in Kentucky was very hard. Hugh O'Connor was trying to show the rest of the country the way these people lived, and was killed for it. Some people thought that O'Connor was trying to make the people of the area look bad.