Altered Developing Process

The subject of this image is a young girl, looking out over the coast of Maine. In order to create this image, I took this portrait, turned it into greyscale on photoshop, inverted the colors so that the positive and negative space were swapped, and then proceeded to take the given image on a special type of paper into the darkroom. After testing out the lighting on test strips, I decided that 9 seconds of exposure would be appropriate to get the correct amount of contrast in grays. However, when it got to the developing process, I painted on developer into random areas instead of submerging the entire image. After letting it develop for 60 seconds, I continued the rest of the developing process. since I painted on developer in certain spots on the paper, only those places came out dark, which explains why the rest is light. If I could change something about this image, I would touch up the small undeveloped marks on the body to make the image full and even. Composition rules and techniques in the image can be found in the forms of informal balance, selective focus, sharp focus, framing, low key lighting, and low horizon line. Elements include line, shape, value, form, and space. Principals would be balance and contrast. This project relates to my life because it was taken near my house where I grew up. My physical location has influenced who I am today by a great deal, one of these physical factors being Wolfe's Neck Farm, which happens to be the location of this image.