Multiplicity Portraits

Artist Statement

The setting of this image is my backyard. The subject of the image is my dog. To create this image I set up a ladder to use as a tripod. I then had my dog sit in different positions in different areas of my backyard. I put all the images into photoshop and then used the guided edit ability to select which type of edit I was trying to perform. I chose the group edit tool and selected all the objects that I wanted to be put over the background. Next, I used a gradient map to turn the photo black and white while preserving the natural color underneath. Using the paintbrush tool I uncovered my dog so that he was the main focus of the image. I framed the image so that all the positions my dog was in, would be shifted to the left side of the image. I then used the space to the right of my dog as negative space. I had not planned this, but I captured the perfect moment as my dog looked to his right. It creates a sort of mystery to the photo because it makes you wonder what he is looking at especially since you can't see what is over there. By choosing to bring out only the color of my dog I created an emphasis on him. If I would have chosen to bring out the color in the background a viewer would lose focus from the dogs.

One technique I used in creating this image was soft focus. I decided to do this as an allusion to The Flash. In many different versions of The Flash, you see moments where he creates multiples of himself by running really fast. When he does this the rest of the image is blurry even himself. By making my image blurry I was attempting to show that my dog was moving so fast that he was creating multiples of himself and it was not done in editing. A composition rule I used was the rule of thirds. I shifted the subject to the left side of the frame to leave open space on the left for the viewer's imagination when you see that the dog furthest to the right is looking to the right. When I first started the project I wanted many more multiples of my dog, but as the project went on I realized that even the best-behaved dogs get a little fussy sometimes. Due to this, I could only get three good images of my dog. In my original plan, I wanted my dog to be moving more to really create the flash effect, but I couldn't get him to move the way I wanted.

To me, the meaning behind this piece of artwork is that you can have many different personalities that you share with different people, but in the end, you only have one true personality; it just can be hard to find it sometimes.