Surreal Self Portraits

Purpose:

• To express yourself using the concepts of surrealism;

• To learn about surreal artists such as Salvador Dali, Renee Magritte, Frida Khalo and contemporary photographers: Rachel Baran, Laura Williams, Manu Pombrol;

• To continue to explore advanced Photoshop tools to create a seamless, convincing surreal self-portrait.

Surrealism is a form of art that came around in the aftermath of World War I. This style of art targets stories that may be unnerving and developed techniques are used to further express the emotions in the images.

Looking at surreal artist Renee Magritte who primarily focused on his depictions of familiar objects in unfamiliar, unexpected contexts. His work would often spark conversations about nature and the boundaries of reality he presented. Magritte’s work influenced minimalist, pop, and conceptual art. Comparing Renee Magritte a surreal artist to Laura Williams who is a contemporary photographer you can see the extreme difference that technology can allow the style of art to expand. With contemporary photography, you can freeze a moment and freeze the emotions at that moment, while as a surreal artist, you are creating the emotion with an idea you have in your head. In contemporary photography, you can create an emotion but changing the settings of your camera but the emotion is also already presented to you in a way.

Seven steps that are important to create a successful surreal self-portrait according to Laura Williams: 

1). Use a self-timer or a remote. (This is used to make sure you can capture yourself at the right moment).

2). Sketching out your ideas. (Planning the way you want your image to be perceived and to be taken can help create a more successful result).

3). The lighting in your photo is key. (Making sure your lighting is consistent across your photos will help ensure that your image will look as natural and true as possible).

4). Angles are important. (If the angles are off your image may look a little funky).

5). Focus. (Consider what the ‘depth of field’ would look like in real life when composing your image).

6). The Brenzier Effect (This is the technique of taking numerous photos of a scene and then stitching them together in photoshop to create a much larger overall image).

7). Making mistakes and learning from them!