No shades of grey

[Deleted member 28510]

Hello all,

For years I tried to create images with just black, my idea being to end up with an impressionistic rendering, eventually I worked out how to do it using Ps7 and Ps13.

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Cheers

 

[fader]

Reminds me of wood engravings, a lost art form that had a resurgence in the art deco period but is not long gone. Cool project!

 

[StephenB]

Very different, great work.

 

[Deleted member 28510]

Hello Isaac,

Many thanks for your comment nice of you. I agree about the woodcut aspect, the reason its almost disappeared again is the availability of good endgrain Boxwood, even pieces 3" x 4" are very expensive and larger pieces are non-existent. Sadly now Boxwood blight is travelling around the world killing the bushes.

One of the aspects of doing this is to see an 18" x 24" print and step in closer to see it disintegrate into its component parts.

Hello Steve,

Thanks for that I do try to be a bit different. I do montages as well after finding Catherine McIntyres work in 1998 and spending 13 prevaricating years doing anything but. I got so angry with myself and my failure to create anything that in 2011 I threw everything to one side to teach myself how to. Being able to do this helped me in my search for the 'no shades of grey'.

Cheers both - Jem

 

[PakkyT]

Very nice. I like this because it is very contrast-y. One of my complains about a lot of people's "black and white" photos is they often are mostly just a lot of greys so you end up with kind of a "muddy" look, not like this one. Is this done from a photo or is this a drawing (electronic or otherwise)?

 

[Deleted member 28510]

Hello PakkyT,

Thanks for your comments good of you, I agree about the contrast and the image above has been done to emphasise it. The original image was a digital colour photo.

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It is possible to deceive the eye (as above) into thinking that there is grey present when in actual fact when looking closely there is not.

Cheers

 

[WaltP]

Wonderful work! I would love to introduce you to several galleries in my area. This work is wonderful and needs to be shown. I hope you are getting lots of interest from galleries near you as well.
Bravo!

 

[speedy]

Kinda reminds of some of the Linoleum & wood cuts that M.C Escher produced. If you ever get a chance, go see his work. Brilliant. M.C. Escher – Gallery

 

[PakkyT]

I agree about the contrast and the image above has been done to emphasise it.

Yes I was going to mention that in my original post. Great for a print and a conversation piece when you can point to it on your wall and tell guests that there is only pure black and pure white in it and nothing in between. Watch them get up close and start looking at it much closer trying to figure out how there isn't greys in it.

 

[jyc860923]

I like that very, very much. It's something I would like on my wall.

 

[Deleted member 28510]

Hello WaltP,

Thanks for your lovely comments, we don't have any galleries near me and those that are in the vicinity are either, "cottages and kittens" or so called "abstract" twee daubs. Photography except for a few alive individuals and lots of dead ones doesn't sell in the UK.

I would be very grateful if you could introduce my stuff to the galleries near you. I would not accept any money, if anything of mine did sell it could go to a charity in the USA and commission for you, that would please me greatly.

I did get a print of the above on Hahnemühle Photorag and although I say it myself it looked superb. I did try to sell the prints at cost plus shipping, no takers on FB/Instagram though, I've put the web pages I did into a new site: Jem Raid Self portrait, figurative and pictorial graphic ( Black no shades of grey ) images for sale at £|$|€|0

Hello Speedy,

many thanks for your comment and the link to Mr Escher, lovely woodcuts the guy's a real artist.

Hello PakkyT

It's an interesting point and it didn't occur to me until I finished that file. It was sometime later into the process that I discovered it as a modification to the initial impressionistic idea I started out with.

Hello jyc860923,

Thanks for the comment, a real boost to my ego, I'm grateful. If you would like to choose one from the website I could send you the 18" x 24" file and if you'd like to do the same thing as WaltP then I would be delighted.

Hello all,

Just to make it clear I am a self portrait figurative video artist: Video art for sale, collecting video art, poetry film and I give my videos freely to interested collectors. Why? Well I have a modest pension and I would rather someone liked my work enough to want to own it.

One thing I would like is to have some direct contact with collectors, the few that have my work are very good at inspiring me to make new sequences of images.

Cheers

 

[Deleted member 28510]

Hello all,

Here's another NSG pic taken in the early Spring at the edge of a forest, the light was still pouring through the new leaves and I thought the little scene just begged for a joyful figure.

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Cheers

 

[Deleted member 28510]

Hello all,

This footpath leads along the top of Ravensnest escarpment, there is a steep drop to the right and to the left an upward slope facing West. At certain times of the year Spring and Autumn the light is able to skim down the slope and illuminate the path and trees.

I climb the 138 steps just along the path to get here, it's well worth the climb. Everytime I do it I am filled with a sense of wonder that something so lovely can be so close to where I live, merely a ten minute drive away. It is also one of my favourite places to sit and contemplate. The history of the area can be plainly seen from Roman mine tunnels to 300 million year old fossils. The feeling of timelessness is almost tangible.

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I give the TIFF files away so that collectors can print their own: Jem Raid Self portrait, figurative and pictorial graphic ( Black no shades of grey ) images for sale at £|$|€|0

Cheers

 

[Deleted member 28510]

Hello all,

A bit further into the technique and I made this montage with a lot of black. I once read a comment about Cyanotypes being suitable only for certain subjects, they didn't say which ones of course and it was then that I realised that it had been written by someone who'd tried the the process and failed. There is so much misleading info about photography, even more so now, I found the best way is to ignore it all and do my own experiments, it's such great fun!

I started this image after finding a lamp standard in a scrap yard, at the bottom of it was the clay that it had rested in and the bolt that held the base on. It had a nice texture and I knew I would be able to start an image using it.

To that I added a bread basket, the window and the brake discs and posed for the figurative part. I like the dense black broken up by the texture of the clay.

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Cheers