John Myers talk

We had a talk by John Myers who is now an ex photographer. He went to Newcastle University and used to shoot with a 4x5 wooden brass Gandolfi film camera. In the lecture he talked alot about other photographers that influenced him to create his work in the 1970's. He explained how these photographers made him see portrait images like they were 'in a box'. The subject was in the middle of the space making it the main part of the image. August Sander, Diane Arbus and Lewis Hine are 3 photographers that influenced him for some of his images. He was explaing how he took hundreds of photos before he was happy with any of them! All of his work is highly influenced by other photographers, he likes to create work of the similar style but not the same. He also said that he never uses flash when he takes images, he likes natural light or the simple lights around the subjects. He showed us a series of portraits, t.v shots and 'boring' landscape images.
Landcape photographer influences: T.H O'Sullivan, C.E Watkins.

These are a few examples of John's work from each series of images: Portraiture, T.v , landscape. My favourite images out of these are the portrait ones as they are more interesting and have a lot more going on in the photo. The one that draws my attention to it most is with the little boy sat on the bed, as it's taken in his bedroom is gives us a feel of his personality as it's in his space. To be honest i dont know whether its a boy or a girl? I also like the other portrait because the girl is being hidden quite a lot by her coat, the only thing you can see properly is her face and legs. To me this shows the girl is quite shy and must of felt a bit nervous having her photo taken as she is also stood quite awkwardly. The top image and bottom image arent really that interesting too me, i dont really get the point of why he has taken them. It definitely gives them more of an effect in black and white as it makes them slightly more interesting as they seem older.