Architectural Photography-Research-Michael Harris

Most of the following information is extracted from Architectural Photography by Michael Harris


Background to the work of an architect
Def: the work of an architect is to design buildings and supervise their construction.

• is a task of immense complexity
  
• acquire a detailed knowledge of the physical laws and properties of a multitude of different materials and realise the construction possibilities of each material
  
• Must also have an understanding of heating, lighting, ventilation and air conditioning along with water, electricity and sewage
  
• this requires several years of study

I believe that photographing architecture should display the details and complexity that comes with architecture


Design Drawings

• There are a number of different types of architectural drawings which expresses an arcitects ideas to the outside world, they show different aspects and perspectives of the building with great detail.

This should be similar to the work of a photographer by using an image to display their ideas to the outside world and portray the intentions of the architect.


History of Architectural Photography

• Photography of architecture began from the first photograph created in 1826 and contunied through to the creation of the daguerrotype in 1839- the stationary form of the buildings was perfect for the long exposures required for these types of image making. Architecural photography has developed raipdly since these days due to the growing technology within photography and the possibilites it enables us.

Specialist cameras and lenses


When photographing a building a photographer must be able to reproduce straight lines and avoid converging verticals. This can be done either in the shooting stages or in post production. There are a number of different ways to do this in the shooting stage using various forms of equipment.


View Camera

• Have a simple basic construction, consists of a rail on which is mounted a front standard holding the lens panel and a rear standard to hold the focusing screen with a set of flexible bellows in between



• The bellows allow the camera to be moved in various directions enabling the photographer to achieve the appropriate optical effects and evaluate the best view point.

(image from: http://library.thinkquest.org/25473/media/images/ph_images/ph_d_view_camera.gif)

Medium and large formats

• Have much higher quality for reporduction purposes



• Two types: the monorail and the highly portable folding baseboard camera

Monorail:

• consists of a single rail on which are mounted the lens standard and the film standard, the mounting blocks for the lens and film standards can each be slid along the calibrated track for focusing purposes. similar to that of the view camera the standards can be shifted up and down, swung from side to side and tilted up and down to create different optical effects in a photograph.
  
  (image from http://www.prairienet.org/b-wallen/BN_Photo/LFN/BadgerM1.jpg)

Baseboard:

• has the ability to foldaway into a portable compact box, the fornt of the box is opened on a hinge, and the lens standard pulled out onto the previously folded runners. The runners are then folded backwards and forwards to focus the image. It has restricted camera movements in comparison to the monorail
  

(image from http://static.photo.net/attachments/bboard/00I/00IGLd-32712384.jpg)