History of Photographers 7 & 8

Eadweard Muybridge

Muybridge was an English photographer who was known for his pioneering work and his work in motion picture projection. He focused mostly on taking photos of open spaces and landscapes unless something architectural caught his eye. He liked using time lapse photography (taking pictures of things over time and seeing how they changed) such as building going up or being torn down. He also studied a lot of horses and how to photograph them but this came to a halt when Muybridge found out his wife was cheating on him and Muybridge murdered the man she slept with. He was acquitted on the claim "justifiable homicide." When Muybridge returned to England later in his life he died of prostate cancer.

This photo is called "Bridge of the Puerto Bello, Panama"When I was looking for photos to use by Muybridge I gravitated more towards his landscape photos than his time lapse photography. I like this photo a lot because of the dark color contrast of the picture and then the light reflection of the underneath of the bridge on the river. Without the river and the reflection this photo would look a bit creepier but the reflection gives it a very pioneer-ish look that sticks out to me. 

This photo is called "Yosemite" and this is another very genuine Muybridge photo. Just looking at this photo you can tell it screams pioneer and old west and that's what I love about it. It looks like a photo out of a history book. Even if he didn't realize it then, by taking these landscape photos he was still taking time lapse photos at the same time because now a days not a lot of places still look like this today. Capturing a moment so pure as the old west, uninhabited by humans the land never touched before, it's beautiful. 

 

This photo is called "The Ramparts, Funnel Hole, Hole in the Wall, Pyramid Sugar Loaf, Oil House and Landing Cove of Fisherman's Bay." This photo is very gloomy and gives off an aura of industrial revolution. It's different from his other landscape photos, it doesn't have that same pure energy of nature, instead it has workers tearing up the land and urbanizing it. I have mixed feelings about this image because I like the point he was making by taking this photo but I don't like the dark, dreariness the photo has. 

 Jacob Riis

Jacob Riis was a Danish American and a former muckraker journalist and a documentary photographer. Riis loved taking photos of impoverished New Yorkers and was one of the first to use flash photography in order to take photos in darker places as he so wanted. Riis photographed the slums of New York and got some of his most famous photos from these adventures. 

This photo is called "Bandit's Roost" and is one of my favorites by Jacob Riis. I like how it shows just how gloomy and dark the slums of New York are and his photo doesn't glamorize anything. He really brought to light the bad side of new York without having it be a bad photo; he still manages to get good shots in difficult working conditions.

I like this photograph because once again Riis doesn't try to glamorize the poor life of the people of New York. I also like this photo because of the contrast between the white blanket the baby is covered in and the grey of everything else around it. It almost represents how the baby is still innocent of the world and doesn't know suffering like the child holding it.



I like this image because of the emotion it portrays. You can literally feel what these children are feeling because of the emotion portrayed on their faces in this photo. You can see the sadness and how they are struggling and it is a great moment that Riis was able to capture.