Photographer Research - Bobby Neel Adams

Bobby Neel Adams

I chose to study Bobby Neel Adams in more depth because i like the concept of his work, particularly his project of 'Ageing' whereby he shoots portraits of people, and then uses their baby/childhood photographs to compare their appearances from young to old. He does this by reacting the baby/childhood photograph, by making the model wear similar clothes, and pull the same expression, and then he rips the portraits in half, and puts one half from each photo together, to make a whole face. This is a great way to show ageing and growing up, particularly when looking at the difference in their facial features.

This is one of Adams' photographs from his Age-map series. I like this photo because both sides fit together so the entire face looks symmetrical. I also like that you can clearly tell that the photos are of the same person, because their facial features and smile are the same. I think it's clever that Adams makes the model look like he's wearing the same outfit in both photographs. 

This is a smilier image as the one above, but of a woman. I like this photo because we can see the clear split between both the photos, but can still tell that it is the same person. These photos show the evidence of time passing, ageing and growing up. I also like that this image is in colour as we can see that the model's outfit on both occasions is the same colour, and the colour of her hair hasn't changed either. 

Even though i like the photos above which are in colour, i also like these images because they are black and white. This makes the childhood photograph look much older. Although the photos are meant to look similar and fit together, and so the new portrait is black and white as well, i think the evidence of 'time-passing' would be much more explicit if the new image was in colour - to show the difference in the advancement of technology over time.

Again, this is another photo which is in black and white, and this makes the childhood photograph look much older. I like this image because it is more close-up than the others that i have included, and so we can see the similarities of the model's facial features much clearer. I also like that we can see the differentiation between the model as a young child, and as an adult. For instance, we can see that her face is longer, her eyes are higher up and her hair is longer. 

Bobby Neel Adams' work has influenced my work as i would like to explore the topic of ageing, and i think the concept of these photographs is interesting and clever. His work has also inspired me to look at other ways in which i can incorporate childhood images with recent photographs, for instance i could use certain parts of their childhood photographs to replace parts of a recent portrait (such as their eyes, mouth, nose etc.) 

This is an image that i created from my ageing shoot. After researching Bobby Neel Adams, i was influenced immediately to mimic his work, and so i shot portraits of my models, with in mind that they had to look similar to their baby photos. I then used photoshop to merge the two photos together to make one full face and this is the result. 

This is a similar image of the one above, but it is a self portrait. I also like that this photo is in colour, so you can see the difference between the old photo from the new. This photo clearly portrays it's concept and i like that the faces from the two photos perfectly fit together and match well.

After looking at these two images (above) i realised that the line between the two images was too jagged and harsh for the picture and the idea of it. After this realization, i decided to re-edit the images for that reason, but also because Bobby Neel Adams' images show a softer line between the two different aged photos, so that it actually just looks like one photo. Therefore, this is the result after re-editing the photos to make them look better and make the line softer, which i am pleased with: 

In summary, i like the concept of these images and enjoy looking at the differences in facial features, expressions and clothing. I also like both coloured images as well as black and white images. These photos have given me a lot of ideas for my next shoot of the evidence ageing.