Factual: All these photos were taken in Germany by Astrid, on a Rolleicord camera, in 1960.
Context: She took these while The Beatles were in Hamburg, after seeing them perform in a local club and loving their music and their 'look' (their hair and fashion sense). This is when there were five Beatles: Paul McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison, Stuart Sutcliffe and Pete Best.
Technical: As I said in factual, all the photos were taken on her Rolleicord camera, they are all black&white film photographs. The first four were taken at a fairground in a municipal park called 'Hamburger Dom', and the last was taken in Astrid's apartment.
Aesthetic: I love all of Astrid's photos, but I like these because of the style, the focus on Paul and John's faces in the first two with Stuart posed with is guitar in the background, showing the short depth of field, meaning she's using a large appeture setting. I love the placing of the people and objects in all the photos are so well thought out and effective, the high contrast levels in the last two pictures really add depth. They all have such a atmosphere to them.
Hope,
ReplyDeleteYou have chosen an excellent photographer, and commented well on some excellent photographs!
All the controls on the Rolleicord are manual - they have to be set by the photographer (this was the case with most professional film cameras) so Astrid definitely would have set the aperture and known the depth of field she was getting. Why do you think she used the setting she did? You could also comment about the lighting and composition in the apartment shot too, but well done!