The famous photographer, Annie Leibovitz, was born in Waterbury, Connecticut in 1949. Annie's parents, Sam and Marilyn Leibovitz, were very creative people. In 1967 she enrolled at San Francisco Art Institute hoping to study painting, but soon fell in love with photography. During her third year at college she got her first job at Rolling Stone magazine as a chief photographer. Throughout her career, Annie was able to capture photos of many famous figures such as John Lennon, Queen Elizabeth, George Bush, Michael Jackson, and many more. Annie has received many awards throughout her lifetime for her outstanding work. One major award she won was the Clio Award in 1987 for her celebrity photographs for an American Express advertising campaign.
Annie Leibovitz is well known for her photographs of celebrities. Her photos all contain intense lighting, bright colors, and unique poses. Many of her photos often bring out a lot of emotion from the viewers. When she took commercial images, she made sure all of them were dramatic and had staged settings. She often tried to take photographs from creative, unexpected angles to make the photo more interesting.
Annie tried to document the importance of life in her photos. She tried to convey no one is perfect and everyone has their own flaws. Many of her photos were of women and their own inner beauty. Her photos also would show the different stages of life. One example of this was her photo of Demi Moore in 1991. Annie photographed Demi pregnant for the cover of Vanity Fair magazine. Even though many people were against this image, it made pregnant women feel less embarrassed about their bodies. It showed people all around the world they should be happy for who they are, and they should not feel ashamed.
Annie has influenced my work in many ways. After I saw her work, it made me want to capture more dramatic photos. Before I heard of Annie, all of my photos were very staged and fake. I want to photograph someones true self. All of Annie's photographs each have an important meaning. These have influenced me to take photos of more meaningful things to me. Annie has also changed the way I think of photography in general. You should always photograph what you believe in and try to show your message.
Overall I believe my three images were very similar with the other images Annie photographed. My recreated photo of Saiorise Ronan had many similarities and differences. Saiorise has pale skin compared to my sister, Jessica Courtright, so it was hard to edit the photo to make the skin colors similar. Also, the background colors are a little different colors. I did Jessica's hair to make it look like Saiorise's and made sure she did a specific pose. The second image I took of my mom, Susan, was similar to the photograph of Tina Brown. I made sure my mom wore a similar shirt to try to make the picture as similar as possible. In the third picture I took I had a hard time finding white face paint to apply on my mom's face. We ended up having to use sunscreen and I had to make the picture look as realistic as possible. My mom's hand placement on her face was slightly off from Meryl Streep's.
In the first image, I tried to take the image at the best possible angle to recreate the photo. I made sure the photo had good lighting so it didn't have any extra shadows. Also, while I was editing the image I had to crop it to make it look similar to the photo of Saiorise Ronan. In the second image, I had to focus the camera directly on my mom so all the attention is on her. I made sure the angle of the photo was similar to the image of Tina Brown to make it realistic. In the third photo, I used natural light to get the best picture possible. I decided to take the photo of my mom to describe her personality. The photoshoot was a fun, exciting activity to share with my mom.
Saiorise Ronan
(https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/06/jennifer-lawrence-will-star-as-elizabeth-holmes-in-a-movie-about-theranos) Jessica Courtright
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Tina Brown
(https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/11/20/how-tina-brown-remixed-the-magazine) Remake
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Meryl Streep
(http://www.rollingstone.com/music/pictures/19 81-rolling-stone-covers-20040511/rs354-meryl- streep-77259862) Susan Courtright
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