exercise: creating depth with lighting

Create a series of images with varying depth.
• Move objects around in the room, experimenting with perspective and lighting. Consider how you can use the lighting to create layers.
• Try adjusting the zoom on your lens. Place some items close to the lens and some further away. Start with a wide lens (zoomed all the way out) and then zoom-in in steps. 

For the next two pictures I placed the foot lamp in two different locations. When the lighting sources overlap, even when they apart, they don't seem to create depth (photo 1). 

1

2                                                                                               .  

The zoom creates the sensation that objects are closer between each other, an idea of flatness, as we could test in the previous exercise.  The sets of images below (3&4 and 5&6) show this, but the light spots help to create depth, focusing your attention on objects that, due to its size, are obviously closer than others (image 7 and the plant, compared with the person behind).

You would also think that the room used in 4 is smaller than the room used in image 3, though the space and camera position is the same. 

3

4

5

6

Finally, images 7 and 8 would seem to be done in a more cluttered space, but this would only be because we can see more of the objects in the image. 

7

8

All of the images would give a feeling of secrecy, mysteriousness, except probably image 8. This is because the light used is hard, i.e. creates sharp shadows in objects and people. 

exercise: depth

In this exercise we are asked to experiment with the depth of field in the camera, zooming in and out the same framing, where two objects are separated at different distances from the lens.
With the zoom out, or open, this is a short focal distance (18mm in the image below), the depth of field is big. The distant object can then be within the focus zone - although this didn't happen in my examples below - and the distance between the two objects seems larger. The best way of seeing this in the examples below is noticing the difference between the far side of the box in the 18mm and the 58mm images:

When you zoom in, increasing focal distance (and move away from the objects to have a similar frame) the objects seem closer between each other, and the distant object is blurrier as the depth decreases. Images are flatter with larger focal distances. 

The image below shows graphically how the focal distance affects the depth of field:

In the examples below the distance object seems always out of focus. This is because the distance to the objects also affects the depth of field, and I was taking the images close to the lenses. 

 
All graphics from http://www.blogdivvy.com/photog/depth-of-field.htm

exercise: spaces

Capture four shots that have the following feel about them:

• An oppressive, cluttered space
• An open, honest, simple space containing one intriguing item
• A stark, empty hostile space
• A warm, friendly, cosy space

how they feel? what meanings  are implied?

An oppressive, cluttered space

For an oppressive cluttered space I've taken this picture of my utilities cupboard. It is an small, poorly lighted and full of stuff place, so I thought it could do the job quite nicely. The photo does not feel very oppressive though, possibly because, although I took it in a low angle, trying to get as many things "falling" over the lenses, the door was open, and the things somehow organised.
Probably a space with more things, like an old library bookcase, or this similar photo but from the inside of the wardrobe, would have worked better.
I also think that the viewer does not get the idea of a small space, as they can only see one corner, it could give the wrong impression of a more open and bigger room.

An open, honest, simple space containing one intriguing item

Since the moment I read the task I thought about an empty room, with one chair, and a bra on it. Don't ask me why because I don't know, I think the idea must come from some advert or movie... anyway, I thought that the photo could be nice with a well lit room and the result shown below is not too bad. 

On the one side, the room is nice and the tones of green of walls and chair make a nice effect. As the bra is the only black element in the room it could be thought that it would draw the attention, but on the other side, the picture has too many aliments, the windows are nice and the bright floor starves the attention from the chair and the allegedly intriguing element. I think the exercise would have worked better in a more simpler, emptier space.
The image, to me, feels more cosy and inviting than intriguing and interesting.

As the photo is taken in a room, what would there be of intriguing about a bra on a chair? what if I had took the chair to the outside... that would have been better, definitely. Then both the chair and the bra would have been quite out of place. 

A stark, empty hostile space

The picture below is a construction site being prepared. Because the light is rather nice, just before dusk, the place doesn't look too hostile, but the idea of leaving the background unfocused with the focused fence in the foreground gives a hint of hostility, prohibition and inaccessibility. The puddles from the recent storm also invoque starkness. 
I think that the desired feelings would have been better achieved if no signs of humanity, other than the fence, where shown, and if the day was less clear and no plants have been included.  

A warm, friendly, cosy space

Ah, as the name of this (b)log invokes, warmer than here...
This photo in a mediterranean beach, with the people doted in the horizon, evokes the feeling of feet buried in the very hot sand, the refreshing feeling of the water coming to you in tiny waves, and the warmth of the sun in the skin.
This is in my opinion the image that better achieves the objective of the exercise, but that is probably perhaps because I'm longing too much...