Nicolas Ruel

Introduction:

I have been looking at slow shutter speed and movement in photography. I have enjoyed looking into photographers work such as Milan Malovrh and Nicolas Ruel. Nicolas Ruel is one of my favourite photographers out of all the photographers I have looked at. This is because he has included a variety of photographs to his portfolio on his website of amazing scenery from all around the world. Some of the photographs are so successful and I would like to extend my photography and travel through Cambridge and distinguish different aspects that you can identify what Cambridge is today.

Nicolas Ruel was born in Montreal in Canada in 1973. I have chosen Ruel as my artist too look into in more depth and this is because he uses a ghost like effect method of layering with his photography. The photographs seem to tell a story and also seem to have repetition in the photograph and that is something I have started to do that in my own work, without even realising. I enjoyed looking through Ruel's project '8 seconds' although some of them were better than others. My favourites are the ones below:

 The one above is my all time top favourite, this is because it's a lovely photograph and the viewer which is me in this case can tell that the picture was taken in Paris; I like it because the layered effect on the photographs gives a lovely ghost effect. This is good because you can see that the photo somehow tells a story. The picture is shown with people blurred within it, this shows that the people are there, but not actually there, I thought it could be people who have been there in the past's experiences and then the layer on top of the bottom photograph shows people who are there now. I really like this photo and this is my chosen one to do a proper transcription of it but of Cambridge. So hopefully the viewer would be able to tell it's Cambridge in the style of Nicolas Ruel.

This astonishing series of amazing photographs closely resembles a collection of mini movies that engross the hectic nature of modern cities. Ruel found that this technique creates intriguing single frame photographs comprised of eight different images layered on top of one another. 

The layered effect gives his work a chaotic and energetic edge which is perfect for conveying the experience of living in a large city surrounded by noise and chaos. It was while studying film and international relations and travelling the world that Ruel found his true calling and developed his unusual technique.

Nicolas Ruel has been working for the last several years on an ambitious body of work. 8 seconds, where he attempts to revisit the image of the world's greatest cities. He has refined an 'in camera' double exposure technique where a sudden swivelling motion triggers the transfiguration of the visable.

Nicolas has featured in a solo and group exhibitions and contemporary art fairs in Canada, Europe and the United States. His photographs are a part of numerous public and private collections. 

Ruel pursued college studies in photography and international relations before being trained in scriptwriting at Universitié du Québec à Montréal. His first first published works 

Nicolas Ruel’s work is stronger and opaque and has a kind of transparency to the photographs. It’s usually 2 photos layered on top of one another to create the tonal qualities, the colour and the detail. The photo underneath is a weakened image and it’s very soft and almost ghost-like. It’s very detailed but faint at the same time. Also the photographs being weakened and a blur being within it, it makes it look like there’s a ghost like atmosphere and it seems like people in the past’s experiences were there and you can almost make them out, they are in the picture but not actually there.

These above are my own interpretations of other peoples photographs i have found on the internet and i've just played around with them on photoshop. I am planning to go into Cambridge one day this week and do a photoshoot on my iphone using my slow camera app and using my orignal camera. This way I can layer the photographs on photoshop and mess around with them and do something similar to what Nicolas Ruel has done with his series of photographs called '8 seconds'

3:00PM today I am going into Cambridge and planning on taking photographs of the people of Cambridge and their surroundings. I am hoping to get a mixture of people in different groups. Including old people and all the all old ladies enjoying their walk around town near kings college but also I'd like to include alot of middle aged and young people to show the viewer a contrast between all three generations. 

I'm hoping to use these photographs tomorrow and edit them and layer them on photo shop and play around with them until I find one which is good for a final outcome. 

I am enjoying researching Nicolas Ruel and taking pictures of people and places and I'm looking forward to seeing the outcomes in the near future. Also the weather is beautiful, sunny but cold today so I should be able to get quite alot of photographs. Nicolas Ruel is my inspiration for my final minor, he's done some amazing photography and I hope my outcomes become as good as his.