Mimi said:
Mimi, you just made my night! I did the first ones, (non cape) for a class in college. We were to do a project in B&W and present it for class. I had did some experiments with double exposures before but with color film. It didn't come out right, but I knew very quickly that I needed to be dressed in all black as it doesn't reflect light and it is easier to see through. So about 10 pm, I was walking around campus with a tripod, a camera, dressed completely in black, and a lot of pictures taken around a women's dorm (because of the over look and stairs that were there.) The campus police actually talked to me once, but I assured them that all I was doing was taking pictures for a class project. I also worked at a photolab so I could print the pictures to the darkness I desired. The biggest trick is to not overexpose the pictures, which was something that I learned as well. Especially the difference in the exposures between the one with me in it, and the one without me. Luckly I have a camera that allows me to do double exposures. Also the position of light for the photograph is important, and experimenting with that is fun. I didn't bring a light with me, so streetlights were all I had, but it made it look so much more natural.
The ones with the cape where an extention of the first, but one did for personal satifaction. I wanted to introduce white to have something solid that I was either wearing or holding, so you see the mask, and the white rose. The pictures took a different effect because the cape reflected light as well because of the material used. It was just a dracula cape with the collar worn under the cape. The picture you mentioned I was afraid that it wouldn't come out as well, because the light was in front of me, instead of behind or directly over top of me, so I made the exposure faster than normal, and the other a little slower than normal (or at least that is my memory it has been 6-7 years). The effect of part of me being solid and the rest fading away was perfect. It was an effect that I really only got in the first set with me setting on the bench and my head and hands are solid with the rest see through.
Although the ones with the cape are very good, I like the first set better, only because there where fewer out of the second set that turned out well. Sometimes getting the focus just right is hard, especially when the appature is so low that the depth of field is very small as well. Not knowing exactly is to be is hard, especially when you are by yourself and wearing a mask. The first only really looked like a ghost, especially when all you see is a shadow and the glint of a small reflection of the hair.
I have two other sets that are not as good, one in a church and the other in the woods. The church one, if it was in a catherial would have been great, but the baptist church was a little bland. Maybe someday I will do somemore, perhaps do one in a cemetary, or a "real" church. It would be neat to do one with more than one person, one being solid and the other being the ghost.
But thanks so much for your comments, but not just Mimi, but everyone. It was a lot for me to post them here, but I am glad that I did.
