Artist research

John Goto. Born 1949.


John Goto is most famous for producing photo-digital artworks, he has worked with historical, social and political subjects throughout his career. Goto studied Fine Art at St Martin's school of Art. European cinema and literature led him to do photography. In 1977 he made a group of culturally portraits of young people in London and called it 'Lovers Rock'.


In the 80's he combined drawing and painting in with his photographs which was John layering the groundwork until he started with computers. Goto produced work that told stories for example, 'Terezin' which told the story of a Bauhaus a trained Artist interned in the Nazi transit camp of Theresienstadt.

Another example of Goto's work is 'The Atomic Yard' which was exploring conflicted ideas of cultures in the 1950's Britain and was set in the highly aestheticised domestic surroundings of Kettle's Yard house in Cambridge. 

John Goto started using computers in the early 1990's with a series that was made in Russia named 'The Commissar in Space' 

His next collection was called 'The Framers Collection' which consisted of small stories which were attached to digitally manipulated snapshots, paintings and documentary photographs. This was his debt to Fernando Pessoa. 

Political and social satire came to the fore in Goto’s "Ukadia" series, which charts life and culture in Britain during the New Labour years when Tony Blair was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. It comprises "Capital Arcade”, set in a fictional shopping centre; "High Summer”, which looks at our uncertain relationship with the countryside, and finally "Gilt City”, in which Goto explores the ever widening gap between rich and poor, a bit like Robin hood. 

The picture above is out of the 'Ukadia' series and is in the ' Capital Arcade' bit The picture below is also out of the 'Ukadia' series but is in the 'High summer' part instead. 

John Goto turned from different global worries from Iraq to climate changes making Art from their worries. John as he was a jazz child he made two pages to his exponents named 'West End Blues'.

John has different Exhibits around the country mainly in london and even here in Derby.   

                                                                       

Evaluation

I have photographed a image for my background and also I have photographed images that I want to put in my fantasy landscape. My work is all about taking photographs of random objects that you want to put onto a landscape either making it look realistic or making it look unrealistic. You could either go with a theme of images making it all christmassy or halloween style or even making normal objects that you see everyday put into a place where you wouldn't normally see them like a table and chairs in a forest a bit like alice and wonderland.

I started of choosing an image where I wanted to place a sunset image for the sky of another image but I found it hard to change it because there was to many colours to use the magic want to get rid of the background, I also found it hard to go around the tree because it had so much detail in the twigs, so I then changed my background image and changed my idea of doing what I wanted to do.

I have used the cropping tool, the lasso tool, layering, paint, changing of the opacity. copying and pasting. I used the lasso tool to cut out subjects from other images to paste them into the background of my fantasy landscape. I used the layering tool to be able to change different parts of my photo without changing everything in the photograph, I used the paint tool to change the colour of the water and the sky.

The biggest problem I encountered was when I came up with my first idea of having the sunset as the sky for a different photograph, I didn't solve the problem I just changed my whole idea and came up with a simpler solution.

I'm not too pleased with my final piece as I feel its too simple but I have achieved the fact that I wanted it to look unrealistic, and everything I chose to do in my final image worked quite well, if I could go back and do it again I would make it more technical and choose a background image that would be easier to manipulate and have more room for different objects, I would probably go with a theme as well next time or try to copy a fairy take that I watched when I was younger. I would also make my image more interesting than boring as I find my image is quite boring, I could have made it more interesting.

my final fantasy land.

first of all as always I placed a photograph in photoshop by dragging it in. This is my landscape base.

I then chose another image dragging it into photoshop with something in it that I want in this photograph, I then chose this image.

to put these two bold heads into my fantasy land I chose the magnetic lasso tool which is this button below.

using this tool I will click where I want to start my cutting and then follow the heads round until I have completed it. If I have missed bits out that I didn't want to I then press the button shown below.

this button will make everything red except the part of the photo you have gone round with the lasso tool this way you can see the bits which you have missed or the bits you didn't need.

using the rubber tool I will go round the image either adding more to the image or taking away from the image. swapping then adding and taking away with this tool shown below. This above shows that i need to take away from the photo.

this way you can add or take away the picture using the rubber shown below.

when you have gone round your picture which I have now done it should look like this.

I then press the camera looking tool again at the bottom and it should look like this.

I then go to edit, copy and then click on the back ground I picked earlier and go to Edit then paste, it should then look like this.

I will then press show transform controls until there is a tick in it. Like shown below.

I will then press on the move tool and I then can move it wherever on the photo I want to, then holding down shift on the keyboard I can make it smaller. placing it in the place I want it to be shown below.

I then follow the same sequence to the other images I am putting in my fantasy scene until I have a little collection. shown below.

I then wanted to change the colour of the water so I went to layer then new and then layer. I then named it what I want and pressed ok. I then went onto paint brush and chose a colour which I wanted which was purple and started coloring in where the water is. shown below.

I went round the outline of the water first so it was nice and neat and then I filled in the middle shown below.

I then went to where the layers are and pressed the drop down menu where it says normal and I changed it to overlay. shown below.

that way the colour will go behind the back ground and you've still got the detail in the water you can also change the opacity by clicking on opacity in the layers bit and drag the arrow along the line shown below.

it finally looked like this.

I then wanted to change the colour of the sky so I went through the same scheme to change the colour of the sky, I decided I wanted it to be a brighter blue and I also added another piece of an original photograph into it and changed the opacity of it to make it blend into the background.

My final fantasy landscape.

Adding Text

When you have open up a file in photoshop you first of all need to add a new layer so go to 'layer' then 'new' and then 'layer' and you should come up with the box shown below.

I've named it text because its the layer I'm adding my text to and then you just press 'ok'

you then click of the 'text' tool as shown above and choose a style for how you want it to look on the photo by clicking on the style you want on the drop down menu as shown below.

I have chosen to have my text vertical. Then you click on the photo where you want your text to go and start typing.

like so. If you want to look at what it looks like without the line through it click on the layer background.

when you are please with your writing where it is you then can change how bold or faint you want it by going to the right and clicking on opacity. Shown below.

then you press the drop down menu and you should come up with this shown below.

to go from bold to faint just move the arrow across the line until you are happy with it. You should then have a final image.

This is my final image.

cloning

when you have opened up an image in photoshop you need to add a new layer by going to 'layer' then 'new' and then 'layer' and you should come up with the box shown below.

if you want to change the name click on the box where it says 'layer 1' and then change it to whatever you want and then press 'ok'

you then need to press on the background layer.

and then click on the clone tool which is shown below.

then by holding down the 'alt' key on you keyboard click on what you want to clone and then let go of the 'alt' key.

You then need to press the layer 1 box as shown below.

and then you need to draw on the place you want to clone your subject and just keep moving it until you have got your full image. like shown below.

if you want to clean up around your image to make it neater you need to zoom in to the image using the zooming in tool shown below.

and then choose whether you want to zoom in or out clicking on whichever you want to do as shown below.

when you have zoomed in you click on the erase tool as shown below and start to erase round the edges.

when you have clicked on the eraser tool as shown above you can start to erase like so.

by carefully colouring around the edges, until it is fully erased as shown below.

you can now zoom out and look at the full effect of your image.

my final image.

Adding colour

After you have open up a picture in photoshop you first of all you need to add a new layer so to do that you go to 'layer' then 'new' and then 'layer'. you should then come up with this box below.

you just need to press 'ok' unless you want to change the name of the layer where it says 'Layer 1' then you press 'okay'

the you need to zoom in by pressing the button above.

you will get a choice of zoom in or zoom out and we need to zoom in. so press the one with the plus sign in it.

I am going to make her eyes blue so i need to be able to see her eyes well so this is how close I need to be, then you need to choose the colour you want.

by clicking on this button above and you should then come up with this box shown below.

then move the ball to choose the colour you want or if you want a completely different colour to a blue drag the arrows on the colour scale up or down, then just press 'ok'.

then you go to the tool bar and select the brush tool shown above.

then click on this drop down menu to choose the brush you want and the size. and you will come up with this box shown below.

then you can choose the colour and size of the brush to what ever you want.

then you start to draw where you want to change the colour of the picture, I am doing the eyes.

I have now drawn where I want the eyes to be a different colour.

you then go to the side bar on the right where you have you layers and press 'overlay' it should then look like the picture below.

you then will have the eyes a different colour, you should then zoom out so you can see the full effect of the adding the colour.

this is now my final image.