3.17. Depression era

From the 1920s onward, governments suddenly discovered the value of photography as a tool for documentation-and propaganda. In the Soviet Union and Germany, photographers were commissioned to produce works promulgating the ideologies of totalitarian regimes; in the United States, government agencies-most notably the Farm Security Administration (FSA)-sponsored photographers to record the impact of the Great Depression of the 1930s at a human level. Dorothea Lange's iconic photograph, Migrant Mother, was a powerful distillation of the sense of resignation felt by migrant workers in California, while Walker Evans and Carl Mydans worked to expose the conditions and experiences of communities in the Deep South and the Midwest, respectively. These images alerted America to the plight of some of its poorest people, which helped to instigate action and change.

Depression-era photographs portray people in their everyday environments rather than in contrived poses. While color film was available in the 1930s, the photographs were shot in black and white, which lends the images a gritty realism. 35mm cameras were becoming more popular at this time, but the Depression-era photographers used 4 x 5in or larger format cameras that delivered finely grained results. The images were often printed with harsh contrast.

This character was photographed at a fairground. The background wasn't particularly interesting, and the sheriff's star needed to be removed, but the image had potential.

To remove a subject from a background, it's usually preferable to hide it with a mask rather than to erase the background. Before you can do either, however, you must remove the image layer's Background status by double-clicking its thumbnail in the Layers palette. Be sure to rename the layer. The Magic Wand (W) tool is ideal for selecting areas of similar color. In this case the background is even, so set the tolerance to 10, then click in a representative area of colorto the left of the man's hat, for example. There are problems, though; this technique has also picked up a similar color in the waistcoat. Refine the selection with the Lasso tool. To eliminate the waistcoat from the selection, hold the Alt/Opt key and draw a wide loop around the selected waistcoat. Conversely, to add areas that should have been included in the selection, hold down the Shift key and draw around them. Soften the edges of your selection using the Select > Feather. 1 or 2 pixels is enough. Finally, click Layer > Layer Mask > Hide Selection to mask away the background. The beauty of masking is that you can still clean the image up if there are any problems. The Magic Wand often leaves behind a few stray pixels, which are easy to see if you hold down Alt/Opt and click the layer mask-it will appear as a simple, black-and-white outline. You can paint the mask with black or white to hide or reveal the isolated pixels. Hold Alt/Opt and click the mask again when you've finished. Open your new background image and hold down Shift as you drag the image thumbnail into your main picture. There were better shots of this old truck, but its role here was simply to provide context. Move the new background layer below the main image and position and resize the two layers with Edit > Free Transform (or Ctrl/Cmd + T). To resize a layer without distorting it, hold down the Shift key as you drag the layer's corner handles. The man layer also needs to be rotated. Switch on the Grid with Ctrl/Cmd + ' and click and drag outside the layer's corner handles.. Convert the image to black and white by adding a Channel Mixer adjustment layer. Remember, you can use this step to interpret the picture: use Blue channel values to make skin look tanned, or the Red channel to make skin appear lighter and softer. To remove distracting details such as the sheriff's badge, use the Patch tool. Set its options to Source, then draw a rough shape around the offending object. This will act like a selection-drag that selection to an unblemished area and release the mouse. Photoshop "repairs" the area automatically. To make the background look a little out of focus, duplicate the layer, then use Filter > Blur > Lens Blur. Fine-tune the image contrast with a Curves layer. Use the Burn tool to darken the man's hands and give them the desired weathered appearance. Last of all, crop tightly on the subject to create a portrait from your scene. Depression-era photographers made records of thousands of ordinary Americans experiencing poverty and hunger.