Nuffield College Chapel

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Some six weeks after my initial request to photograph Nuffield College Chapel (HERE), I was granted supervised access, which was somewhat restrictive where possible visiting times and dates were concerned.  However, today was that opportunity, but for the first time I was having to conduct the work without a planning visit.  As a result, I opted to travel with a larger than normal selection of lenses to cover every possible situation.

The small chapel lies within a former attic space and was designed in the 1950s by one of the College architects, Thomas Barnes.  Its location dictate the orientation of the chapel and resulted in the liturgical east end (the chancel, containing the alter) being located at the south end.  The entire décor including the design of the pews was the work of English painter and print-maker John Piper.  Having worked alongside stained glass artist Patrick Reyntiens on large commissions including Eton College Chapel and Coventry Cathedral, Piper recommended Reyntiens’ work which resulted in the commissioning of five windows (eleven lights).

There were some wonderful benefits to photography in this space – not least the fact that the windows were immediately accessible at a height that would guarantee no need for post-production correction of perspective.  There were also some difficulties: the lack of space proved awkward on occasion when aligning shots; in some circumstances, the appropriate camera height resulted in the roof immediately outside the window becoming visible in shot.

However, the most demanding problem was the visibility of buildings and foliage through the windows.  This could be resolved in part by shooting at a smaller aperture, but that was not going to compensate for the huge difference created between a background that was partially pale yellow limestone and the bright white sky: either some complicated post-production work will be required, or this would help decide which lights were going to feature.

Nuffield College Chapel – West Window

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The windows of Nuffield College Chapel present a new difficulty in post-production as a result of the background clutter that influences the appearance of each light.  Following much experimentation it proved impossible to illuminate this during the photography stage and proved significantly more demanding to reduce in post-production.  In a follow-up visit it will be interesting to see whether I have managed to achieve any level of accuracy in terms of colour, saturation and lightness.

The largest of the windows lies at the liturgical east chancel (but is actually the North Window).  It depicts the five wounds of Christ and is titled Symbols of the Stigmata.

Initially, I photographed each of the three lights individually, using an 85mm lens and an aperture of f/1.8, but it transpired that the uniformity of the image was greater when photographed as a whole from a greater distance and at a smaller aperture.  To produce this image, 16 photographs were taken at 248 mm using the Canon EF 100-400 mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens, at an aperture of f/8.0 and exposure times ranging from 1/2 s to 1/80 s.  As with all images photographed for my research project, it was taken using the Canon EOS 1Dx Mark II.

Not insignificant amounts of the top of these two lights were bleached out by the bright white clouds in the photographs, but the deep blue of this window enabled a slightly more straightforward edit in post-production.  Each of the two lights was photographed separately, so to achieve the composite view of the window above, it was necessary to take 29 photographs using the Canon EF 85 mm f/1.2L II USM lens, at an aperture of f/1.8 and exposure times ranging from 1/2 s to 1/100 s.