Evaluation

Exhibition-

My Final 6

 

I have chosen these photographs as my final 6 because I think they are my strongest images. Each photo can stand alone but also fit perfectly as part of my series. I think I have managed to achieve the visual cohesion within my images I originally set out to do which makes me confident when submitting them. Referring back to the issue I think that is present within todays society surrounding beauty and who has what it takes and who doesn't based upon their looks, I think I have broken through this boundary by taking males and females from different ethnicities and putting their portraits together as a series to show that everyone has beauty and that society can't categorise people. 

Business Cards

I decided to use the website moo.com to create some business cards for have left University to help me gain contacts.
I have chosen to use the portraits taken in this module so there is a fluidity to it.

Project Proposal

Printing-

I printed my images in 3 sessions. I did it this way so that I wasn't in a mad rush towards deadline because from past experience I know that printing is very busy at that time.
I used the uni printing service and printed onto A3 as I thought this would be a reasonable size for hand in. This was also to match my print box.

Shoot 9 with Hemina

When I was in the early stages of organising this shoot I knew I wanted to shoot a mixed race female too keep up my theme of diversity between my models as so far all the females I had shot had been white. I was unsure which backdrop to use as I had used most of the colours available at this point but after looking back through my previous shoots I decided I wanted to shoot on the yellow background again as I wasn't happy with either shoots that I used it with. 

This proved to be a good decision because I really like the colour against her skin tone and how it will bring brightness to the series of portraits as a whole. I finally managed to use the 85mm lens for this shoot, which made it a lot easier than the ones with the 50mm as it gave me the effect that I wanted.

Hemina had never modelled before which actually was good news for me as it meant no one else from the class had shot her. (At this point it was hard to find a model no one else had shot.) She was quite confident and took instructions really well so I would definitely do a shoot with her again in the future. 

I think that where I had mentioned early on in this module where I was looking at artist's such as David Lazar and Steve McCurry that I wanted to use his focus on the eyes in my work has worked because in my finals the eyes are prominent and draw you in to the photograph and and make you feel like you are in their personal space.

Contact sheet-

Lighting Set up -

Edits- 

These are 3 images that I picked out from the shoot and edited. I really like these three however I think the top image is the better one to have in my finals as it keeps the visual consistency with my other finals. I think this is a good final image and will sit well the rest of my portraits. Im excited to print it and put them all together in my print box. 

Shoot 8 Angel

My shoot with Angel went well. As she is a second year photography and video student she responded well to pose instructions and understood what I wanted to achieve. Though she is polish she understood me easily and there wasn't a language barrier. I was happy when I found out she was foreign as it strengthens by model line up as I wanted them to be different and chose a range of ethnicities.
I think the orange background worked really well with her hair colour, however it did leave a orange tone over her skin tone that I couldn't get rid of until post production but other than that I had no technical issues.

Shoot 7 - Olivia

Olivia - I shot Olivia on a Red background. I chose this colour as I hadn't used it before and I thought it was striking enough to look good next to the portraits I have already got.

Olivia was very responsive to the shoot and was happy to be infront of the camera, this helped as most of my models have been quite camera shy. The only issue I had was her facial expressions were very 'posey' and not the natural look I was trying to capture however I am confident I have enough images that I will be able to pick out and edit a couple of images. 

Set up-

Contact - 

 Edits

Shoot 6 - Reshooting Rhian

Prior to these shoot I made mood boards which showed example poses for the model to look at and get inspiration from, it also made them more at ease during the shoot which was helpful.

Rhian- This was a reshoot because there were a few aesthetic issues with the pervious one. Unfortunately this shoot didn't go well at all. I had technical difficulties with one of the lights as even though it was on the lowest setting it was chucking out a lot of light, creating a yellow hue over Rhian. Another issue I had was that Rhian only bought one item of clothing, even though I did ask her to bring a selection. This meant I felt limited with what I could shoot. I have learnt from this experience and in the future I will do tests with the lights prior to the model turning up however I won't be using this for my finals.

Contact sheet-

Media in todays society

I looked into an article online called Media, Culture and Society which provides a peer reviewed international forum for research and discussion on the media. It comments on the increasing role of the media in todays world. It states that society is influenced by the media and people aspire to meet the unattainable standards of the people they see online. It goes on to say that the media affects peoples perspective and it has intervened so much it has given people a warped sense of whats right and wrong. Commenting on popular tv shows such as dating shows that are sexist or promote a specific ideal that isn't attainable nor 'real life' situations giving people a false ideology of whats attractive.

I don't want my images to just solely focus on society and ideals within it but I would like them to touch on the fact that people from different ethnicities can come together and as a series stand strong portraying many ideals of appearance all as strong as one another.

Shoot 6 & 7 Plans

I will be reshooting Rhian and making the necessary changes that were mentioned in my tutorials so I can create the best possible portrait of her. I am going to keep her on a yellow back drop and make sure I style her and position her better.

I also have a shoot booked with a girl called Olivia. I plan on shooting her in front of a Red back drop to bring out the tones in her hair and to do a slightly darker makeup look to separate her from the others, but also keeping in mind that the portrait will need to easily fit in with the previous ones.

As Olivia hasn't got much experience modelling I will print off some example pictures to show her so she can get some inspiration for poses and outfit ideas.

Silver Print

Silver print is an online service that sells photographic supplies. It was recommend to use Silver print to find a portfolio box. I thought the prices and overall look of the box was good so I used their serve to order an A3 Print box and A3 plastic sleeves. This will make the overall look of my finals more professional when being shown. 

When my print box arrived I wasn't too happy with how it looked as it had a scratch on the front but it wasn't too obvious so I didn't see it as too much of a problem. 

Where my idea is going

When I first moved my idea on from surrealism portraits to just looking at Portraiture I wanted my photos to be visually cohesive and have the same relationship with the camera. I have specifically chosen all students that visually differ from one another. I have chosen models who look slightly different/ unique because I want my Portraits to break out of societies version of 'pretty' and use this to my advantage by showing how viewers that you'd not need to conform to societies standards. I think so far my choice of models have been quite diverse and photogenic to make a successful portrait photograph. I want to try and shoot a few more females with different hair colours as Emilita is blonde to make sure no one looks the same. 

Summative Assessment Presentation

800 words Work outline document

Exhibitions - New York

Gregory Crewdson

 After seeing Gregory Crewdson Exhibition in New York I was inspired by how he mounted and framed his photos, and how it complemented the size of the images. I thought his photographs were gripping, with the settings they were photographed in and how he placed his subjects to create a story. I have been a fan of Crewdson's work for a while so I was so excited when I found out he had an exhibition in New York at the Gagosian Gallery while I was there. Im glad I went to see it as it has helped me to visualise how I would like my finals to look layout wise and with a similar frame and mounting style. 

Brian Griffin

 Looking at Brian Griffins work in the Steven Kasher gallery also helped me to imagine how my work would sit side by side if framed and mounted, however I will definitely be printing much bigger. But he did get me thinking about spacial awareness and order of my photographs.