In this post i’m going to research some ‘Reaction’ photographers and also some cool concepts linked this theme. I’ll then refer back to this and apply it to my own work:

‘REACTION’ PHOTOGRAPHERS

Patrick hall:

Hall does the opposite of trying to make his subjects feel ‘comfortable’. Instead, in this piece of work he extracts reactions by using Stun Guns on people and called it ‘The Stun Gun Photoshoot’. Hall got the subjects friends to taser them personally, which created a wide range of emotions from both parties. For instance the friends tasering were probably excited whilst the subjects were afraid. In total he managed to photograph 100 people in one day. Everyone had to sit on a high-chair so that they would stay in place and not move too far away from the frame of the camera.

Hall created a video of his shoot which shows all the reactions taking place:

“What I found most interesting about the reactions people showed while getting tazed was you never knew how they would react.  Some people screamed while others were quiet.  A few people looked like they were experiencing pleasure while others had the most painful faces I’ve ever seen.  I saw jumpers and fallers.  People laughed and people cursed.  I even had about four guys and girls who did not react at all and seemed to be completely unphased by the 300,000 volts of electricity.” – Patrick Hall.

Hall wanted to get something ‘real’. He stated that normally when he had people get their picture taken they’d act different and pose. Therefore, I think that this ‘tasering’ concept caught them off-guard and captured their raw emotions and feelings, since it’s quite hard to hide them when being stung with that amount of volts.

Personally this photograph is quite interesting to me. The subject is wearing red sunglasses which add personality. He’s also got a surfer necklace which identifies his style. His facial expression is quite exuberant although he’s getting tasered. His lip lines and wrinkled skin are deepened due to hid bold reaction. Accordingly, his neck has tensed-up and his teeth are clenched. This may signify stress, anger, pain, etc.

Composition wise, Hall’s photograph includes a clean grey background which contrasts against the people’s bare skin. The back light shines on the people’s backs which gives a shine and as Hall says makes the subjects stand out from the background. Hall wanted the subjects to be bare on-top so that the the focus would’t deviate anywhere else.

More ‘Stun Gun Shoot’ photographs:

                                

“You never knew how they would react,” said Hall. “Some people screamed while others were quiet. A few people looked like they were experiencing pleasure while others had the most painful faces I’ve ever seen. I saw jumpers and fallers. People laughed and people cursed. I even had about four guys and girls who did not react at all.”

Craig Silverman:

Silverman has cleverly shot some of people’s most frightening reactions. The photographs are taken at Niagra Fall’s scariest fear attraction called ‘Nightmares Fear Factory’.

Link to their webpage: http://www.nightmaresfearfactory.com

Examples include:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/craigsilverman/amazing-photos-of-people-getting-scared-shitless#.xmp9lgpRA

The people’s reactions are so extreme and exaggerated with shows their true emotional feeling towards what they’ve seen.

Adrain Chesser:

His piece of work is called ‘I have something to tell you’. Here are some examples:

Adrain Chesser succeeded in interestingly capturing some portraits of his family. These  vibrant portraits show the reactions that Chesser caught. Prior to have taken these shots, he told his family members a very shocking message. He revealed to them that he had ‘AIDS’.

“It occurred to me that if I ritualized the act of telling, that it might be possible to transform these childhood fears that were still effecting me as an adult.” – Adrain Chesser

The reactions vary extremely, some are seen frowning in disbelief whilst others are consistent in masking their emotions with a smiles.I think that the concept is great, and although he survived a modest way of causing an outburst of emotions.

Personal Website: http://www.adrainchesser.com/

Shea Glover:

Another cool manner of getting a reaction is through the medium of verbal utterances. For example the student photographer Shea Glover walked around her city telling people a positive phrase, which also doubled as a social experiment.

Basically she’d record random people whilst taking the shots as this shows the before, during and after process taking place. When the people asked her what she wanted to take pictures of, she replied with something along the lines of: “what I thought was beautiful”.

Her prime aim was to capture the way in which the people’s demeanor’s changed as she told them that phrase. In result, everyone either immersed into a little smile or a big one, but either way they had a positive response.

“I conducted an independent project, which evidently turned into a social experiment regarding beauty.” – Shea Glover

Examples of her work from a website: https://fstoppers.com/documentary/photographer-captures-peoples-reactions-when-told-they-are-beautiful-102444

Wan Chai:

Source: http://hongkong.coconuts.co/2015/04/16/look-me-wan-chai-reactions-your-face-photography

I really like Wan Chai’s work because he captures very real reactions. He practices street photography in this specific project called “Look at me!” and goes around the street catching people unexpectedly, which adds an essence of spontaneity.

Examples of his work:

Similarly, Chai is also conducting a social experiment and using his camera to record it. Most of the reactions were defensive and the subjects tried to hide their faces or stared in a confrontational manner. Overall a certain friction and connection is created between the photographer and the subject.

My favorite photograph is the one of the citizens in the car which was called “The Boss and His Buddies”. It’s interesting to see their faces when being photographed. Since they are in the comfort of their own car and probably accustomed to looking out into the exciting city, I’m, sure they weren’t expecting to see a camera pointing at them.

He sums it up himself in this statement:

“It was a really fun experience. I didn’t say one word throughout the shoot, yet I was saying ‘look at me’ in my mind the whole time, hoping people would notice me so I could capture their reactions. “It was very interesting how different people reacted, and I could never predict the responses I got. It was also really exciting as some people exhibited really extreme reactions. I even got pushed and my camera almost broke at one point.” – Wan Chai

 

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CONCEPTS

‘If Only for a Second’ Campaign:

I found a very interesting website which contained simple but extraordinary reactions of people, after seeing their carefree makeovers – http://www.mimi-foundation.org/en/. This project was created by a French Foundation called ‘Mimi Ullens’ that deals with Cancer patients. Exactly 20 patients were featured with their ‘outlandish makeovers’.

The foundation added that they got inspiration from a fellow patient that described her life before and after finding out that she had Cancer. She said: “You know what I miss the most? Being carefree.

They all showed a great variety of emotion:

This series is quite uplifting in my opinion; I say this because it has a very warm meaning behind it. The foundation aims to show patients that life is all about enjoyment and having fun.

Whilst getting their makeover the patients were placed in front of two-way mirror and told to keep their eyes shut, then when the makeover was over they’d be instructed to look. The Mimi Ullens photographer called Vincent Dixon, would be behind the glass and ready to snap the shot.

‘If Only for a Second’ or ‘Ne Serait-ce Qu’une Seconde’ – Vincent Dixon takes the shot precisely 1 second after the patients open their eyes. I believe that for that split-second the people feel something and completely forget their illness, so this project is very effective.

More examples:

“Within a second, smiling faces were seen all over the room. At that very moment, the cancer did not exist for the family members either.” – Mimi-Ullens Press Release.

‘The Make out Project’

Photographer Jedediah Johnson ‘made-out’ with people using bright lipstick and then recorded his results.

“The result is a portrait not only of the subject but of me and the moment as well” – he said.

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