My second photo shoot idea was to freeze and press flowers. This was to show how I froze these plants at a moment in time and for a short period of time and stop its life cycle. This would also represent how at any given moment in time, a moment can be make or break to a living organism.
Most Successful Edits
“The project was about those of us – and we are in our millions – who, through the Forecast, experience a reinforced sense of Britishness”.-Mark Power.
Mark Power is a British photographer, born in 1959. He is a member of Magnum Photos and Professor of Photography in The Faculty of Arts and Architecture at the University of Brighton. Power mainly uses a large format film camera, but has more recently explored into short film making. The Shipping Forecast is the project of his which is inspired by ‘The Shipping Forecast’, which is a BBC Radio broadcast of weather reports and forecasts for the seas around the coasts of the British Isles. It is produced by the Met Office and broadcast by Radio 4 on behalf of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. The forecasts sent over the Navtex system use a similar format and the same sea areas. and are fed back to the public four times a day. The waters around the British Isles are divided into 31 sea areas, also known as weather areas. In 2017, Radio 4 celebrated the Forecast’s 150th anniversary, and there’s everything to suggest it’s more popular than ever. The best place to to listen to the shipping forecast is said to be in a cosy bed with the wind rattling the windows and the rain lashing down outside.Each image is captioned with the 0600hr forecast on the day they were taken. In Mark’s project it’s the people that are the main focus and how dependent they are on the shipping forecast.
https://www.magnumphotos.com/arts-culture/society-arts-culture/mark-power-the-shipping-forecast/
This is one of my favourite photos of Power’s project. It exhibits a ‘calm after the storm’ sort feel, as the sea appears to have hardly any waves and it a reasonable distance away from land. The battered buoy creates the idea that the sea has previously been viscous, this damage may have occurred over time or from just one strike of a wave, this emphasizes the powerful and unpredictable nature of the sea. He has used natural lighting, which appears to be overcast on that day. A black and white filter has been used, this suggests how the shipping forecast is so important even though it’s just audio and no images, it still creates a clear picture of the weather, without visuals or colour. The black and white may also have been used to create a less exposed picture as the sun can still be bright on overcast days. The cold tone creates an eerie mood, sort of like a ghost town, exhibiting the remains of what little is left. The messy looking vegetation could indicate high wind levels or it could be markings from the previous waves. There is a clear rule of thirds, with the the background (the sky), middle ground (the plants) and foreground (the sand). This is representative of the structured timing of the shipping Forecast schedule and how people plan their lives around these specific timings and although the weather is unpredictable, the one thing you can to rely on is that the programme will always be on at those times. The photo seems simplistic but the closer you look the more complex it is, for instance the three elements, water, earth and wind are all mixing together in harmony, all still in each others company.
WARNING – THERE IS GRAPHIC IMAGERY
The life cycle is a viscous cycle unappreciated by most. The intense wait until our final days, that truthfully since birth has been inevitable. In my opinion, the life cycle aids our adaptation even though we are each just tiny specs within the universe we all make impacts one way or another, whether it be from passing on your knowledge to someone at work or just even making someone smile. Life and death is seen pointless to some: “born to die”- this is untrue we’re born because someone wanted to devote part of their life to us and to give us the best experiences possible.
For my photoshoot I decided to photograph roadkill willingly supplied by cats. I thought that this could represent how brutal life is and how anything could happen at any given moment.
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Abandoned walks
For mapping out a journey, some photographers use the simple technique of going on a walk and photographing everything as you see it. This is a type of documentary photography due to the individual wanting to capture a specific thing so that image remains outside of that second.
I also wanted to capture how people have disturbed this once loved environment and left it to overgrow and rot.
For my walk, I wanted to explore somewhere desolate and closed off from reality. I discovered a small piece of private land that I was permitted to explore. I was intrigued by this area due to there being a series of abandoned green houses and overgrown shrubs. This area was eerily quiet with plants and weeds scratching against the once standing greenhouses trying to get out. These slight noises gave an atmosphere of sadness to me because these green houses were once thriving with colour, now all that’s left is rotting and decay with the musky smell of damp.
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For my photoshoot for Paul Rieffer, I took images of sunsets at multiple different times, trying to get the most colour outcomes very time to make it easier for when it comes to editing my final images.
Contact sheets:
Final images:
I chose these final images because I believe they relate most to the photographer I am influenced by. They are interesting pictures of sunsets and include clouds and sky which can be manipulated and edited to look like Rieffer’s colourful work. All I would have to do is create multiple layers on top of each image and add colours such as purple, blue and yellow to patches where I think they would look the best, and then reduce the opacity until I get the desired outcome i’m looking for.
Edited images:
Chris Porsz is a street photographer who, during the late ’90s began his long term project, “Reunions”. He captured a series of images showing the culture and people of Britain during this time. his images included a range of individuals in different professions, groups of children of varying ages, couples, and different identities that were common at the time (from punk to goth). Porsz then brought this project to a conclusion, by, 30 years later, tracking down the subjects of his original photographs, and having them reenact the original images:
Porsz’s photography shows the contrast between the original image and the modern takes, as the differences between the (often young) original subjects and their now maturer selves, along with the changes to the environment over the years, helps to display the journey of the individuals through their lives, through the use of just 2 images. Porsz work is an example of the drastic change that can occur within the space of 3 decades, but his ability to recreate the images using the same subjects in the same positions helps to give a sense of continuity, showing that the subjects memories of the original image (and who they were at the time) is still with them, and remains a part of their identity regardless of the time passing.
Chris’ work has inspired me in creating my first photo-shoot, which will be centred around recreating archival images using the same subjects in the same positions. This links to the Journeys & Pathways theme of the project, as it will allow for the viewer to see the differences and similarities between the subjects and how they have changed over the period of time between the original image and now, and will help to draw together the 2 different periods of time, creating a loop where the subject is shown to be the same individual that they were when the original image was taken, while still displaying changes and differences that make them the person they are today. The images will show the journey of the individual through their life, from the person they were, to the person they now are.
I had to change some of my ideas as i would logistically be unable to do the shoots or was not comfortable with carrying out some ideas. Also after doing other shoots, some ideas appealed to me less and i found more of the path i wanted to take with this and how i wanted to go forward
This is the photograph I have chosen to edit and finalise for this recreation, I feel my model is posed the best in this photograph and the angle is the best and it looks like it has the best potential to be the best recreation of the original Ad. I feel it has good lighting that can be edited and adjusted to fit right and create a good image and there is enough of a background showing for me to turn the back blue.
To begin with I began by editing the brightness and the contrast of the photograph, I adjusted both of them due to the style of the original ad being quite vibrant in its colours quite harsh which is why I adjusted the contrast and then as well the brightness as to be able to have the image as well lit.
For the next part I selected around my subject and around the frame so that only the background was included in the selection I then went and played around with the colour photo filters to find the right shade of blue to put as the background of the image. I left the table unselected as although it was very low down in comparison to the original AD I did not feel I would be cropping it out so left it clear to be kept in the photograph.
Below shows my final outcome from the photoshoot and the editing, I feel this photoshoot and recreation turned out well as it shows a different side of the advertising in fashions as it is a recreation of a different time when fashion was having different sides between two very different decades, overall I feel it has been a successful outcome.
