Narrative: What is your story?
Describe in:

• 3 words

Lifestyle, Relationship and Personality

• A sentence

Exploring my Grandparents lifestyle, based on their upbringing, occupation and relationship with each other as well as other family members.

• A paragraphs

My photographic book looks at exploring the occupation of Ron Welling and Margret Welling’s lifestyle through portraits and objects. Being brought up in the 1940’s means their lifestyle is very different to mine. Traditionally, they were raised to believe that the husband has to provide for the family, as the wife stays at home as a house wife. On top of this, religion has impacted their lifestyle and the way in which they structure their days and has been apart of their life since a young age. My Granddad worked in the financial industry, after moving to Jersey in the year of 1984, and managed to make his fortune out of this industry, due to his hard work he not only managed to provide as the only financial support for his family, but also has provided a luxury retirement for himself and his wife which has clearly influenced their lifestyle.

Design: Consider the following

• How you want your book to look and feel

I want my cover to be a hard back, suggesting an official book with official information like a hard back dictionary, the information in a dictionary can not be changed like my Grandparents lifestyle, suggesting a reliable source for their lifestyle, The book will feel smooth and the image wrap cover will allow this to be achieved, creating an overall nice book to hold. As it is a book about family the book will look like a coffee table book which are often found in open areas of homes, these coffee table books often are family albums. Therefore, my subtle cover will allow the coffee table ideology to be achieved.

• Paper and ink

Due to my photographs sticking to a documentary style, I want the books to clearly depict reality and so I have decided to use matte paper. I also believe that having my main subject being my Grandad, who is an authoritative figure, the matte paper will conceptually present this as well as making the pages look like an important document showing his work life, it will also complement my black and white imagery.

• Format, size and orientation

My book will be 20 x 25cm standard portrait, due to the majority of my imagery being portraits allowing for the full frame to clearly be presented and making clearer emphasis on my portrait photographs, allowing the conceptual representation to clearly be illustrated within my book.

• Binding and cover

For my cover I am wanting to use an image warp, of one of my top interior imagery. The photograph is of a window looking out onto their garden, the curtains either side suggests the ideology of stage curtains and the window is the narrative about to be told, making this an effective image to use as it is their interior suggesting their lifestyle. With regards to binding I will have a saddle stitch which I took inspiration from Sam Harris’ book as I believe the subtle stitch will suit my narrative.

• Title 

Retirement

Mr Ronald Welling and Mrs M Welling

• Structure and architecture

I want the structure of my photo book to maintain a simplistic theme, in order to not distract viewers from reality and the narrative trying to be portrayed. The photographs will be matched in a sense of whats happening in the frame, colour and texture in order to display the narrative of my Grandparents lifestyle. The double page spread will illustrate the key element of my Grandparents lifestyle, as well as having key portraits on a single page on the right with nothing on the left to emphasise the frame and conceptually what is happening. The photographs will be in a chronological order to display portraits, family event and then interior to clearly present a clear understanding of my narrative.

• Design and layout

I will mainly use single page spreads for my portraits, with having nothing on the left to allow the main focus to be on the portrait suggesting an element of my Grandparents lifestyle. With archival imagery I will use two on a page and if I want a comparison I will use two images to a page. I will use more double page spreads rather than 3/4 page spreads to allow maximum effect on my imagery. I do not intend to having any inserts with texts, as I want the main focus to be on my imagery.

• Editing and sequencing

The first photograph of my book will be a portrait of my Grandad on the right side of the double page, to illustrate the idea that he is the authoritative and main figure of the family. The next two pages will have a picture of my Grandma on the left hand side, making this artistic decision emphasise how my Grandma is more submissive as when you look at a photo book you look on the right hand side then the left, so she is less likely to be looked at. The last image will also be a portrait of my Grandad allow the sense of authority to be the closing statement of my book.

• Images and text

I do not to add texts to my photographs as I believe that it will influence interpretations of my Grandparents lifestyle, which leads to an unreliable source of depicting their lifestyle.