For my photo shoot I placed asked by subjects (my mum and dad) what room they believe they spend the most time in and where they find them selves most comfortable, this last point was essential as a lot of the time my parents are not in these rooms most of the time but it where they enjoy being the most and where they most feel at ease and comfortable. This was essential for the project as it aloud me to reflect their personalities through where they are most at home and comforted .Furthermore, i used the natural lighting found around my house and in each room as well as using the natural lighting coming from the windows to help produce the best images possible; this factor also help fully represent the most naturalist situation and truly highlight the significance of the environmental portraits and the deeper meaning that is shown throughout. After taking the photos i download them onto my computer and opened them up in light room which gave me the opportunity to scan through they efficiently and select the best images that i wanted to continue working on and edit.

After finally selecting my images i needed to decide how i wanted to continue on with them; overall i had some black and white images, colour images, overlaid images and finally some images i simply left the same as i believe the image did not need editing and the original was enough to project what I wanted it to.

Black and white images:

For my black and white images i generally chose the image that high over exposure due to the natural lighting of the room as it enabled be to help control this factor therefore leading t an overall improvement in the image. From the black and white images it also help me set a fairly neutral tone compared having a varse majority of bright colour which help control your eye to fixate on one point. For me this something i wanted to avoid with the up coming images; this was because there are so fine details in the background that i wanted the view to notice for example the Channel poster and my mum spotty scarf. This aloud an overall understanding of each image to be projected and represented.

Coloured images:

For my coloured images i wanted to project the comparison between my mum and dads comfort place as well as their opposite personalities, For my dad he was in his garage and has a more warm feeling to the image with a busy background, and light coming from behind him. Compared to my mum who was in the lounge with a more colder editing to the image, with natural lighting shining on to her face with a more simplistic background. To me this offers a large conceptual feature to be projected and displayed; then finally ending on a sharper image of them together which combined the colder and warmer image together creating a more contrasted and colourful image.

No editing image:

For these two image i decided i wanted to keep them the same to highlight the natural lighting and the type of colours our house has that will help reflect and represent their personalises as well as this in both images they have be#aming smiles which i think add to the idea of needing to be edited and the overall deeper meaning of the images.

Evaluation:

Overall I am responsibly happy and pleased with the final out come of my images of my home sweet home environmental images; i am pleased with the backgrounds and the concepts behind the decision making of what room my parents wanted to be photographed as it highlighted the essential idea about being comfortable and well ‘feeling at home’ this helped aid the deeper meaning and conceptual factors. Furthermore, i am happy with my edits as i feel it really helps demonstrate and represent each of my parents personalities and how they come together and work well as a team. However, next time i would maybe try get what room they are most comfortable in and where they most enjoy being compared to where they actually spend the most amount of time as this would enable an extremely interesting and different point of view as well as well as showing a further understanding of environmental photography and how it is used to tell and represent an individuals story through the use of photography and carefully though out editing.

Environmental portraits

An environmental portrait is a portrait which focuses on the individual or group of people surroundings rather then the actual people in the photograph. For example this could be participants workplace or home life but typically the background always has a meaning to the people in the image and could be argued that its a reflection of themselves. Furthermore its suggest that by photographing people in their natural environment you are more likely to get an understanding and grasp their true characteristics and therefore portray an essence of the unique personality traits asides to just getting a physical understanding from their own physical features- leave room for more interpretation and story telling. As well as these point due to the fact the model will be in their own environment it’s much likely they will be much more comfortable and will therefore be more relaxed during the shoot compared if they were in the studio, where its likely they will feel more awkward and possibly produce more rigid photographs. All this in mind its key to consider the details of the surroundings, whilst i have already suggested that the background may dominate the subject, it is not always the case. In fact there have been many environmental photographers that have conveyed messages through the use of the background in a subtle way however still be proven to be significant. Overall highlighting the importance and the thought that needs to go in to the individual and their background in order create meaning and purpose for that person in particular.

For my own environmental portraits I will be looking closely at Larry Sultan and Alec Soth own environmental portraits to help give me inspiration in order to create my own images, this will help benefit my own work and allow room for development. For my own shoot for environmental portraits i will use the methodology of my own home and my family environment in order to add a more personal touch and will give me opportunity to add my own ideas.

Some of Larry Sultan and Alec Soth’s environmental portraits:

Planning my own environmental portraits- Getting to know my subjects

Robert Gow- father

• 50 years male patterned with Veronica Blair
• Works as a computer engineer for a building company and require him to travel round the island to different buildings in order to help with the computer aspects of the property
• Works from 8am-7m, Monday to Saturday and occasionally a Sunday if he is required to come in
• In Roberts spare time he enjoys gardening with his girlfriend and working on projects- most recently building and electric bike from scratch. As well as going out for family meal to his favourite restaurant and a big soft spot for his two kittens
• He spends most of his time in the garage working on his personal projects or overtime projects for his work, as well as his paintings on the walls and cleaning his pride possession of his rose red race car.

Veronica Blair- Mother

• 50 years old girlfriend to Robert Gow
• Works a directorial manager at a Trust company, working with her clients in person and online. She has suggested that its an extremely stressful and busy job due to the large work load and long hours.
• Works from 7am-8/9pm on a Monday through to Sunday and gets a day off which changes each week depending on her clients, work load and family
• In Veronica’s spare time she likes to spend time in the garden with her boyfriend when she has the time, enjoy playing Mario cart with the family and much like my dad loves going out for dinner at her favourite restaurant
• For my mum, her favourite room in the house where she spends the most time is the kitchen as it normally where we will sit as a family or where I do my homework, this is because due to the fact she is always very busy when she is home she likes to spend as much time as she can with her boyfriend and me

I live with both my subjects and therefore know rich in depth detail about both their personality traits and therefore I will get a better opportunity to really grasp the importance of surroundings that will truly reflect the key significance of the background to each subject. My action plan is further grasp both my parents opinions on the importance of our own house hold and to reflect their personality and their belief through photographs.

• Joan was 6 years old at the beginning on the occupation
• Joan lived on the north coast of the island, from her home she had a view from France, which lead to being to hear the horrifying noise of bombing from France
• She portrayed the feeling that the Jersey government was selling the island to Germany- metaphorical feeling
• When the war first began people all around island, everyone would put out white sheet as a representation of surrendering to the Germans
• In June 1940 Joan and a 5 year old girl from across the road went and sat in the middle of a field across the road and watched the planes fly over the sky, however soon to be interrupted by their concerned mothers came over soon to warn them to move under a tree if they wanted to watch the plane to avoid being a target for the Germans to shoot.
• Joan said she liked watching the plane and seeing the white vapor trail of around 30 planes flying over her home and the island
• It was reported later that day that multiple people were shot along the avenue and died
• Germans began to store guns near the center of the island and soon began to block people of from certain areas of the island, this soon led to a more realistic feeling of the island being taken over
• At the begin of the war there was a fair amount of food still available although the process of each individual having a restricted ration.
• Her father having a ration of 5oz of butter compared to her mother who had an allowance of 4oz however Joan’s mother registered with an incorrect address in order to receive more rations- she used the address from the farm house across the road
• Military zones were made all around the island and curfews were introduced- summer 22:00 and winter 21:00 however many people always tried to find way to go against the rules
• A night no lights were aloud to be seen from each individual home so each night Joan and her family would board up their homes using blackout frames to cover windows and door cracks
• Used to see the star at night, ‘the star would light up the sky’ unlike nowadays, which the night sky is destroyed by the light pollution
• After a couple months into the occupation the ‘pinch for food’ began.
• They started to substitute food, for example tea- used to peel parsnips and grated them placed in a oven and let them brown. After made sure they were dry before placing in a mug and pouring boiling water over them and called this substitution tea or even coffee
• There was also no sugar available so therefore sugar beat was used instead

Out of all of Francis Foot’s work I have decided to analysis this particular image described as ‘Foot’s daughter Dora poses as a milkmaid.

Visual:

For the visual aspect of this image it is clearly a black and white as during the time Foot was around and producing his image this was the one materials available at that time, although the black and white feature wasn’t necessarily an intentional feature I believe it to create and more authentic feel to image. Furthermore the tone of the image suggests the weather wasn’t the best at the time the image was taken and give suggestions of a darker feel through the inky shades, alongside the texture of the image. The photographs main subject of Dora and the cow are although not that clear are evidently the main focus of the image and provide the main focal point and slowly deteriorating the quality of the photograph around the outsides, which heightens the central kingpin of the image. This photograph has a lack of a 3D feeling due to the lack of shadows from the woman and cow and also could be due to the fault of the quality of the picture. There is no repetition to be exact however the continuing blurry trees in the shot create a more consistent and realistic back drop, similarly to the minimal use of straight and sharp lines which also could be to the fault of the quality of the image which furthermore presents the development of photography through time.

Technical:

From this image it can be presented hard to estimate the techniques used to produce the lighting, shadows and patterns, although from my own knowledge of the time it’s most likely to have only used natural light which also would explain the plain black and white shads. It’s unlikely that flash was used as the image lacks the features of flash used, furthermore the positioning of Dora- Francis’ daughter and the cow it strategically placed in the centre of the picture to draw most of the attention to the cow and woman. There is a lack of technical aspect due to the lack of equipment available at the time Francis Foot was developing his photography skills. The lens was most likely to be basic and caused the blur around the outside of the image, not necessarily on purpose, contrasting with the somewhat focused centre of the shot. This factor reflects my earlier point of the lack of quality of camera suggesting a larger lens supported by the bigger area of landscape covered in the snapshot. The exposure in this image seems to be minimal although over exposure could be suggested from the overall white sky section in the top half of the image, however is controlled by the other darker features presented. There is evidently a high sensitivity which is seen through the grainy like quality yet again giving a more authentic feel and experience about the photograph, as well as this point the snapshot has a much colder temperature due to the lack of colour accuracy and colour cast and recommends levels of white balance.

Conceptual:

Conceptual: From this image I get the feeling of Francis Foot trying to represent Jersey and ‘show off’ it is amazing traits and features it possesses as well as the aspect of how important his family is to him. Firstly, through the use of the landscapes, the island is portrayed as a beautiful and peaceful locations through the nature and greenery and the large field in which the cow and woman are placed. This feature is also highlighted by the lack of building that are not seen for miles over the field and therefore increases the idea of a peaceful location that Jersey is. Secondly, the use of the cow in the image demonstrates jerseys pride possessions and shows off the angelic and usefulness of the classic Jersey cows. Lastly the fact Foot uses his own daughter to dress up as a milkmaid alongside the cow and the scenic background, which portrays the importance of family and the community which additionally shines a light on the island and adds further positive connotations.

Contextual

Visual:

For the visual aspect of this image it evidently has vivid colours, this point is help supported by the refreshing green shade illuminating the main focus of the image, the stones. The tone of the image has a much brighter feels to it this is due the nature of the tree and the grass highlighting bright green shades, this factor is the supporting the importance of the centre piece of the stones. The surface of the rocks is uneven and compliantly different colours with aspects of lighter and darker colours this help create the more uneven texture of the rocks. This point helps lead to the idea of the image having features that create a 3D structure and furthermore add emphasis to the minor repetition produced by the positioning of the rocks with three stones lined up and a fourth one laid across the three stones, this layout adds aspects of symmetry and creates a more aesthetically pleasing view. Finally there is not evident or strong line structure to the image as the stones and in fact are quite the opposite due to the uneven lines, textures and colour coming from the stones.

Technical:

From this image it’s clear natural lighting from the sun in the main source of illumination therefore producing the natural shadows from the trees and stones due to the over whelming over exposure from the daylight. The historical stones are places on a land field, on what looks like fresh green grass which overall help as contrasting colours to the image. Overall the image looks fairly natural and does not look manipulated to look a certain way rather the photographer using the natural lighting and the camera control to get the perfect view feel to the feel. The photograph has a large strong sharp feeling towards it make the stones really stand out against the contrasting green trees and grass. The photography is clearly focused rather than blurred i believe this to give the best effects on the deeper meaning of the importance of the historical features. From the image its suggests that there is a much slower shutter speed due to the slight feature that lead to the conclusion of over exposure. The photograph leads to the connotations of the idea that the image has high sensitivity, this is seen through the lack of graininess.

Conceptual/ Contextual:

The idea behind this image is that it is a representation of the beauty and historical aspects of the stunning current location. Using the natural aspects of nature through the greenery of the grass and trees, next to the huge grainy rocks that holds the historical feelings of the island and portrays the significance. The deeper meaning of the image holds the similar feeling as the conceptual aspect, as the rocks itself has deeper meaning into the historical aspect of stones adding further connotations.

The Jersey Archive is the islands national repository holding records on all aspects of Jerseys History. The archive has a large array of different purposes for example researchers could use the archives resources to trace back family history, the old stories of their streets of their house to their home itself, and even more interestingly discover more about the German Occupation of Jersey during the Second World War. In 2017 the archive team launched thousands of images from the Jersey Evening Post photographic archive and are not to be seen online for the public. Occupation Registration Cards, will and testaments and transcriptions of early baptism, marriage and burial registers can all be accessed on the online catalogues. The Archive says that the security and security of these records and documents are their number one priority. Since the Public Records (Jersey) Law was passed in 2002 the Jersey Archive has been the official repository for all archival records produced by public institutions. The Jersey Archive continues to the grow and develops its records accepting records from businesses, clubs, societies and individuals. When new documents are brought into the archive they are carefully packed in acid free materials and stores in the correct environmental conditions. As long side collecting and preserving records and documents the Archive is committed and dedicated to making archives available to all members of the local public and the world wide community. Jersey Archive, as the official repository for the Island documentary heritage, can offer guidance, information and documents that relate to all aspects of the Island’s History. For example, Family History, family history is one of the most popular subjects for research from the public and allows members to go on a journey to their past with ancestry history information available. Jersey’s Heritage online includes descriptions of over 200,000 documents that are held at the Jersey Archive.

• House history
• contracts
• Island maps
• Criminal records for family historians
• Military records for family historians
• Conservations
• Preservations and storage of documents
• German occupation
• Bunkruptcy records
• Historic building research

JERSEY WAR TUNNELS EDITS AND FINAL SELECTION PROCESS

Initially, I downloaded all my images on to the computer and opened into Lightproof Classic and began the selection process. Firstly, i determined whether to keep each image or not by flagging the imagine or not and then leading on to making ratings out of five on each imagine. With 1 being to lowest rating up to 5 being the best. This helped slim and refine my images even more. Finally the final process was selecting different shades of colours on top star rated images in order to further decrease my final selection. This is the best process as it enables be to quickly cleans out old and unusable images and refines to only the out of that particular selection.

For my artists references I will comparing two completely different photographers that focused on the same area of photography- portraits. I chose one from the Societe Jersiaise Photo-Archive called Francis Foot and one contemporary from the Archisle Contemporary Programme called Yury Toroptso

Francis Foot

About: Francis Foot was born in 1885 and was the son of Francois Foot who lived from 1847-1918 and Louisa Hunt who lived from 1843-1934. Francois, Francis’ father was a China and Glass dealer who was located in Dumaresq Street, during this tie period this particular area was one of the most wealthy area in St Helier. Francis started working life as a gas fitter which soon led to an interest in photography and the earlier phonographs/gramophone records, soon to figure out that this could lead to a career where money was able to be earnt to make a living. Therefore the family took on a second shop in Pitt Street, this is where Francis worked as an eager photographer, along side his parents who sold gramophones, records and more, whilst still concentrating on their other shop, however when Francis’ father died Francis put his focus of on the business in Pitt street. Just before The First World War Francis married a lady called Margaret Vernon, in which they had four children called George, Stanley, Dora and Reg. Some of Francis’ photographs were turned into postcards, although many of his images feature portraits of his family. Soon enough the shop in Pitt Street became dominantly more important, where Francis was still selling records in the 1950s and 1960s when they were mad from vinyl. It was Stanley’s son John who gave the collection of the glass plates and other photographic material, which had been gathering dust since his grandfather’s death, to La Societe Jersiaise in 1996. Its online photographic archive contains 322 images of subjects as diverse as Battles of Flowers, St Helier Harbour, shipwrecks, fetes and coastal and country views.

Yury Toroptso

About: Yury Toroptsov was born in 1974 in a rural community near Vladivostok, Yury Toroptsov left his native Russia in 1998 to begin his studies at the New School for Social Research in New York as a Muskie Fellow, after having won a prestigious scholarship. With his Far-Eastern origins, American travels and the current residence in Europe, Yury Toroptsov keeps at the centre of his work; people and their identity and the permanence of the myths. Memories, metamorphosis (in an insect or amphibian) the process of transformation from an immature form to an adult form in two or more distinct stages.), profane (of a person or their behaviour) not respectful of religious practice; irreverent) and sacred (connected with God or a god or dedicated to a religious purpose and so deserving veneration) are the recurring themes in photographs. Toroptsov’s photographs have been featured in numerous personal and group shows including at the Maison Europeenne de la Photographie, Paris Photo, Musée de la Chasse et de la Nature in Paris. Cureently he is still now continuing his hard work in Paris.

After developing my own personal research in to the creations of zine’s i started to focus on how i wanted to structure and develop my own. the first step was selecting around 16 images that i wanted to use within my zine. during the selection process it was essential to keep in mind the focal point for instance would be the relation to the occupation and the historical significance it holds, therefore when looking at each image in detail i needed to decide if the image was essentially appropriate and of high quality. i had now my selection of the image i wanted to use which had been cropped and edited to help project the feeling and affects i hoped to be portrayed through the zine. To continue the next thing to decide was the order and size of the photographs on each page, for example, will it fill the whole page/ half the page/one side/ both sides/ how many images will on each page? etc. An example of where this type of mind thought came in to play was the back page, it was determining whether having an image would be have a dramatic effect or not, after careful consideration i finally decided to fill the back page with one image of a silhouette of a soldier on rocks looking out towards the sea, i deemed this to be a perfect ending for the zine as the photograph has connotation of a more calmer semantic field and has suggestions of a deeper meaning of an end and finishing, with the solider looking out to the future and a new start.

I used light room to help me select and edit my images and refine them to the minim amount in order t be able to move on to actually creating the zine, furthermore this lead to be to the conclusion that all of my images being represented in a black and white form, to me this really helped reflect the historical features and what has come of Jersey and our surrounding since then whilst still holding and portraying the historical importance.

INDESIGN work:

For my front cover i decided to keep it simple with a plain black background that continues to be displayed throughout the rest of the zine. For the title i chose a word ad translated it in to German to represent the historical features form the war, in this case i used the word ‘die reise’ which means the journey, this fitted perfectly as previously mention, is a genre i was concentrating on whist making the zine.

Finally after deciding on a definite structure and layout i printed out the zine making sure when it was printed and folded everything would still be in the correct position. As well as these factors i had to consider the over edges from the paper being folded and made sure there were no white stripes down the side of the booklet i did this by extending the image on indesign by an extra 3mm and trimming the pages when they were printed off, this resulted in a tidier and more complete finish.

The printed out zine:

MOOD BOARD

As a class we were presented with a large array of different types of zines and newspaper in which we got to explore and have a closer look at, the above images in my mood board were the main ones that stood that i have the most interest in- possibly help inspire me when creating my own zine/newspaper. These included zines produced by publishers working with photographers, for example Cafe Royal a publishing team creates a regular zine working along side many different photographers. What makes the Cafe Royal zines so iconic, is the consistent format and layout of the front cover which helps people viewing the zine remember the cover next time they see another one.

When looking at at the different types of zines it was clear that there are many different types and style that can be created and produced, making each piece unique in its own way. For example, size, format, design, layout, orientation, rhythm, title, cover etc. This will all be important areas that i will need to consider when producing my own as these are all key visual concepts which will potentially make or break my own zines/newspaper.

On the 4th of June we attended the photographic archive of the Société Jersiaise, where we were introduced to our new A2 project that we will be concentrating on for the rest of the present term and a large majority of Year 13. The topic tile being ‘The Occupation’.

The the photographic archive of the Société Jersiaise which consists of around 80,000 photos/images dating all the way back to the mid-1840s. This includes many different collection from different times periods, different parts of history, different parishes etc. Providing a true representation and understanding of what Jersey used to be like in the nineteenth century and early twentieth century. The photographic archive of the Société Jersiaise was founded all the way back in 1873, including the founding objectives; the creation of a museum and library. The Société Jersiais opened its museum in 1877, with the practice and collecting of photographs already identified as priorities, these activities were continued as significant parts of the society’s museum and library. Some of the first photo to be produced arrived in Jersey on the 9th of May 1840 after just nine months in which the Société Jersiaise first publicized it in the urban centres of England and France.

The archive holds examples of work by important nineteenth century photographers such as William Collie, Charles Hugo, Thomas Sutton and Henry Mullins. The collection incorporates late nineteenth century studio collections of negatives by Jersey based photographers such as Ernest Baudoux, Albert Smith and Clarence Ouless. Important twentieth century holdings include a major archive of over one thousand negatives by Percival Dunham Jersey’s first photo-journalist and an archive of one thousand three hundred German Occupation images compiled by Emile F Guiton (1879-1972) Honorary Curator of the Société Jersiaise Museum and founder of the Photographic Archive.  The archive from this current day presents over 15,000 portraits of identified people and views of the parishes, bays and valleys, alongside the collection contains details of visual records of the Jersey Channel islands history and a full representation of technical and aesthetic developments throughout the photographic era. Public access to the photographic archive was accepted in 1992, and now contains online catalog with over 36,000 images that can simply be searched via a link, as well as the images, negatives and original prints are also available. When we arrived at the archive we were presented with a series of different tasks, our first task was to look through some of the original photos and write down which ones stood out to us and why, having discussions on our tables about each of the images. To me this helped initial ideas flow and give me an overall better understanding of where I wanted to start with this new topic. Another one of the tasks that I found extremely relevant and helpful was the last one, where as a table we were given a large selection of images and had to place them in an order to tell a story, to me this really provided an understanding of how powerful images can be and lead me to want to investigate further in to the new topic.

Images from the photographic archive of the Société Jersiaise