For this NFT we have decided we want to highlight the fact that people are expected to look a certain way based on their gender/sexuality.
We decided that we were going to make a film but also include images that I will have taken by the time we shoot the film. We also decided that we are going to add the images in between the scenes. This would be seen as a glimpse into what was going through our model’s head, but also foreshadows what will happen by the end of our film.
Celebrities that have already done this:
Recently the red carpet is often the place for celebrities to make a statement. For example Billy Porter turned up to the 2019 MET Gala in a large gown with the torso of a tuxedo and the bottom half had a black velvet ballgown silhouette.
He gave an interview to Vogue saying:
“This industry masquerades itself as inclusive, but actors are afraid to play, because if they show up as something outside of the status quo, they might be received as feminine, and, as a result, they won’t get that masculine job, that superhero job. And that’s the truth. I’ve been confronted with that.”
This is our second mood board. It is based on the fact that many musicians help people come into their own skin. For example, many musicians want to change the social normalities such as men need to look masculine and women need to look feminine. Artists such as Yungblud, Damiano David (lead singer of Maneskin) and even David Bowie/ Ziggy Stardust.
Music also helps people express themselves and allows them to feel part of a community. This feeling of being in a community is especially strong when you attend a concert as everyone in the room has something in common. Most of the time you’ll meet someone new or even find someone who will watch out for you throughout the night.
An NFT is a unit of data stored on a digital ledger, called a blockchain, which can be sold and traded.
A famous NFT is the rainbow cat, Nyan Cat. Which sold for $690,000
The NFT can be associated with a particular digital or physical asset (such as a file or a physical object) and a license to use the asset for a specified purpose. NFTs (and the associated license to use, copy or display the underlying asset) can be traded and sold on digital markets.
Blockchain and the technology enabling the network have given the opportunity for musicians to tokenize and publish their work as NFTs. This has extended the list of options for musicians and artists alike to monetize and profit from their music as well as other content surrounding the themes of the music and the artists public image. In addition, NFTs have provided the opportunity for artists and touring musicians to recuperate lost income due to the 2020 COVID 19 pandemic which resulted in music industry revenues falling nearly 85%.
NFTs were utilized by artists to increase revenue during the pandemic . In February 2021, NFTs reportedly generated around $25 million within the music industry (in an industry with annual revenue of over $20 billion or .125%).On March 3, 2021, rock band Kings of Leon became the first to announce the release of a new album, when you see yourself in the form of an NFT which generated a reported $2 million in sales. Other musicians that have used NFTs include the rapper Eminem.
At a very high level, most NFTs are part of the Ethereum blockchain. Ethereum is a cryptocurrency, like bitcoin or dogecoin, but its blockchain also supports these NFTs, which store extra information that makes them work differently from, say, an ETH coin. It is worth noting that other blockchains can implement their own versions of NFTs.
On 07/06/21 we went to the Jersey museum and art centre. While we were there, we went around the exhibition which was about the heritage of different people in Jersey. In that exhibition, there was a display covered with glass which contained people’s registration cards from when they first moved here.
I went on the Jersey Archive but sadly was unable to find any more information on the people in the images above. However I did do some more research on where the stereotypical ‘Jersey’ surnames actually came from.
The name Le Breton has a long French heritage that first began in north-western region of Brittany. The name taken from when the family lived in the province of Brittany, known to the French as Bretagne.
This surname was first recorded as Normant and Normanus in the 12th century and other early variations include Le Norman, Normand and Le Normand. The census records for the island show people with this surname living in most of the parishes.
It is one of the oldest Jersey surnames, first recorded in the 12th century as de Haya. Other variants of the name include La Haye, delahaye and de la Haie. Census records show that this family originally settled predominantly in the parishes of Trinity and St Helier. A number of de la Haye’s emigrated to new colonies such as Australia.
The pound note in the image above shows that it was established in 1834, when Jersey adopted the English currency. Before 1834, the currency was livre which consisted of French coins. In the 19th century there was a rate of 26 livre = 1 sterling pound. After the livre was replaced by the franc in France in 1795, the supply of coins in Jersey dwindled leading to difficulties in trade and payment. In 1834, an order in council adopted the pound sterling as Jersey’s sole official legal tender, although French copper coins continued to circulate alongside British silver coins, with 26 sous equal to the shilling. Because the sous remained the chief small-change coins, when a new copper coinage was issued for Jersey in 1841, it was based on a penny worth 1⁄13 of a shilling, the equivalent of 2 sous. This system continued until 1877, when a penny of 1⁄12 of a shilling was introduced.
I chose these as my final images because I believe that they are the best images that represent Air, land and water pollution as well as the current situation with medication and the need we have for it since the pandemic hit.
I especially believe that some of my images that represent pollution have a strong message. I used Jeremy Carroll as my main inspiration for those images as I feel as though I accurately adopted his ideas.
I also feel like I have explored more information on the current pandemic and have more of an understanding of how much damage it has done on the economy and the environment. But I’ve also found out how it has brought people together and I believe that I have shown this through my images.
This shoot was inspired by Jeremy Caroll. As well as including Caroll’s style I wanted to highlight the topic of air pollution as well as water pollution.
I wanted my images to show the impact that people have on the world. Even by eating something with a plastic wrapper humans are negatively impacting the world and pouring plastic into the oceans.
Water Pollution (plastic)
Plastic is accumulating in the world’s oceans at a staggering rate. An estimated eight million tons of plastic – the equivalent of over 26,600 Boeing 747 planes – are swept into our seas and oceans every single year, mainly via rivers and coastal urban centres.
500 marine species are known to be affected by plastic pollution.
Nurdles – the pre-production pellets from which most plastic items are made – are a significant direct source of microplastic pollution. Because of their small size and the way in which they are transported and handled, millions of these pellets are spilled in factories and other sites every year, and are often washed straight into storm drains and out to sea.
Unfortunately, the environment is the worst hit by activities of the tobacco and cigarette industry. Until everyone learns to start doing something about this trend, they might be in for some big trouble in the nearest future. This article will focus on some of the negative effects of tobacco on different elements of the environment, as well as steps that must be taken to prevent the looming damage.
The smoking industry is designed by its own processes to harm nature. The kind of land needed to grow tobacco is often not gotten, except by chopping down of trees. Over time, deforestation has cost our environment. And continuing in the process of deforestation will do more harm than good.
Land Pollution (plastic and global warming)
In 2019 a new report “Plastic and Climate” was published. According to the report, in 2019, production and incineration of plastic will contribute greenhouse gases in the equivalent of 850 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) to the atmosphere. In current trend, annual emissions from these sources will grow to 1.34 billion tonnes by 2030. By 2050 plastic could emit 56 billion tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions, as much as 14 percent of the earth’s remaining carbon budget.
Plastic pollution on land poses a threat to the plants and animals – including humans who are based on the land. Estimates of the amount of plastic concentration on land are between four and twenty three times that of the ocean. The amount of plastic poised on the land is greater and more concentrated than that in the water.
Plan
WHO
Kiera and Miriam
WHAT
Strangled by plastic+vaping
WHERE
studio+house
WHEN
05/05/21
Contact Sheet
Final Outcomes
Best Edited Images
For this image I used a blue and green gel on top of my light which was on the highest brightness and had a slight warm tone to help the green shine through however I wanted it to be a cool blue to emphasise the coldness of the ocean and the the fact that humans can be seen as cold hearted since we are so careless with what we do with our rubbish. The blue background also helps emphasise the fact the image is focusing on the treatment of ocean life.
I liked the shadow that the mask created on my model’s neck as it helps represent the deeper parts of the ocean and that plastic effects them as well even though they are hundreds of miles deep. The shadow could also emphasise the fact that millions of creatures are dying due to plastic.
I used a mask in my image to show that the current pandemic has caused lots of damage to the environment. For example, many people have the disposable masks which can easily break, they’re also very light weight and if dropped, can easily float away out of reach and can land anywhere. Even the COVID 19 tests have plastic packaging which is only used once and then binned and destroyed.
I zoomed in to 35 mm on my camera and stood quite close to my model to ensure that her neck, which is getting strangled by rubbish, was the main subject. I wanted my model’s hand to be in the image to show signs of struggle and pain to further show that if humans were in this situation more people would want to help and stop what is going on. I also used a fast shutter speed and got my model to move her head and hands so that I could get a more realistic image.
I like the fact that there are a range of textures in the image. The mask, crumpled bits of paper and the plastic bag all have a harsh look to them which nicely contrasts the smoothness of the model’s neck. I got my model to keep her rings on her fingers to show that it’s not only large bits of plastic that are the problem.
There is a very cool tone to this image which I believe is good to help present the important issue. The blue and black colours in the image link to the saying ‘blue and black’ which is often said when someone got hurt and badly bruised. I feel like the colours in my image are a metaphor of how our world is slowly deteriorating and getting beaten till it will break.
This image was taken to represent air pollution and the damage it does to our bodies. I used red LED lights for my main source of lighting as I wanted the image to be quite dark. I chose the colour red to help emphasise the dangers of smoking and also emphasise the fact that our air is slowly getting polluted by fumes from cars and industrial sites. The thick smoke represents the fact that the air we breath in isn’t clean and we are slowly damaging our bodies.
The smoke is in front of my model’s face to emphasise that we aren’t really seeing what’s happening in the world and that we are normalising things that should be changed. Smoking not only does it damage and kill your lungs, it is also putting a strain on the environment making the trees take in more CO2 and since trees are decreasing in numbers due to deforestation, we are getting less O2 in our atmosphere.
The image is blurred to represent the fact that the world is changing ridiculously quick. The image has quite a smooth texture all together. The smoke, because it’s so thick, helps smooth out the model’s face and when the smoke rises above the model, it looks like its a shadow on the middle of the wall.
The shadow in the bottom right of the image represents the fact that we are slowly beginning to change the the world for the better. It could also however represent the irreversibility of the damage we have done to our planet, and it is looming over us, slowly growing and becoming more and more apparent.
I used a quick shutter speed for this image as I wanted to capture the smoke at different stages so that I could pick the best looking images. Since the smoke is in front of my model’s face, I think that it allows the model to represent the whole world watching its planet get slowly destroyed. The smoke being thick also represents the amount of chemicals that get released into our atmosphere each day.
For this image I zoomed in at 25mm and stood about a metre away from my model which I think was a good decision as I wanted to focus on her face and above so I did a headshot and left quite a large gap above her head to allow the smoke to rise.
The chains around the models neck links to the fact that when you smoke you are slowly damaging your lungs and the chain looks like her airflow is being restricted which is what we as a community are doing to ourselves when we release harmful gases and chemicals into our atmosphere.
I chose this image because I thought that it looked like my model was praying for help whilst they were tied up with rubbish. I wanted my model to represent the struggle the animals go through, however I feel like this image looks like it represents the people who are noticing the damage that the animals are put through and they are pleading for help and for people to notice the harsh reality of what the world looks like.
The green lighting helps this idea of people wanting to help the animals who are in danger. Green is a colour often associated with life and new beginnings. I chose the green lighting to emphasise the fact that even though plastic effects oceanic life quite significantly, land creatures and the land itself gets effected equally as bad.
I asked my model to keep her rings on as I noticed that one of them was made from microplastics which are now known to be even more dangerous for animals as they mistake the plastics for things like small eggs or insects.
Final Analysis
I believe that my final images worked well with Carroll’s work since I used the same concept as him. However, I focused on keeping little things in the images such as jewellery and also wanted to use coloured lights to create more of an atmosphere and have a story behind it.
For my first gallery, I wanted to put the red image in the middle because it’s the most eye catching out of all three of my images. The red also has connotations of danger and I thought that it would be best to put that in the middle so that the viewer can subconsciously understand that the images are about the danger we are putting ourselves and our planet in.
The other two images next to it have a cooler tone which is less harsh than the bright red. Although they are cooler toned, they are more aggressive images due to the fact that people are tied up or are seen struggling.
For this gallery I wanted to do the same pattern as the one above. However, I wanted to show that the two blue images result in the red image. Where smoke takes over your body, and you put yourself in danger. Just like when people emit fossil fuels into the atmosphere we are damaging the planet’s ozone layer, and consequently putting ourselves in danger. The middle image could be seen as a warning, and the other two images is the world before things get permanently damaged.
Bellissimo’s work extends beyond regular photography. Her work explores the physical and psychological relation between nature and human beings when combined through the use of collage. She precisely cuts out bits of different images and layers them together. Her work evokes a sense of empathy, intimacy and harmony while humans and nature coexist.
This image was taken in with a plain white background with white lighting; this helps the viewer focus on the model. The model has a hole where his eye should have been, the fraying around the eye shows that the hole was put there by force, just like how humans intentionally damage our world by leaving rubbish around. If you look closer at the hole in the eye, you can see there is a lighter section nearest the nose. It almost looks like bark. This shows the connection between humans and nature. When we damage nature we damage ourselves in the process.
The hole in the models eye could also emphasise the fact that we as a species ignorant and we are choosing not to notice the damage that we are doing to the world. However, the fact that the we can see the model’s other eye represents a glimmer of hope that we can change the world before it’s too late.
The model’s mouth is also slightly open which could represent that maybe the model wants to say something however is too afraid to speak up. He could also represent the people that are saying something. But because there’s such a small amount of people who aren’t afraid to speak up about these matters, compared to the population of the world, the small gap could represent the world’s view on their views and they feel like their view is insignificant.
For this shoot I wanted to highlight the fact that even when we need to heal ourselves, we harm the planet in the process.
I took pictures of a packet of capsule tablets which were encased in foil and plastic wrapping. The capsule itself is made from a kind of plastic which dissolves in our stomach acid. By having these types of tablets we are constantly adding to the plastic productions.
In addition to this, I wanted to emphasise the fact that the whole population now relies on medication. As more diseases are found, there is a higher demand for cures/vaccinations to be found at the same time. This then means the production of plastic waste increases as well as the funds that need to go into pharmaceuticals around the world. This has become more apparent recently as COVID 19 took over throughout 2020- the present day. The whole world was relying on the pharmacists around the world to find a vaccine to prevent the spread of COVID. This lead to the government needing to provide millions of pounds to ensure that the NHS and labs throughout the country were safe enough to work in but also so that they had enough protective clothing and equipment to help those who caught the virus to keep as many people safe as possible.
Lockdown had a major impact on the UK’s economy as shown here:
However, there is evidence that even more money will be put into the NHS and pharmaceuticals in the next coming years:
Contact sheet
Final Outcomes
Best Images
For this image, I went into photoshop and increased the contrast from 0 to 22 and decreased the brightness from 0 to -15. This helped enhance the texture of the plastic and foil wrapping. I also put the image into black and white, I did this to show that even the things that help us can harm us. I think this works well with the two ends of the tablet. The darker side represents the harm that plastic does to our environment and the lighter side is how plastic can help us, like for packaging our medication and keeping things fresh.
I also think that the fact that the image is in black and white also represents the dangers of medication. Even though they are made to help people, they can quite easily kill . Some can take to many without realising and cause serious harm to themselves. The contrast in the colours of the medication can represent this fine line.
The two colours of the medication could also represent the fact that in America, there are fees for medication and medical care. This was problematic especially throughout the pandemic because if someone who was financially struggling , they wouldn’t be able to afford the medical help they needed which then meant that they had to struggle and live in pain. But, if you had enough money to afford the medication/ help you would be able to recover quickly and get on with your life.
I created this image by merging the image above with the colour version and flipped it. I did this to try and represent the mass production of medication that happens each year. I wanted it to be a circular image to show that there is a routine in this industry and once the routine has finished it begins again. I also mixed the coloured image with the black and white to show the range of medication that is created and sold to different people around the world.
The Corona Virus put a huge pressure on the Pharmacists around the world to work constantly around the clock. This meant there was a mass production of test tubes, syringes and pipets, all of which are made from plastic.
Experiments
For this shoot I took images of my friends, first individually and then together. I did this to show that people became united during the pandemic. It also represents the fact that people get closer when they are in certain situations that can cause panic. I chose to put the black and white image behind Aaron and the coloured medication behind Kiera to show that they are different people and have totally different lives. But when they are together I put the coloured medication behind them to represent that they are in the same situation and are connected in some way or another . This represents the world when the pandemic hit and everyone had to go into lockdown.
Jeremy Carroll is a photographer and artist who wants to change the world and by doing this he must change how people see things. In order to illustrate what plastic pollution is doing to fish and sea mammals, he created an exhibit called “Entanglement.” It shows humans entangled in the waste that is most commonly found in seawater and along beaches.
Famous Images
Jeremy Carroll focuses on sharing the impact plastic has on the environment and sea creatures through images of humans facing the same problems. Humans often feel more remorse when they see arm done to things they view as their equal.
Image Analysis
The red rope and plastic around the models neck is central and is what draws the viewer in as soon as they look at the image. The colour red could have been used to emphasise the fact that the person is now in danger or it could represent the blood that is drawn from the tightness of the plastic around the neck. In the centre of the model’s neck, you can see signs of struggle with the wrinkles that have formed and the fact that you can see the model’s hands trying to loosen the items that are currently shortening their life right before their eyes.
Carroll used a white background to ensue that the model was the centre of the viewer’s attention. The model also takes up a lot of the image which helps direct the viewer to look at the different materials and textures restricting their airflow. The different textures also emphasise the smoothness of the models skin and how it looks like it can easily be broken. This helps show the innocence of the creatures that get caught in these kinds of traps daily.
On the model’s neck, there is bits of yellow rope which had fallen. This helps emphasise how easy it is for plastic and debris to get into the ocean. It just shows that not every bit of plastic was put into the ocean on purpose. The shadows on the model’s neck look like marks that have been left there from how tight the plastic was wrapped round.
