This piece was influenced by the work of Matthew Venot, as I was inspired by the bold distinction between the subjects he photographed in contrast with the bright blue sky in the background which is a common theme in his work.

I used these 2 as my final selections from the Venot inspired shoots as they perfectly capture the striking contrast between a simple, boxy flat block and a clear (ish) sky.

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I started the framing process digitally at first as I wanted to play with different layouts before finalising it physically.

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This is the second layout I tried which I preferred, however I felt like it was missing something as the rest of my project mainly consists of pattern(s) + repetition .

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For the final layout I rotated the bottom image to add slight disparity & make it a bit more abstract.

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for my second photo shoot i took a different bus but still took photos around town as it where i felt was most interesting the lighting wasn’t the best on this day and feel it affected the photos so they didn’t turn out as well as my other shoots but still had some i liked

for this photo shoot i captured about a hundred photos again so i used the pick and reject system again coming up with 45 images i liked the most

i then narrowed them down again using the star rating to find my favourites from the shoot and which ones were worth editing

i decided on which ones would work well in a sequence using the the colour filtering and came out with 2 prints

for this shoot i decided to try the final images in black and white to give some differentiation in my final pieces

overall i was pretty happy with how this photoshoot turn’t out and was happy with my final images i think me changing to monochrome really helped these images stand out and will do the same to some of my images from my final photoshoot and try to go during a better time of day for lighting

Aims for my photobook: I wanted to create my most successful book yet, using Lightroom I created a softcover, small square photobook layout, using premium lustre paper. This was because I wanted the pages to be of a smooth texture and high quality imagery. I decided the shape of this photobook should be square as a lot of my images are landscape and some are not of the highest quality so I thought a smaller book would be a smarter decision as it will less apparent that the images may be fuzzy in some areas. Furthermore, the most important part of this book is communication the idea that these are not just randomly selected images, they are placed in this order to attempt to tell a story.

Above is my front and back cover, I thought that having these are monochromatic images and having my book filled with life and colour would be interesting for the reader, and they would be intrigued by this feature. I really like these images appear as if the tree branches are linked together despite being different images.

I have selected this as my title as this is the name of the main road that connect from my mums to my dads house, and this is where me and my brother spend a lot of our childhood as we used to walk from my mum’s house in St Helier to my dad’s house near Green Island in St Clement (Photoshoot 2). ‘Fountain Lane’ contains memories from my childhood as we used to spend lot of time feeding a house and finding chickens in this area. I like how this title is a physical and mental reflection of memories, and this title was my best outcome as it links to my brother life too, and this book is a reflection of how our relationship has grown in the last year.

This image on the right was taken by accident, however, I think that it ended up being a really successful and natural images. Additionally, it links in well with the photograph of my bedroom on the left, as it’s taken in the same location, so the background and lighting is the same throughout both images. I think these pages are some of my most successful and this is simply because they link with each other so well, they lack contrast, however I wanted to start out will warmer toned and more subtle images as these are located at the beginning of my photobook.

For this slide above to be successful, I have to leave the white space on the right, meaning that my dogs eye is not in the middle of the page, and when my book is printed you will be able to see his eye rather then it being lost in the middle of the page. I really like the atmosphere behind this picture, as my brother looks very happy and my looks scary which adds quite a funny affect. For this photoshoot (Photoshoot 1) I decided that the most successful photographs would be taken in my house, as this is a familiar and happy environment to take images in.

The thought process behind this spread was linking the path to my dads house to a significant figure that is within my mums house, and thought my dog was the best type of figure for this idea as he is a big part of our lives and loves doing on walks down Fountain Lane, giving another link to the name of my photobook. Throughout my book, all of the portrait images with a white background are all placed into the book with the same template in Lightroom, meaning that all these portraits images appear the same size when doing through my book, this is so that all of my book appear cohesive.

This images meaning placed together was in an attempt to show that my brother was walking to the beach, which is next to my dads house and a huge symbol of our childhood, as we spend all of our summers with our dad at the beach. I think this is successful as the first image is filled with one focal point and a lot of texture throughout the background, whilst the second image has a lack of texture and not really one focal point, this was in an attempt to create subtle contrast throughout the pages.

This image of the tree was one of my final images from my second photoshoot, this meant that I wanted it to be recognised more in my photobook as it is one of my higher quality images. To contradict the intricacy of the tree body, branches and leaves, I have placed a blank page next to it, this is so this image receives more attention as it is one of my most successful prints.

There is some red present in my dogs toy, and also within the brushes throughout the image on the right. the blue sky also contrasts with the orange like tone in my dogs fur. Additionally, the image of my dog is very dull and the image of the road is filled with lots more colour and vibrancy, meaning that these pages link well together. Also, I think its aesthetically pleasing that my dog is looking to the right, and this next image is on the right, meaning that I am attempting to give some direction to the flow of my photobook.

In my opinion, this double page spread is the most successful from my photobook, this is because this was originally quite a large image, so when placed into a landscape format, only some sky was lost, this means that I could make my brother the focal point of this double page, with his body not being exactly in the middle only means when the book is printed, he will not be folded and will still be visible when looking through the book.

For the pages above, I thought that the natural blue sky background would link them together well, after some experimentation with the image on the left, I thought it would be more successful if it was kept in a portrait format, as the original photograph was portrait too, also I really like how the quality of these two images is high.

The flowers which are placed on the right hand side page, and ones that are placed inside, where the next pink and white flowers which are below are always outside, this is create a contradiction between inside and outside nature and how different they can appear, also both of these photographs were taken inside me house, and the next ones below are on the way to my dad’s house, creating the story.

My most successful image from my second photoshoot is the one of the flowers above, this is why I have bled this image to the outside of the page, as I believe that it should have the biggest space as it did not look good as a double page spread as the image was too zoomed in and appeared more pixelated then in its normal format.

Analysis of my photobook: I thought that my photobook was very successful, compared to my previous photobook, it took me a lot less time and was of higher quality at the end. In my opinion, I told the storyline somewhat well, as my book could of been a lot better if I had another photoshoot, or simply more original images to work from, as my photoshoots were taken during the evening, the light was continuously changing, and this meant the lighting and quality of some of images was unsuccessful, limiting the amount of raw images I could of used throughout my photobook, Alternatively, creating a smaller photobook was a lot more effective for me and it meant that I had more time to do editing. The overall layout of my photobook is good in my opinion, and creating this was the best option for me as I could showcase my best images in an effective way.

The last step was to send my book to Blurb after creating it in Lightroom, after paying for the book their is an option to buy a PDF version, I didn’t end up paying for this. There was another feature which involved getting a preview of my book which allowed me to see my photobook in its digital form. This shows a version of the book where you can flick throughout all of the pages.

To present my final prints in a different form than foam board and window mounting I want to create another photo-zine as I think it is an effective way to present my images. I created a photo-zine for My Rock project to present my images from our La Hocq trip. Previously, I created my zine on Adobe InDesign so I am going to do the same but make sure I make these much needed improvements. Most of my final prints will be displayed in this zine perhaps in a monochrome format as well as other images I took in preparation for this project. Not all my images involved will be presented as my final images but only a small selection of 7-10 that I am going to mount. I am aiming to have around 14-18 pages in my zine to include all my best shots of architecture.

Front and Back Cover

Photo zine creation

To begin with the construction of my photo-zine I needed to create a document following the correct measurements and pages in order to craft a good quality zine. I then had to decide if I wanted to keep a monochrome theme throughout the whole zine which I think would look the best. I wanted to keep the front and back cover in colour to attract viewers with the bright blue sky. I chose this front cover because it gives a brief idea of what images will be involved in this zine, the idea of Simple vs Complex architectural structures.

For my first 4 pages I wanted to present my images from the finance district located near the Esplanade as I think they are my most eye catching images in the zine.

Next, I wanted to introduce my first double page spread of one image which is also photographed at the finance district of the same buildings displayed above.

Then I wanted to present my images from the Waterfront apartment complex, carrying on the theme of monochrome images to make the zine more organised.

After thinking about which location I wanted to present next I decided to use images from all locations again carrying on the black and white images.

Evaluation

Overall, I am happy with my zine but could’ve been heavily improved if I decided to start the creation much earlier in the exam, however I do like how all my images are in black and white as it follows the style of Helene Binet who is one of my chosen artists. I tried to connect the images together by almost making it seem as if two images create one structure such as on page 13. I could of improved this zine by including more close up shots of unique features of the buildings I have photographed. I included one image from my Fort Regent photoshoot to try and mix up the style of images with the photo on page 14 being a structure which is much more simple compared to the rest. I did experiment with only using images from the Waterfront but I believe I did not get enough quality photos for them to be included. I was thinking about creating a photobook instead of a zine however it wouldn’t of been worth making due to a lack of effective images.

Robert F. Kennedy’s Funeral Train:

Paul Fusco travelled the world as a photojournalist. But his most indelible images, portraying a nation in mourning, were captured on a single day in 1968 as he rode aboard Robert F Kennedy’s funeral train from New York to Washington.

He died on 15 July at an assisted-living facility in San Anselmo, California. He was 89. He had complications from dementia, said his son, Anthony Fusco.

During the heart of his career, Fusco was a staff photographer for Look, which in the 1960s was Life magazine’s chief competitor. Both magazines had circulations of several million each and were known for their exceptional photography.

After joining Look in 1957, Fusco worked across Europe and Asia, and from Egypt to Mexico to Brazil. Drawn particularly to the downtrodden, he photographed Kentucky coal miners, homeless people in New York, migrant farmworkers in California and rural poverty in the south.

“I want to take pictures of people that, when you see them, you can feel their lives,” he told the Record newspaper of Bergen County, New Jersey, in 2005.

As the train emerged from a tunnel under the Hudson River and entered New Jersey, Fusco saw what would become his most memorable and poignant subject: ordinary citizens alongside the railroad tracks, bearing witness and sharing grief.

“I was astounded by the people,” Fusco told the Palm Beach Post in 2010. “I just reflexively jumped up, went to the window and pulled down the top pane. And I just stood in that window for eight hours and shot film. I was overwhelmed by the constant stream of people and the variety and mixture and visible pain and loss.”

For my project I took some inspiration from Michelle Sank and her ‘Sixteen’ collection where she had UK teenagers from Cornwall answer questions about their lives and how it feels to be 16 as well as growing up in poverty and isolation from big cities. I thought it was very impact full how she would connect a portrait of each teenager with their answer showing viewers the diversity in their small town. I liked that you were able to get a deeper insight into the teens lives just by their answers not matter how short or how detailed their made them. I wanted to do something similar in my photo book so that it would help viewers get a greater understanding of each subject and their lives.

Questions

For this part of my project I came up with seven questions which ranged from being quite generic to more specific questions that have meaning to me and my friends. I wanted to have a wide variety of questions which gave a lot of detail to help tell a story of what it is like growing up in Jersey as a teenage girl as well as how important friendships are as they become people that were most comfortable around.

One of the questions in this questionnaire is catered more for my friend group specifically, it I the second to last, it may seem strange that I have asked what they do on a random day in the week but to us this is a specific day where we all try and meet up. Depending on the week sometime there only be 4 people but there can also be the whole group, it is a day where we make time to spend together which I think is very important especially for teenagers at stressful times.

Responses

As I wanted a more personal feel to my project, I got myself and my friends to had write our responses. I also wanted to show the difference between how each of us write which I think gives a deeper meaning to the answers and overall concept. I think the way people layout their answers on paper and their handwriting can tell you a lot about their mind. For example, my friend on lefts responses are shot and straight to the point as well as being simple and some could say that they look sweet with the little hearts draw on the side where as my friend on the right has a louder personality which I think can be shown through her responses and the way she has laid out her answers.

Photobook Layout

I have decided to use this layout in my photo book as I want viewers to be able to see the person and what they look like as well as their answers before they see any other images which I have taken. I wanted to keep all these portraits in black and white so that it can be shown for when a new persons section is being shown in the book. I think this was a very successful part of my project as viewers are now able to get a deeper insight into each of the subjects lives as well as their thoughts of certain matters.

For my third outcome I will use these images and others to create a slideshow/gif. I will centre the corners in the middle of each photo using lightroom / photoshop.

Final outcome using bloggif.com :

Contact Sheets

My fourth photoshoot was my smallest, this was mainly due to an idea which I had while in school, these were taken in the studio so that I would be able to have a neutral background to each image.

Sub-Selection

I have used the same selection system as I have in my previous photoshoots, i have used the ‘p’ key to white flag the images that i will be editing and the ‘x’ key to reject the photographs that I wont be using in my final images. As this was quite a small shoot it was quite easy to narrow down which images I will and wont be using.

Editing

In the whole shoot I only made two images black and white as I wanted to enhances the saturation of the colours from the subjects hoodie. The two top edited images are both similar portraits which I wanted to have in different formats as well as showing more of the subjects clothing and body on the right. I have again used a similar editing style so that I will have a cohesive set of images which make a smooth flowing photobook when they are finally presented. For both the black and white images and the coloured images I have decided to decrease the exposure an slightly increase the contrast so that I create a darker background to each photograph while enhances the different tones and colours in the final image.

Final Images

Below are two of my final images in a landscape format, the left photograph is a classic portrait with the subject looking at the camera, posed while the right image is of the subjects back as i wanted to show the different dimensions of the subjects clothing. I like the contrast between the two images as the right image is full of colour which stands out against the dark black hoodie and light grey background, where as the left image in black and white but still conveys a lot of emotion.

I have as got final images from this shoot in portrait which are quite similar to each other but their are either using different subjects or facing opposite ways. The image on the left is interesting as the pose tells a small story behind the photoshoot, the subject looks like she is looking towards another camera and someone has got a different angle. The two other photographs are back shots i wanted to highlight the designs of the subjects favourite hoodies which they have mentioned in their questionnaires. I turned the middle black and white as I felt that it fit better with the different tones and shading. I also had the subject in the last image have her hair behind her as I wanted to capture the details and texture which was one of the reasons I kept in in colour so that the brown would be enhanced by the lights.

After choosing my final images I created a zine for my final images which be would put in a CD case- to put the zine in a DVD case I would simple have to change the orientation of the zine from landscape to portrait.

I created this zine using Indesign, I opened a new document and created four pages, I then inserted my images and readjusted them to the page size- after doing this I then made the images fit the frame proportionally to create my final zine. I wanted to make sure I kept the colour scheme of the images connected- as there are only four images the zine (by technicality) can have either set of images as the front and back covers so I kept the images with similar colour schemes together (yellow + orange and green/yellow + green/yellow).

After printing this zine I am going to put it in an empty, clear CD case, for this I have to measure the CD case and make sure the dimensions of the zine fit perfectly into the case- this will make my zine the front, back covers and the inside images: one image will be covered by the CD but for display purposes I am not going to put a CD in the case.

CD CREATING PROCESS

First I created the zine which will be the front cover and the traditional fold out in the CD, this is seen above.

I printed the front and back cover separately as the dimensions are different for the front and back cover of the CD (front- 12x12cm, back- 15×11.8cm) so my second “zine” will simply be a double sided page, The back cover is bigger as to have the image folded so the spine of the CD has imagery in it. I may write a title and track list on the CD but I am unsure as of what to write so this is still uncertain, especially since if I was writing on the case/images it would take away from the cinematic look of the images. Once printed, I inserted the prints into an empty CD case, the final outcome as seen in this blog post.

Contact sheets

For my third photoshoot, I wanted a mixture between naturalistic and posed portraits as well as photographs taken from further away. These images were taken in three different places at different time throughout a sunny Thursday. We first went to a car park in St Clements as I thought the lighting was good and wanted some images with the sun shining towards our faces, these were taken between 5pm and 6pm so the sun had not started setting yet. The second part of this photoshoot was in Green Street car park on the top floor so that i could use the natural light, these were taken in ‘golden hour’. Lastly the third part of the shoot was taken down in a St Ouens car park connected to the beach, I decided I wanted these images to be taken while the sun was setting as I took inspiration from Kayla Varley for some of the photographs included in my shoot. I believe that this was a successful photoshoot as I have found great images that I will use in my final selection.

Sub-selection

I had a lot of images for my third photoshoot so to help myself narrow down my final images I used the flag tool to differentiate between the images that I will edit and possibly use and the photographs that I will not use. I also used the star tool to pick out the ones that I wanted to focus more on while I was editing and which ones I felt that were more likely to be picked out after.

Editing: Photoshoot 3

The editing for my third photoshoot was quite similar to my first and second as I wanted a cohesive style of editing throughout my images, I felt that my doing this my photobook would be able to flow better then if I used different styles of editing.

Below are two of my images which I have kept in colour, for the left photograph, it is shows how the original was over exposed, to combat this I decreased the exposure tool in Lightroom and increased the contrast which dulled down the image helping with the brightness. After I found the level where I wanted my image to be with the lighting, I adjusted the temp tool by putting in slightly in the yellow as I think it gives the image a sunny glow enhancing the overall look. The edited image on the write hasn’t been changed much from the original photograph, I wanted a deeper colour for the car and shadows, to get this effect I decreased the shadow tool and the whites tool in Lightroom.

I have also editing some of my images from this third photoshoot in black and white, for the image on the left I thought that the photographs would fit a more monochromatic look as it is not a normal image of a posed duo, I wanted to enhance the shadows and to do this I decreased the exposure and the shadows. The image on the right was taken during the sunset but was not one that was very saturated, to combat the duller sky I turned it to black and white and I found that it looks better. It is a more casual image which I like so I didn’t do much changing from the original image.

Final Images: Photoshoot 3

Above are three portraits that were taken at green street car park in my third photoshoot. I like how they are all similar composition but have slightly different editing, this helps to make a triptych. In the first image I like how there is a yellowish tint making it seem more golden accentuating the colour of the subjects hair and skin. The middle image is edited a little darker than the two next to it, I enjoy the contrast between the little skin and the darker tones from the subjects hair and hoodie, I feel that this helps to center the subjects face and bring the main focus to it instead of what’s in the background. In the final image I decided to edit the photograph lighter to show the colour off the subjects hair and the different textures. I also like how saturated the colours in this image are, the blue from the sky and the blue detailing on the hoodie help to make a good composition and connection in the image.

Above are are three portraiture style of photographs which have changed into black and white as well as a singular coloured image. I like the composition of the three images on top as they look cohesive due to the monochromatic similarities as well as the position of the two duo images outside of the individual naturalistic portrait. I feel that these photographs have a great way of showing the story that I am trying to convey through my images, that teenagers tend to be happier and need their friends especially during this stage of life. The first photographs is one of my favorites from this part of the photoshoot as it shows true emotions and has a great composition with the subjects centred with the car in the background. Lastly, I think that the photograph of the individual shoe is quite interesting as it using a great angle from the ground where there is lots of details being show creating a greater message. The lighting also enhances the image as the sun highlights the embroidered picture on the sock as well as the comic designs on the shoe.

These six images are from the last part of my third photoshoot from St Ouens, I have done a mixture of black and white images as well as keep ones in colour. My top three landscape images are mainly ones to represent the friendship part of my project as they are mostly group or duo images. One of my favourites out of the three is the middle one as I like the composition between the two subjects, where they are both facing away but you are able to see the design on the back of the t-shirt as well as the details and different shading both of their hair. The bottom three portrait photographs are also some of the best from this part of the shoot, the left image is a portraits with golden lighting which helps to accentuate the subjects hair and detailing with the hair style as well as her necklace which helps to break apart the harsh black from the top. For the middle image I found that I wanted to have a classic black and white edit over the top of a funny, more relaxed image, I like how this image can show the dynamic of the friendship clearly as well as the closeness of the friendship.