for my first photoshoot I wanted to photograph objects that I would say are “gender locked”, meaning that it would be seen as quite strange by the majority of public if the opposite gender were to use them this include objects such as perfumes, fragrances, loafers, high heels. My thought process behind this was that id edit some of the images with colours opposing the gender that would normally use them. For example, with a picture of loafers i would change the background of the image to blue and then create a contrasting image with pink as the background. The reason for this is because i want people to look at these images and challenge the stereotypes that people often make and have been making for a very long time.

this batch of images I think didn’t come out well in this photoshoot as I didn’t have the right set up when taking these images as the lighting was off and the canvas I was taking the pictures on didn’t help much either as it looked to tacky. so to help create better images I went to a studio for my second portion of images from this photoshoot.

like previously stated I managed to create far superior images in the second batch as I had a proper set up for my images the images came out with a much better quality, and a lot more detail on the objects which is exactly what I wanted to achieve.

3 best images from the photoshoot:

the reason why I believe these three were the best from the photoshoot is because they came out exactly how i wanted them as I needed the images to look a certain way for my editing process, as I needed the object to have a plain white background with minimal shadows as I would be able to take the shadows out through Lightroom.

outcomes of the best images and how i edited them:

for this image I didn’t touch the basic parts of the image I just added two mask to adjust the appearance of the heel and the background of the image, the reason I decided to change the colour of the shoe was because I thought it would look to plain and boring if it was just the same shoe over and over again across all images. I also made sure the colour of the heel wasn’t to similar to the background so it wouldn’t be to hard to tell apart.

the editing process of this image is fairly similar to the first one as I wanted to make sure to keep a pattern in the book as I didn’t want anything to look out of place. as you can see by the adjustments I made to the image I focused on just changing the colour of tint of the loafers as they are black I couldn’t change the colour of it without it looking odd so I decided to add a pink tint over the shoe to go with the pink background.

for this image I decided to work on more than just the masking of the image as I wanted to make sure the colours were going to pop all over image and not just the background hence the saturation and vibrance being substantially increased in the editing settings.

when editing the objects of the image I wanted to try something a little bit different instead of having the objects the same colour as the background I decided to change the colour of them to something a little different to the background but not to far off so it wouldn’t look to off the colour scheme of the image which is why I adjusted the heel to be red still fitting with the colour scheme of pink .

conclusion of photoshoot 1:

This is the reason why i though these were the best images from the photoshoot as they allowed me create exactly what I wanted to the best out of all the other images as I was able to make the images have near to none shadows with the coloured background to make the objects pop out the image as much as possible which was what I wanted to create. However if i was to do this photoshoot again I would have taken a lot more images from different angles accompanied with different forms of lighting to bring out a different type of image, this could have consisted of the objects having different things around them to help bring a different meaning to the image/understanding of it.

I decided to plan how I’m going to mount my printed images by using Adobe InDesign, all in three different categories, Individualism, Socialism and Realism.

I explored the theme Socialism by taking photoshoots of a group of friends and family doing any sort of activity such as, going bowling, park, town, going on a walk etc. This symbolizes Socialism since socialism is all about socialising, making memories, having fun and being with people you enjoy spending your time with. For this photoshoot I decided to go explore different locations around jersey, for example St Peter, St Helier etc. Exploring Socialism brings attention to collective experiences, social justices, working-class and communities. Showing how people with different backgrounds and different environments can unit and the importance of equality and justice in society.

Best Images:

I decided yo leave some of my images in black and white because I think it gives a stronger connection to the theme society and it makes the images more un-posed. It shows how positive society can be when united.

I explored the theme Realism by taking photoshoots of nature, the environment, and daily uses. I also explored realism by taking portraits of people are work showing their environment, where they are most of the day and from face expressions if they enjoy their job. By taking images of people at their work can show realism since that’s the reality of like cant be always going away or having fun, got to go back to reality which is work and which people spend most of their day. Realism can also show historical aspects, everything changes overtime but sometimes the special places don’t.

Best Images:

In my opinion these images these are my best image because they show the best three different aspects of realism. The first one lose detailed plants/flowers, second one daily life use/routine, and thirds nature. I love how they are set and how the colour blend so well with each other, all with different shades and colours making it more lively. I left the second images black and white because it shows the different shades of black and white which make it more interesting than editing it with colour.

For my first photoshoot I explored the theme Individualism. I went to different places and took photoshoots of different people at places they love most and where they like to spend most of their day. I took portrait of where people feel comfortable and at peace such as at the beach, shopping, doing make up, around their childhood plushies etc. In my opinion taking portraits of people where they most love being is a very important part of individualism because it sometimes can show how someone’s personality is by just a image. For example taking a portrait of someone on a tree can show that they are adventurous and like exploring. Exploring individualism allows to show different personal identity, unique perspectives and self-expression. It gives individuals the power to tell their own experiences, passions, likes, dislikes and stories, through portraits or candid moments. It can also express a sense of freedom and show everyone’s different beauty.

For my individualism photoshoot I decided to try use as bright colours and possible so the images give it a positive mood. Three photos are black and white but I left it like that because I think it feels more powerful an highlights more the theme individualism. The images show everyone what she enjoys doing and independence. For my other photoshoots I increased the exposure to make it look more bright but not too bright that you cant see the different shades and colours. Below are some of the best images that I took in my opinion. I love how they are set and show the theme individualism very well and with different expressions.

Best images:

Prints:

Photobook Final Layout:

Evaluation:

This is the final layout design of my photobook – which I am telling a story through, explored by three different sections of the book. The first section is called Folly, composed of various monochrome images, with motifs such as cobwebs and animalistic features and props. There is movement and photos with a slow shutter speed in this section of the book, which is momentarily disrupted when the cobwebs are introduced. The second section is called Prudence, composed of colour images, most keeping a similar combination of tones. I wanted to create a stark difference between the two sections. The third section is called End.

Final design layout:

In comparison to my statement of intent:

Before conducting my project, my statement of intent consisted of a few paragraphs stating what I wished to achieve through this exam project. I stated that I aimed to closely follow themes of power roles and femininity, through photographing women and depicting them as equal to men, as this has been a reoccurring struggle in society for centuries. I aimed to illustrate the theme of union by tying in power roles to unity, through creating images that perfectly present women as a community, and how they have come together to defeat traditional expectations and stereotypes. I knew I needed to link my artist inspirations: Yayoi Kusama and Helmut Newton, to the theme of union as well as incorporating my own ideas based on experience of being a young woman.

I crafted my photoshoots in a way that I had originally planned to, exploring indoor and outdoor scenes, as well as photographing in places that my artist studies did. This way, I was able to carefully resemble my inspiration’s work, as well as including unique and personal ideas to develop this project. Helmut Newton is renowned for his provocative style of imagery, delving into themes of eroticism and power. Yayoi Kusama is well known for her distinctive use of repetition of colourful backgrounds with lots of pattern, where she explores self-obliteration and mental health. She uses the busy backgrounds to symbolise her mental state, after growing up suffering with hallucinations. Despite both of my artists being extremely inspiring and successful, they uniquely portray hidden messaged through their work, which is what originally inspired me to merge them together into my project.

Gender inequalities have created a strong narrative that women should not be allowed to have important roles or a high status, but I have always wanted to challenge this idea. Therefore, I want to show a modernised version of how the world views women, yet depicting them as powerful and dominant throughout my own work, despite not having lived through the 60s and 70s when these issues were at an all time high. I want to successfully demonstrate my understandings of these societal problems through presenting my work as a way of comparison, highlighting the change and how far women have come since the 60s, while also expressing my knowledge on how the world has changed to view women as equal to men. This effectively links to the theme of union, by highlighting the unity of men and women, not only women. Newton managed to help push this shift, as he demonstrates his feminist beliefs in an appropriate way that women can appreciate, which shows that many men in the world do believe in gender equality. In relation to Helmut Newton, my project follows his values as I used techniques that would allow the females in my images to appear how I want them to: confident. I used low camera angles in many of the photographs, to allow the model to be viewed as a character that holds power and dominance, this is because the use of a low angle physically makes them appear bigger in the frame.In relation to Yayoi Kusama, my developing and editing aspect of my project is mainly inspired by her bold approach to photography. Although I did not have vibrant backdrops or even set ups of installations, I used Photoshop to add in pops of colour to create luminosity, which I think turned out successful. I believe my work illustrates clear themes of femininity, power roles and even identity through my different approaches to each shoot.

What would I have changed:

Overall, my project as a whole has been successful. I demonstrated understanding of my artist inspirations and linked them to the theme of union, whilst also incorporating originality. However, one of the main aspects that brought my project down is my editing skills as I am not as comfortable with Photoshop than I am with Lightroom. This limited my ability to edit my images effectively, with patterned backgrounds. This meant that all of my final images that I edited using Photoshop were plain, and arguably dull.

Another element within my project that I would change is my camera skills. Sometimes I am not careful enough with the camera settings, meaning some images were underexposed and some were overexposed etc. Therefore, this made my editing process a lot longer because I had to fix simple mistakes that could have been avoided.

Lastly, I would change the style of my first photoshoot and also carry out more photoshoots. If I had completed a few extra photoshoots in the time given, this would mean my final outcomes would vary a lot more, displaying different aspects of the themes. Also, my first photoshoot was an experiment photoshoot, where I did not yet have a clear enough idea on how my images resonated with the theme union etc. This meant that by not doing enough research ands analysis before photographing, my photoshoot appears random and perhaps irrelavent.

Overall, I enjoyed exploring the theme of union, what it means and different ways union can be seen in our daily lives. I decided to explore the idea of friendship as a form of union in my project and chose to focus on my two friends’ friendship which has lasted for 14 years and counting. I began by researching three different artists: Jose Ortiz, Hayley Warnham and Bobby Neel Adam’s whose work I believed linked to my idea quite well. For example, I found a image in the style of pictorialism by Jose Ortiz who depicted the same man walking at different points in time and combined all of these together. This sparked my idea of creating images where I would have an image of my friend standing by herself then surround her with images of her and her friend taken in the past at the same location; highlighting how much brighter and warm the world feels when she’s with her friend. I also tried to replicate this style of pictorialism seen in his image by adding a sepia tone over some of my images and adding shadows to the cut outs to make the lines more blurred and fantasy like. Overall, I like how my experiments came out however it doesn’t really replicate the work of Jose Ortiz that similarly as his piece only inspired an idea for my work loosely. Next, I looked at the work of Hayley Warnham who adds bold, bright colours to her grandads vintage photographs. I thought her work linked quite smoothly to an idea I had that I wanted to convey in my work about showing the effect their friendship has had one another; making their world brighter and better when they are in each other’s presence. I like how this idea came out as I managed to successfully replicate her work whilst still making it unique to my idea. I think the bright colours were successful in conveying the positive emotions associated with their friendship. Finally, I wanted to emphasise the strength and length of their friendship in my work which lead to me finding the artist Bobby Neel Adam’s who merges pictures of people now with pictures of them when they were younger. I decided to create multiple versions of this idea to create a visual narration of how long they have been friends for. I started by making images of my two friends separately and merging themselves with images of themselves as young children, I then merged two images of them as young children together, then finally I merged two images of them now together. However, when creating the image with two images of them merged together when they were younger, the merge between the two images didn’t look very smooth as one of my friends didn’t have any close up photographs of herself as a child and the one she did have was quite blurry, limiting what I could do with it. Therefore, I decided not to include this image in my final pieces but overall I think I was able to effectively convey the length of their friendship as I made clear comparisons between how they used to look when they first met one another to how they look now. One improvement I would make to my project is photographing different objects that represent their personality. Whether that be photographing their different likes and hobbies literally, or photographing things that represent their personality metaphorically (eg the sun for my friend who is always happy, loud and bubbly and the moon for my friend is more quiet and calm in nature), I think this would’ve added more depth into my project and explored who my friends are as individuals, which in turn helps to explore and understand their friendship further. I think this would also help highlight the beauty and rarity of their friendship as although their likes and dislikes differ, they are still best friends. 

My concept

My photobook will act as a Time Machine; taking you back in time to where my two friends first met each other. Throughout the photobook, I will be creating a journey that’s representative of the strength and length of their friendship. The beginning of the book will be focused around their friendship when they were in primary school and will include individual portrait images of themselves. This will then be followed by images of them in the present which will allow the viewer to see how although they may have evolved and changed overtime, their friendship has remained constant. 

The main message I want my photobook to portray is strength and beauty of friendship by showing the unique bond between my two friends. I hope to convey the idea of appreciating the people who choose to stay, who show up and who make time for each other even when life gets complicated. Their story is proof that friendship can still be maintained even as the individuals within it change. By looking at where their friendship started and where it stands today, I hope to remind people of the importance of holding onto these special people in a world that moves quickly and changes constantly. I am planning to add a variation of different layouts of images in my book such as having some single images fully spread out onto one page and then some pages where there’s 4 or more images on one side. I am also going to make my photobook portrait as this is how most of my images as oriented too and have a hard cover as it gives it a more professional and sleeker look.

Designing process

In order to make my photobook, I first imported all of my edits I had made on photoshop onto Lightroom then began narrowing down the ones I wanted to use by assigning them a white flag and the rest a black flag. I then created a new collection and called it photobook which I then dragged all the images I wanted to include in it. I then ensured my book was in a portrait orientation and saved it beforehand.

I wanted my photobook to tell a story of their friendship so I decided to have the first couple of pages of my book dedicated to images of them when they were younger. I experimented with different layouts and numbers of pictures but ultimately decided on a page which had 4 images together as I thought this replicated the photo albums in which they found these images. Additionally, this layout ensured that all of the images were quite small in size which was essential for making sure that they wouldn’t print out blurry/ of not good quality as they would’ve if they had been bigger due to the photographs being from a time where the camera quality on phones weren’t as advanced. I then decided to add my David Hockney inspired images that depicted their old primary school as I felt this linked in well to their childhood photographs. Next, I added in my images where I experimented with adding pictures of them now with pictures of them as small children as this was supposed to represent how much time has passed and how they’re still friends despite this. I then decided to add some more of my David Hockney inspired images but this time it involved images of their bedrooms now, both of which are significantly different and represent their opposing personalities. Finally, I ended my book with a variety of photographs of them in the present both together and individually. Once I had finished my layout of my images, I then decided to add a black boarder around some of them as some of the pages felt sparse. I then went onto the front cover of my book and picked out an image. I decided to use the same image as the last one in the back of the book as I thought it was a nice way to link the whole book and story together. Next, I experimented with making different short, simple titles for my book but ultimately decided on ’14 years’ as it is a bit vague and so the viewer has to actually look at the book to understand what it is about. I chose this title as this is the amount of years my two friends have been friends for and since the book is about their friendship from beginning to end, I thought it fit quite well.

Final photobook

Overall, I like how my photobook ‘14 years’ came out. I believe I was able to successfully convey the strength and value their friendship holds as I explored their friendship not only now but since they were younger too, through using pictures of them in primary school and pictures of them now, still close as ever. Additionally, I also like the layout of my photobook as it is not repetitive in nature. I ensured to use a variety page layouts throughout my book and not have the same layout more than twice in a row. I think this makes my photobook more interesting and exciting to look at as you can’t predict how the images will be laid out on the next page. Another thing I like about my photobook is the lack of writing in it. I think this is a positive thing as in my last photobook I had quite a lot of writing as I felt like it was necessary in order for people to understand what story I was trying to convey, but in this photobook I think my images and the order of them are effective in creating a story that does not need words to explain it, showing the quality of my images and clarity of my idea this time around. However, when looking over my photobook once I thought I had finished, I noticed I had some pictures of my friends now right after the images of them as children. I thought this didn’t fit the storyline as I wanted my book to act as a journey of their friendship starting from the beginning to the end and so I decided to move these pages further down to make my story more smooth. One improvement I would make to my photobook is adding more pages that only consist of one full sized image whether that be on a single page or a double page spread as I think it would help my book look less cluttered and read more smoothly. Additionally, I would have liked to use more raw studio photographs I had taken as it would’ve allowed me to show off my photography skills in taking studio portraits and adjusting things like lighting, as most of my images involve me using photoshop to manipulate them so you cannot really see the raw image behind it.