JESSICA EVANS

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I got the photos back…eeeep! I’m so happy with how they turned out! For this shoot I used Portra 400 film (whereas the test for the test shoot I used Ultraplus 400)  because I had heard people rave about this film and how you just can never go wrong with it and I also used Ultraplus as well as a backup in case I didn’t like the Porta 400. As it turns out…I can’t really tell a difference!

Here are a few of my favourites from the shoot:

As I expected there are quite a few images with a stray finger included, and also plenty where the flash didn’t go off correctly, but I feel I combated that well by taking multiple of the same or similar shot. The only downside to this is the time it takes to wind the film in between each shot, so any of the spontaneous shots I took where the flash didn’t fire properly, unfortunately, were lost.

During the presentation, Rohan spoke briefly about maybe showing two photos on screen at the same time to ensure we have long enough to look at each photo, which is something I would really like to do, however, as I am largely creating this as an Instagram post, I feel that the screen will just be too small (as you may know Instagram posts are square and these frames are rectangular) to fit in two photos at a time. I think I will experiment with timing and find a balance between showing each photo for long enough with the rhythm of the song.

The final thing I would like to try is small animations that may add to the photos in some way. I’ve been researching out to make small scribble animations that I think could add to the videos quirky sense of nostalgia, however, am worried this might take away from the 3D effect the photos already have, so may end up just animating the title and leaving it there.

I had the shoot on the weekend, woohoo! Technically it was two shoots, I ended up shooting one couple at sunset on the Friday and the other two couples at night on Saturday. I ended up taking around 5 rolls of film which I know will be plenty, I just have a creeping suspicion that a few or many of the photos may not turn out because I’m not going to lie to you, there was alcohol involved. I know that’s not incredibly professional and in a lot of ways unwise, but I do genuinely feel it really helped everyone loosen up in front of the camera. Whilst everyone involved had agreed to everything prior to the night and was aware of everything involved I felt we were all very responsible and were able to enjoy the shoot in a more relaxed manner.

I am a little disappointed that one of the couples I was supposed to shoot fell through. Our schedules just didn’t seem to line up and it is something I wanted to be able to take my time with and not have the subjects feeling rushed or pressured, so I decided it may be for another time to shoot them. I know that three couples will be more than enough as I am only expecting to use a 60-90 second snippet from the song I chose and am therefore estimating to only need around 30 photos (10ish per couple) and I know I shot around 120ish photos on the weekend.

Overall, I’m feeling really good about how both the shoots went, particularly the sunset shoot. I’m really excited to see how the lighting turned out in that one. I wish I had some to show in this post today but I guess that’s the beauty of film photography, you just don’t know until you get them!

This week’s struggle is with music. As I had initially thought of this idea inspired by a song, I had my heart set on a specific song and felt as though my music choice would be an integral part of my project when it comes to mood and emotion. I’ve realised that it’s just not going to happen exactly the way I wanted it to, but that’s completely okay. I’ve taken a step back from my original idea and the project has kind of evolved into something even better than I could have hoped for. Rather than relying on a song to be the focal point of the assignment, I realised I should truly let the photographs shine and only have music as an aid to the photographs. With this sentiment I have been searching high and low for some amazing royalty-free music, I know they’re out there somewhere!

I found what I thought was the perfect song. I was looking for something lo-fi, warm, romantic, and nostalgic and this track “Holding Hands” By Janson Jones was perfect.

As he is quite a small artist I found on Soundcloud I decided to try my luck and ask for his permission to use it. To my surprise, he got back to me almost straight away and sounded just as excited for my project as I did. He too liked to experiment with 3D film so he was all on board and just asked that I credited his song appropriately. I was over the moon!

Unfortunately, it wasn’t too long after before I realised that even though I had his permission, licensing the song to be uploaded for Vimeo was just not something that would happen in time for submission, and so I decided to keep this song in my back pocket for another time.

And finally today, I came across THE song. “Always On My Mind” by Paper Twins on Epidemic Sound.

Whilst I knew this assignment was about so much more than the song, music inspires me every day to create and be productive, and I wanted this project to be perfect which is why I felt so strongly about the music selection. Whilst I know finding the right song can be a bit of a headache sometimes, it’s worth it to know that your work can be shared anywhere and to anyone without the worry of copyright strikes. The right song is out there, you just have to find it.

References

SoundCloud. 2020. Holding Hands. [online] Available at: <https://soundcloud.com/jansonjones/holding-hands> [Accessed 14 December 2020].

Epidemic Sound. 2020. Paper Twins Feat. Erik Fernholm – Always On My Mind. [online] Available at: <https://www.epidemicsound.com/track/TIXIdgQtKp/> [Accessed 14 December 2020].

This week in class we presented out pitches to Brian and Rohan for feedback. After having a test shoot last weekend to familiarise myself with the camera and film developing process I felt as though I finally had a clearer idea of what I wanted this project to be.

I was really happy with how these photos turned out and how quickly the developer was able to get the photos back to me. Practise shoot really gave me peace of mind as this is the first time I have ever experimented with film and, as I’m sure you know, there are plenty of things that could go wrong.

Reflecting on the actual shoot, I was really impressed with my subjects eagerness to participate, this made me feel a lot more comfortable taking their photos, they genuinely seemed as excited as I was which made the shoot even more fun. I was also really happy with the lighting. Even though I, unfortunately, don’t have any lighting equipment, I couldn’t believe how well the tiny flash on the camera did, even in the pitch black and I really like the way the flash looks too.

In terms of post-production, again I was really happy as I didn’t feel the need to edit the photos at all really, the film I used captured the vibrant colours, and I love the amount of grain on the images too. In the beginning, I was a little worried about the animating process as it seemed like quite an extensive amount of work per photograph. I discovered an app that made the process so much quicker, which I again was extremely happy with.

The only negative I realised from this shoot was how often the flash failed to go off, rendering that photo practically useless. To combat this I will ensure I have an abundance of extra film rolls in case this continues to happen, and also try using other sources of light too.

The final thing I noticed was just how easy it is to slip a tip of a finger into one of the frames as there are three lenses, whilst it doesn’t always completely spoil the photo, it does take away from the incredible 3D effect, which is something I will just need to be more aware of on the day of the shoot.

In today’s class, we discussed the term ‘expanded photography’ and looked at what some social media platforms, like Instagram, mean for photography as art. In today’s day and age, everyone has access to a camera, whether that’s their phone, point and shoot or a DSLR camera, AND, arguably most importantly, we all have the ability to share the photos we take instantaneously from one side of the globe to the other. Coming from a time when you need to purchase a camera, purchase film, load up your camera, get the photos developed, taking photos used to take a lot of time and a lot of money to create, not only that, sharing these photo required galleries or newspaper spreads which was unrealistic for most. This meant that not everyone, in fact very few people, had the ability to create photos and share them with others. Many photographers nowadays are concerned about what the advancements in technology and social media might mean for photography as an art form. The industry is saturated with amateur photographers, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but it does mean that the use of photography is evolving more and more every day into a means of being social. I believe that the term “art” can mean a vast variety of different things to different people, and while artistic photography is drowning in a world of eggs on toast and selfies, I believe there will always be a time, a place and an audience for artistic photography. “No amount of camera technology will turn a mediocre photographer into a great one, nor, in conceptual terms, will it transform a bad idea into a good one.” (O’Hagan, 2018).  I find myself dipping my toes in both pools of water as I’m sure many people these days do,  and I don’t think that detracts from photography as a means of art.

References
Sean O’Hagan (2018), ‘What next for photography in the age of Instagram’, The Guardian, 14 October.

Today in class we discussed narrative photography and looked into ‘“Reading” the Photobook’ by Gerry Badger. We talked a lot about the sequencing of photos and how we can be very deliberate with our choices in order to tell a story in the most compelling and logical way. I found this quite interesting as there are a million and one different ways to tell a story and I’m sure every single person would tell it slightly differently to the next person. I found this topic to be quite relevant to my own project, where I plan to create a collection of 3D photographs of couples and moments of affection and love. I haven’t yet completely decided on what form I’d like the collection to take. What inspired this topic for me was a song that I heard and connected to and in a perfect world I would love to create a music video for that song but that unfortunately just isn’t possible.

Whilst no matter the form of the project, the overarching message I hope will remain the same, and that’s simply to appreciate and celebrate the love that’s around us. I currently have two couples that are on board to be photographed but ideally, I will have three or four. Today’s class really got me thinking about sequencing. Assuming I will have three or four couples, I wonder what the best way to order the photos will be, whether that is couple by couple or maybe ‘like objects’ e.g kissing, hugging, etc. Whilst I think the latter option will demonstrate my overall theme, I’m concerned that placing the photos side by side may provoke the audience to draw comparisons between the couples which is not something I want to encourage at all. Love is love and should be celebrated not judged.

I really enjoyed creating these photos for this assignment! For this project, I decided to imitate a beautiful Belgian photographer I found on Instagram called Aneta Ivanova. I fell in love with the way she uses black and white photography layered upon silhouettes, I think it creates such a beautiful image and meaning.

When approaching this imitation assignment, I wanted to focus mainly on the shapes that Ivanova uses in her photograph. She creates beautifully rough and interesting edges with rooves and birds which is something I definitely wanted to carry over into my work also.

When setting out to take my landscape photographs I had a few places in mind and a few final products I wanted to achieve before heading out on my shoot but also found myself just wandering around looking through my lens to find any interesting shapes that I may not see with my naked eye which seemed to actually work the best in the end. I was pretty happy with my shoot and felt as though I had a wide variety of material to work with, and was very excited to head into the editing process.

When selecting and pairing my silhouettes and landscape photos together, I realised I had taken the photos with the subject (boats, buildings, flowers, etc) in the incorrect third, which rendered a majority of the photos I had taken useless. As you see above in the third photo, the houses are at the top of the image (back of the head) with the dead space down the bottom (towards the face). I really wanted to create the raw edge the Aneta created with those rooves, however, as I took my photos with the houses down the bottom of the image, it meant there wasn’t enough of the image left to fill out the rest of the space.

In spite of this issue, I still feel as though I was able to imitate the essence of her work and am very proud of the way my photographs turned out. I played around a lot with the opacity of the pair photos just to see what worked best which I think is what made the photos look the most like Aneta’s. When comparing mine and Aneta’s photos against each other, they are similar, however, I now notice how much she emphasises the expressions on her subject’s face, and it seems as though she edits the photos so that these expressions are highlighted. I feel in order to do this I would need to really plan ahead with the photos I’d like to take, including the shadows and the highlights, and also practise my photoshop skills a little more.

Something that is very important to me and that I carry with me throughout my life and into my work is to always look deeper within others and ourselves and I believe my photographs parallel that well. I want my work to inspire those who view it to look beyond the facade and find a deeper meaning that is unique and personal, that also encourages kindness, sensitivity and empathy.

“I don’t care what’s in your hair, I just want to know what’s on your mind.” – Twenty One Pilots, We Don’t Believe What’s On TV (2011)

During today’s class we looked into exploring lighting and how might we use it to create and capture different images. Having previously completed the Diploma of Screen and Media, I felt confident approaching todays task, little did I know just how difficult lighting can be without all the bells and whistles! Even though I didn’t have a perfect studio 3 point lighting set-up, I still had a lot of fun trying to be creative with the resources I had and felt as though I was able to achieve a lot with just a desk lamp and a bit of paper.

I really enjoyed taking a look at my classmates work from that exercise too, I was just amazed with out creative some people got and how professional some of their photographs looked, using things from around their room. It really inspired me to think more outside the box and make more use of my household items. If there’s one thing I realised in today’s class, it’s that you don’t need to spend thousands of dollars on equipment to take great photos. Whilst I regularly prefer to photograph with natural lighting, this week I learned how to better light a subject to help capture its features. I found I really liked how my “butterfly” lit photos looked the best.

My favourite student work from this week would have to be Alica’s. I absolutely love the way she utilised a piece of glitter paper to help reflect light, I think it created a really beautiful image. Her photos looked really proffesional, I thought, which goes to show how much you can achieve when you really set your mind to somthing.

References

Photos By Alicia (16/11/2020), https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1rSBfrBfxHPIlJ0JyifIf8IjGXxcTk5Fj