I decided to stick to the theme ‘social media is addictive’ basing my project off one of the pieces I did for assessment two, I really dove into the psychological research behind the addiction and found it so fascinating, because I find my self and so many people around me obsessed with online activity. It got my creativity flowing so I’m really excited to dig deeper into the topic.

The main themes that flourished from that piece were addiction, isolation, narcissism, obsession, delusion and self-worth. People feed these negative issues through social media with out fully realising due to the easy accessibility of the Internet and social media platforms. It’s quite scary how immersed humans can become in the online digital world becoming fixated on their representation or focusing so much energy while scrolling through a feed.

Through discussion with classmates we started to exchange ideas, the main reoccurring point coming up was that we constantly find ourselves lost in our phones looking at other people’s lives. This string of ideas brought me to combining old and new media to create a pin board of instant photos of people in certain environments glued to their phones. They ignore what is right in front of them, whether that is friends and family or homework. I want to catch a moment through a traditional medium that doesn’t give people the privilege of reviewing, editing, commenting on or posting of any type. With an instant picture, you have to take your time to compose your shot and after it’s taken it’s done. You have to wait until its time to develop the film, moving on to the next shot. There is a raw sense of imperfection because you hold the moment dear to your mind and the picture stays the way it is after being developed, no alterations or online judgement.

The new media element I want to include is the posts people have made on social media, whether that’s a status on Facebook or a picture on Instagram. I will print and pin them next to the instant photos to highlight what they perceive their life to be; yet they are just present on their device. I will also use yarn or string to show the connection of peoples lives, explaining the almost stalker mentality we have created using social media to view everyone’s lives so intimately.

The final piece will appear to look like a crime board, showcasing a string of stories all linking a web of social media addicts to represent the various types of users that are found abusing digital media. I definitely think that we do become un-healthily addicted to social media and I want to learn more about it to become self aware of how I’m using these platforms as well as informing the people around me.

I’ve started to take photos and it’s harder than it seems to get the perfect picture you want with a disposable camera, I’m pretty sure I’ve gotten 2 shots I want out of 5 with my film.