Category Archives: Projects

WEEK 8 – ASSIGNMENT 3 – STRANGERS AND STORIES

PHOTO ESSAY OF MIGUEL MIERELLES

 

Assigned to Taylor, we workshopped who would be best to interview and shoot for our photo essay. For Taylor, I suggested a friend of mine Adam Hoss Ayers who is a glass and steel sculptor and who I used last time for my Media 1 project profile and excellent for the visual aspect of this media.

Taylor suggested I photograph a family friend of his, Miguel Meirelles, at his antique/restoration shop in Malvern. I had an idea that I’d photograph Miguel in his workshop clothes, wood shavings curling around his feet as he worked on his latest creation. I thought I’d shoot him in black and white as to me this always looks more interesting and use a fish-eye lens for close ups. I wanted to capture the action of what he was doing and an essence of his character.

However, on the day that we had planned to shoot, Taylor hadn’t turned up to class, and so I didn’t borrow a fish eye lens thinking he wasn’t going to show (he did in the end).

At the antique shop, the first thing I saw was Miguel in his kitchen with his workers having coffee and a bit of lunch. It seemed this is where the energy, the centre of Miguel’s actions came from and I was intrigued to take a shot of this. Taylor, having more experience with DSLR cameras, helped me get the settings right, and we aimed for a dark, almost film-noir look.

I got some close ups of some of the antiques on sale and made sure I got some of the French signage as Miguel often travels to France to obtain new pieces for his showroom. Thankfully, Miguel quite accommodating and quite easy to talk to, regaling us with stories of his escape from Mozambique in the 1960s, his time in Europe and finding his love for restoring antique furniture.

 

At some point, a middle-aged couple from Adelaide came in and started talking about new pieces they wanted. Miguel was, of course, relaxed and friendly with them and I sensed they trusted his judgment. I asked him how he coped with the competition on the street (there are at least five other antique shops in the vicinity) and he said that there is no competition if you have the right product.

While Miguel was a natural bon vivant, I also could tell he had a hard- nosed business sense and this seemed etched into his face. I think I saw this as he was walking back into the workshop while the Adelaide couple were in the showroom.

 

The last shot of him selling the table seems so natural that I could tell he just loved what he did.

 

In Lightroom I didn’t do that much to the photos other than adding the vignette feature, darkening  or cropping where I felt it was necessary to emphasise an aspect or lead the viewer to the suggested subject. eg. The first shot of the chair in the kitchen.

What I liked about this project was working with Taylor as he’s quite affable and helpful and meeting Miguel who imbued a passion for life.  It was also interesting that Miguel and I had some things in common like he knew a friend of mine Nicholas Dattner who had a furniture shop a while back in Collingwood, as well as sharing stories of our travels to Africa. There was, in the end, a great swapping of stories.

WEEK 4 – MIMESIS – PROJECT 2

One of the greatest challenges of mimicking photo journalist, Steve McCurry, is the sheer brilliance of them. Each photo captures the right moment, the right place, the right time, the right light, the extraordinary colours and the right story. They are picture perfect. Too perfect as some have said. This has been shown in his blatant removing of people in shots or placing in different people in the background of his shots.

They are picture perfect. Too perfect as some have said. This has been shown in his blatant removing of people in shots or placing in different people in the background of his shots.

Too perfect, as some have said. This has been shown in his blatant removing of people in shots or placing in different people in the background of his shots.

Apart from this, I didn’t quite have the budget nor the time to fly off to exotic locations or wars to cover. So, I had to make do what was at hand. At first, I thought I’d directly mimic McCurry’s work in some of my test shots using my daughter as the Afghan Girl:

 

As you can see, this didn’t quite work! So, rather than directly mimic McCurry I thought I’d aim for the essence of his work which for me would be trying to encapsulate a story my photos – ‘The Extraordinary in the Ordinary’.  I would also focus on using a deep focus and lower shutter speed to get a sense of depth. I would also choose vibrant backgrounds that McCurry is famous for using Melbourne locations. I chose Coburg Mall and  Degraves Street and Central Place, the former for its multicultural mix and the latter or its graffiti. Furthermore, the subjects had to be ‘gritty characters’ or ‘the average person’ which McCurry uses quite often.

The Five Images

After shooting 125 images, it came down to these five:.

Ghost in the skull

I came across this woman who I thought was at first homeless but as I watched she seemed to be seriously drug affected. I chose her as my subject mainly because where she was sitting. It’s vibrant yet the picture to her left is somewhat a foreboding future for her  – a skull. I was going to use another shot of her which included a sign advertising crepes next to a cafe but the light of that sign was too distracting and didn’t balance the shot.

I shot this at 1/5, F-5.6, ISO 100.  It was a rainy day and I couldn’t get the F-Stop further up. I should’ve taken a tripod or upped the  ISO. In post I increased the exposure and cropped it which is always challenging as cropping can totally change the flow of the eye.

The Dirty One

The Dirty Dozen DogThis was purely accidental this shot of the dog. It immediately reminded me of McCurry’s Dog in a Monsoon:

Alas, I didn’t have a white background to silhouette my dog subject. Anyway, I did have the sign ‘The Diry Dozen’ juxtaposed with the dog which is amusing.

I tried playing with the colour saturation in photoshop but it looked too surreal and instead increased the exposure and cropped the shot. I found by cropping this too much ruined the vulnerability of the subject. Camera set at ISO 400, 1/30, F-4.

Subway Hawk

I chose this shot because I like the light coming down the stairs and the woman to the right is actually in a barbers shop. I like the starkness as it suggests that the lady is here all day by herself, her only link to the outside is a landline phone.  She’s also covering her face which could suggest two things: she didn’t want her photo taken or she’s hiding from something. It also reminds me of the Ed Hooper painting, Nighthawks. Something art deco about it.

The camera was set at ISO 400, 1/20, 6.3 and in post I cropped and adjusted the exposure levels.

Three Wise Monkeys

What I liked about this shot is that the three ticket machines almost seem to be characters themselves. The arrows are pointing in one direction to a no entry signal. Almost like Monkey See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil. I shot this at 400 ISO, 1/20, F-6.30. I like the greeny tinge to the image here. For some strange reason, one of the green arrows was in reverse and on the man in red in the background. I had to clone out the green arrow in photoshop. I also cropped and adjusted the exposure. I guess I could’ve cloned out the people in the background to give this more dramatic effect, in retrospect. After rall, this is what McCurry does! I could’ve also waited and then used a flash on the man in red but it wasn’t until I looked at this at home did I think of this.

You’re always being watched! The Hiding Eye in the Rainbow

Here I was trying to tell a story of a chef taking a break in the alleyway and checking his phone. By choosing to have the eye in the shot (I had originally had just the chef cropped in the doorways only) suggests that he is being watched while he is on his break. I love the vibrant colours that fill most of the shot, then curve into this washed out dark grey. Great contrast. I had the camera set at ISO 400, 1/60, F6.3 and played around with cropping and exposure levels. Below was an alternative shot but it just didn’t quite work as well as the one above. The eye is not connected to the subject as much as the previous image.

Conclusion

While I set out to capture human stories and The Extraordinary in the Ordinary, I didn’t quite get what I wanted. In Coburg, by the time I got there on my shoot day, most of the restaurants were closing up and there was barely any life to shoot.. Also, people these days are always looking down at their phones so it can be quite hard to get an unguarded moment from them or one that is at least interesting.
Where I did succeed is getting some amazing colours contrasted with the greyness of the city. In addition, this exercise helped me brush up my skills and learn DSLR camera which I knew nothing about previously.

Other shots I considered:

WEEK 2 – Outside prac and favourite photographer

The Prac – Outside on the street with DSLR

Though I’ve had some experience with photography, mainly with a compact when travelling and the ubiquitous iphone, I have never used a DSLR. So this week it has been a learning curve understanding the camera terminology such as F-stops (higher the number, the greater depth of field; the lower the number, the shallow depth of field), ISO and aperture speeds. The last two I’m more familiar with, especially using analog cameras where you simply focused on the speed of the film (usually 100 ISO).

Experimenting with the DSLR around the city was more pleasurable than I thought as I was able to get some shots that I thought were at least reasonable.

I like the first one here with its bold pink in contrast to the dark framing.  Also, the chair in the foreground leads you in. I call it “Flamingo Noir”. Mmm. Have I invented a new genre?

Pink Flamingoes

 

 

 

 

 

Cross Out

I seem to have, rather accidentally, found a use of shadows formed off buildings. I was trying to develop a way of guiding the viewer into the image. For example, this one below. It’s a little over exposed but I feel like I’m walking into the frame.

FAVOURITE PHOTOGRAPHER

I chose Steve McCurry because like many people I was taken by the iconic and arresting portrait of the  Afghani girl in a refugee during the Afghani War. There is something haunting and accusatory in

the young girl’s eyes. I’d never seen anything quite like it.

It wasn’t after I was perusing in a bookshop that I saw some more of McCurry’s work and I ended up buying his Monsoon series which focused on Asia and Australia.

But what I really loved about McCurry’s work was the way he was able to not only achieve these brilliant and vibrant colours but draw you in with the subject matter through framing the subject with something juxtaposed in the background.

Take for example the photo below. The train, a symbol of progress and modernity (by Indian standards – the shot was 1974), cuts through the frame with the ancient Taj Mahal in the background. The men seem quite at home on something that is not from their culture and perhaps McCurry is trying to say that India has always been a country happy with change while keeping its culture in tact.

In fact, McCurry’s photography inspired me to go to India,  and I ended up going to Jodhpur, the ‘Blue City’ (below).

Alas, it wasn’t as blue as it is here in this photograph. Clearly, McCurry had used filters and has admitted to Photoshopping his images – a crime surely against photojournalist orthodoxy.

Thus, he’s had to redefine himself more as a storyteller rather than that of a photojournalist. In any case, I think he has made some fantastic choices and has a keen sense of what holds the gaze of the viewer and the subject’s story.

 

 

      

 

 

PROJECT 4 REFLECTION

What do you consider to be the most successful and problematic aspects of the submitted work?

One of the successful aspects of this project was finding clarity or as Samuel Beckett once said, ‘To find a form that accommodates the mess, that is the task of the artist now’. Our project was on audience – a rather nebulous label – and once we indentified three aspects of it (online fandom, event fandom and trolling) our project became relatively easy and we assigned each one of these aspects to each other to investigate.
Originally, we had agreed to cover cosplayers but as no events were within our project time and cosplayers were hard to get hold of, it was becoming obvious we might have to change tact. Fortunately, a Doctor Who fan event, The Whoniverse, came up which not only provided a rich source of material such as cosplayers to interview but also a plethora of academic papers on Doctor Who fandom as well as an active online community.

The only downside was that due to the short notice of the event, neither Georgia nor Grace could help film. Therefore, I was left to operate the camera and interview on my own and you can see that the camera work isn’t the best as I try to engage and keep an eye on the viewfinder. Having said that, I still really enjoyed the day, as the camera allowed access to people that normally wouldn’t be available to me. Also, working alone allowed me to move independently and make decisions quickly.

Once I had the footage, the difficult part was of course making it into a cohesive piece – difficult as I had over 50 minutes. Even though I had prepared questions I often deviated and didn’t always ask the same question I’d asked other interviewees. This reduced the likelihood of consistency and so by using voiceovers (the most difficult part of the process due to my awful acting ability) I was able to create a cohesive through-line.

However, in regards to producing a uniform work for the whole project I am not sure we achieved this. This is not entirely the collaboration at fault here but bad timing with the event and our own commitments. Thus, the videos for each of our aspects of fandom are quite different in form, tone and style to each other. Likewise, the text on the Tumblr website does not connect as well as it could. We could’ve allocated someone to produce the text but that would’ve been an enormous undertaking for one individual even with research provided for them.

What you learnt in the making process about collaboration that might be relevant to your broader development as a media practitioner?

I’ve collaborated on numerous projects before whether that be writing a script with a friend (never again!), small films or theatre pieces. In short, it’s not easy. Creative differences, expectations and sheer personality clashes can make a collaboration…not a collaboration!
Having said that, I am happy to say that the Project 4 collaboration was a relative success – relative in terms that there were no disputes. Both Grace and Georgia were wonderful to work with and I think that comes down to their well-balanced personalities and eagerness to do a good job. I do have a tendency to take over (wouldn’t say dominate!) and I’ve learnt over the years to keep this in check by framing my language with, ‘As a suggestion, how about this…?’ Even when I pushed for our group to do a documentary as our sole media artefact and they responded less than enthusiastically, I conceded that I was out voted and acquiesced to a webpage that incorporated visual and textual elements.
In the end, we worked to each others’ strengths: Georgia was good at film editing and resourcing while Grace was good at writing and putting the Tumblr account together. I was able to provide numerous papers on the subject and provide the raw film footage. If we were to do another project together, now knowing each others strengths, I think we would be able to formulate a more cohesive piece.

Looking more broadly as a media practitioner, this experience has taught me that I am flexible, I can work independently if I need to and that collaborating invites different points of view as well as experiences. It is, to conclude, a diverse and satisfying media experience and I may see myself making similar and larger documentaries in the future.

PROJECT 3 – Portrait of Adam Hoss Ayres

PROJECT 3 PORTRAIT OF ADAM HOSS AYRES 

 

Reflection

What stands out for me was finding, after shooting 47 minutes of footage, a theme that greatly helped to simplify the story of Adam Hoss Ayres: glass.

The beauty of his glass creations made him cry with joy but, as we discovered later, there was also a connection to great pain. He began his relationship with his stepfather with glass and ended it by trying to break glass. None of this had occurred to him before and it was a privilege to help him find that. So, the human element, finding, in a sense, closure, is the thing I like the most about this piece.

Visually, which is not always my strong suit, I think the singular framing of Adam is vibrant and colourful while motifs such as the fractured dissolves add texture and fit with unifying theme. The use of Adam’s music gives greater depth and meaning to the work, as it becomes more frenetic and louder thus matching his turbulent family life.

What was difficult was not getting distracted by other possibilities. For example, I had a quote from Adam’s website from Pablo Picasso: ‘I am constantly doing things that I can’t, that is how I do them.’ I was going to show how Hoss has expanded his craft by living this aphorism but in the end, it jarred with the unifying theme. Furthermore, making choices about found footage was perhaps the most perplexing of all: what was copyrighted, what was not, what I could use and could not. It was a conundrum. Fortunately, I found footage from a Roger Corman film which, though comically, extrapolated on Adam’s broken childhood.

Next time, I might experiment with more visual elements, perhaps a more disjointed style, as I think this piece is somewhat conventional. I also discovered a website (http://nofilmschool.com/2014/08/what-i-learned-after-interviews-first-documentary) about how to formulate questions like avoiding closed questions or getting the subject to repeat the question in their answer. These tools are just some of things I’ve learnt in expanding my practice.

 

 

PROJECT 2 – Self Portrait

Russell McGilton

Fear and Love

Russell McGilton PROJECT 2 RMIT MEDIA 1 from Russell on Vimeo.

In my self-portrait, I wanted to focus on the two things that are my greatest concern: my five-year-old’s well-being and my own. I hoped that this aspect of my project would reveal my vulnerability and thus show a part of me.

While becoming a father has been the most profound experience of my life it has, unfortunately, turned me into a worry machine! The unpredictability of what a child will do, that everything is a game to them, and will, without one thought of the consequences, do something that sets me off into a panic.

As much as this is true, I did, on the way, forget my own safety. Without ‘thinking of the consequences’ I was hit by a tram. My daughter’s response floored me: ‘How are you going to protect me daddy if you’re gone?’

So here, in my film, I wanted to show my on going anxiety, that the ‘adult playground’ is in fact not really for people at all and it is something I have to negotiate every day.

In terms of editing, I was inspired by the Kuleshov Effect montage by creating a repetition of the single portrait shot, and have tried, in part, to convey what seems disjointed visuals, but are in fact connected in a I kind of ‘alchemy’ to quote Scott McCloud (Blood in the Gutter). The text sutures these seemingly unconnected images and I think, even without text you would be able to ascertain a unifying meaning – anxiety over a child. You can see this with the rapid foot shaking, the clawed hands, the rapid cuts and the sound which increases with dramatic intensity towards the end.

Overall, I think I achieved what I set out to communicate. I think you get a sense very early on that it’s the perspective of myself as a father and my anxieties of the urban world for my child and myself.

On the other hand, perhaps I could’ve shown more fun aspects of fatherhood to give a sense of contrast but I let myself be dominated by the sound clips. In fact, sound has really told the narrative here – first it’s slow, then atmospheric and then mechanical and frenetic. I suspect, as I’m somewhat new to this kind of film making, have been led by the material rather than leading it.

 

 

REFLECTION – PROJECT 1

This was much more difficult than I though it was going to be. Once the ‘selfie’ format had been ruled out it was down to examining myself. So I came up with elements of my life that have and are important to me: travel, adventure, theatre, love and family. I think you can get a good snapshot of who I am.

PROJECT 1 [Media Self Portrait]

The Importance of Feeling Earnest – The Evolution of Self

Adventure

Bibi-Ka-Maqbara with bike close up

When I was younger, I didn’t cope well with routine. An uncluttered, unpredictable and unplanned life was what I wanted. Cycle touring was a conduit for having an authentic connection with people. This photo conveys a sense of independence, a starkness but also a remoteness, a choice to cut off from others.  Yet, contradictorily, I strove for company and attention where ever I could find it.

 

Love

img015-3

I’d fallen head over heels for Rebecca before I left overseas.  Instead of imagined joys balmy India nights sipping gin and tonics  it was extraordinarily hot and the traffic was horrific. Eventually, after four months cycling and fighting, fighting and cycling, we went our separate ways. The sign in the image became an ironic reminder of what lay ahead.

 

Ambition

bombay to beijing side poster

I set myself the task of  writing a book ‘Bombay to Beijing by Bicycle’ at all costs – even relationships.  The book was published, a major achievement for me. More so,  was doing the one-show which I took to Edinburgh Festival.  For a sense of contrast,  I put my car keys in the shot. The cup and pen shows that I’m thinking of more shows to put on.

 

The Return

13032015074

Now, I’m not saying I’m like Bourke and Wills –  get lost, eat your camels and die (do you think they choked on a hump?) but I do relate to their quixotic project.  I often bite off more than I can chew and don’t always arrive at the destination I want to get to. I like this image of  Bourke, peering towards the light behind the Nicholas building, as if he is still searching, never satisfied no matter where he is.  Alas, a lot like myself.

5. Pepper Pigged

I’d always put off having a family for as long as possible.   I’ve included my daughter in my self portrait to show the arc in my life from independence to being someone with a dependent.  Also, she is a part of me and I am part of her – her silliness is mine. Or is that the other way around?

 

Daily Rituals

Coffee.  It’s a daily ritual for many of us. I chose this because this is what my life has become – regular, routine, mundane and something I apparently need before I begin the day. I like the way I’ve film this – coffee front and centre, leading the way, me chasing after it, completely addicted.

 

Rejuvenation

 

We bought a house recently and my partner and I, are a building a deck. Renovating seems to be the ‘normal’ thing that forty-something people do and is often a point of conversation.  I’m a little embarrassed talking about it. But there it is.  A pile of life, one shovel at a time.

 

Bamp!…Bamp!

I was watching a red-mohawked emcee try to whip an audience into a frenzy at the Brunswick Festival. I related to it having emceed before and struggling to overcome the inertia of a not-so-participant crowd. I could feel his pain.