Date: Tuesday 15th March 2016
Camera: Canon EOS 450D
Editing Software: Photoshop CC 2014
Settings: F/11, ISO 200, 1/125
Plans For Shoot: My plan for today's shoot is to photograph a few different objects such as sanitary products that are under the category of gender. I will, however, focus specifically on women and one of the many inequalities that they face.
What I Hope to Achieve: I hopefully will achieve a few good quality photographs that I have composed in varying ways based around ideas like the grid composition or the golden ratio which I was unable to fulfil in me two previous photoshoots.
I would also like to photograph a series that is inspired by the artistic style of the photographer Phebe Schmidt, whose work implicitly to me suggests ideas about gender. For example, I would like to employ some of Schmidt's style which includes her use of bold colour backdrops that do no appear dull or patchy like the latest pink studio background.
Also, another hope of mine is that I can smooth out editing issues that arose in my last photoshoot with the pink background. When attempting to rectify the issue in editing the images appeared fine on the monitor but once printed again seemed too patchy and thus I wish to avoid this issue within this photoshoot.
Finally, my other wish is to create a series of photographs which challenge ideas surrounding gender among those who will see my work. Hopefully, the interpretations of my work will carry a strong political, social and cultural meaning varying between each individual due to their socialisation. I do also wish that my work will transcend the different social groups and find its meaning through the eyes of everyone therefore avoiding excluding anyone.
What I Actually Achieved: This is my third photoshoot and I had a few reservations about the studio lighting after the issues of last time but I feel it was more successful than the second photoshoot.
Firstly, I was able to try a variety of subject compositions and used my mind to create a grid. I did not use any guidelines on composition for this photoshoot due to time issue in a shared studio but in the final exam it is definitely something to consider.
Furthermore, I replicated my previous studio set-up in the style of Phebe Schmidt's by returning to the trusted baby blue hue backdrop. Most of Schmidt's work is on a pale pastel hues which I was able to match in the college studio. Although, I was unable to discover the lighting used by Schmidt, Armitage and Calypso and thus had to improvise. For this photoshoot there was a difference in the lighting not from the box lights but form outside uncontrollable sources which made the studio darker. Consequently, the backdrop, despite being there same pastel blue used for the first photoshoot, appeared too dull and would again be an issue unless dealt with in Photoshop.
Moreover, I was able to play with techniques on Photoshop as I used the previous tools such as the 'Vibrance' tool alongside the 'Hue/ Saturation' and had to dramatically change the 'Brightness/ Contrast' of the images in an attempt to save my work from the dark lighting. In future I will do test photographs and download them before finishing in the studio and running out of time to re-take the images.
When showing my final outcomes for this photoshoot to an audience the responses made about my work were around ideas such as: international inequalities, the capitalist patriarchal system that mostly benefits men, the beauty that is cohesive with the difficulty of being female/ having a uterus.
What I Am Going To Do Next/ Progression: The next photoshoot on my list to do is the male counterpart of this photoshoot which will be men's inequalities. To progress I will pay careful attention to the box lighting and the outside lighting and ensure that if outside factors changed the outcome of my work too much I may have to change lighting during a photoshoot to compensate.
Least and Favourite Image Evaluation -
Least Favourite:
Favourite:
The reasoning behind the above pictures being my favourite and least favourite are for a multitude of reasons.
My least favourite is so because the background is duller than the rest of the series and unintentionally there is a gradient in lighting from tonally dark to over exposed at the bottom. Also, the objects were placed in a way that way too central and did not conform to any compositional methods and therefore had too much blank space. The writing also needed to be made bolder in Photoshop which I failed to do up to the same standard of the second photograph.
The second photograph, however, is much better than the first for a multitude of reasons. The first reason being that the backdrop colour both before and after editing was brighter due to the lighting from the soft boxes. Also the use of various sanitary products relates the final outcome to a larger audience. The composition is better than the first image as well. The colour matching between products conform to stereotypical femininity and also makes the outcome more aesthetically pleasing.
Meaning -
Denotation: Feminine sanitary products, process of periods.
Connotation: The process of becoming a 'woman', the pain of having a uterus, patriarchal consumerist attitudes oppressing women, the natural process as connoted through the petals, the beauty within the pain due to the possibility of life.
Context: I wanted to display ideas that transcend not only British culture but also that of somewhere such as America where the tampon tax is a prevalent issue of debate. I also wanted to portray the role of capitalist patriarchy in establishing gender norms through socialisation institutes such as the media. I also did not want to directly relate this to a gender as I wanted to portray that various genders experience natures difficulties and that the marketing of these products for just women fails to include other groups such as trans people and others.
No comments:
Post a Comment