Sequencing

Sequencing has been a problem throughout, I originally just throwing my dummy books together. It was only after I did my final few sequences after I had finished shooting I really started thinking about it.

Because of the variety of images I had I thought it was better to have them in threes. I would start with a standard studio one followed by a location one, then finally I would finish with one of my high key idealistic portraits. Though I did use objects or double page portraits as breaks throughout the book. I started off with approximtly 64 photos that I thought counted an narrowing them down!! But I eventually after having to be cruel about my work cut them down to 30 Images in final that I was positive I wanted to use!

Left over photos.

I have had such a hard time trying to narrow down my photos for the photo book. I haven’t wanted to waste any of my work. If I could have done my book would have had 300 photos not 30… I have ended up with so many beautiful photos of Jess and some pretty comic ones. But no one wants to look at a book that long of the same face unless they know the person the books about.

I am planning to do something with my left over photos I want Jess to be able to have something to look back on. As I never realised how big this project really was until I looked at all the images I still have left over and barely glanced at twice. But I see this really has been such a big project that has taken so much to develop into the final stage that I am now at.

Putting my work on Instagram.

This was the first image of mine I chose to put on Instagram, I wanted to see how my work would be received. And I loved this image from the moment I took it. So I thought I have classmates who put their work on social media why can’t I! This piece to me wasn’t what you see on Instagram all the time so for that reason I thought I’d risk it. And I got a lot of likes not hundreds but enough to put confidence in to my work, I even got a good handful of additional followers which was nice. Felt my Instagram was getting a little more out there!

I think adding work my work to my Instagram did encourage me a bit more to go for it with my work. And that people want to see what I am doing or else why follow my page. It did give me confidence I desperately needed, I am the first one to admit I am often defeatist about my work and am the first one to pick faults. So doing this both got my work noticed and inspired me to be confident in the work I had created.

 

Balloons and bubbles for faces…

I want to look at the issues I had in my last shoot. As looking at the images I found some rather entertaining ones.

We had such a job with these balloon and bubbles, from trying to throw them just enough with out a hand entering the photo or just her face being taken over by one. We did have so much fun doing this shoot. With a lot of me telling my friend who was assisting to throw the balloons this way and that like you can control a balloon. To my sister getting a mouthful of bubbles and mid shot spitting out bubbles.

There was also the placement of the light, we had this sort of halo of colour and because my sister is quite tall I kept capturing the light in the back. Or she would hit her head of it when stepping to far back. As fun as we thought this shoot would be and it was fun! The nightmare with balloons falling not enough or in the wrong places and mouth full of bubbles while more pop on the lens! It really did have it’s laughs and I came away with some of my favourite shots.

Emma Watson and Vanity Fair

I want to write about this as the backlash it received blew me away…

I have been watching and reading the Harry Potter’s for as long as I can remember, Emma Watson was always an inspiration. I mean who wouldn’t want to look and like her!! So 2001 6year old me goes to see what at the time is the most magical thing I have ever seen excuse the pun.

And what amazes me is 16 years later we are in denial that Hermione Granger grew up. We are in a day in age where all we do is make kids grow quicker, put the toys down and pick up the IPhone. I am apparently part of the minority who found this Vanity Fair cover tasteful and artistic, not revealing and shame worthy. She is 26 now not 10! And the criticism she received on this was enormous. The belief of gone is little Miss Granger and she calls herself a feminist… Yes she outgrew her school uniform. She is one of few celebrities trying to make a change. Feeling comfortable and empowered by her body does not lose her these titles, it embodies them.

“It just always reveals to me how many misconceptions and what a misunderstanding there is about what feminism is, Feminism is about giving women choice. Feminism is not a stick with which to beat other women with. It’s about freedom, it’s about liberation, it’s about equality. I really don’t know what my t—s have to do with it.”

 

I could not agree more with what she has said, her views on equal pay have nothing to do with her breasts that are not even on show. How does it differ from the male celebrities we see shirtless all the time. Or the Kardashians and their constant no clothes plastic surgery look. Emma Watson is a perfect example of elegance and poise, and she showed this in a classy beautiful artistic way. With the smallest cleavage reveal since pre-Kardashian sex tape!

I for one respect her, she has grown and many of us grew with her and can appreciate that fact. Our generation should be more sad that the current generation will know her as Belle NOT Hermione!!

The final shoot part two.

After thinking I had done my final shoot I quickly realised that I had not. The shoot had not turned out how I planned, it just felt like a total disaster to me. I did have work I could use but I didn’t end on a note that I wanted too. So me and Jess decided we would fit another final shoot in!! Much to our amusement to have a final final shoot!

Before hand for some reason I was so nervous about this final part, I have in last few days started to realise that my degree is really coming to an end. So I was sad to see this particular session come to an end. Jess has grown so much in the time I have been shooting her, and we ended on a fun bright shoot in which she looked stunning.

Because of my worry over the shoot I thought it was best to make it as fun and light as possible. This work after all is turning into a celebration of the person we see growing in front of us.

I have used a lot of colour this year with her, but one thing I have not done is include props or gone bright. All the images have been almost voyeuristic in both pose and colour I found. So I though some light was needed to round it all off.

We used various things to get this look in the shoot:

• Ballons
• Bubbles
• Coloured gels
• excellent bubble blowing skills
• Not enough blue tac
• And A Jess…

W used a simple set up on of light on the back with a coloured gel on and then a beauty box on her. And because of some worry about printing these later in a good format we used the Nikon D800. I did not want anything to complicated just simple beautiful portrait with some light fun colours.

And I believe I got exactly what I asked for. I think this was a fun shoot to finish on and has wrapped up the work for Jess. She has done her part now in this project and now I need to bring it all together to finish this project for her.

Planning my last shoot…

Because my last shoot didn’t go as well as planned, I have decided to to another I did not want to have to shoot again. But this shoot I have decided I want to use it to add more images to my final photo book.

But this time I wanna change up the way I photograph her ideal side. Instead of the more body focused voyeuristic style to it, I wanna brighten the colours and do a genuinely pretty shoot. I want to make this shoot more fun and will be including props in this one as I haven’t done before in this project. I want to see if I can incorporate a fun side to the ideal, but only use a maximum of three images in the final edit.

I don’t feel anymore would work and am unsure if the last shoot will fit into the narrative I am trying to make. But either way I think if the shoot goes how I want to then I would like to use them as a final print for my work exhibition. I still want to be able to show her in a way that isn’t over sexualised, more beauty shots and vibrant colours.