Family Assignment

Family

Artist Statement

When I have a camera in my hands, I feel really positive and happy with the thought of producing a good piece or body of work. Having an artistic flare I try to be creative with my images whether it is from the composition or the actual subject itself. I am very adventurous and I am willing to give anything a shot when it comes to photography, although, I aspire to become a great portrait photographer having the skills and confidence to create fantastic images and hopefully getting some of my work published. As well as portrait photography, I really enjoy wildlife photography. I think this is due to my great fascination with wildlife animals; capturing great shots within this category would give me an amazing sense of achievement.

As I am currently studying at college I am taking advantage of trying to experiment with the different fields of photography to find out which I am best suited to. When I get a good idea for a shoot I really focus and try to create that image as best as I can, for this, time alone (in quiet) is a must to think it through. In order to get good images I research other artists work and see what kind of shots of whatever it is I am shooting to gain the knowledge of what my competition is.

I am loving learning all these new skills within photography and watching my work progress so every now and then I look back from old too knew to see how my work is improving which gives me a great sense of achievement.

Definition of Family

For this assignment I am looking at the word Family in a different/creative way rather than it's obvious meaning of blood relations - parents/siblings etc. 

I see the word family as one of many meanings. I feel that an assembly of objects with common features could be known as a 'family of objects', for example, instruments all belong to different families i.e. brass family. Also, animals all belong to different families for instance you have, amphibians, reptiles, mammals, fish, birds and insects. These would also fall under genus which opens a vast meaning to the word family. From genus you can look into zoology, form, bacteria, biological science - biology, plants, liliospid, fungus and many more. 

Another example is exactitudes, from the work of photographer Ari Versluis, grouping together peoples dress codes which then brings categories of fashion into the meaning of family.

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Initial Ideas

Fashion Categories - Styles - Indie, Urban, Gothic, Classy, Emo, Punk... 

Clothing - Shoes - Vans, Converse, High-tops, Stilettos...

Science - Chemicals, Molecular Model,  Atom Structure, Elements, Cells, Bacteria, Science Laboratory Equipment, Flame, Water...

Animals - Horses, Dogs, Cats, Monkeys, Tigers, Lions, Donkeys, Giraffes, Goats, Cows, Sheep, Pigs...

I want to be really creative with my images making them colourful an maybe some abstract images too. 

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Research

Bernd and Hilla Becher

I find the work of Bernd and Hilla Becher inspiring because they took a typological approach to photography, documenting blast furnaces, cooling towers, gasometers, water towers, lime kilns, compressors, factory halls and head frames of mine shafts. They compose all of their images the same placing the building in the centre of the frame isolated from its enviroment. I think this works well when they categorise them into typologies as it clearly shows the similar characteristics and structure within the same type of buildings and structures. I like the concept of this work although I want my images to be more vibrant and more modern.
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Ari Versluis

 

I like these images as they show perfectly how I see the word family. I think that because he has photographed each exactitude in the same pose and composition, it strengthens that meaning and shows it more clearly. I am inspired by these images to create my own images using a studio because it clearly shows the story behind the image with no distractions in the background and maybe trying to position my objects in the same pose to emphasize my definition on the word family.
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First Shoot


Contact Sheets

For these images, I used a white backdrop and a flashgun with my camera set at 1/10 - 1/30 as I had some light from the window which kept changing and affecting my image, with a wide aperture of f4.5-f5.0 and my ISO set at 400. 

I was aiming to create a clean image which clearly showed my idea of a 'family of objects' in this case all being the same type of shoe without any background/foreground distractions. Inspired by my artist research I tried to photograph them in the same pose/composition although I wanted to add a little creativity to the images so I added a little twist to them. 

EDITS

 

I am really happy with the outcome of this shoot and feel that I have gained some really strong images. I think that with the shoes all being of the same kind and using the similar colours it really works with the idea I am going for. This is my favoured image from the shoot as I like the composition with the shoes being in size order and the use of the rule of thirds. As well as this image showing a family of shoes, if you look at it in more depth, it could also have a story of a family of mothers, sisters and/or friends. Although I am happy with this shoot, I really want to try and look into my biological science idea and try to explain that idea through images.

Experimental Idea

Image research
     

These are a few images I looked up to get the idea of what Bacteria cells look like under the microscope in order for me to create the correct look when doing my experimental shoot.
 
Contact Sheets 

To create these images I had my camera set to 1/30 with a wide aperture of f5.0 and the ISO at 400.

After completing this shoot and looking through my images, I decided that in order to gain the image I was aiming for I was going to have to use a filter in photoshop to give the image more of a realistic/professional touch. To edit my images, I gave them a really high contrast in Camera Raw so that they would work well with the filter that I wanted to use. I then opened the images into photoshop creating a curves layer and using a bas relief filter at around a 20-40% opacity. 

Edits

           

   
                                                

This is an experiment I did to try and create scientific images. I used ingredients that I had at home to attempt to represent a family of cells, bacteria and fungus as if you were looking at it through a microscope and was lucky to find some fungus in a plant pot lay on the top of the soil. As I have previously stated, I think this links with the word family as biological science - biology comes under genus and there are thousands of categories of bacteria's, cells fungus etc which all belong to different families.

Final Image

Evaluation

I have chosen this as my final image because I feel it holds more of a story behind the image. Also, I decided that with my images shown as a set rather than individually I feel that this helps to portray my definition of the word family, showing a family of images displaying families of bacteria, cells and fungus. I was inspired to use my images as a set rather than individually from looking at the work of Ari Versluis. During my shoot, I focused on making these images abstract in order to try and make them look more realistic. I think within these images, I have managed to represent at least 3-4 families as a whole, these being; blood cells, bacteria cells, fungus, and water. 

To make sure my images looked like I intended them to, I got a second opinion in which I was told, "The bottom right image looks like some fresh blood drying out, where as the top right image looks like a very small amount of red blood cells mixing with water." secondly, "The top left and middle centre and right images all look like some form of growth or fungus that's growing wildly." and also, "The bottom left image looks like water has been frozen in a state of movement or frozen where there has been bubbles of air still rising in the water."

 I think that going more into depth with the meaning of the word family for this assignment has worked really well especially in the short space of time we had to complete it. This assignment has made me realise that one word can have a vast amount of meanings; you just have to put the effort in to research it.