This is my major project plan on my photographic project: Photography and Mortality. I created this on Visme as infographic.
Thursday, 31 October 2024
Wednesday, 30 October 2024
Project Plan: Photography & Death
I created this plan on Visme using an infographic template. To create a visual timeline for my project.
Creating Website: About Page
Zoe’s Bio
Zoe began life in the flatlands of the fens, in school she lived in the black box and performed, wrote and directed plays. Once she escaped at 16 and flew away to Germany, she knew she had to keep creating by any means. Zoe fell in love with the camera from an early age, and still considers it a magic box. Zoe has kept the first photograph she ever took (a blurry Christmas Tree), when her father gave her a camera aged seven. Zoe’s photography, writing and films explore themes of womanhood, feminism, the strange and surprising. Zoe now lives in a high tower in Leicester looking down on the ravaged city, considering her disappearance into the final frame.
Zoe also teaches art, design, and media at DMU International College. Zoe has a first degree in English and Media She also achieved an MA with Distinction in Creative Media Arts (Photography) from the London South Bank University. Zoe's film 'Let's Eat Hair' was shown at the Phoenix Cinema in Leicester.
I created this About Page I will change the image and redesign later however this gives me a good idea of how it will look.
I have checked my mobile view on my About Page and I just needed to reposition the image from the bottom to the top so I just used the move too to do this. I then clicked on the text and used the text size buttons to reduce the size of my text so that it was smaller as it was the mobile view.
This seems to work quite well and I thought was consistent with the page design. I also checked the mobile view
This did not need adjustment and again works well with this page, so for the moment I am happy with this.
Monday, 28 October 2024
Creating a Website: Art & Photography
Today I am starting to make my website on Wix. This will be in my 'progression' route art and photography.
I began by choosing a website template that I thought would work in structure for my work.
I changed the navigation(menu) bar and customised this by clicking on the bar and then clicking on the design icon changed the font size, changed it it bold and chose the font I would use throughout the website. I then went to 'manage menu' and I clicked on the Home page and in the drop down box I clicked on 'show on menu'.
I then changed the position of the title and subtitle by using the move tool and dragged this to the Header so that i could be seen on each page. I then double clicked on the title and changed the font to 'Palatino Linotype' at 74pts. I also made this bold. The subtitle was in the same font at 46pts.
I then centred all the text and the navigation bar - I may change this later depending on how my design looks when I have added the image.
I then uploaded my own image onto the site files. I did this by clicking on 'image' and 'upload image'. I then went to teh site files and edited it so I had a black and white copy in case I decide to use a black and white image on my home page.
I then right clicked on the background and changed the background image from my site files. I then went o the header and changed the colour on the header by clicking on 'change' background' and colour and I chose an appropriate colour from the color palette.
I went to the footer and changed ten colour to match the header by right clicking and then clicking on 'change background' and 'colour' I then used the colour that had saved from the colour palette. I then clicked on the copyright text and changed to my name and edited the font to Palatino Linotype and the correct year.
I have saved all my changed by clicking on the save button in the right hand top corner and then I have previewed the site to check all ages are working and everything is appearing correctly. There was an issue with my footer not appearing on each page so I right clicked on the footer and went to the 'show on all pages' button'. Once this was completed I saved again and then previewed for a final check.
I will be continuing to post my progress on creating my website through the term.
While I was thinking about how to improve my homepage I added a quotation by Susan Sontag which I think compliments my work that I intend to put on here.
I am now going to look and edit my mobile view. I will start with my homepage. This is how it looks when I started
I edited the image in the Wix editor to create a portrait image. I the tried to add this as background by changing the background and there were issues with this so I will come back to the image.
I changed the header items by going into the left hand side menu and checked through the buttons and settings to check everything was where it should be and nothing was hidden. I then clicked on the text and adjusted the alignment and adjusted the size and positioning to ensure that the text was correct on the header which will show on each page.
I then saved and previewed this to check that it worked correctly. I then found a work around the image problem by just adding the image over the top and then rearranging the positioning of the writing by right clicking and clicking on 'arrange' and bring to front' in the drop down box.
I will see if I can find a better solution to this but for now this is okay.
Wednesday, 23 October 2024
Game/Concept Art Example of Ideas
In this post, I will discuss my ideas for my Game/Concept Art Project. I have been thinking about the concept of transformation and I have been looking at artists and designers' work that will help me explore this concept.
I have been looking at Yoshitaka Amono and his work. I am particularly interested in examining this as Amano; 'is a Japanese artist, character designer, illustrator and a theater and film scenic designer and costume designer.' (Amano, 2024). The image below is a take on David' Bowie's Thin White Duke, Bowie here has been transformed into an anime character. This was based on a story by Neil Gaiman set in futuristic New York.
The image here also reminded me somewhat of Edvard Munch's Madonna, the swirling universe and the figures of woman. Going back to my original thoughts that I would like to explore some kind of transformation I like these different versions of the same image and I am interested how things are changed or interpreted over time. Maybe the character creation here is one character but different versions of themselves just like the Thin White Duke was just one of David Bowie's many characters.
Through this process, I may create one character who has many identities and then these characters could inhibit a story or a game. I will be thinking about this further and creating some test characters to see if this idea will work.
References
Amano, Y. (2024). YOSHITAKA AMANO. [online] YOSHITAKA AMANO. Available at: https://www.yoshitakaamano.com/ [Accessed 22 Oct. 2024].
Barder, O. (2016). That Time When Yoshitaka Amano Painted David Bowie. Forbes. [online] 12 Jan. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/olliebarder/2016/01/12/that-time-when-yoshitaka-amano-painted-david-bowie/ [Accessed 23 Oct. 2024].
Zoryasch, F. (2016). ‘The Return of the Thin White Duke’ - Amano’s tribute to David Bowie. [online] Eyesonff.com. Available at: http://home.eyesonff.com/showthread.php/165501-The-Return-of-the-Thin-White-Duke-Amano-s-tribute-to-David-Bowie [Accessed 23 Oct. 2024].
Sunday, 20 October 2024
Mikiko Hara: The Fleeting Moment
I will begin my research with Mikiko Hara, mainly as I have not investigated her work previously and I very much want to photograph objects and things within my project. Hara uses a German-made Ikonta from the 1930s and as I am using film photography through the Polaroid I felt an affinity to this artist. The images Hara takes are in snapshot style; 'She [Hara] photographs the nonchalant figures of fleeting passersby, as well as the landscapes and material things that emerge and disappear before her eyes wherever she goes' (IBASHO, 2024) The idea of fleeting moments, things, objects, people are important and made more so by their capture. The image below of a room, too small and containing the three young men, reminds me somewhat of a frame by Bill Brandt with a Miner and his wife at a table. Their whole life was in the frame and here these young men's life surrounds them in this small space where they live and eat and sleep. They are packed into the frame and the gentle light makes these; 'intriguing images are printed from colour negatives made with a classic camera originally designed for monochrome films, adding a distinctively soft tonality and texture.' (Yoshinaga, 2024). The softness is in contrast to the chaos of the small space, the young man sleeping looks as if he passed out uncomfortably exhausted in this odd position while the other young men one dressing, the other eating pay no mind to each other clearly used to this existence, maybe thinking that this will not be forever. However, now in this image, it is for eternity.
In this next image by Hara from the series 'Small Myths' (2022) Hara captured passerbys and things without the awareness of the subjects, her camera hidden, 'Yet, these portraits reveal something infinitely personal, as if the photographer and her subjects were bound by an invisible pact' (IBASHO, 2024) It can seem like that in the image as if the image were meant to exist. The image below of the boy standing by the bed, looks ghostly, angelic and so still as if asleep. I remember my own child when he was very young and could not sleep or had a bad dream just standing by my bed in this way (used scare me so much, to awake to find him just standing there). Again the soft colours and gentle light are present and in the frame the domestic environment seems to hold the boy in place within the frame.
Soto states of Small Myths that; 'Hara’s personal vision full of authenticity and intimacy is established throughout a lively sequence of pictures, regardless of whether they were taken in her living room or the streets of Japan.' (Soto, 2023) and this is certainly true it does feel as if by looking at these images we are intruding in a personal moment, even in the image below of the pear, it feels intimate and personal. Small Myths is work made over two and a half decades (Colberg, 2023) Colberg argues that Hara' photography; 'is based on connecting with things and people, on being in and with the world — and not on extracting pictures.' (Colberg, 2023) I think this is important as pictures that are good come from an understading a connection to teh subject in some way and taht is what I am hoping to achieve in my own work.
I am unsure what I will photograph, I have ideas and thoughts but nothing concrete and with this in mind I took a few practice shots, I thought that they were overexposed and I have not quite understood the idiosyncrasies of the camera yet (all cameras have their quirks!) The practice shots here are just called 'Sunday Morning' these were shot using the manual polaroid with I-Type black and white film. I used settings of F16, 1/125 and I adjusted the exposure compensation. I used a tripod and the self-timer function
'Magic'
In this first image I liked it that the only thing that was clear was the word 'magic' across my t-shirt
'Pensivity'
Here the pose worked and the framing, I will work more on this image, I may shoot this again in colour thinking of Hara with the soft tones and gentle lighting
'Day Slumber'
I liked the colour tones here and I may work more in colour as it is a very soft look. I like it that I am overexposed on one side, as if I am disappearing.
I will experiment further with my own images and I particularly like the idea of working with the tonality of the colour film and will try to explore this further.
References
Colberg, J.M. (2023). Small Myths. [online] Conscientious Photography Magazine. Available at: https://cphmag.com/small-myths/ [Accessed 20 Oct. 2024].
IBASHO. (2024). Mikiko Hara - Series. [online] Available at: https://ibashogallery.com/artists/46-mikiko-hara/ [Accessed 20 Oct. 2024].
Soto, A. (2023). Mikiko Hara - Small Myths. [online] c4 journal. Available at: https://c4journal.com/mikiko-hara-small-myths/ [Accessed 20 Oct. 2024].
Yoshinaga, M. (2024). Mikiko Hara - Photography Artist. [online] Miyako Yoshinaga. Available at: https://miyakoyoshinaga.com/artists/mikiko-hara/overview/ [Accessed 20 Oct. 2024].
Project Sign Off: Mortality & The Photograph
I have now finalised my project and this, in my case, has been signed off by me! Below is an image from Karen Knorr who also uses Photographs and Text. Below is from 'Gentlemen'; 'The photographic works Gentlemen (1981-1983), photographed in English gentlemen’s clubs in Saint James’ in central London, consider the patriarchal values of the English upper middle classes with text constructed out of speeches of parliament and news. The complete series of 26 images and texts investigate the values that ally these classes to conservative aristocratic values where primogeniture is still an issue in a country symbolically ruled by a constitutional monarchy' (Knorr, 2014) Knorr's image and text pieces are beautifully constructed and presented and this is is an example of the kind of work I intend to produce over the term.
Black and White Silver Bromide Prints on Ilford Paper
50 x 60 cm / 20 x 24 in
Edition of 10 + 1 AP
My own Project Sign Off can be found here. My images will not be as formalised and will be taken using a manual polaroid camera.
Knorr, K. (2014). Gentlemen | Karen Knorr. [online] karenknorr.com. Available at: https://karenknorr.com/photography/gentlemen/ [Accessed 20 Oct. 2024].
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