It has been a week of many parts: attempts at reconciliation, crisis of confidence, reshooting, editing, interviewing, calming the stressed and trying not to rise to the bait, and just learning to let go. This is not all just about me, btw, but us collectively….ok so most of them are me… anyway….
I have reviewed all the images and tried to decide what to show, reckon I will only have space for 3 images of around 16 x 20, so what best to show the series?
Canvased opinion of tutors, fellow students and the man on the street (ok actually the man in th kitchen, but you get the idea). Still undecided, one likes the portraits, one the stuff, one a combo. anyway its down to me in the end and I have a week to decide.
In the meantime I have been back to the archive today and reshot some of the possibles, to see if I can get them a bit better. One of my previous victims/researcher was there so I was able to give him the photo I took of him (i had a set of small prints with me to use as a guide) which pleased him. Now have to wait til I can pick up the negs on monday, hopefully scan on tuesday, make a decision, do dust removal etc ready for going to print meeting on 6th April. So by mid april mounting should be done and work ready for show. Phew!
I built plenty of contingency into the plan (learned something useful from my earlier career then). There will still be lots to do for show, but its stuff I can do myself at home.
I hate to release any kind of responsibility for my work to somone else, but needs must, I cannot print and mount to the required standard so just gotta trust the professionals!!!
I have just had two days of interviewing for the Apprentice task, and very enlightening it has been, for a number of reasons.
The first interviewee, a photographer with experience of curating/portfolio reviewing/ editorial also gave me some insight into my portfolio. Actually the process of preparing a generic portfolio was a challenge and made me recognise a themes within my work. I can see how I have progressed, what I am doing this year makes last years work look naive and contrived, funny when I was so pleased with it last year. such is growth I guess!
That meeting has been particularly useful when thinking about what exactly I might want to reshoot at the archive for my final portfolio of images and what would complete it, and make it into a more well rounded collection.
The second interviewee was a very experienced, award winning photographer with a long career which has covered just about everything, from war to royals and everything in between. Happily he gave very freely of his career and advice for people starting out in the business, so much so that I thought how great it would have been if he had come in to talk to the students at college (he would but I bet the college wouldn't want to pay for it!)
He explained a lot about the business side, which has not been discussed at all on course, it was all very interesting and I wish I had had this meeting earlier, and all for the price of lunch! Bargain!
I just need to write up 3 hours worth of conversation. These two days have given me a lot to think about.
Ok, so got to show the work so far to two tutors!
Both seemed to understand my concerns and agree with me about what are the strongest set of images, those from the Bancroft archive and it is something from this set that I will show at the final exhibition.
On that subject, we, as a group, are just trying to get on with it, putting aside the niggles that have been frustrating us lately…..(Put it in a box!)..we should be enjoying these final weeks, and aiming for the best show we can, so that's what we are going to do!
Need to decide now how many to show, and get those ready for printing.
I have a busy couple of days ahead, interviewing 2 people in the industry for the apprentice task, which should be fun. A bit nervous because one of them asked to see my portfolio….I know she is just asking to be polite but I just hope its good enough.
Feeling a bit disillusioned.
I had made some definite style decisions for the journey part of the project and stuck by them on the shoot. I picked up the negs and have now scanned them, they have come out ok but I am just not feeling them as I would like. On the shoot I tried not to make them look too landscape-y by trying to project this following a route idea, but they are just rather dull.
I like the archive ones much more, they are very typical of the sort of thing I do. I 'm not sure whether to focus on them or what.
I had planned another on location shoot but then decided to do the scanning first to see how I felt about what I had already taken. That seems a good decision now, as I don't think I can just go on doing what I was doing , and not being happy with the results, its costing a fortune.
also , knowing that we will only be able to show a couple of images each at the final show, it feels more sensible to use the archive shots as that set doesn't need to be shown in its entirity to make sense. Just a couple of images from the journey project wouldn't really look like a journey just a couple of rather naff canal shots!
hope to get to talk to a tutor tomorrow, as someone's thoughts other than my own would be welcome.
Last weeks shoot at Tower Hamlets Archive went well, a few more visitors, who , happily were willing to appear in my photographs. Afterwards took the films for developing and have got them back today, they look fine but need to be scanned, so more about that when I have done it. (scanned now and a fewshown opposite)
So now the archive images are done I have to do the Limehouse journey ones. I have been avidly checking the weather forecast, and as the forecast for most of this week is rain, thought I had better get out there today (as it was due to be sunny). This is the first full outdoor shoot I have done with the WISTA, so was a bit concerned about the setting up and moving about with all the kit, especially as I was going to be on my own.
Actually that was the least of my worries… it was really cold and blowing a gale, at one point the wind nearly blew a dark slide out of my hand and into the Regents Canal, just managed to hang on to it. I struggled on until 1.15pm then decided I had had enough, especially of dodging the cyclists and runners. I had taken 10 shots. I have been concentrating upon the aesthetics of the images, trying to make them less like landscapes, and give more of a feeling of a journey using a strong sense of perspective of the paths that I / Jonas followed.
I had an interesting discussion last week about the depth of field I am using (shallow). A fellow student was saying that he didn't like it (which is fine) because he liked to see all the fine detail across the whole image. My answer to that is that for me the photograph isn't just about the detail, but about the feeling that the image gives, and that is always what I am looking for when composing a shot, and thats what the shallow depth of field gave me. I thought today for the outdoor shots I might change this, but when I tried it, I wasn't happy with the look, also I am trying to get a bit of continuity into this project rather than being totally random, so am sticking with my first thoughts. For once it might be good to have a coherent body of work, and it would be good to get that event in before the end of my degree!
I wonder if its a bit of a contradiction in terms, using large format but not being that concerned about the fine detail! Am I just mad? answers on a postcard please…
