My Personal Project Proposal for University

It was my first time doing one of these, i need a lot more practice..

I have decided to do my personal project on the Marina in Swansea. I have attempted to document this subject before but feel I could and should have done a lot better. I have decided to shoot digitally on this project although it has been mentioned to me that I could get very good results with a large format camera shooting in this environment. However I am still unsure of the type of pictures I will want to produce, whether they are pictures of the landscape of the marina, portraits of fishermen, boats or equipment and tackle. I feel this project will be interesting and challenging because of the diversity of the area. My plan is to spend a lot of time there throughout the day. From the early morning start to the day some fishermen might have to the middle of the night.

Robert Frank, Peru.

This is a collection of Robert Franks Peru images which were shot in 1948 which were all shot on a 35mm film camera. Most of Robert Frank’s photographs from Peru are portraits; I think he displayed the landscape and labour in Peru excellently. It gives the viewer an insight into what life was like for a Peruvian. The way in which they were short captures a sense of the land and environment in which they worked.

“I was very free with the camera. I didn’t think of what would be the correct thing to do; I did what I felt good doing. I was like an action painter.” This is a quote from Robert Frank which is in reference to how he shot his photographs in Peru. I think this comes across in the pictures as quite  lot of his pictures seem really natural and even the ones that are staged for example the one with the two kids in they also look really natural. I think his relaxed approach to shooting his pictures was mirrored in his subjects. 

 

Zed Nelson, Gun Nation.

These are a set of pictures taken in America. This project explores the irony of American citizens being able to purchase guns as a symbol of their freedom but it also being one of the country’s biggest killers which results in the death of 30,000 people per year. The work challenges the myths and clichés that underpin the culture of gun ownership in the United States today. It seems after every act of gun violence in America there is always someone asking the question, why did it happen here? These pictures easily answer that stupid question. It shows how easy it is to purchase a gun, the kind of people who purchase guns and the harrowing fact that children are exposed to firearms.  What is great about this project is that Nelson avoids the stereotypical groups that are often portrayed as being behind the whole problem. The way in which these pictures are presented makes it seem ludicrous that so many people are allowed to actually use a gun. One of my favourite images of Zed Nelson is the portrait of the father and his baby. The father is trying to tell us that he has a gun to protect his family, however Nelson is trying to say how dangerous and sometimes unpredictable these types of weapons could be and if something were to go wrong which can sometimes happen the baby could certainly be put in harm’s way. These pictures are taken in such a way that people across the world can familiarise themselves with it. They are basically family portraits the types of pictures we see in friends, families and our own houses, only these people are holding a semi-automatic weapon. This adds a feeling of suspense to viewers and contradiction because the Americans who have guns could end up fatally harming the very people they claim to be protecting. These pictures ask the question if this is the right way to go about protecting your loved ones. It is far too easy for people to act on a hunch which temps your average citizen to pick up their gun aim and shoot.

 

 

“The first image refers to pedophilia in the Vatican. Second child sexual abuse in tourism in Thailand, and the third refers to the war in Syria. The fourth image refers to the trafficking of organs on the black market, where most of the victims are children from poor countries; fifth refers to weapons free in the U.S.. And finally, the sixth image refers to obesity, blaming the big fast food companies.
The new series produced by Cuban artist Erik Ravelo was titled as “The untouchables”, are photographs of children crucified for his supposed oppressors, each for a different reason and a clear message, seeks to reaffirm the right of children to be protected and report abuse suffered by them especially in countries such as Brazil, Syria, Thailand, United States and Japan”.

This picture and caption was taken via Saudis in USA’s Facebook page. It’s interesting that they chose to display the subjects in the crucifix. This image shows the suffering children have to endure due to the explotation of adults. Perhaps it’s the fact that Jesus supposedly suffered and died for our sins, who are the children affected by these issues suffering for?

 

Image with Text

Having just been given a brief in uni for image and text I came to realise how much of a difference a short paragraph or even a sentence can make alongside an image. I understand that it’s important for an image to be strong enough by itself but I think it’s important to learn the story behind it as well. For example we see many shots of people in third world countries and it isn’t anything new and interesting however if we learnt more about the subject the story behind the picture it can bring a whole new meaning to the image. 

The winner of the Contemporary Issues genre and Word Press Photo of the Year 2014 came from American photographer John Stanmeyer. When I first saw this before reading the caption I was surprised that this was the winner. My first thought that it could have been an advertisement for 02 or Vodafone. However after reading the caption my view changed on the picture. The caption read “African migrants on the shore of Djibouti City at night raise their phones in an attempt to catch an inexpensive signal from neighboring Somalia—a tenuous link to relatives abroad. Djibouti is a common stop-off point for migrants in transit from such countries as Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea, seeking a better life in Europe and the Middle East”. These days most people have mobile phones however if this was a picture was taken in the Western World it could have easily been people checking how many likes they just got on their latest Facebook status. this image show how important one little device can be for some people. 

Nadar

After researching Frank Meadow Sutcliffe I became interested in early photography and this is where I happily stumbled across the French photographer, Nadar. Examples of Nadar’s photographic portraits are held by many of the great national collections of photographs.

 

This is an animation of Nadar’s self portrait which is a total of 12 frames taken in 1865. I love history and i think this is why I am so interested in early photography. It’s great to see how far photography has come since this.

Jeff Divine

This is a small collection of Jeff Divines pictures. It’s probably not too hard to create a visually pleasing picture of people surfing; we all see pictures of beaches regularly and visit beaches all the time so it would be difficult to impress people with pictures with this particular subject. I think the above are a few pictures that I thought were really well shot. I think the white sand and blue sea look really good with a splash of colour inbetween. This is usually achieved by a colourful surfboard. I think what you also get with these types of pictures is symmetry which is also pleasing to the eye. For example the black and white image of the two surfers is a really good shot because both surfers are in the same position. Also the face that its black and white makes the viewer focus more on the surfers as bright colours can often pull your attention away from the main focus of the picture. These pictures show us a different side of glamorous lifestyle professional surfers can have.

Humberto Gatica – Memory Tree

I found this set of pictures really interesting. Humberto’s idea was to explore time through the fragmentation of memories where the family history links generations through life and death. I think having these pictures in black and White was a great idea because when remembering something it’s not always very clear. Also the fact that there were a few images on each picture made it difficult to make sense of each one, but the disorientation of the image as a whole ties in nicely with the idea of memory. It’s a clever and effective way of doing a project on portraits. These days it’s hard to keep people interested as we see pictures of people every day through social media and advertisements, this certainly drew my eye and I think many others would be interested by it too.

Water Rats, Frank Meadow Sutcliffe

His most famous photograph was taken in 1886; Water Rats caused a little comment at the time as it featured naked children playing in a boat, but the image is not erotic. Sutcliffe was using the conventions of the academic nude to show how photography can approach art. He was, however, excommunicated by his local clergy for displaying it, as they thought it would ‘corrupt’ the opposite sex. Edward VII (then the Prince of Wales) later purchased a copy of the picture.

Frank Meadow Sutcliffe – Artist research for personal work

Francis Meadow (Frank) Sutcliffe (6 October 1853 – 31 May 1941) was an English pioneering photographic artist whose work presented an enduring record of life in the seaside town of Whitby, England, and surrounding areas, in the late Victorian era and early 20th century. His studies of 19th century Whitby beautifully capture an earlier way of life. Although the majority of Frank Sutcliffe’s photographs were made in or around the small North Yorkshire town of Whitby, he achieved an international reputation in his lifetime and is now regarded as one of the masters of late 19th and early 20th century photography. 
His first camera, bought for him in 1869, was a huge mahogany stand camera that, when extended fully, was 3ft (1m) long and used 15x12in glass plates. Sutcliffe used the wet-collodion process, which required that the plate was exposed and developed before the light-sensitive coating had dried. It was a complicated and awkward process, but he managed to produced good results with it.
 His writings revealed that he resented the amount of time he spent doing formal portraits of babies and children when he would rather have been photographing the outdoor scenes about which he was passionate.
He became a well-known figure in the town and, when his work permitted, was often out photographing local people and scenes in Whitby’s thriving harbour, around its ruined abbey on the hillside overlooking the town and in the surrounding countryside.