Project Proposal Form
I will be filling this in throughout my research as I find out in more detail what I would like my final images to be.
| Which of the words given in the brief document have you selected, and why? |
| I have chosen entropy, and the reason I chose this is because I feel like it is something that relates to my life. The definition of entropy (according to website Merriam Webster) is chaos, disorganisation or randomness. |
| What do you want to point your camera at? |
| I’d like to point my camera at the areas of mess in my flat. |
| Why are you interested in this subject? |
| I’m interested in this subject matter because when I moved in to my flat we all made such an effort to be tidy, and now that we know each other more we have all become comfortable with being a bit messier, some more than others. I think it would be interesting to document this change. |
| What do you hope an audience will take from your images? |
| I hope that it makes the audience self-reflect, and think about what they do differently around different people. A few months ago I would’ve said that I acted similarly around most people, but after moving away from home and having my own space, I have realised that I withhold certain parts of my personality from different people, and I would like the audience to reflect this on themselves. |
| What areas of research are you considering to help deepen your understanding of the subject you have chosen? |
| I will be looking into bird’s eye view photography because I think it is an interesting perspective. I will also be looking into tenebrism which is a more dramatic version of the chiaroscuro lighting technique that I like the look of. |
| What practitioner(s) or visual resources would you consider to have influenced you? This not have to be photographic. |
| I looked at the work of Ori Gersht and Kriss MacDonald early on in my project, however, towards the end I really took inspiration from Frederick Sommer. |
| What support or equipment might you need to achieve your goals? |
| I will need to use a DSLR camera, lighting, and a tripod. My DSLR of choice would be the Canon 600D as I find this the easiest to use (even though all of the Canon cameras available can do the same thing, I just find the layout of the 600D the easiest to navigate). Because I am doing still life photography it would make sense that I use a 50mm prime lens too as this is advised for this kind of photography. |
November 5th 2017
Photographer Research
For my independent project, I have decided to choose the theme of entropy. Google defines entropy as ‘lack of order or predictability; gradual decline into disorder.’ and this is the definition of entropy that I will personally expand on.
Ori Gersht
These are two pieces from a 16 piece photoset called ‘Blow Up’, based on the detonation of floral arrangements. I think the pieces show entropy because they show how the explosion gets worse and causes the flowers to deteriorate, and the photos are full of disorder. I like the colour schemes used; the colours are quite muted and washed out, which could further support the theme of entropy as the colour has been made to look faded and decayed. There are some hints of bright red and purples in the pictures though which draw your attention and may symbolise the power from explosions.
The images were sourced from: http://www.prixpictet.com/portfolios/disorder-shortlist/ori-gersht/
Kriss MacDonald
This piece was created by Instagram user Krissmacd (Kriss MacDonald). I like this piece because it resembles a classical still life whilst looking more modern due to the saturation of the colours, and the lighter colour choices in general. The image its self is pure chaos, the actual subject is on a background of vintage fabrics which blend into the flowers in the middle. There are also some dead/dying flowers on the ground which could represent entropy because they were once alive but have declined into decay.
I also like this piece and might consider doing a flat lay composition in my own work. I like the warm colours and how they signify autumn, along with the orange leaves.
These images were sourced from MacDonald’s Instagram page which can be found here: https://www.instagram.com/krissmacd/?hl=en
Thoughts So Far
My first idea is to do something like the images by Kriss MacDonald, but actually have a series of images, each getting more cluttered and declining into the kind of chaos we see in Kriss MacDonald’s pieces. I am going to test this out with my own resources to see what it would look like.
November 11th 2017
Test images
The following images are a test of the layout and idea that I have for my final images. I would like to do a series of images that gradually decline into chaos, or depending on which direction you view them in, go from chaos to nothing. I haven’t fully decided on the subject matter yet, and what I do end up deciding on will change the overall message of my images, so I am putting a lot of thought into it. I think the fact that I chose orange peel for this experiment is good though because orange peel is waste and will decay.
These images are technically quite poor, as there is a lot of dust on the background distracting from the image, and they were not taken in very high quality. However, I am okay with their poor quality because they are only to demonstrate my ideas when it comes to my photoset.
29th November 2017
Change of direction
After speaking with Adam, I have decided to change the general direction of my project. I have decided that a better way to interpret ‘entropy’ is through more of a subjective theme rather than showing entropy through a series of photographs. The way I will be documenting entropy is that I will be taking photos of small sections of chaos in my flat (a very chaotic space). I feel like my flat really fits the definition of entropy as in the first few weeks it was probably one of the tidiest spaces in our building, however, now it can actually be really messy; our flat has declined into chaos.
These are the photos I took this week. I think that my favourite is definitely the last one, the one with all the fairy lights. After discussing with Adam, I think I can agree that the reason I like this the most is that the composition of the other images is poor. I also like the perspective of the image, and I think the rest of my images will all be taken from this angle to create a link between all my images, but also because I think it is aesthetically pleasing.
In the next week, I will be taking my final photographs.
2nd December 2017
Further research
I like the idea of flat lay photography, so I have decided to do some research into this as it uses a bird’s eye view angle as the main running theme.
These are just a few of the photographers that I found on Instagram that have participated in the flat lay trend, I have included their captions and usernames on the right as a way of crediting them, but I also think it’s interesting to know the story behind each image.
The first two images seem to really focus on the composition being perfect, and having everything in line, and while I do really like these images, they would not fit in with the theme of my project because they are the opposite of entropy.
The second two images are more relatable to my theme, especially the last one. The first image seems to be ‘accidentally’ messy as if the items were thrown onto the surface like that, but we know that it was probably a thought out and calculated composition. However the final image is more discreet, this could have actually been a natural set up where the photographer already had the items in this layout before they decided to take a picture. Though it was probably a very well thought out composition, it at least looks accidental.
Frederick Sommer
Following on with this theme, I have looked further into photographer Frederick Sommer, who I brushed upon briefly in my still life research. There are two specific images of his that I really like and think are the exact kind of direction I would like my project to go in. These are the two images:
I absolutely love the lighting in both of these photographs, its soft but at such an angle that it creates some really dark shadows and I like this effect. I also like the contents and context of both of these images; the whole idea is that Sommer has visited places that have been abandoned and taken photographs of things that have been left there to decay. This really fits in with my theme of entropy, as the definition that I am working from defines entropy as a gradual decline into chaos, and I would argue that a decaying building is declining into chaos.
Tenebrism
This is a good example of tenebrism by Kelly Borsheim, and this is a photograph she took to do a still life painting from.
Tenebrism is also referred to as dramatic lighting, and I really like the idea of something like this to make the mundane items in my flat more exciting and interesting.
Final Concept
For my final images, I would like to take photos in my flat of little areas of chaos. When we all first moved in, we all made such an effort to make a good impression on each other and seem like such tidy people. I know that personally I was putting on a facade, and almost transforming into a different, more tidy version of myself, to fit the social context that I was in. This fits in really well with our reading from week 6:
‘an individual has as many different social selves as the many different social groups he is in contact with, or, more generally, as the many different social contexts he experiences.’ (Miroiu, 2014)
This basically says that we act differently in different social situations, so I have decided that I would like to document how me and my flatmates act now that we are comfortable with each other and our social context has changed, because the tidiness of our flat has certainly declined and it has become chaotic, which fits in with my theme of entropy.
Unused Images From Final Shoot
Please find below all of the images that did not make it into my final set, with brief descriptions of why. There are more developmental images further up on this page too.
References
Miroiu, C. (2014). The Selfies: Social Identities in the Digital Age. [online] Australian and New Zealand Communication Association, p.3. Available at: http://www.anzca.net/documents/2014-conf-papers/796-the-selfies-social-identities-in-the-digital-age/file.html [Accessed 6 Dec. 2017].
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