initial ideas & a wordy reflection on week one

At the start everyone in our production group had a drastically different idea for the topic they wanted to document. These included poetic (mine being about questioning the idea of a community and whether it had to be a physical one for it to matter; I wanted to explore the relationship between different poets and their connections) and musical documentaries, a documentary on Farnham Rants and another one on student finance.

In the end we sort of came up with a topic that managed to more or less intertwine all of them. The idea was to create a poetic documentary collaboration by using opinions supplied by others, written work, animations (both visual and text) and explore the meaning of community instead of focusing on a specific one.

We thought it would be interesting to see what people thought community really was and if they feel like they're a part of any, and whether the word community is associated with only positivity It was originally inspired by Ai Weiwei's amazing Sunflower Seeds because of the idea of people coming together to create (in this case, create a visual representation of community), and for my original idea the inspiration was this documentary on spoken word by Kate Church.

Initially the plan was to film in Lion & Lamb, however after I got in contact with Farnham Council and they informed me it was privately owned, it soon became obvious it would be very hard to actually get in contact with the agency that owned it. Instead, we moved our interview shooting location to Farnham Park.

On the day before the interviews, I wrote down the questions we were going to ask (just a reason for me to add some behind the scenes photos, really):

Looking back at it now, I wish we had put more thought into this. The questions were alright but they were... closed (thankfully the people we interviewed chose to follow up with what they meant). At the same time, they were also way too long and wordy, so in the end we got very different answers to the same question that barely linked together which proved to be difficult when we got to editing.

We had planned to shoot interviews on the 27th, however the morning was rainy and dark, so we moved the date to 28th and instead spent time filming the storyboarded intro which would be the opening shot with a cup of tea, following the poetry lines of 'What is a community? Is it a cup of tea shared with a friend?'

I said the lines out loud and it was quite nice, although later in post-production we realised that it was slightly too underexposed and dim for an opening shot. I later re-shot it in my own apartment in the morning to get more light. Personally I feel like it's quite a nice and colourful shot. The same happened with our projector shot that Emily later swapped for a recorded screen.

My role for the production was cinematographer. I was excited and couldn't wait to shoot. Reflecting on it, I'm not very happy with how some of the shots ended up looking. The interviews were very quick and there was a lack of directing so the people didn't stand in the framing I had previously set up, thereby we ended up with ever-changing shots as I had to adjust them for every single person. Perhaps this is only a small issue, but as the cinematographer I wanted to push myself to the highest of my ability and I don't feel like I did.

On top of that, midway through storyboarding the documentary, I realised there wasn't much work for me to do at all as there were so many individual animations such as stop motion, adobe animate and adobe after effects that there was almost nothing for me to shoot specifically as everyone ended up being a cinematographer anyway. That's probably the main reason I got so upset during the production - I felt lost in what I had to do.

Despite all this, I still had a quite fun filming week and it was a nice experience.

I learnt that:

• I would work much better in a team where all roles were specific to
  a single person rather than blurred
• communication is very important to relieve stress
• more time needs to go into planning out small details such as questions
• ...apparently cold weather can also affect productivity

subliminal

ISO 400, 24mm lens, aperture f/5.0, shutter speed 1/8 sec

This is my final portraiture choice. I've titled it Subliminal as a reference to the idea behind it which is that this is a double portrait of a person I know and a stranger - the subconscious - through the reflection in the mirror that gives the viewer a different angle to look at the subject.

Personally this was my favourite photo from the shoot because of multiple reasons such as:

📷 contrasting colours, temperatures and brightness

🔅 eeriness and confusion within the setting - the flower set-up, an untold story

📷 looking into portrayal of oblivion - peaking through the door

🔅 attention on the subject's face through the torch light

📷 the different expressions on his and his reflection's faces
🔅 barely noticeable - blurriness of movement of a flower by the mirror

The only few things I'm not very happy with are parts of the actual location, such as the visible thermostat and ventilation in the door, as well as the heaviness of the curtains. These are things I couldn't necessarily change as they were all within the location. Perhaps the other thing is the angle the subject is leaning in, however I had difficulty finding a way to shine the light on his face without it ruining the bond between him and his reflection.

mirrors and double portraiture

My three main ideas at the start of this project were:

strangers

lights

colours

For a while I was considering taking photos of complete strangers. After looking into Crewdson's work, I was thinking about creating a relationship between two subjects of a portrait. There proved to be a difficulty for me to find a 'stranger' because I had decided I was going to take the image in my flat and I didn't really feel comfortable inviting people I didn't know.  So instead I had a rather strange idea to capture the relationship between the subject and the photographer. 

First came the 'making' of the set. This involved rather a lot of work tying strings to around fifteen roses and carnations. 

To bring in the idea of exploring the relationship between the photographer and the subject I would need a way to allow myself into the image as well. Earlier in November I visited 180 The Strand where this piece by Ryan Gander stood out:

I be... (xix), 2017

The playful yet complex practice of Ryan Gander (born 1976, UK) is stimulated by queries, investigations or what-ifs, rather than strict rules or limits. His newly commissioned works for EVERYTHING AT ONCE consider the psychology behind looking, feeling and wishing.

[..] Collectively titled Dramaturgical frameworks for structure and stability, in reference to Erving Goffman’s sociological approach that uses theatre to portray and evaluate social interaction, these figures also play on the notion of spectatorship, shifting the relationship between spectator and spectacle. [1]

So here's what the first few photos looked like:

The problem with this, however, was that I didn't enjoy taking these photos as the camera obstructed my face and there was no way to have a light facing me without ruining the scene in front of me and its feeling. I kept a conversation going between the subject and I so he wouldn't have time to really prepare a single facial expression for the camera. I suppose I don't really have many good directing skills as I just naturally prefer to let the subjects of my images to do what they feel like doing whilst having a conversation with them.

There also seemed to be too much going on to focus on one thing. This is the one problem I always touch upon when I try to realise my ideas. I am very fond of intertwining different props, lights and thoughts, but I'm not usually aware of how cluttered things look until after the image/film have been taken/recorded. After realising the first image was too messy, I decided to get closer to the subject, going against my previous plan to take the photo as if I was peaking through somewhere (the door gap in this instance). The second photo was slightly more appealing, but I realised I didn't want myself to be the second subject anymore.

I remained closer to the subject for the next few shots, however I asked him to move the mirror so it was reflecting him instead, going back to something I had mentioned in one of the previous posts - strangers within an identity. And as soon as he had done that, I realised that's what I wanted from my final image.

At one point the subject had been a stranger to me, but now I could confidently say I knew him very well. It's this contrast between characteristics that I love so much, and I adore how in the reflection he looks completely different to his direct portrait, has a whole different expression on his face - caused by the tilted angle and lights.

Still, I was unhappy with the issues I had framing these - the first one cuts off the mirror and the second one cuts off the side of the bed frame. The one thing I did love was how the torch cut his face halfway and brought attention to him straight away.

Overall, this shoot successfully intertwined the three ideas from the beginning of this project: strangers ✘, lights ✘, colours ✘

However, it wasn't any of the images above that I chose for the final portrait. The final image was constructed through the knowledge of what I had to do:

- place the camera outside the bedroom door
- get the mirror and bed in frame to avoid awkward crop
- have the torch on the subject's face


Bibliography:

[1]  180 The Strand (2017) Artists. At: http://everythingatonce.com/ (Accessed 17.11.2017)

ravaging through the flat

Jack and I haven't had heating since we moved into our new flat. Some time ago we purchased one of those cheap yet electricity-consuming heaters so that we wouldn't actually freeze to death. The best thing about it though is that it glows. Quite literally it is the brightest source of campfire-like orange colour I've ever seen.

At the same time, I also bought a LED strip that comes with a RGB & white remote and you can change the colours and get every other shade in-between. I only realised how bright it was once I had set it up. 

The orange of the heater and the blue of the LED splits the room into two. It reminded me mostly of this photograph I found in one of Crewdson's books:

I love the contrast between the coldness and warmth, the darkness and the artificial light.

That got me thinking about whether I could introduce another light into the image as despite both current light sources being quite bright, they were still too dim and simple to really bring out the subject of the image. I happened to pop into a hardware store after work one day and found a quite cheap torchlight, which seemed to be worth the investment. In terms of light I have it all figured out. I am still debating about the choice of subject/subjects and props. 

Following my last post, I decided I wanted to take the image that would be a shot from the ending sequence of a film. For this specifically I imagine it being a wide shot that peaks through a gap.

Previously whilst researching Crewdson I realised I wanted to make the image somewhat surreal, like it was part of a story that remained untold. I also mentioned that I loved his usage of flowers because that was something I was quite interested in in my Foundation year when doing my short poetry films. 

So here is the list of what I think my 'set' should have:

• LED lights, torch and heater
• fresh flowers (mainly roses)
• strings and tape to attach them to the ceiling
• plain duvet covers + pillowcases
• tripod as the shoot time is going to be in the evening

stranger /ˈstreɪn(d)ʒə/ n. : a person with whom one has had no personal acquaintance

Today was a game changer. Bear with me.

My parents came to visit me for my birthday. This was going to be the first year I wouldn't have seen them and I was very upset. They came, and then they left, and now I'm sort of left here feeling like I don't know what's happening anymore. Everything that could be going wrong is going wrong repeatedly, if that's even possible.

That's how I ended up in a type of a purgatory. Half of me wants to quit everything I've been working for and just go home to help my parents, and the other half is terrified of how close the first half is to actually packing its bags and leaving.

Somewhere between that I realised that strangers are everywhere.

Before you judge me for sounding cheesy, I'd like to point out that it is true, no matter what everybody says. You know a person, but you never really know them. You never really know what's in their head, or what they're thinking about. You see what they choose to show, or what they're comfortable showing. 

And then I sort of realised that those 'halves' I was talking about are actually just two strangers within my own head. 

I'm not sure where I'm going with that. I hope this doesn't sound like an existential crisis, although perhaps it is.

Anyhow, this opened my mind to some ideas to think about, such as:

• relationship between the two subjects in the image (as I want to experiment with a double portrait)
• relationship between the photographer and the subject
• exploration of the subject's mind

I'm also thinking about the distance between the camera and the subject. In most of my photos I'm close to the person I'm taking the image of.

However, it would be interesting to take it from further away, sort of like peaking at them? I don't think I can currently take a studio-like image without the subject actually knowing they're being photographed, but perhaps there can be an implication of oblivion.