Hi everyone!

As part of my photography course, I have to track my development on a blog. The posts from September 2011 until January 2012 are part of a module called Project Management, for which I was required to work in a group of eight students to create an exhibition. The blog followed every step we took in order to create a successful gallery. The blog posts starting from September 2012 follow my final year on the course. I'll be documenting my research and analysis of my final year projects, as well as include notes of my Professional Practice unit - which prepares us for a range of post graduate options. Finally it also looks at a project called New Creatives, where I'll be working alongside an artists to help college students get more involved with art.

Sunday, April 28, 2013

52 Week Photo Challenge

It's week 17 and this weeks theme was "steps". The first thing I thought of was the Guildhall, which seems to be an ongoing theme. The Guildhall is where I'll be graduating this July so I'm extremely excited. The government also recently took some time to clean all the steps, making it the perfect moment to photograph it!

I wanted to mainly focus on the steps, but not in an obvious manner. That's why I kept the pillars out of the frame, as well as the ground. I think the two main areas of photography that I tend to go into are Landscapes and Abstraction. The photo looks like it's got a huge lens distortion to it, which frustrates me so much! But the steps actually do curve like that, so there's nothing that could be done about it. I like my photos to be straight and that's why I stood right in the middle of the Guildhall. You can see a line going all the way up in the centre of the photo, making it a little bit more into my signature style of photography, in spite of the rounded stairs.

Hand-In

Last Thursday was my hand-in for two units: Advanced Practice Research and Self Led. For Advanced Practice Research I had to create two research workbooks for each of my projects (Succession and 7591 Miles). Self Led only referred to my 7591 Miles project. For this I had to hand in my three finals, my development workbook and a reflective writing, which basically just sums up all the research I've done and how I've come to my final.

It's a bit of a strange feeling now that I've handed this in. It's the same as after my dissertation hand in - I'm happy that it's all done, but I've still got another hand in and a whole exhibition to set up! Usually the hand-in means the end, but we've still got so much to do!!

The next deadline is the 16th of May, which is when I have to hand in my portfolio (pretty much done) and a final blog post explaining what I'm hoping to do over the next 5 years and how the course has helped me get to that. This means I won't be blogging for a while after the 16th (until I've got my mark back).

Anyway, a few days before that I have my VIVA practice presentation. The VIVA is an oral presentation about my work, however it's not my work that is being marked but the way I talk about it and my knowledge of the subject matter. I will be talking about my Succession project for this as I feel the most confident at that project. My actual VIVA is sometime closer towards the end of May. Also around the start of May we have to start setting up our Eldon exhibition. We start setting it up and deciding where all the work is going to go on the 7th of May, but the actual exhibition isn't until the 31st of May! I'm a bit worried about hanging up my work, since my Succession photo is incredibly heavy and I literally know nothing about drilling holes and stuff.....

Friday, April 19, 2013

52 Week Photo Challenge

It's been a bit of a busy week, so I completely forgot about last week's theme! The theme was "Statue". Again, not my favourite theme as you can't really find another meaning for it, but I had a couple ideas. Portsmouth has quite a few statues so I wasn't short of choice. At first I wanted to take a photo of the lions at the Guildhall, but as the week slowly passed and the next theme was announced, I decided to find a way to combine the two themes into one photograph. This would be a bit more interesting than just a statue, and it would mean I was back on track with my weeks! The theme of this week is "glasses", which I quite liked. It's a bit more broad than the previous themes we've had.

Across from the Guildhall is a council building which has got these very reflective windows (glasses) and there is a statue of queen Victoria in front of it. I really like how the photo looks, I like how the statue is centred and the Guildhall is directly behind it. It's also interesting because the windows are a lot more modern than the reflection it it. The flags ad a pop of colour to it. Another thing that I like about the photo is that is doesn't have any people it in, so there is nothing to distract you. And finally, it was a beautiful day so the reflected blue sky makes the Guildhall stand out more, and the clouds towards the middle of the photo add a bit of mystery to it.

Monday, April 15, 2013

7591 Miles Finals!!

Today I went to Brighton to pick up my other two final prints for the Eldon exhibition. It feels like the millionth time I've gone to The Vault, but they're lovely and have done a fantastic job with all of my prints. The photo to the right are all three of them. They literally look beautiful. The colours are so bright and having them printed shows so much more detail than when I see them on my screen. The orange and the green in the third photo are so vibrant which relates back to the bold red in the first photo.
 The photo to the left is just a detail shot of the mounting and the paper. It's printed on matt paper and has a seal over it which looks really nice and feels smooth too. I think it's fingerprint proof, but I'm not 100% sure. The diabond mounting is very light and sturdy. I can't wait to put these photos up in the Eldon exhibition alongside my Succession photograph.

This might sound a bit cheesy, but I'm so proud of myself for finishing these two projects. Both of them used large format film, something I never thought I'd ever use, let alone enjoy! I also started playing around in the film-making world by creating time lapse videos, which is something I'm hoping to continue. Both of the final projects are beautifully presented. The Succession photo looks a million times better in its frame, and these three 7591 Miles photos also look a lot more impressive printed and mounted.


Friday, April 12, 2013

Portfolio

Today I spent the day cutting the black border off of my portfolio photos and putting them in the plastic sleeves. It took me a while! I had to cut off quite a thick border on the top and bottom and two very thin borders on either side. And then do that for 18 photos.....

Then sliding them into the sleeve was pretty difficult too, for some reason they just did not want to get in there! So, again, trying to do that to each photo was a bit of a pain.

BUT! Even though it was a struggle, it looks amazing! The photos are just the right size and fit in the sleeve perfectly. Because the paper was quite heavy, it feels like a very expensive portfolio. There is a lot of work in there, even though there are only 10 slides.

I have put the photos in a specific order, starting with my 7591 Miles project and my Succession project. All the photos following that are in the order from favourite to least favourite.

I'm so happy with the look of my portfolio, and I hope that my lecturers will like it too, since they're the ones marking it!

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

52 Week Photo Challenge

This post is a little bit late since I've been spending quite a bit of time working on my finals for the exhibition.

The theme of last week was "Utensil". I wasn't really thrilled about it since it's such a specific theme. You can't really interpret it in any other way... So being someone that doesn't like going for the obvious, I had real trouble figuring out what to do. In my kitchen I have this twisting rack where I keep all my utensils, so I thought it would be quite cool to take a slow shutter speed photo of that rack twisting. I took a few photos just testing it out, but I found that the images look better is they have more colour in it. So I removed all my black and boring coloured utensils and only kept the colourful ones in the photo.

I also played around with the shutter speed and the rotating speed. I started off with quite a long shutter speed (1.3 seconds) and rotated the utensils at a very quick speed. Although the colours looked quite cool, you couldn't identify the subject matter. So in the end I went with a shutter speed of 0.6 and twisted the rack very very slowly.

Even though I originally didn't like the theme, I do quite like the photo I've come up with. It isn't a portfolio worthy photo, but I definitely liked playing around with it.

Monday, April 8, 2013

Jessops Package

Today I received a very very very heavy tube from JESSOPS! I love Jessops and was devastated when they went out of business, however a few weeks ago I received an email from them saying that Jessops photo is back online!! Wooo!! So since I needed to print my portfolio, I decided to just have a look at Jessops prices, and they were cheap. At photobox it would have cost me around £100 to get 20 A3 photos printed and at Jessops (thanks to the 40% discount offer) I only spent £40!

Anyway, so my portfolio photos arrived today and I am literally so excited!! They didn't have an exact A3 size, so I printed them slightly bigger with a black border which I will be cutting off myself. The photos looks amazing, and the quality is great too! A lot of the time my photos print off quite dark when I use online printing services, but these came out the exact colour as on my screen. They feel like they're very good quality and the paper is very thick. I'm so excited to put them in my box portfolio from silverprint! I tried to pair the photos together so you could kind of see how it would all look, but I have very limited space in the flat (especially with the drying rack out!) But you can kind of tell.

I'm so happy that Jessops is back in business, I will definitely be buying more things from them. And hopefully they'll re-open some stores too before I go to Australia!



Saturday, April 6, 2013

122x54cm Canvas

My boyfriend's dad loved my 7591 Miles photos so much that we wanted to have a canvas made with all three photos on it! He had quite specific sizing for it, so I first created the canvas in photoshop to get all the measurements right. It ended up being 122x54 cm. There is a 5cm border around the photos and 2.5cm between each photo.
I got it printed at The Vault in Brighton, who I have been visiting A LOT recently. They first developed my 5x4 film, I then got my A2 print printed and mounted, I then picked it up, and today I picked up the canvas. I'll have to go again next week to pick up my other two A2 photos in the series..... Luckily I really like Brighton.


The photo above is what it looks like all together. The photo is quite dark so it doesn't show off the colours very well. It's so vibrant!! The red in the first photo really stands out and the green in the third photo looks incredibly. I'm amazed by the quality of the print, as I wasn't sure how it would look. The thick white border around the photo looks great too, it makes the colours pop even more.

Personally, I prefer having each of the photos printed individually, but I think they look fantastic printed like this too. To the left is a little detail shot of the canvas. I love it.

Like I said earlier, I will be going back to Brighton next week at some point (and do a little bit of shopping...) to get my other two photos printed and mounted. I received an email back from my lecturer saying that I will definitely have both Succession and 7591 Miles project presented at the Eldon show. The exact words were "Yes we will make the room", so that is very exciting.

Other than that, it looks like spring has finally arrived in Portsmouth! It's beautiful outside and when you stand in the sun it actually feels like I only need to wear 3 layers instead of 4! In Brighton it's still wintery and gloomy though.

Wednesday, April 3, 2013

Business Cards

I've been going a bit crazy over free samples lately. I've order anything and everything ranging from make-up samples and moisturisers to puppy toys! One of the many many things I ordered are business cards from Moo.com. Moo is an online company that specialises in professional looking business cards for reasonableness prices. I desperately need some new business cards as I ordered mine from Vista Print for very cheap and they aren't very good quality (Card Paper). I've also got an image on it that isn't even in my portfolio anymore!

Anyway, so then I came across Moo's free business card samples. You could order 10 cards for free with free postage and everything. This is where the crazy part comes in... I got them sent to 4 different addresses so I managed to get 40. I sent one pair to my flat in Portsmouth, one to my parent's house and one to both of my boyfriend's parents' house.

3 out of 4 are now at my flat in Portsmouth and I will be collecting the last set sometime in the near-ish future. First I ordered some "Pet Photography" business cards, since I'm very interested in that field at the moment. They look beautiful. The quality of them is amazing, they are very thick and smooth business cards and have got a matt finish to them. The second set I ordered is of my 7591 Miles project. It's simply got on photo on the back. The third set I ordered was my Succession photo. I originally wanted to have the circle on the back, but I have having all sorts of problems, so I just put it tiny on the front to get the idea, and then the clearing photo on the back. I quite like it this way because I love the clearing photo, and it shows the quality of the photograph. Finally, I printed my ducks. At this point, I figured out that you can choose multiple designs for the cards, so I chose 4 different photos (3 blue, 3 purple, 2 red and 2 yellow).

When I order my real business cards (I won't just live off of free samples...) I reckon I'll create several different designs to show the range of photography I can do. I'll probably order 100 cards and choose maybe 5 different projects? I haven't quite decided yet, I wanted to have a look at the quality first.

I don't expect to get rid of all of my business cards during the Eldon show, so I will be using them in Australia too, although I'll just have to cross out my mobile number and write a new one. Or maybe.... order another few free samples to various different addresses. Neighbours??





Monday, April 1, 2013

March

It's time for my monthly video! It's something I've been doing since January, and basically every month I take a whole load of photos/videos/time lapses and I put them together in one video at the end of the month.
January: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krNZrlufyUA
Feburary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6BtKr06yTs
March: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1i15xhVqT6U

March has been pretty busy! It started off with me going to the Artful Dodgers in London, and also visiting the BEST burrito place in the world (at the westfield in stratford). It basically works like subway, but then it's a wrap and it's filled with all sorts of tasty things. I love it. So I took a photo of it to show everyone how incredibly full it is! I then photographed a tribute band called The Bootleg Beatles, who dressed up like the Beatles and sang their songs. I accompanied Lauren Whatling as it's one of her projects and it was great fun! I do have a few blog posts about the experience, but I really enjoyed that. At the end we also received their autographs which was very exciting.

That was then followed by New Creatives! New Creatives is a project I've been working on since October 2012 where I worked alongside an artist, Oliver Merkin, and we went to Portsmouth and Havant College to help students with their art work. It was then displayed at Aspex Gallery in Gunwharf. I first took a time lapse video of the curation of the show, which was then displayed at the exhibition, and that's followed by some photographs of the preview night taken by Lauren Whatling.

The video then continues to show some of the work Kevin and I have been doing, so it includes my dissertation, which I handed it at the start of this month and Kevin's dissertation poster which he got a fabulous 2.1!

I then went to my parent's house for a couple days and photographed my parents' beagle multiple times. She's a great model, but also very naughty. I've got a photograph of her holding some stolen chopsticks. Of course, I couldn't leave out my little hamster, Chili! Who is also a massive poser.

In between my Kayleigh shots and Chili shots there is a photo of my with a giant suitcase. I bought myself a huge huge huge light weight suitcase for £40, which was quite a good deal as it was meant to be double that. It's literally gigantic. Which is good, because I've also done a whole load of shopping to fill it up with.

I then went to the circus in Portsmouth. I received some free tickets from Subway since we let them advertise. It was a great show! I took a whole load of photos but also some timelapses! It was surprisingly difficult since I had to use a really slow shutter speed, but the time lapses have turned out quite nice actually!

Finally, I also got a whole load of stuff done for uni. My Succession photo has been framed and is hanging up in my parent's house. It looks amazing!! It looks so much more professional and expensive now it's framed (which it should do....). I also got my 7591 Miles photo printed and mounted on diabond. I love it. It looks fantastic. However, my lecturers like it too, which could be seen as a positive, but they want my to print the other two photos in the series exactly the same..... That's pretty pricey.

Anyway then the video finishes with some more shots of Chili, who really did not want to be photographed and tried to escape.