Plastic Pollution

Guy Farrow

Guy farrow was the photographer involved in the marine conservation ‘we will stop the plastic tide project’. These photos were taken and edited into posters and adverts which promoted the marine conservation project. They showcase the damage which plastic is doing to the environment but demonstrates it on humans to have more of an impact.​ Although the images aren’t the most eye-pleasing to look at, I really like the message they convey and the abnormality of the bits of plastic on coming from the human subjects.

We see a lot of similar photos of animals in this state where they have been tangled in a fishing net or injected plastic debris which has invaded their homes. I think these images have a very powerful message behind them that we wouldn’t think it was normal if humans were walking around, tangled up in plastic bags/net so why do we think it’s acceptable for animals to suffer in this way and shouldn’t we be doing more to recycle our plastic and prevent it entering the habitats of these animals.

I didn’t think it would be very ethical to photograph portraits of human models with plastic hanging from their noses as it isn’t the most pleasant experience and the images aren’t the most visually pleasing, however, I did like the concept of plastic affecting humans and the impact it would have on us if we were in the same position as the animals who suffer from plastic pollution, so with that in mind I decided to explore plastic in and amongst the habitat and in places which it would cause us to bother. This way I can still portray the message that I want to portray but in a more visually pleasing way and less invasive of people’s physical space.

© Guy Farrow 2006-2019 Adobe Systems Incorporated.

© Guy Farrow 2006-2019 Adobe Systems Incorporated.

© Guy Farrow 2006-2019 Adobe Systems Incorporated.

© Guy Farrow 2006-2019 Adobe Systems Incorporated.

I did however experiment using portraits with images of plastic in a different style.

As you can see from the image above I used the top of the lid from a McDonalds cup to cover up half the eye of a portrait of my housemate. I particularly like the lighting in this image and the reflection of the cup on my house mates face. I feel like this is a similar style to Guys method but is a little more visually pleasing than having plastic hanging from her nose, however I didn’t think this images had the powerful effect that I wanted it to have so I am going to widen my research into environments and the way plastic has invaded different animal habitats and landscapes.