Over the last week, I have done some research including doing a PEST analysis, and figured out a purpose for my book, and where it would fit in the market. From my research and my ideas, I concluded that my photography book was heavily inspired by Dafy Hagai, and my concept was based around wanting to produce something that is happy and uplifting. From this, I decided that my photography book would be part of a series of books,that explores different cultures in different countries, and celebrates the communities in their natural form. The book series would explore several different countries and I am starting with Portugal as I have a personal connection to it. This tutorial I spoke about my progression, and also began to think further into the possibility of creating a behind the scenes video to release with the book.

This week I have also created a flat plan, and a draft layout using images from the internet to make the process of producing the layout of the book quicker and easier when returning from Portugal.

This week included having informal group presentations, where we discussed our progress and our ideas going forward into the final major project. The development I have achieved following on from last week, was deciding on what style of outcome I wanted to produce at the end of my final major project. Coming to the conclusion that I wanted to produce a photo series, I realised that this didn’t fit into the outcome requirements for the photography and styling brief. In the informal presentations, I was able to voice these concerns and come to the conclusion that I would no longer be producing an outcome to fit with photography and styling, but produce something for the ‘imaging’ brief. I also discussed my mood boards, ideas, and thought of solutions for some of the worries I had for shooting in Portugal.

This week I couldn’t be present for my tutorial. Over the past week I have been doing some artist research into my sketchbook, and analysing what I found inspiring about their images. I also spent some time thinking about what my final outcomes would be, as photography & styling have set outcomes to be met.

This was the first week that I spoke about my idea in a group, and got some feedback on the work I had done so far. The group crit was helpful because it was good to see what my peers are doing, and bounce ideas around the group. Up to this week I produced some mood boards to illustrate the style that I am going for with my final major project.

From my research I decided that I want to shoot in documentary style, and capture the moment rather than produce set up fashion shoots.

Mood Boards:

This tutorial was the last individual tutorial with this specific tutor. Following on from her advice, I brainstormed and thought about what research I had done and enjoyed the most. I also thought about topics that I would find fun, and were personal to me. This led me to change my idea to focus on Portugal and culture, as I am from there so it is close to my heart. I still wanted to keep an element from my initial theme, so decided to keep the feminine gaze aspect going forward.

Day Hagai’s work was the main inspiration for my idea progression, and my current idea is to photograph the women of Portugal, to portray and celebrate them.

 

Over this last week I visited London and saw some exhibitions at White Cube, The Serpentine, and The Photographer’s Gallery. Stacey Dooley’s documentary have been my main source of research and inspiration. Her documentary’s have a feminist approach, and I feel that she is extremely current. From my research this week, I have been inspired by documentary’s and documentary style of photography by Wim Wenders.

In this tutorial we spoke about the research I had done, and touched on how my ideas still hadn’t progressed very much. Up to this point I wasn’t thinking outside of the box enough, and was focused on what my outcomes should have been. This was not letting me engage with my research and the things I enjoy. In this tutorial my tutor gave me some advice to think about what things I like, and things that are personal to me.

This tutorial was the first one to one tutorial regarding the final major project. Over the past week I began doing some research into my chosen theme of feminism, and had an idea for one concept for an advertorial.

Advertorial – An advertorial to raise awareness to the globally feminist issue that is child marriage. Creating an advertorial for a British brand such as Next, promoting children’s wedding dresses as if child marriage was the norm in well developed countries.

The research I completed for this was to look into Girls not Brides organisation, and reading up more about the issue of child marriage.

In this tutorial we discussed my idea, and came to the conclusion that this topic is extremely sensitive and it would be difficult to produce an outcome that wouldn’t offend someone. Going forward, I will do some gallery research in London and try to progress my ideas.

This week was spent finishing and proof reading my dissertation, as the deadline is extremely soon. I couldn’t attend the formative crits, and as I have been finishing work for other modules, it still has not progressed a lot.