For my exam, I chose the starting point of personal opinion, as I felt I had lots of opinions that I would like to voice through the medium of Photography. I initially brainstormed topics I could cover, which included Celebrity Culture, Reality Television, The Music Industry and Mental Health. I settled on looking at mental health as I decided this was a topic in which I could easily translate my opinions, thoughts and feelings into photographs and edits.
For my final shoots. I took inspiration from both my preparatory shoots and the photographers and artists I've researched.
In my preparatory shoots, I began to look at both portraying mental illness itself and creating metaphors for social stigmas regarding people with mental health issues. For my fourth shoot, I implemented white masks for the first time, making my subject wear one during a lesson and photographing him working and the way people behaved around him. My next shoot after this was the one in which I first implemented the painted mask. For this shoot I shot on location in a forrest near me. I simply photographed my subject wearing the mask from different angles as well as moving them to different places in the forest. These shoots inspired my use of both the masks and using different environments other than the studio for my final pieces.
Also, many of the Photographers and artists I discovered through my Photographer research and research logs helped inspire both my preparatory shoots and my final shoots.
My final pieces are very dark in mood, which is mostly due to the use of the featureless white masks and my use of lighting, however the surreal nature of the photographs can give them a slight comedic tone as well. The dark mood of my pieces is a result of influences such as Edward Honaker and Nicolas Bruno, both of which use muted colour palettes to achieve a depressing and eerie mood in their images. They both also create surreal imagery, Bruno through composition of photographs and what subjects and objects he uses, and Honaker through use of camera and photoshop techniques such as long exposures and using warp tools to digitally distort images, the first of which I heavily incorporated into my shoots for my final pieces. However, for my images I also included some saturated colours in contrast to the dark muted colours and low key lighting. This was inspired by Photographer Melissa Spitz, who often incorporated saturated purples and pinks into her series about her Mother's struggle with various mental health issues.
As a result of this project, I have improved and developed a number of skills in the medium of Photography. One of the skills which I hadn't previously incorporated into Photography is the use of physical art and props. From the fourth shoot onwards, I began to use white paper masks to represent the presence of mental illness. For my fifth shoot, I decided to create some physical art to use for my shoot, so I got one of my two white paper masks and covered one side in various brightly coloured paints. This mask and the plain mask can be seen in many of my preparatory shoots and all of my final pieces for this exam. Another example of my use of physical art is my physical experiments for both my, in which I created Decollages similar to that made by Artist Mimmo Rotella.
There are also many technical skills I've honed during this exam period that I hadn't touched on perviously. One of these is the use of studio equipment and the studio itself. For most of my preparatory shoots and one of my two exam shoots, I shot in the studio rather than on location, which usually not my preference. I mainly did this as my subject matter was easier to get across when in a controlled studio setting, but doing this has also taught me how to use a studio and its equipment effectively. For example, I have implemented spotlights into some of my last preparatory shoots and my second exam shoot, using a snoot on them to create low key lighting on my subject, which I felt created a dark tone in my work and linked it well to my subject matter of mental health. Also, I have learnt to use studio backdrops to add mood and atmosphere to my work; most of my shoots were shot on a dark blue or black background, which are colours that represent sadness and depression.
Overall, I would say that I responded well to the exam starting point, of which I chose Personal opinion and chose to focus on mental health and mental illness. From the start, I began to brainstorm ideas of what aspects of this I could look at and how I could present them. I quickly narrowed it down to looking at both portraying mental illness through Photography and creating metaphorical representations of social stigma surrounding mental health issues. Throughout the exam, I feel that I've experimented with both computer techniques to create pieces and physical techniques, which makes my response varied and shows off several skills and techniques. I also feel that I've kept to the subject matter I chose well, constantly displaying my ideas, thoughts and feelings on the subject of Mental health through using masks to portray it and shooting with these in public locations in order to get people's reactions to them, which acts as a metaphorical representation of how society perceives and reacts to mental illness.
However, there are some things that I feel I could have improved on based on their ability to respond the exam starting point and the exam as a whole. I would say that I could have implemented more advanced editing techniques in Photoshop to hit AO2 more successfully; Although I used Photoshop often, most of the techniques I used, even during the making of the final pieces, were fairly simple. Additionally, I feel that I could have completed more shoots in preparation for the final exam; I completed seven shoots, whereas the recommended amount is ten in order to consistently demonstrate the assessment objectives. Finally, I would say that I could have done some more regarding recording my work and observations, especially when it comes to explaining the deeper meanings behind my pieces, as they are based on mental illness and it is often not explicitly clear on what the meaning behind it is. I could have also gone into more detail about how my shoots link to each other, my research and the exam as a whole.
In conclusion, I would say that my final exam went well, as I created pieces that I feel were an improvement both technically and visually than any of my previous preparatory shoots. However, I feel I could have worked more to explain the links between this, my preparatory shoots and my research.
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