Here’s the final piece:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/martikhora/4136640599/
Well my first proper photography session was a blast. Possibly because I was doing something new and exciting. Or possibly because Kim baked cookies. Either way it was fun. I, without any input from Kim, selected items from around her room (books, dvds etc etc) which I felt reflected her identity the most, and spread them all over her bed.
The input she did give was helping me compose the shot, as photography is a forte of hers. She suggested putting it down low so the objects at the front were in focus and the ones at the back blurred. This didn’t work very well because I specifically wanted to see ALL the objects very clearly and spread out. I didn’t actually tell her that I specifically wanted it shot from above, but it was interesting trying different positions and such.
She felt kind of awkward when looking directly into the camera when lying on the bed. She didn’t really know what to do with herself…
So I suggested that she closed her eyes instead, as if she were asleep. This turned out to be a bloody masterstroke, because it gave the image a kind of eerily serene feel, an edgier atmosphere. Almost as if she is either as peace with her stuff, or it subdues and pacifies her…
We set the camera so it took a black & white and a colour photo for each shot. I much preferred the colour shots because it emphasises the bright and garish nature of all the different forms of media around her. Anyway out of about 20 odd shots I chose the one of her ‘asleep’. I did suggest doing some with her naked but she wasn’t into that idea for some reason.
Oh and using Kim’s own camera to take the photos? It did not lack for poetry.
Post-production
You’ll see that I photoshopped the final photograph as opposed to just leaving it as it is. I gave the chosen photo a ‘Glow’ effect and richer, darker tone overall, to emphasise it’s dreamy-serene-eeriness. You can see the other photos I took on Flickr.
But taking the image was just half the story. The next and just as important half is uploading it onto Flickr and tagging it! And I did just that. I really enjoyed tagging it – and made sure to make them extra cross-overy to make it look more cubist and Hockneyesque. And it does look pretty darn cool with all the overlapping squares and rectangles – it really accentuates her being drowned in stuff.
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It’s actually a kinda cool way to explore who she is, or at least who she wants us to see who she is… It’s fun to hover over each section and see what lies beneath. And for extra exploration, you can click on the centre square to find a link to her own Flickr profile, and in turn look at her own work!
Feedback from the group was generally positive. They seemed to get what it was about, they liked how she had her eyes closed – some saying she even looked dead. (Don’t think I’ll tell Kim that)
It was suggested that I could utilise the fact is was online even further, by maybe linking it to videos of Kim speaking, or flash animation of photographs etc. I do like the idea of this, it does have a lot of potential. I would like to do something like link to an online diary of Kim’s, so people could read her thoughts and what she’s doing. I doubt she’d let me do it but it’s an interesting idea.
Doing flash animations also intrigues me, it would be a good excuse to get to grips of how to do it. But at the same time, I like it’s simplicity. A lot of the time less is more, which I think is the case here. But I can see the potential and maybe I’ll come back to it later on and see what I can do.
Overall, it’s another success in my book!
