Final Evaluation

For this project, we were allowed to choose what we wanted to do, as long as it related to our chosen theme for the year - my chosen theme was fashion. This allowed us to be more creative with our work, as we were choosing something that personally really interested us. It was also interesting as it meant that nobody's work would be the same / or similar. It was a little bit difficult at first to think of ideas, because we had complete choice and control, but once I started to research artists, I began to think of possible outcome ideas. I started off by researching artists who had taken pictures for magazines, and looked at the techniques that they had used to create their photographs. An artist that I particularly liked researching was Joe Gall who incorporated 'ghost' photography (double exposure) with fashion :

I first experimented and explored with the idea of gothic fairytales, but then I started to look more at portraiture work, and decided that instead of going with my initial idea of double exposure and the gothic fairytales, I chose to incorporate my theme of fashion into portraiture work, as I felt like this would be something different and more unique from my previous outcomes. Throughout the project, my ideas evolved dramatically, but I'm glad they did as I did fairytale photographs during my AS year, and wanted to do something different, which is why I was more inspired by portraiture photographs. I feel that if I had stayed with the idea of fairytales, I wouldn't have experimented much or looked at new techniques and artists as I had already done it, so because I changed my idea, I have more variation on my blog now.

My main inspiration for my final outcome was Andy Warhol, and his collection of photobooth pictures:

I thought his work was really interesting, as he captured peoples expressions and thoughts (as well as fashion sense) at that exact moment and I took inspiration from this for my final piece, as well as from the work of Cindy Sherman, who is famous for her self portraits where she takes on the persona of other people, which also inspired me for my final piece as I decided to do self-portraiture for my final outcome:

 Overall, these were the two artists that inspired me the most throughout this project.

I think that for this project, I presented my final piece in an interesting and unique way - on a pinboard full of photo strips, so that it looks like a memory board. I'm personally happy with how it turned out and I think that visually it looks really interesting, rather than being on a mounted sheet, as it looks more personal. 

I think that I should have done a bigger variety of images and dressed up in more interesting outfits to take on different personas, as I think that this could have related more to the theme of gothic that I was exploring at the beginning of the project. I also think that I should have done more facial expressions, or set the camera to a timer where it takes several pictures in a row, like an actual photobooth would do, as it would capture the real feeling of a photobooth and wouldn't look as posed or 'staged'.

Overall, I really enjoyed this project, however I found it difficult to begin with as there were no set rules that we had to follow, it being the personal project. Also at the beginning, we were asked to think of final outcome ideas, which I found slightly difficult as we'd just begun the project, however overall I enjoyed it. Although when I started exploring different techniques and artists, I found it enjoyable and interesting. In the future, I think that I would like to incorporate portraiture into my fashion theme and combine them as I really enjoyed that. 

The photographs above are how I originally displayed the photographs, however I decided to change it as I felt that the way that it was currently presented was almost too crowded, and perhaps it would look better if it was displayed in a simpler way, such as what I decided to do below :

Overall, I think that this way turned out much better than the original way of presenting my artwork. I used thin pins to pin the photographs to the foamboard, as it doesn't take away from the photographs which heavier pins would, such as the typical gold pins. 

Dark Room Experiments

Experimenting with the 'drip' and 'splatter' effect - makes the photograph look more gothic and interesting. Also makes the viewer look harder to see what the picture actually is of.