Revised photobook

There were two key issues that I felt compelled to address after my tutor’s feedback and reflecting on my own thoughts about this project. These were how to achieve a ‘constant’ look to the photobook and how to present these images in a way that would prompt or trigger ideas for and emotion in the ‘viewer’. 

‘A constant look’

Returning to the images I agree that the final selection of images did not present a 'constant look' to the photobook. Why was this? Some of those  images had some considerable post production treatment to generate a certain feel, for example,  'warm sunshine’, the passing of time or an attempt to place the image back in time by representing it as an image taken many years ago that had faded with time. Post production treatment experimenting with techniques learnt during the course approaches introduced a degree of inconsistency across the book. My tutor felts that this colour rendering and use of grain 'detracts from the quality of the image (both technically and emotionally)'. For the most part I have to agree though differing in respect of one image i.e. ‘Amateur artist on honeymoon’. This image of one of my Dad’s earliest pen and ink drawings done on his honeymoon works better for me with the heavy grain…it conjures up a feeling of artistic effort.

How to achieve a constant ‘look’?  

Initially I went back to the original images and experimented to see if it was possible to process them to 'look' like old photos in a way that would provide a consistency of ‘aged’ look. This proved again to me that the images that I am using do not easily lend themselves to creating the look of old photos right across the board.

On reflection I have concluded that I can trigger memories of ‘yesterday’ through images taken ‘today’. This works for me in terms of my memories. For others it is less simple, but I believe that the images are not so specific that they cannot trigger thoughts, memories and emotions even if these are not that personal to the viewer.  

Photobook: version two

So I have reworked the photobook avoiding the highly glossy finish that neither I nor my tutor liked (I usually print my images on smooth pearl photographic paper and need to replicate this finish in the photobook). I have given this second photobook an introduction to give the viewers  as my tutor says ' a bit of a clue ' My original instinct to write a short introduction to the photo book, setting the scene so to speak, which I originally considered and discarded, was right with hindsight. This introduction sets the scene for viewers – my intention being that  the images they view will trigger the experience, the idea or emotion that Roland Barthes describes as the 'punctum' - the 'element which rises from the scene, shoots out of it like an arrow, and pierces one' ( Barthes, 2000, p.26 ).

This second photobook with a number of revised images will be submitted with my assessment material. The original images for these revised images will also be included in my selection of prints for assessment.

Revised images:

P 705

 

P 701

 

P707

P704

Assignment 5 : The photobook - did it work?

Was the photobook the right presentation 'vehicle' for my project ? I think so. However, this was the first time I had created a photobook; it was a learning curve and the end product was not as successful as I had hoped. Both I and my tutor agree on this point.

So I shall redo the photobook now with a number of changes. 

Firstly, neither I or my tutor liked the highly glossy finish. I usually print my images on smooth pearl photographic paper and need to replicate this finish in the photobook. 

Secondly, the book needs an introduction to give the viewers  as my tutor says ' a bit of a clue ' My original instinct to write a short introduction to the photo book, setting the scene so to speak, which I originally considered and discarded, was right with hindsight. I followed advice to keep captions simple trying where practicable to hint at what the image represented to me. With hindsight, I think the need that I felt to explain images suggests a lack of success in what I was trying to achieve' 

Adding an introduction will provide set the scene for viewers whereby the images they view will trigger the experience, the idea or emotion that Roland Barthes describes as the 'punctum' - the 'element which rises from the scene, shoots out of it like an arrow, and pierces one' 
( Barthes, 2000, p.26 ).

Assignment 5 - achieving a constant look

I think it fair to say that the final selection of images did not present a 'constant look' to the photobook. Why was this? Some of those  images had some considerable post production treatment to generate a certain feel,for example,  'warm sunshine',the passing of time or an attempt to place the image back in time by representing it as an image taken many years ago that had faded with time.My tutor feels that this colour rendering and use of grain 'detracts from the quality of the image ( both technically and emotionally )'. 
This post production treatment experimenting with techniques learnt during the course approaches did introduce a degree of inconsistency across the book. How to get round this? how to achieve a constant 'look' ?  

  
 The images that I want to use do not easily lend themselves to creating the look of old photos right across the board; and given that I want the images I've taken today to trigger memories of yesterday, this suggests that I would be better sticking to printing images that I have taken in the here and now and leave them to jog memories of the past. This would work for me in  terms of my memories. For others it is less simple, but perhaps the images are not so specific that they do not trigger thoughts and memories even if these are not that personal to the viewer.  
                       

A:  Lightroom colour preset

P700: Daylight WB

                            

        Same image but different treatments to try and achieve the  sense of hot sunshine within a glass greenhouse.....

              

P701 :: Cloudy WB

P702:original image AWB

              However, if I were to opt for the idea that the images were taken a while ago and have changed over time, for example, started to fade  or some colours fading, how would this be achieved, how would it look and could it or should it be applied across all images to provide the consistency that I feel is needed?    Looking at the images above I think Image C comes closest to what I was trying to conjure up..This was achieved by  using the cloudy white balance setting ( P701).

        I also experimented with some differing approaches to 'aging' photos  to see whether there was any approach that would work across. 

 P703 : Photochrome  version

        I have come  to the conclusion however, that this project is better served by using the original images to achieve a consistency of look  rather than processing them to 'look' like old photos.

    

       



Tutor report (2) - Assignment 5 Challenging the interpretation concept ....

P682

The image above is a recapture of a photograph of my Dad working in a greengrocer's taken by a passing professional photographer sometime before decimalisation. The original was placed against a black background to bring out the lovely customer friendly quality that Dad had, so expertly captured in the original image. The image below (P681) is an attempt to recreate the original photograph  by a modern version which conjuring up the same sense of my Dad...

My 'model' here was a very patient and obliging Portsmouth market stallholder happy to help try to create the same pose...

P681

Tutor : The problem is will the reader realise it is a more or less random stall holder? Does this matter?  A very helpful and insightful comment. Looking back again at these two images I think it matters only in that the sequence of reading the images is perhaps the wrong way round which suggests a stronger link between the two men that was intended. Reversing the images would underline the idea of the modern image conjuring up the 'memory' i.e. the eye travelling left to right from the modern  to the 1950s picture and be more consistent with the rest of the work. Another reason for reworking the images into a new version and reviewing the captions.

P686

 'Amateur artist on honeymoon...'

An unexpected side of my Dad was an artistic streak that stretched way back to before the war. P686 below shows the earliest example that I have - one of two pen and ink drawings that he made on honeymoon.
I used a heavy grain to give an impression of a painting. Tutor : Do you think this is necessary? Has it worked?

 Here's the original  image without the heavy grain ...

                           

         I prefer the heavy grain version - it works for me as I think  it refers back to the 'artist' in that it looks more like a painting. However, the question being asked suggests that it might not work for  other observers. Should I then make a change here? My instinct is to stay with my original choice but I will revisit this when I review the concept of achieving a 'constant' look to the photobook. 

I 

Tutor report (1) on Assignment 5 - my initial response

Here's my tutor's feedback with my initial response in red...

 
Feedback on assignment 5

Most of what I want to say in general is in the annotations/notes that I have added to the documents you sent in and these are good, they really do help to understand what you were setting out to do, how you went about it and what you think of the result.

You have done some very thorough research which is evidenced by the good reading list you have included for this assignment.  You seem to have all the key texts and it is good to see a student engaging well with the theoretical side of the subject.  This practice should stand you in good stead for the rest of your degree.

I mentioned that I am not a fan of gloss for books (in fact I am not a great fan of high gloss at all!); in general I like to see some sheen on images, perhaps semi gloss, lustre or semi matt, as I think it tends to give the tonal range the best chance.  Gloss has a tendency to have reflections and I find matt rather lacking in tonal range but sometimes it is important to give the images a textural feel (and look of course)  I also think that glossy books just look cheap!

I'm not surprised here as my own view after getting the photo book back from the printer was that I should have opted for a more matt finish ( see my reflective account posted on 29 April).

I think that you need to think about a constant ‘look’ for the images in the book.  If you are trying to create an old photos look then you need to think about what old colour photos look like and whether you want your images to look as though they have been on a frame on the piano for years (faded some of the colours disappearing and so on) or whether you are trying to make them look as though they have just been taken but at some time in the past.  The other approach is to clearly separate the old (and ‘old) images from the new ones that are portraying a memory.

Fair comment...my initial attempts to try one kind of 'look' for every subject suggested that this would not work across all subjects but hindsight is a marvellous  thing..and I need to revisit this again
.

For me some of the treatment you have applied post production, colour rendering, grain and so on, detract from the quality of the image (both technically and emotionally) both in the book and the separate image that you have included.

Definitely worth revisiting my approach here ..

Also you should look at the different ways of cutting out a subject from its background.  In my experience different subjects work better using different techniques, but which ever you use try to make the edges as un-obvious as possible by feathering or whatever.

Interesting  as I did try some feathering but  a new technique for me and I need to go back and try this approach again.

You might want to think about making a new set of prints or at least preparing a new set of digital images (depending on how you are planning on submitting you work for assessment) that address these points.

I have decided to revisit my approach here and produce a new set of digital images. I did not like the glossy photo book and think my concept worth a second attempt using a semi matt finish.

You have Camera Lucida in you reading so you should think about what Barth says about punctum vs stadium in the image and how this relates to your images. I think; if only because of the way Barthes has written about it, his context for the explanation; the sort of subject that you project is dealing with makes these things particularly pertinent.  For example how do these concepts show in the Nearing Retirement image?

Hmmm...I need to go back to Barthes'  'Camera Lucida' ..

For me, and I get the feeling for you too, the final book is not a successful as the research and preparation work might deserve.  I think you could fix this by thinking about the overall ‘look’ of the images as I discuss above and perhaps by including either a foreword or afterword that give at least some of the background to the project.  I don’t think that a viewer coming cold to the images would realise what is going on but given a bit of a clue the images could give rise to all sorts of ideas and emotions in them.  You should at least discuss all this in your log/blog as trying to fix things that don’t quite go as right as you thought they would is the way we learn and is central to the purpose of these modules.  Credit is given for critical assessment, proposed remedies, and suggested ways forward.

Learning Logs/Critical essays

I mentioned Harvard referencing.  It is not vital that you use it for informal log/blog entries but you must use it for formal essays and critical reviews.  I have given links to help you in this for the future.

I have now researched this referencing system and from now on will use it in my blog and also for any written work if providing references or a bibliography. As a trial run, I have revised my Reflective Account as best I could given that my approach to recording detail such as the chapter / page number was not as consistent as it should have been. Won't happen again!

I think that the content of your blog is fine and makes an interesting read.  You might want to give it the final once over to check that it is as easy as possible for the assessors to find what they will want to see.  The index should be clear and there should be the minimum of clicks to find anything.

Reading for Assignment 5

Barthes,R., Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography, Vintage Classics, London,1993 

Barthes,R., The Rhetoric of the Image in: Image,Music, Text, pp.32-51 Fontana Press,London 

Chandler,D., Semiotics, 2nd ed.Routledge,Abingdon,2002

Fox,Anna and Caruana, Natasha,Behind the Image,AVA Publishing SA, Lausanne,2012

Hirsh, Julia.,Family photographs: Content,Meaning and Effect,OUP 1981

Hirsch, Marianne,   Family Frames  photography narrative and postmemory, Harvard University Press, 1997

Photoworks, Issue 20, Family Politics 2013

Richin,F., Bending the Frame: Photojournalism, Documentary, and the Citizen,Aperture,New York,2013.

Traces  Foam International photography magazine,issue #25, Steidl/ Gagosian, 2010

Spence,Jo  &  Holland,Patricia , Family Snaps, The Meaning of Domestic Photography, Virago,1991

How about a photo book?

Feedback via the student website tells me that presenting assignment images in a photo book should not be attempted by first year students as this approach is much harder than many realise. I wondered at first why this would be? Is this a reference to the technical side of things, the expense or the amount of time this takes ?

Then I remembered seeing a tutor video on how to prepare for a photographic assessment which included a photobook so I went looking for this guide as a starting point. The comments I found here were helpful - only one image per page, keep captions simple and avoid a black background.

Research on the internet took me a stage further. Here I found advice from designers on the type of font to use for the captions ..that is, the type of fonts that I could afford i.e. being free.

The most significant advice for me though was to remember that a photobook is not a collection of images presented in book form but images presented in a coherent way with a relationship to each other as pages of a book work together to tell a story..This seemed particularly relevant in that what I wanted to achieve with this project is a thematic approach creating memories of my Dad.

An optimist at heart I decided to plough on with the idea of creating a photo book for this assignment. I decided if anything, it would be a real learning process giving me markers for the future.

Colouring the passage of time ..

I've been trying to work out how to give my project some coherence , a thematic approach that brings everything together other than the subject of the project i.e.my Dad. This has proved harder than trying to source objects for a still life approach to some of my ideas...I had to resort to Amazon to track down a genuine pumice stone ( more of that later ).

It did occur to me that I could use colour to indicate the passage of time in my approach ..i.e. images looking back to my father's middle age or his wartime experiences looking like photos taken at that time whether in mint condition as taken or looking as if the passage of time had had an effect on the actual photo..
But would this sacrifice the overall quality of image?

In her book 'On Photography', Susan Sontag wrote that a photograph is 'not only an image (as a painting is an image), an interpretation of the real; it is also a trace, something directly stenciled off the real, like a footprint or a death mask' (“Image-World” p154). How to achieve the 'trace' of my Dad that I'm looking for ?

 My father  was a nurseryman at the beginning of his working life growing tomatoes and at the end when he grew carnations and chrysanthemums. In between he worked as a shop assistant in a greengrocer's..


So, what does the nursery offer?




P651 original: F10 @ 1/60 18mm ISO AWB  

P651b Cropped 

I have very dim memories of visiting my Dad's tomato greenhouses when very young, maybe a toddler. I remember heat, the smell of tomatoes on the vine and a brick built well and being stung by red ants. P651b comes closest to conjuring up the sense of warmth I felt then. The colouring has a warmth to it; a sense of sunshine and warm brick.The watering can waits for someone to return..or for a hosepipe to be attached. Either way the image has the promise...and joins my shortlist to be revisited...



P651c 

I

P651d

Both P651c and P651d above convey time passing in the sense of a decaying photographic colour print - this could be an image taken some time ago before digital photography - a fading instamatic print.

P651e

This sepia coloured image (P651e ) above suggests a Victorian / Edwardian nursery - too much is out of my time frame if I opt for a historical reality.

P651f

I think what this exercise has done is question my idea of using the colour of the images to indicate a linear passage of time through these recreated images /traces of Dad from crude black and white to digitally enhanced colour. I think this will create too much of a straitjacket where I want the flexibility to create a memory or trace or footprint using both composition and processing to best effect to achieve the end result that I'm looking for.

What does a string of tomatoes say ? Roland Barthes and testing concepts

There a number of concepts that I want to test out as part of gathering material for this final project. For example, whether to use objects with a direct connection to my Dad such as medals, army service record book or to opt for objects, subjects, scenes with no direct link but a visual connection via my memory or imagination.

There is also the concept of time passing or time past; the sense of smell or feeling. Do I or can I convey this by using different software processes or camera settings.

And how to bring a sense of wholeness to the images that I choose for the final selection. Am I telling a story of conveying a sense of what a person was like. Will I need to explain the photos by way of actions or  allow the viewer to 'read' the image for themselves? 

Roland Barthes has some interesting things to say here in his work ' Image, Music, Text ' ( Fontana 1977 ). In chapter one entitled 'The Photographic Message', he writes 'Thanks to its code of connotation the reading of the photograph is thus always historical; it depends on the reader's 'knowledge' just as though it were a matter of a real language, intelligible only if one has learned the signs'. He also says that meaning in images comes from the object photographed, 'the interest lies in the fact that objects are accepted inducers of associations of ideas'. A bookcase equals an intellectual etc.

So if I photograph an artist's easel, does this indicate that Dad was an artist ? If I select a picture of tomatoes, does that say he liked tomatoes, grows tomatoes?  

P644

And if I change the colour of the image, what does this transmit to the reader, particularly if they do not have the same  visual experience as myself? Does this matter if I'm creating visual memories rather than recreating them ?

Personal Project Proposal

Leading the way ...in the footsteps of Dad

PERSONAL PROJECT PROPOSAL

AIM: To explore the concept of memory via photography and my interest in family history.

WHY?

My mother in law was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s recently and this brought back memories of my own personal experience of coping with my mother’s senile dementia. I remember her looking at a collection of photographs that I had brought together to help trigger her memories of family times past. Studying a picture of my father taken before he died twenty years earlier, she commented that she hardly remembered him and what he looked like. But she did recognise him.

I also remembered at the time, colleagues who used to conduct reminiscence sessions for elderly people in care homes telling me how the sense of smell triggered memories much longer than visual impressions. Had we had more time together I would have brought together an ‘album’ of scents and smells to trigger our conversations of things past.

Leading the way ...in the footsteps of Dad

When my father died nearly thirty years ago very suddenly, we were left with our own personal memories and the shared photographic memory captured in family photo albums. More recently  have been researching my family history, I realised that there was very little trace of my father other than a few black and white images from the early days of his marriage and fading colour ‘snaps’ taken over the years to record family events rather than my father.

Is it possible to ‘conjure’ up memories of my Dad through photographic images that trigger more than a visual memory? How to conjure up the memory of someone not there? There are a number of issues, for example:

-          Finding traces left behind that could be used for this project i.e. physical evidence of having made an impact

-          Using places / people/ objects that trigger personal memories that have no meaning to an outsider

-          Achieving images that give a ‘sense’ of a person to those who never knew them

OUTCOME

A collection of images displayed as a book which give a sense of who my Dad was - images on a personal theme drawn from my interest in family history.

Ideally these photographs will also create a visual ‘memory’ that can be experienced by ‘outsiders’ and maybe trigger other   family memories of their own.

HOW?

Certain themes instantly come to mind when I think of my father. These are my starting point. I intend to explore the possibility of a central theme/focus running through each image and how reproducing past memory as a past image or reworked in today’s world and lifestyle might work in the context of the outcome that I am trying to achieve.

PROJECT PLAN

1) Shooting script

Themes to be explored

1.      Memory - here and now or referenced by old photographs

·         Shadow on the wall?

2.      Family – father  ( died in 1922 –no extant photograph but sibling- step sister still alive )

·         Portraits?

3.      Workplace – greengrocer/ nursery man/ gardener

·         Revisit a black and white photo of my Dad taken in a greengrocer’s shop by taking the same kind of image today using a willing greengrocer in same pose?

·         Smell of hot sun in greenhouses full or ripening tomatoes?

·         Autumn colour of chrysanthemums (Dad grew these commercially as well as tomatoes)?

4.      Wartime  - RAF / Army ( Burma ) –memorabilia

5.      Character – artistic / creative/ introspective

·         The artist /sketching trips?

6.      My childhood memories – cigar smoke, Satsumas, Christmas?

7.      Sense of place - where does he fit in?

·         Referencing his father – war memorials/ commemoration

The images will be colour or monochrome as appropriate to the intended outcome and likely to be a mix of representational/ still life/ interpretative / photo journalistic approaches  again dependent on the best way to achieve a particular interpretation.

2) Work plan (March –April 2014)

Research  

·         Reading re concept of memory / trace / photographs

·         Family image research

·         Locations for photo shoot

             Shooting schedule   March 2014

Week 1   (10-16)

·         Outdoor shoot:

o   Workplace   Portsmouth

o   Character     Bosham

·         Indoor shoot:

o    Childhood memories

 

Week 2   (17-23) 

·         Outdoor shoot:

o   Workplace   Portsmouth  

o   Character     Bosham

o   Family & Sense of place Worthing

·         Indoor shoot: 

o   Childhood memories/Memory /Wartime

 

Week 3   (24- 31)

·         Outdoor shoot:

o   Workplace   Portsmouth  

o   Character    Bosham

o   Sense of place 

o   Character

·         Indoor shoot:

o   Wartime / Memory

 

Editing / processing images  Weeks 1-4

10 March – 6 April

Photo book preparation   Weeks 5-7

6 – 27 April

Project submission Week 8   (April 28-30)