Work DIary Shoot 1- Seaside

For my project I was looking to accurately evoke a feeling of journey within the audience through the use of my images. A major part of my shoots take massive influence from photographers whom I have previously researched. My first shoot especially derives themes that are featured within the work of Staudinger Franke where he features relics from the past and composes the image in a way that indicates how the subject may have been used at the time. I wished to use the low tide to capture the beached ships, focusing on a more metaphorical aspect of journey instead of purely travel photography. Across both of my shoots, I wanted to translate a sense of progression through environments, highlighting unique aspects of specific area and contrasting them with unique aspects relating to another location. This allows the audience to feel as if they have travelled by highlighting items and people that would not typically be apart of their everyday lives. This form of travel photography is one that I have taken much inspiration from photographers such as Tomer Ifrah and Stephen Shore as they both use composition and colour to make each place that they visit feel completely unique to the last. I planned to use seaside culture and a spaceaous environment which would contrast with my London shoot. A main concern for the day was the extremely bright weather which when reflecting off of the water, causing my images to appear over exposed. In order to counter this I set a higher shutter speed and dropped my ISO accordingly to around 100 and in lower light, up to around 600.

For this image I wished to imply a sense of journey through composition. Within this image I attempted to utilise themes that were present in Staudinger Franke's Mohawk shoot. At first glance, the image appear to depict a ship on a voyage across the ocean, a sense of journey is implied through the composition of the image, showing the ship travelling from right to left of the frame with land in the background. However the black and white tones of the image intentionally cause the ship to appear as if it is floating when in reality it has been beached. This shows a ship at the end of its journey as it sits in the sand to rust while at the same time suggesting what life was like at the beginning of the ships journey. This uncommon sight would also contrast greatly with London photography as you are likely to never see such a sight in any other location. For this image, I used a zoom lens on my canon camera. I was aware that I was going to make the ship appear as if it were floating, so I wanted to use less light in order to create more contrast. At the time, I was attempting to counteract the sun as it glared off the waters surface, causing my image to appear even more over exposed. I set a low ISO of under 100 while keeping a higher shutter speed to ensure a crisper image over a longer distance. I wanted to make the horizon appear like a journey's end for the ship so I used manual focus to blur the background slightly, focusing more on the ship.

For this image I attempted to convey a more literal meaning of journey. I was torn between multiple imagery and photo joiner when deciding how to show this literal journey, I opted for multiple imagery as it allowed me to show a more vast example of journey without being limited to a single frame. I used the same composition while choosing different backgrounds which varied in scope and colour. The familiar composition with contrasting backgrounds causes the audience to feel a genuine sense of progression. While capturing each image I wanted to have certain consistencies within the frame that would cause the multiple imagery to blend better. I had to ensure that colours would match and each image would remain at a consistent brightness. As a result, I selected locations with strong light so I could keep my camera settings relatively similar. I chose a low ISO of 160 for these images while keeping a fairly midrange shutter speed in order to ensure that the image was not too bright. The depth of field within the image helped to create a consistent effect as each background appears blurred, revealing small amounts of information to the audience regarding the location by offering connotations to seaside towns.

For the next shoot I wish to contrast heavily with seaside culture, choosing to focus on the hyperactive living of city life and the different cultures that can be found within it. I hope to find aspects that are unique to the city of London and expand the use of other photographic techniques such as selective colour in order to highlight these aspects. I believe that I succeeded within this shoot as I highlighted specific aspects of journey which will make the experience unique to any other location. I must now expand from what I have started and evoke visually different feelings of journey which relate to London.