Photos
Sunday, September 20, 2009
These days I've been very very busy.
Didn't you just finish your shampoo label, Vina?
Yes I did. That was a pain. And now we're given a new project where we are supposed to take a photograph that "intrigues and leaves room for the viewer's imagination".
We only had a week to do it so it was a pretty tight schedule. Wednesday night, a few hours before the shoot, I was testing out my Nikon d5000. Then at that moment, of all the things that could happen, the camera died.
I was too shocked for words. I stood there and my mind went blank for a while. If I were still a few years younger, I would have cried out in exasperation or something like that. But I was quite surprised at myself when all I did was sit down, and think of the things I could do to still make the deadline. I came up with several plans. In the end, I went out to loan a Canon 350d from RMIT. It was the last one remaining so I was lucky Nita told me about the pre-booking.
concept ONE
At first my concept was the imaginary friend. Then halfway through it changed to the story of a little girl who broke a leg off her doll and since then she's always followed by the ghoul of one leg... This was the final product:
Of course, I made compressed the image so we can all see it here without crashing your browser.
That photo was such a pain to take... actually that was before I rented the 350d. I used a camera I borrowed from the homestay brother. It was quite old so the screen was really small and it was so prone to blurring. At first we took it in the living room. I readied the set and Esther, my housemate, to go behind the curtains and be the 'foot model'. When Chelsea (the kid) came, I asked her to sit beside the curtains. But she saw the single foot below the curtains and FREAKED. She ran away and didn't want to get close to the curtains at all.
Even after bribing her with ice cream, she refused... It must have been quite a trauma to her... In the end we went to her parent's room where she would be more comfortable, and then shot her separately with the one foot. I merged the two together using photoshop.
concept TWO
Of all the three photoshoots, this set was the most elaborate. It almost made me faint because I had to move really heavy potted plants around and all that bending made my blood pressure go haywire. I even had blackouts a few times that night.
I stole a plastic bag from an unknown person to make that crime scene tape look-alike thing when it's actually a Western Union bag. Then I stuck cut-outs from fashion magazines and stuck them to the toilet wall. I moved pots of plants. I wrote and stuck the writing "OFF TO MEET KRZYKIDD_01". I borrowed Listy's mac. I wrapped a white light with red paper, and a yellow light with blue paper. But in the end I only used the blue light because the red one was too overwhelming. This is the final outcome:
The concept lies in the setting. The fashion magazine cut-outs show the identity of the person who might have been in this place, who is a teenage girl. The plants symbolise 'growth', because teenagers nowadays seem to be growing up with technology to the point that they become obsessed and even take their laptop with them when they go to the toilet, and meet people from online communities. In this case, she went off to meet 'krzykidd_01'. Then something happened to her - therefore the crime scene tapes.
concept THREE
I was getting pretty stressed because when I was shooting the toilet stuff, I was feeling like a mess and the pictures all looked like crap. But I think that picture I showed was decent. I guess you really need to see it from the computer to judge anything, not that small stupid screen of a 350d.
So thinking everything looked like crap, I was getting very much depressed. I told myself not to be frail but I got pretty down that night. Luckily Listy was there and gave me mental support. She snapped at me when I started whining and though it wasn't pleasant at the time, it really brought me back to reality.
After around half an hour of trying to come up with something, I remembered what Shelly told me - that David did not require a long concept (or any at all) as long as the photo is intriguing. So having that in mind, I thought what the hell. Why don't I just come up with something fun. I don't even care anymore how much I will get for the final results. I think I should just relax with this brief.
It doesn't really have a concept. Whatever. I'll think of something later. I used the same lights as from concept two. Blue on the mannequin, red on the other side of the bed. The mannequin's name is Sally. If you're wondering why the heck does a mannequin have a name, it's because Listy borrowed it from the homestay mom and during that time, I was reading ghost stories to her regarding imaginary friends for inspiration. The imaginary friend happened to be named Sally. Listy was freaked out by the story so I thought it would be funny to name the mannequin Sally so I did.
These photos aren't on my facebook but they're here exclusively for people who actually read my blog =D long live blogs!
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Didn't I tell you I decided to have fun? Other photos aren't uploaded because they are a bit too shameless.
The shoot for the second and third concept went on from 8pm till 1am. Setting up the location and thinking of a new concept took time. After the shoot, I was going to upload the photos to my laptop but for some reason the camera refused to be connected to my laptop. So many bad and unlucky things had happened that I wasn't surprised anymore. I just went to sleep. The next day I tried it with Listy's laptop and it worked. Many of my classmates facebook status-ed 'this project is so easy it was a breeze' but for me it was several days of trial.
But what's important is I learned a lot from this right? :)
So the next day it was Listy's turn to get her photoshoot done for her fashion design project. The theme was retro / personal space. She styled her hair and clothes to seem as retro as her wardrobe could manage and I was given the job to direct poses props and of course take the photos.
Did I mention my photo editing skills have greatly improved? =)
And guess what I did today. I went to church! Whoa. Then after that Listy and I went to Queen Vic market and I did a bit of shopping. I bought a cowboy hat (wee~) and a black lace top in this really chic shop. I wore the cowboy hat home and when I was at the station, going down the elevator, this guy suddenly stood next to me, and asked 'so how was your day?'.
I think he said something before that but I wasn't listening because I didn't even know he was talking to me. I looked at him a bit, then looked away again and just ignored him while smiling. Then he continued... "I like hats." "...alright (I answered with an amused smile)" "Especially straw ones."
Haha okay... I think his name was Alex, not sure. Listy ended up giving her name to him and she was the one who heard.
Anyway long day. I'm beat now and not feeling too well... See you later :)
Labels: Design Project, mannequin, photography, retro
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Hello. This blog was created for me to store memories. Because... I have a bad memory. hehe
juice-22 EST.2006
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