Still Life

After thinking about and coming to a creative halt with the development of my ideas in terms of still life fashion photography, I have decided to change the theme of my images. I want to explore the pressure that young girls have to grow up, and how they act older than we expect them to even though they have that pressure on them. I want to do this through symbols that represent the contrast between young and old. For example, a child’s paintbrush in a makeup pot, a cupcake rapper used as a means of fashion in a magazine, or a loveheart sweet set on fire.

These ideas were inspired when my mums friend found messages on her daughters phone, and she was shocked that her 14 year old had grown up so fast. Also, by my little sister who has started wearing makeup and dying her hair.

I feel as though I can move forward and experiment with my ideas more with this concept, using the studio and in some cases the scanner to create my images, as layering cupcake rappers and magazines will be more effective in the scanner than in the studio.

Still Life – Klara G

Klara uses contrast within her images, the black background compared to the white and yellow used as subjects. Her images are both lit from above, creating a shadow within the picture and have a slight vignette effect to them. The lighting is also hard and spotted in one area, with no diffusion of light throughout the image. This highlights the contrast, which her images already show through the colours used.

There is only one colour used within her images, as she matches the object with the subject of the image. This works effectively when photographing and advertising makeup as the colour of the product is the selling point.

Still Life – Initial Ideas

Thinking of Still Life, traditionally it consists of food and flowers in studio lighting, set up with a composure that makes the image appealing. However, further research into Still Life found that there are concepts and metaphors that can be projected from Still Life work, as well as there being a place for Still Life in fashion photography. Still Life fashion photography is what has interested me the most and what I would like to experiment within this brief. I have taken inspiration in the form of Klara G, a photographer who works with colours within makeup and fashion and matches them with other objects in her photos.

I want to work with fruit and veg as well as makeup in the images I use, to combine traditional Still Life photography with fashion still life. My ideas include working with the transparency of fruit like oranges and lemons (cut into slices) and to highlight that with the studio lighting, making them glow or making a coloured shadows with them.

Other ideas I had include the depiction of youth in objects throughout decades, an object to represent a time era/trend in the past or present. This idea was however, inspired by the ideas given to us, and I wanted to do my own research before I committed to that idea.

I first knew that I wanted to photography when I was about 10 – my Dad was really into taking photos to document memories and adventures, and we went on a trip to Geirangerfjord + Alesund in Norway and, because of my Dad, had to take a million pictures. When we got there, I had to take a picture of my sister and her friend standing on the viewpoint in front of the Island of Alesund and I remember that in the photo, the sun behind them made a circular glare in the camera, framing them in what I thought looked like an angel halo, and I was so proud of myself and the picture I had taken. That’s when I decided I wanted to do photography, for GCSE level at least, and it has carried through to me now wanting to do it at University.

Living on the south coast has probably influenced my photography through my frequent exploration of landscape photography and still life. Being able to live ten minutes away from the beach, as well as being in a village, with lots of landscape, has shown that my strengths have developed in photography of objects and places rather than people. Especially abstract, as I like to experiment with angles.

However, saying that, my favourite type of photography is portrait. For me, conceptual photography is so much more effective through the use of people, because it can resonate with the audience, whereas abstraction and still life doesn’t quite tell a story as easily. However, being an introvert, my portrait photography is weaker because I’m naturally quite a shy person, so am not able to communicate with a model very well. Although I have ideas of how I want the image to turn out, it doesn’t quite come out the way I planned. It’s a skill I need to practice, as portraiture is an element of the career I want to go into; gig/concert photography and/or fashion photography.

Some of my biggest inspirations, or favourite photographers include; Adam Elmakias – a concert photographer for the likes of Warped Tour and the bands that are frequent on the lineup, Julie De Waroquier – a conceptual/surrealism photographer, Danny Suede – a semi amateur travel photographer (he experiments with light and exposure a lot, which I like, and also photographs his brothers band on tour). However, I also like to gain inspiration through the photographers I follow on Instagram, as I like to browse photography pages a lot.