M.A.D - GDC - S2

This project has shown me that i’m really passionate about photography, be that of still or moving image and it’s brought me closer to figuring out what career path I want to take, which as of now, is a freelance DOP (do they even exist? If they don’t, i’ll start it, if they do, that’s where i’m headed!)

What was really nice about this project is that everyone was working on different things, so we had the chance to help each other out in a more varied way. I was asked to do the make up for my friend’s project on his clothing company, where the theme was the Mexican day of the dead. Also, another friend making a visual narrative to go alongside a selection of poems from the book ‘Milk and Honey’ asked me to be the camera woman (I would say DOP but her storyboard was so impressive and precise I find it dishonest to say that I had a very heavy influence in the photography and so can’t really name myself DOP) It’s so nice to have such a strong uni ‘family’ in which we all help each other and in turn, allows us to better our personal and professional practice. 

Screenshot of the email I sent to one of the models, it was so nice to meet and work with other creatives that I wouldn’t met otherwise. Talks of working together in the future and collaborating are already in the process. Not only did I get to work with talented enthusiastic people, I made friends with them too.  

After talking to my dad, who is the encyclopedia for everything, he explained to me one must sync the shutter speed of the projector and the camera to reduce the visibility of the lines, so again, swallowing my pride and letting my dad help turned out for the absolute best- thank you thank you thank you.

I found it easier drawing inspiration from examples of simple classic typefaces being used for album covers, to see how other designers found solutions to the problems i’m facing. I prefer serif typefaces in general, however, after talking with the artist i’m doing the work for, he much prefers block san serif type faces...I feel like I can find an in between though, like the album cover on the left, it’s san serif but isn’t harsh or ‘blocky’.

Struggling a bit with the typeface to adopt for the logo, I looked through the pages of ‘Type Matters’ by Jim Williams and ‘Just My Type’ by Simon Garfield, but it’s still stumping me a bit...

It also has become apparent that I need to make the border of black abyss more so, so there is space for the logotype and the design breaths.

I absolutely live for Jorja Smith, and her new branding is no exception. I quickly realised I was copying her, and after a crit with Anna, it came apparent the logotype should be simple and unedited, as the image is so strong and one would not want to distract from that with an over the top logotype. Above are my experimentations with various styles, including hand drawn. This, however, is too messy for me and isn’t in keeping with the style of the genre that is Ansah’s music, which is mainly deep house.

After cutting and preparing flowers for almost half an hour (removing leaves and stems and what  have you), the bath was filled and milkyfied and the shoot commenced. Using a variety of more flowers and less leaves was more successful, i’m glad I did the test shoot otherwise it wouldn’t have turned out as nice for the real shoot as I would have stuck to more ‘gritty’ wildflowers. This was, what I thought, going to be my last shoot day but unfortunately i’m just not happy with the projection footage so will be reshooting on June 1st, which doesn’t leave a lot of time to edit.

One set of frames I had in mind, where I was planning to hire a small crane for the camera so the motion was seamless, fell through. My account wasn’t verified in time so I my booking request wasn’t accepted..maybe it won’t be too much of a loss, but it would have still been much better to have the open to cut the footage out of the edit rather than not having the option of it, and rather my shoddy attempt to do the motion free hand....yikes

Day one of official shooting over! A slow start, it took it a while to get over my nerves as it was the official start to shooting. A long day too, as I did the shot list twice, once with the projective film on the mirrors, and one without. I was glad to get home. As it was such a hot say it was hard to keep the models hair damp on set, I want the hair wet in all three sets as to keep this weird sense of hysteria, and also to have continuity throughout the shots. I was really pleased with the way the outfit looked on set. It was hard when the protective film was taken off the mirrors as I kept getting my own reflection in shot a lot, which was annoying as it means I won’t be able to include many ‘establishing’ shots to this set in the edit. Good thing is by this point, I have met the model several times and got to know her to a level we are comfortable around each other, so she wasn’t phased when I got a bit flustered on set. I’m glad I took Anna’s advice to get Ollie to help out with the equipment, his quick tutorial really helped me, on the technical side, with making my shots look more professional through understanding the white balance, aperture and so on, and how to control them on a camera...rather than just guessing.

What I need to watch out for it getting the right balance with the ISO settings and the aperture, to ensure that the face is in focus and the shadows are dark enough. At first I underestimated the amount of lines I would need to make the shot interesting, the document thats projecting is almost hard to loo at on a screen because the amount of lines makes your eyes strain. Doing a test shoot showed me that the jpegs I had created for the shoot weren’t adequate for what I had in mind, thank god for test shoots otherwise I would have lost so much time at the beginning of the real shot fumbling about trying to make a new projection.

Made this one way too poppy red, needs to be darker. I think the overall tone coming from the pose isn’t as striking as the other poses, although the eyes are good. However, the brightness of the red takes away from the eyes and doesn’t communicate the tone I want to put across. 

(screenshot from my PSD file)

By clearing up the splatter a bit, it puts more focus on the eyes, and in deciding to remove the shoulder, all focus is put on the face and the make up details making it a more powerful image, im still editing another image from this shoot that might be more powerful, but i’m struggling with cleaner up the splatter on the nose

For the test shoot I kept the protective film on the mirrors, and I liked the foggy effect it had, however I am concerned that when I remove them, the polystyrene board I have placed to create a white reflection will be a lot more visible. To get around this i’m just going to have to shoot twice, one with the film still on the mirrors, and one when they are removed. Hopefully then it will mean we won’t have to re shoot one way or the other. 

Funnily enough the models didn’t realise that Ansah was in fact my boyfriend Ryan, until I told them, but I said to them that it was to maintain the level of professionalism needed on the project, and they very much agreed. The two models being in a romantic relationship themselves, it creates a clear and necessary differentiation between a working environment and a social one.