I have created an article that I would like to appear in a professional journal/magazine, the module also covered writing the preface for my Northern brief “Leeds Can Drink You Under The Table” along with keeping up a blog to document my progress within the module. Whilst doing this module I have found out a lot about the way that north and youth culture unwind and socialize. Being southern I have found a few of the northern “traditions” and dialect very interesting. I mainly focused on what I know nights out to be, seeing as I am a young uni student. So I decided to go out with some friends, and my camera. We went to many different clubs and pubs and I attempted to take photographs in a documentary and candid style. This was quite hard to do as I wanted to remain undetected however, with drunk people they all want photos to be taken looking at the camera. Making it extremely difficult to take a big DSLR with a long lens; concurring this was fairly easy. I decided to use my D7000 a medium sized DSLR with a 50mm prime lens, instantly making the camera smaller and less noticeable; to finish off the stealth look i took some black electrical tape and covered any white areas e.g. Nikon  mode dial, lens cap, etc. 

I really enjoyed using the blog as it gave me the ability to document and keep track with what I was doing both for the course and personally. by linking my Instagram account to the blog I could take photos of what i was doing and link them straight to my blog. This allowed other people on and outside of the course to critic my work and suggest improvements. I have also included some of the galleries that I have attended whether that's through Instagram, photo uploads or even blog posts.

Lastly, I produced a magazine article/journal in which i had to talk about myself in a third person perspective where i would be attempting to sell myself as a photographer. I decided to use my automotive photography and talk about all the different techniques that I use whilst taking photos of cars. i found making the magazine to be an extremely enjoyable experiences allowing me to use my IT and design skills. I looked into Performance VW an automotive magazine that contains amazing images and superb write ups. It offers great details into the cars, owners and the modifications to the cars. Although, this mas doesn't look into the photographers or the photographic techniques, i decided to write the article as if they were interviewing me and publishing an article for readers to gain a view into my work flow. The layout of the article was in the style of PVW paying attention to detail, using one of their features from a 2012 issue. The most obvious thing that I noticed form the research was that they used one wide shot of the subject image that spans across a majority/all of the page, with smaller detail shots located around the blank/background space in the large image.

When doing research into the northern brief I looked into the new youth culture. focusing on the binge drinking society, where the youth are encouraged by the media to drink excessively. For example the TV program Geordie Shore, where a house of early 20 year olds get drunk and do stupid things on a regular basis. 

I think that the north has always been known for drinking, mainly steaming from the industrial era. This is a very stereotypical view, that the north all worked in factories and would go to the pub after a days work; drink their troubles away with a pint. However, as a "southerner" this is the characteristics that i have been lead to believe by the media.

An inspirational photographer that has done a similar project is Maciej Dakowicz who has released a book called "Cardif After Dark”. This is a photography project taking photographs of the youth culture in Cardif drinking excessively and the aftermath at the end of the night. 

Today we are looking into Connor Page an automotive photographer from SlamMedia’. He is known for his use of multiple off camera flashes, this has allowed him to take some extremely interesting photographs. This feature is showcasing some of Connor’s work for SlamMedia’. 

His use of lighting is extremely flattering, showing the beautiful curves of these beautiful beasts. The typical lighting is a 3 or 4 flash set up, giving Connor flexibility with where the lights can be placed to illuminate the beautiful mechanics.  The use of no diffusers or soft boxes casts a harsh light that Connor and SlamMedia’ are known for, this has proven to be an extremely fitting light for cars.  Where as, this lighting style would be too harsh for a human model, the fact that it hits the car with some hot spots helps to emphasize the shine of the paintwork.

We asked Connor who his biggest influence was? He responded with, “it has to be Stanceworks! Their images have always stood out to me and I have strived to recreate and be truly inspired by their work.” Connor’s inspiration is clear in his work this is more prominent in the works using natural/ambient light. For example Zarina’s Mini, these photos have a Stanceworks style edit to them, taken in bright sunlight with a dull filter over the top. This isn’t to say that the images are dull, but that the images don’t have a lot of contrast to them. The addition of a pinky/purple hue has been added as Connor’s own twist; also exaggerating the fact that the car belongs to a girl.

The choice of location is also very important to Connors photography, the rundown alleyways (even though it isn’t as rundown as it seems), Industrial estates and city center give an old, industrial feel to the photographs. This helps to enforce the mechanical majesty of the vehicles. It is also important to use new and interesting locations, this will keep viewers interested in his work as well as throwing him some new challenges that will need concurring.

The bright colors of the S13 juxtapose the dark grungy background; this also helps for the S13 to stand out. Connor has achieved this, by exposing the photograph to the background, lowering it a few stops to get the desired level of darkness, and then positioning the lights to illuminate the car. The location also has a flowerbed in the background; the flowers have a similar color to the car complementing the paint of the car.

Using a low aperture lenses has given Connor the capability to take interesting detail shots of the different cars, the most obvious use of this is the shots of the cars stance. (the stance being the position of the wheels) this lenses also allows a lower ISO meaning less noise, meaning a higher image quality. The reason that these detail shots are so interesting is the shallow depth of field, leaving only the focal point in focus and blurring the rest of the image. The high quality lens Connor uses also gives interesting Bohka to the background adding another element to his photographs.

The equipment Connor uses is a Nikon D7000, and a selection of off camera flashes, these vary from shoot to shoot however, all of them and used with out filters or diffusers. Occasionally tripods are used, this can be when he wants to use creative lighting or doesn’t have access to more than one flash. This is known as strobing, Connor has been know to use this lighting technique from time to time; this isn’t as reliable as using multiple lights. This is due to the fact that Connor will have to set up the camera on a tripod, then walk around the car strobing the lights to fill it in. this is highly experimental and takes a long process of trial and error to perfect however, it can sometimes produce phenomenal images.

“Ever since I heard the roar of an engine I have loved cars. Ever since I held a camera I have been obsessed with photography. They were bound to meet eventually!”

“I would say that my favorite shot, assuming I cant say all of them would be… the photograph of the S13 with the owner and friend in the back ground” we agree with Connor on this. The photo of the car itself is amazing, the low angle really emphasizing how slammed the car is. However, we also like this photograph for the way that Connor has positioned the “beautiful models”. He has them looking very casual and natural, having a flash to illuminate them and keep them as one of the focal points. To make sure that they didn’t distract too much from the car Connor has used a shallow depth of field achieved with his low F/stop; this guarantees the car is the star in this image capturing everyone’s heart.

We are predicting Connor will continue to develop as a photographer and will continue to produce some outstanding work. His work with SlamMedia’ will surely improve and maybe round a not so distant corner he will be inspiring aspiring automotive photographers. His work truly is worth of this magazine, and will only become more so with time and development into his techniques and styles.

It is very well known that Leeds and the north like a drink, mainly stemming from the industrial era. The working classes would go to the pub after a hard days work and enjoy a cold pint of the good stuff. This culture hasn’t been dropped, just because this era has ended and the factories have closed. However, it isn’t just the hard, working class that enjoy a cheep pint. The students and youth culture of today are drinking more than ever, with binge drinking and drunken mistakes being the norm.

The media only encourages this “way of life”. TV programs such as Geordie Shore and The Only Way Is Essex highly promote this lifestyle. It is also becoming more socially acceptable to get very drunk; you can see this with pubs and clubs offering student/cheap nights.  For example Dry Dock, a pub in Leeds, that is orientated around students have a night where you can buy drinks for one pound. Clubs also try and encourage heavy drinking by offering “special” deals such as a free shot with drinks or double your drink for half price.

There are problems with this new lifestyle, for example people stumbling out of clubs and continuing their nights on the street. This combination of drunken people trying to get their last drink, buy food and get taxis home can cause violent behaviour. Another problem with this level of drinking is people lacking the ability to hold their drinks, resulting in vomiting in the street.

“In 2010/11 there were 198,900 admissions where the primary diagnosis was attributable to the consumption of alcohol (the narrow measure). This is a 2.1 per cent increase since 2009/10 when there were 194,800 admissions of this type and a 40 per cent increase since 2002/03 when there were around 142,000 such admissions.”

“There has been a long-term downward trend in the proportion of adults who reported drinking in the week prior to interview. In 1998 75 per cent of men and 59 per cent of women drank in the week prior to interview compared to 68 per cent of men and 54 per cent of women in 2010.”

These key facts were taken from an online web page, that discussed some of the statistics for drinking in the UK. These quotes show how although the amount of adults that are drinking during the week is going down, the amount of hospital admissions due to alcohol has increased. Showing that even though less people are dinking on a weekday, the amount they drink and how much they abuse alcohol is going up. This can be somewhat accounted to our new slack view on binge drinking, thanks to media promoting this lifestyle.

Layout Development

Here is my Layout development, as you can see I am using InDesign. This is a great tool for creating books, magazines and journals; it contains features such as automatically containing a safe zone for text, options to add columns for text and bleed.