Photos From My First Photo Shoot

Taylah surrounded by bags and receipts, gasping at one of the reciepts from the amount of money she has spent. I quite like this photograph as it is, but I would like to look at using a different background. I would like to re-shoot the couch in the background and replace the blanket and the scarf with more bags, receipts and purchases to expand on my idea.

Taylah listening to an MP3. I might re-shoot this photo and get her to dance around or appear to be singing instead. I want to Photoshop in the album art of a band that use explicit language, something that she shouldn't be listening to. If I was to use this photo I would replace the background so you can't see my sister walking through.

Taylah dressed up to look like a famous person, in this case Lady Gaga. I think this photo is really cute and she really enjoyed doing it. I would like to replace the background with a shot of a bedroom wall that is plastered with Lady Gaga posters and memorabilia.

Aerika getting her hair straightened. I think this photo is quite cute, but I don't think it really says a lot. Probably wouldn't use the same subject matter in my final portfolio.

Aerika trying on high heels. For this photo she became really difficult and wouldn't get in the photo unless my sister was sitting next to her (you can see her dressing gown on the left hand side. My original idea was to have her sitting in the closet with a lot of shoes surrounding her which I think would've been a lot better. Could re-shoot with Taylah.

Aerika drinking milk out of a martini glass. This is probably one of the best shots I got. I think she looks really cute and innocent with her missing teeth showing, which also helps to show her age. If I was to use this photo I would use a different background (if it is possible to mask it out).

Aerika using my laptop. If I was to use this photo I would Photoshop in the image of a website that she shouldn't be looking at at her age. I would also mask out the background a bit.

My First Photo Shoot Experience

I called up my friend Amanda and arranged a time for her to bring her two children, Aerika and Taylah, around to my house for my first photo shoot. I had an AIPA (Advertising and Illustrative Photographers Association) form for each child for Amanda to read and sign to give me permission to photograph her children and use the photos for my portfolio and other applications over the next two years.

I wrote up a list of ideas for each child as a guide to what I would photograph. The list is as follows:

Taylah:

• Wearing makeup, looking in the mirror at herself
• Taking a pxt of herself, maybe sending it off where you can see the image on another cellphone
• Reading a Cosmopolitan magazine or a book like this that is too old for her
• Listening to an MP3 where you can see the album art of and artist who uses explicit lyrics
• Surrounded by receipts and shopping bags from spending a lot of money
• Wearing heavily labelled clothing
• Wearing a lot of jewellery, big earrings, etc

Aerika:

• Using my laptop to look up inappropriate things or using a webcam
• Pulling a top out of a drawer wondering what to wear, top has inappropriate saying or image on it
• Watching TV/movies that are too old for her
• Drinking milk out of a wine/martini glass
• Sitting in the bottom of a closet trying on high heels, surrounded in shoes
• Hugging a photo of a boy or kissing a poster of a famous person
• Straightening her hair
• Hair dyed (using Photoshop in post-production)

I began to work with Aerika first who was the younger of the sisters at age 6. I found her unbelievably hard to photograph. At first she would seem really excited to get ready for a photo but as soon as I got her in front of the camera she would refuse to do anything I asked her to do and nearly started crying at one point. Due to this, I cut her part of it short and only got her to do a few of the ideas I had come up with.

I then moved on to working with Taylah who is the older sister at age 9. She was a lot easier to work with and even helped me with Aerika during her photographs. Taylah was easy to direct and had fun doing it which made photographing her very easy.

The kids started to get a bit restless so I decided to call it a day and arrange for another time to take photos once I was back at tech. From here I will be able to look at the photos I have and re-shoot the ones I am not happy with and continue to work through my list of ideas. I will probably just work with Taylah on the rest of the photographs since she is a lot easier to work with and because of her age, is easier to get her to pose.

Photographic Typology

We were set a task this week in Photography to find out what Photographic Typology was so that we could explore it in class on Monday. I found a little definition for it at:

http://adferoafferro.wordpress.com/2009/03/16/photography-typology/

"Typology is the study of types, and a photographic typology is a suite of images or related forms, shot in a consistent, repetitive manner; to be fully understood, the images must be viewed as a complete series (Kristine McKenna, "Photo Visions," Los Angeles Times, 29 Dec 1991)."

Re-writing My Proposal

I needed to expand my proposal to hand on to the ethics commitee at CPIT so they knew where I am planning to exhibit my work, etc. Here is my final proposal:

The theme that I would like to run through my series of photographs this year is something that concerns me, how young girls are growing up too fast these days. It really upsets me to see ten-year-olds wearing makeup or thirteen-year-olds having their first child. I would like to address this issue through a series of photographs using a range of models of different ages. I have a few people in mind – Aaliyah (4 months), Aerika (5 years) and sister Taylah (9 years).

I am aware that I will need to ask permission from my models parents Stacey and Amanda, and get them to sign an agreement for me to photograph their children, in turn making them aware of the nature of my photographs, where and how they will be exhibited and also give them the opportunity to view my final photos where they can give the photos a final check over to make sure they are happy with them.

I am not too sure what I want to show in my photographs yet, but for example, I would like to take a photograph of Aerika reading a book where the title reads, “Dressing For Your Body Type,” or having Aaliyah wearing heavly labelled clothing or Taylah shaving her legs. I would like to place my models in slightly dark or twisted environments as well, where they may seem a bit out of place. My intention is not to exploit the children, but to address small things that are happening everyday and make people aware that children are intilted to their childhood and their innocence.

I would like to be able to produce this set of photos for my final assignment for Photography this year and also possibly exhibit them in my exhibition at the end of the year, as well as in a portfolio to show employers when I apply for jobs. I don’t intend on putting these photos on a website, just on my Photography blog to show my process towards my end of year assessment.

Trip to Godley Head

These are all the photos I took on our trip out to Godley Head. I had never been to Godley Head before and had a lot of fun going through the pitch black tunnels that only fit one person wide when you hunched over. I think this place has a lot of history and a story to tell through the photos. I am quite happy with the shots I got.

Panoramas at Sumner

Our class went to Sumner for a Photography field trip to take some interesting panoramas. My camera died so me and Anna worked together with her camera and took a few groups of photos which we then stitched together in Photoshop. Here are the panoramas we created with our photos.

Inside my car

Inside the phone box

Icecream shop

Cafe seating

Ideas for Photographs

I started to think up all the things that I didn't like about girls growing up too fast and came up with some more ideas as to what my photos could be about. Here are the things I came up with:

- wearing labels/fashions (ie. big glasses)
- getting their hair dyed
- wearing makeup
- having a cellphone, txting/pxting
- playing playstation
- having mp3's
- wearing high heels
- talking to boys
- watching too much tv, programmes that are too old for them
- listening to music that has swearing
- measuring their body/weighing themselves
- wearing bikinis
- going on the computer too much/webcams
- piercings/earrings
- wearing innapropriate clothing (ie. tops with words on them)
- taking the pill
- using credit cards/spending lots of money
- straightening their hair
- wearing fake tan
- drinking
- smoking
- shaving their legs
- fake nails/eyelashes
- having a large collection of shoes
- getting tattoos
- dieting
- reading magazines/books that are too old for them
- cutting out pictures of models
- plastic surgery
- catching the bus alone
- walking the streets at night
- getting attached to boys/having relationships
- wearing lacy underwear

Some of these ideas work better than others. I think some have more to do with self-esteem than growing up too fast (such as plastic surgery or measuring their body) so I won't use these. My favourite ideas are smoking, labels, web cams, inappropriate clothing, talking to boys. I had a few other ideas of different ways I could approach my theme:

- dressing them as adults
- putting them in makeup but in innocent scenes (such as playing with dolls)
- make them look really innocent but put them in destructive scenes
- make them into barbie dolls
- dollhouse where each photo is a different room, could be shown as grown up

Out of these ideas, I quite like the dollhouse idea. My nana actually makes dollhouses that are lit up and everything, so this could be quite a fun idea to test out for the meantime. I don't like the idea of dressing them up as adults because I think it has been done before.