Went to the beach, played frisbee, lost frisbee in a very mysterious way, found some shorts…

Wow. A bit slack on the updates. Anyway, I went up to London to see the graduate shows of my fellow university colleagues. It was the private view of the Debut show at Proud Central, Charing Cross, but we managed to visit the  other show, Iris, at the Maverik Showroom, Shoreditch. Both shows were very well presented and displayed a range of works from documentary through portraiture to fashion. Click on the links above for more information, and if anyone is passing, then do drop in.

While up in London we also visited a few exibitions, the first of which was ‘The Family and the Land’, a showcase of Sally Manns’ photographs at the Photographers Gallery. Mann, whose ten year project, Immediate Family, photographing her three children growing up in the countryside and surroundings of Virginia, gained her recognition as a photographer or note, producing some amazing, intimate photography of her children. These photos are as close to being perfect as its possible to get, but for me this was also her best work. Her later series of pictures, Deep South, Photographing landscapes that were significant during the American Civil War, just didn’t look as polished and completed. I can understand the process of large format wet-plate photography and the inconstancies that each photo will have, but to me they just looked like some blurry not very well shot landscapes. Her most recent project, What Remains, deals with the taboo of death, with Mann photographing bodies in various stages of decomposition at a research facility in Tennessee. These photos I found intriguing, and morbidly interesting, and would have liked to have seen more. Lastly as a conclusion to What Remains, Faces, was to bring the project to a close, with 30 photos of her children as adults, with very large closeup prints of their faces made to celebrate life. Again I found these photos were eclipsed by the near technical perfection of Immediate Family, but I think thats just cos I like literal photos…

The other exhibition we popped into was the Wolfgang Tillmans Exhibition at the Serpentine Gallery, This I found “interesting”, and did give me a good example of  ’Art Photography’, not that it was bad, but to me I didn’t really know what to make of it. Some of the photos I found interesting, but only when I thought of them as pictures,  not photographs. I think this is were I start to struggle in my appreciation for the less literal, more conceptual side of photography. If I was some super art critic I think I would have liked this, but I just found it odd.

Luckily the Serpentine Gallery has a cool pavilion/cafe/tent thing for 2010, designed by Jean Nouvel. Its red. Very red. in an homage to Londons busses and phone boxes, it kinda messes with your eyes when you first step inside. Inside are bean-bags, sunken seating pits, hammocks, and table-tennis tables. Its a very cool space, and very red. Personally as a part-time architecture buff, I liked it better than the exibition we went to see, and I’m looking forward to the creation for 2011.

Red & Green, The Serpentine gallery pavillion.

After nearly two years I have just two weeks left of my university career. Both exiting an scary at the same time. Full post-uni chat to come soon as I’m currently sat writing up my sketchbook for my final project. Sketchbooking is one thing I won’t miss from Uni…

As for my final project, I chose to photograph people who ride bikes. Nothing unusual there. I could have done something ground braking, flown to far flung countries or whatever, but currently I wanted to have some environmental portraits in my portfolio to compliment my sports photos. After this project I think it will be something I will carry on, and I think I’ll try and branch out into and do more portraiture, especially from a commercial point of view.

In other news, I am participating in the year long photography project, ‘What is England‘, curated by Stuart Pilkington. Myself and 49 other photographers from around the country have set out to produce a series of images that answer six set briefs that reflect on our chosen counties, to build up a picture of England in 2010. The second photo ‘Group’, is now up on the site, the third photo, ‘Work’, will be up June 30th.

Went out location hunting in Sandbanks and Studland. Nice little day trip.

Sand dune

Evening Sun at Bomo… not the greatest photo (that post is annoying) but who cares?

One of the things that I have been trying to work it is a style in my shooting. I think its hard to pin down exactly what makes the way people shoot photos recognisable as theirs; framing, composition, processing, angle, aspect, the list goes on. I think I have finally started to find my style of shooting, weather I will keep with it I don’t know, I would like to think it will evolve as I improve and take more photos. Here are some things that I have noticed in the last few months that I thinks important not just for my image making, but just for photography in general;

Shoot more. Yea, kinda odd as I’m on a Photography Degree, but I don’t shoot nearly enough. I’m trying to take pics as often as possible, but other things get in the way. Its been nice recently just to go out and take photos, not for clients or for uni, just cos its nice to take photos. As the saying goes; practice makes perfect.

Cut down on kit. Yes its nice (not to mention expensive) to have every lens under the sun, loads of flashes and everything, but it destracts away from the actual picture making. I’ve restricted my shooting to just my 50mm f/1.8 (the £70 plastic one) I think this enables me to concentrate more on picture making. Too much time is spent on choosing a lens or f/stop and all the technical malarkey, I’m not being ignorant, I’m very up on the technical side of things, but sometimes who cares if the highlights are blown of the saturation is down? that takes us onto…

Processing. Lightroom is probably the biggest change to my work flow. Since having it I can apply my own custom pre-set, do the odd exposure/contrast/colour tweek here and there and Roberts your mothers brother. For 90% of my shooting, there is almost no need to go near Photoshop. This has taught me to think more about the composition, as I really don’t wanna spend hours in PS unless I have to.

Hopefully I can keep up with trying to get at least one photo I am happy with a week, I have some plans in the pipeline as well as doing my Professional Project at uni, the last one before I graduate in June and head out into the big wide world… Now that’s a scary thought…