hey guys what's going on
last week made a video discussing
photographic style
and this week i'll build upon that by
sharing some of my own documentary photo
projects so over the last three years
i've been working on a number of
different series
so i plan on breaking them down sharing
my inspirations and thoughts and
processes towards them and if it's of
any interest these are all shot on
medium format or 120 film
but i'll look into that later on in the
video so if you do enjoy then please
consider subscribing and let me know
your thoughts or even favorite images or
projects
down in the comments below so with that
said let's jump into my first project
titled along the curb
so this project was shot in early 2018
and was the first one
i've ever made it was a collection of
stranger portraits focusing on the male
persona on the street and tried to
create a diverse body of work featuring
subjects from different nationalities
age groups and job professions in the
end i decided to present these photos as
a collection of prints
which is a totally new way of seeing my
work which i hadn't done a whole lot
previously
being the first project i had made i
really had no idea what i was doing
so initially it was somewhat difficult
to approach people but over time i began
to develop a technique that i still use
to this day you want to be as friendly
as possible and really avoid harassing
people for a photo
as soon as someone thinks you're taking
advantage of them you've lost the trust
of someone and you've also lost a
portrait image
so it's crucial that you present
yourself in the most honest and least
threatening way
possible it might also be useful to
outline exactly what the image might be
used for
just in case they feel their privacy may
be breached in any way
so it's always good to have a little
script in the back of your mind before
you start shooting
so i made this project on my mamiya rz67
which is a medium format slr
camera which is the perfect choice for
portrait photography i actually bought
this camera for the sake of shooting
this project
and i'm so glad i made that decision
when i did it also does use a waist
level finder
which is really good when you're making
images of strangers because you can't
hide behind a camera
which i believe creates another layer of
trust between you and your subject
additionally being such a weird and odd
looking camera i found that people would
actually approach me and ask about the
camera which allowed me to break the ice
a little bit quicker and easier
creating some more meaningful images so
as you can see these images are fairly
formal the crop is very similar the
lighting is somewhat the same
and the tones are consistent throughout
all the images as i mentioned previously
being my first project i wasn't as
comfortable pushing my boundaries in
some areas
compared to how i am today this bodywork
didn't have too many theoretical
components to it
which really shut out some of the ideas
that could have been incorporated into
this project
i remember at the time i was really
against writing about my photos
but since then i've realized that
writing back your work and expressing
your ideas
is a great way to understand your own
process and you'll find that you'll be
able to articulate those ideas to other
people
in a far more easy way i've also found
that reading books and journal articles
and watching interviews
is a great way to push your own work in
a different direction which you probably
didn't expect
and it will have a really good impact on
your photographic process as well
in terms of inspiration for this project
i looked the work of alec soth
but i will get into him in the next
project but just briefly he often
documents disconnected communities
in a really collaborative way so
although the subject matter is not
really similar to mine
i was really inspired by his idea to
engage with someone who we had no prior
connection with
and create a really true and honest
representation and narrative about them
so looking back my own project a couple
years later
i'm really happy with how it turned out
it's definitely not my best project
i don't think because i don't really
feel like it's complete but i definitely
learnt a lot which really has shaped my
work today
anyways let's jump into my next project
so learning from my past mistakes and a
full year later i really wanted to
create a more complete body of work
this time around so this series also
shot on the mamiya rz67
documents the people and places of
footscray a very multicultural area of
melbourne
it's also an area that's experienced a
fair share of gentrification
impacting house prices which has shifted
the culture there that's existed for
many years
so i thought it was important i touched
on this idea of the old versus the new
much like my previous body at work
i wanted to document the everyday person
whether this be shopping at the market
walking the street
or at the many cafes and restaurants
footscray has to offer
essentially i try to create this
non-biased narrative of what i saw
but also acting in a collaborative way
so as far as inspirations go
as i mentioned previously i looked into
the work of alec soth but more
specifically
his book titled sleeping by the
mississippi this project explored the
people and places along the mississippi
river
back in the early 2000s all shot in an
8x10 large format camera
so it's combined portraits and
landscapes creating a harmonious
relationship between the two
i was intrigued by this idea of picking
a geographical location
and documenting whatever exists within
those parameters within a particular
discourse so my work takes little
stylistic inspiration
but i would say i'm more interested in
his subject matter i also looked into
the work of ingvar kenne
more specifically his project titled
citizen so this project documents the
people he came across either by chance
or through a job over the span of 10
years what i find so interesting with
this collection of photos
is some of your subjects are famous
people and some are not but they all
exist on the same level with the only
difference being their gender
each portrait has a similar composition
but he uses space extremely well to
enhance his narrative
keeping each image very unique i would
say subject matter was more in line with
what i was doing at the time
compared to soth for example so it was
really interesting having him as an
inspiration source so i'll leave a few
links down in the description below if
you want to check these photographers
out
in a bit more detail so looking back at
my project once again there are so many
things i would have done differently
with one of them being only taking one
portrait per subject for example
especially because i was shooting on
film
i don't really know what i'm going to
get until i get my scans back so there
was a couple of times where i thought
i'd made this great image
and i get the scans back and i noticed
that i focused on someone's ears
rather than their eyes which really
affected the overall quality of the
image
which most people might not notice but
to me it does really bother me in some
cases i also probably didn't do enough
research prior to shooting this project
so i would highly suggest if you are
about to begin a project of your own
make sure you look into the subject
matter at hand and research some
practitioners who work in a similar
field this should help inspire you to
create a stronger body of work
and eliminate some of those issues that
might occur if you don't have a whole
lot of social
cultural and historical knowledge about
the subject matter in saying this
however
shooting this project in the way i did
really taught me a lot about
representation for example
which i believe has shaped my work today
properly representing someone is such a
crucial part of documentary photography
and i feel it's not really talked about
enough it's so important to honestly
portray someone
in a way they like to be seen especially
if there is some kind of power dynamic
at play i feel these sorts of guidelines
and lessons are only really taught in
the classroom
and are less existent on social media
which can be quite conflicting i will be
making a video in the future
discussing the more ethical dimensions
of documentary photography
so if you are interested in that then
keep an eye out for that one so hope
that gives you an idea what this project
was like and you can kind of see my
progression from the previous one
now once my next project titled from
hell to heaven
so coming off my footscray project and
coming back from an overseas trip
i had this newfound source of
inspiration and i really wanted to
diversify my folio
and create something fresh and unique
which i hadn't previously made before so
i decided to experiment with photoshop
and collage work
and began messing around with my old
photos trying to find a use for them and
give them a new meaning so after a few
weeks of playing around with this idea
it led me onto this project which
attempted to challenge the notion of
documentary photography
in a 21st century post-truth world the
images are also sequenced in a way where
they start in the dark tones
representing hell and transition into
the latter tones representing heaven so
my protests involved taking three or
four my own images
which all had their own element of
documentary photography in them
and blending them around to create
something new i was really inspired by
this idea of sampling
which is a technique used in music where
an artist will take different sounds
from different songs
and they'll blend it into their own
music to create a new sound altogether
so for me taking these old images
which i had just sitting on my hard
drive and mixing them around together
really caused me to think that i don't
have to go outside
to make work instead i can sit in my
room put my headphones on
and make work that i am actually proud
of and it's still a valid form of
photography in terms of photographic
inspiration i looked into the work of
lucas blalock
who was an american artist working in
the more photoshop area of photography
he uses a photo which he has taken
and then cuts out pieces in photoshop
creating these obscure looking images
only slightly different from the
original i would say this sort of style
is very true to 21st century photography
and i imagine it'll become more and more
popular in the future
what really drew me in which is how
creative his pieces are
and how he came to make some of these so
although my project has a pretty
different approach
it was so refreshing looking into an
artist that still exists within the
photography domain but he's doing
something completely different to most
other photographers out there it's also
reassuring to know that people do
appreciate this modern form of
photography
and there is room for it in the
contemporary world so those three
projects were some of the more major
ones i've been working on over the last
couple years
but recently i made a video talking
about my current project
which i would say is probably one of the
bigger ones i've ever done so i won't go
into too much detail in this video but
if you want to check it out i'll leave a
link on screen
and in a couple months i'll make another
update regarding that project
so i highly encourage anyone watching
this to go out and create a project of
your own
it doesn't have to be massive it can be
something small and really personal
but the idea of making work with a theme
or concept i believe can be super
beneficial to your process
and also to your creativity this was a
lengthy video and it probably was pretty
self-indulgent
so if you are still watching i really do
appreciate it if you did enjoy then
please consider subscribing and let me
know your thoughts down in the comments
below
but for now thank you so much for
watching and i'll see you in the next
one
cheers
