Tuesday 31 January 2012

Narraive and Illustration: Project - Illustration

Exercise: symbols

Aim:  The aim of this exercise is to find symbols for the following subjects and add short notes on how you would use them in a photograph.  The symbols are growth, excess, crime, silence and poverty.

Growth: A seedling.  Cupped hands full of earth with a seedling growing out of the earth.  A simple, natural, face on portrait of someone with cupped hands against a white background.

Growth : A height chart or marks on a wall with dates by them.  Two children, one taller than the other with the smaller one reaching up to the older ones height marks enviously.

Excess:  Lots of the same objects.  I would represent them stuffed in a suitcase so full it won't close. It couldn't be anything expensive, such as watches as this would just look like theft!.This also has connotations of excess baggage.

Excess: One of those excessively large and unnecessary 4x4s being filled up at a petrol station, preferably by a smaller person to help represent how unnecessary it is.

Crime: The classic white outline on a floor suggesting a victim of a crime with a reason or motive in the background to create a juxtaposition.

Crime: Bars on a window.  This could be an individual window or a building with a line of barred windows or even a prison.

Crime: A homeless person outside a bank (corporate crime/crime against humanity).  I would use a recognisable high street bank rather than say, the Bank of England.  In the current climate bankers bonuses are still in the news and are becoming a byword for legalised crime!

Silence: A face with a zip for a mouth.  This can be easily done in Photoshop or just by taping it in place. A finger to someones lips,

Silence:  A shot of a space that is supposed to be quiet such as a library or monastery with people obviously not making noise.

Silence:  The opposite to the above.  A place that should be noisy but isn't; a football crowd that has just been relegated or is waiting for that vital penalty in the shoot out.  Or an empty shopping mall that you would normally expect to be full, perhaps with a lone figure walking through such as a security guard.

Poverty: Homeless person - Here is a shot I took in Paris of a homeless person complete with  crutches either side, beer cans, posessions hanging on the railings and.....mobile phone.  I took it with the camera by my side so not to be noticed.  The AF picked up the chain in front.  Call it serendipity but it seems to highlight the trap that homeless people find themselves in, especially with the padlock hanging on the chain.



Poverty: A top down view of a weathered hand with a few pence in it.  A simple shot, outdoors with nothing else in the frame.  The juxtaposition of the weathered hand linked to the small change suggesting a life of poverty.