Evaluation
Having completed this assignment now I feel like I’ve been through a lot of different things, I wanted to do a tableaux and that didn’t really work out. When I had finished the first edit I soon found out that the image of Nora on the bed wouldn’t be good enough to tell the entire story, I still don’t think the images tell the story as well as I would’ve hoped, but I had a feeling from the beginning that it wasn’t going to go that well. I wasn’t sure about the idea at all and I feel like I could’ve done a lot better. I’m pleased with the editing process and all of that, and I really love the location, but I wish that the story was better. I kinda regret not going with my original idea of Watership Down because I think that could have been an interesting series or tableaux, I quite like the idea of portraying humans as animals and I could have done something with coloured smoke for that as well, which I mentioned that I wanted to do anyways. The images for the story turned out alright, but like I said, I feel like they could’ve told the story a lot better, it might’ve been easier if I managed to get a hold of some more props. But I couldn’t afford casually buying a bird cage and a christmas tree for the shoot, it would’ve also made it a lot worse getting to and from the location.
I am very pleased with the edit though, I’ve missed working like this in photoshop and I find it really fun. I enjoy working with the small details and I feel like I did a good job on that when it comes to this assignment. I’ve also tried to be as neat as possible with my edit this time around, so I could easily figure out where the problems were coming from if something popped up. I went back and forth a lot with the colour editing though, which quickly became quite messy, I didn’t enjoy the edit and I started all over again often. Doing this obviously let me get a good final result, but it took a lot of time and I could’ve definitely been more efficient when it comes to that aspect.
Going down to the more physical bit, doing the actual shoot was good, I enjoyed working with the speedlites because I haven’t really done that a lot, doing this assignment with the flashes let me explore that area of photography and that’s something I really appreciate from these assignments. I could’ve done more test shoots before doing my actual shoot and I should’ve done another shoot after, even though I think the images from the first shoot turned out just fine. I couldn’t go back to Bail House because it was booked out, and my model had a personal family emergency anyways and I didn’t want to bother her with a shoot at that time. Doing another shoot could’ve helped me by giving me another chance to change the lights up and maybe get a hold of some more props.
I’ve been very inspired by manipulated images while doing this assignment, I’ve been watching people’s work closer and I’ve been looking at how they edit. I even attempted to edit one of my photos like David Talley’s work from one of his timelapse editing videos to try something else. I’ve enjoyed trying new things this term, helping my peers with their work as well has been good and I’ve really enjoyed watching them work and helping them out. It’s good to see other people’s processes and learn from them as well, as much as they can learn from me to be honest.
Overall I think the assignment went well, I enjoyed the process and the editing, but I feel like I could’ve told the narrative story better than I did in the end. And I’m honestly a bit disappointed in myself that I didn’t manage to make a tableaux, I was very excited about doing that and I don’t feel like I’ve accomplished what I originally wanted with it. I did try hard, and I think choosing a different narrative story would have been the best option if I wanted a better final result.