FMP - Project Proposal

Rationale:

I joined the college in October, I got a B at GCSE in Photography, however we did not have any cameras in my secondary school so the course was limited to our phones. I gained a lot of experience on editing pictures on my phone, however when I left school and came to college I was quite lost as they had a lot of new equipment that I did not have access to in secondary school. I felt slightly bewildered when I joined the college because everyone already knew each other and many had previous practice with equipment and cameras whereas I haven't. I have a lot more experience in Photoshop compared to others because my GCSE course was focused around Photoshop to make up for the lack of cameras and equipment.

In September I wanted to be a freelance artist, I feel that since learning new techniques and learning how to use a camera, I think that my aspirations have changed slightly. I want to continue to work as an artist but also have the ability to use my new photography experience as well.

In September, I had no plans about university, however I think that university may now be an option to me now that I have seen some of the courses available to me, such as Falmouth University. I am still unsure about where I will be in a years time but I have a better plan than last September.

In Unit 1 and 2, I spent it learning how to use the equipment and the cameras. This was quite hard as I did not have any experience at all so I felt like I was playing catch up through these projects trying to learn everything that other students already knew. However the information I learnt about the studio and equipment has been vital to the rest of my projects so I am glad that I did learn it.

In Unit 3 I learnt more about the options available to me when I leave college. I wish that I had paid more attention to it at the time because I thought that it was useless but now that I am considering University I think exploring my options will be very useful for me.

I think Unit 4 was the hardest unit. I had to work in a group with one person I did not know and one person who I did not like. This made it very hard to work as a team because none of us where willing to co operate so we ended up doing separate projects. I enjoyed the actual project and I think it was the most successful however the stress of the group made it hard to work inside lessons so I worked a lot in my own time. I learnt how to use the cameras for video in this project which was hard as I specialized in Photography but I think it was a good technique to have.

Unit 6 was the most different to the other units because we had to shoot the pictures based on words that were given to us. This got me out of my comfort zone and I found it quite interesting to shoot in different locations that I wouldnt normally shoot in.

I want my FMP project to be based around a change in a location. I would like to try out light painting and I would also like to use a lot of Photoshop techniques because I like the idea that you could create something that you could not see with the human eye. I have previously when I was in secondary school however I didn't have the equipment or knowledge that I currently have, so I think that it will come out better than last time. I think that photography can be used to create something that you would not see in everyday life.

Proposal:

The project is to create something around the theme of "metamorphosis". I would like to create something out of light and experiment using both landscape and portraits in my images.

For many years I have been inspired by light. My first realisation of this was when I saw a trailer for the game Infamous: Second son. It is revolved around people harnessing different elements and being able to change form. I love the supernatural feel to this game and it has inspired the use of landscapes in this project. Below are some screenshots from the game that show light.

I like the trails that they left behind them around the city and how magical the elements felt in this game. The light and smoke really inspired me and I wold like to create something similar in my project.

I feel quite inspired by the theme and my ideas of using light painting. In 2015 (year 9) I learnt about light painting for the first time. I shot these images on an ipad using a long exposure app.

They are very limited as there was no equipment available to me throughout secondary school. This meant I had limited knowledge leaving these images very plain and they are not pleasing to the eye.

As there is many different types of light photography, I hope to use a ratio of video tutorials to photographer research to learn how to create different types of photography. The photographer research will allow me to see what different styles i like and they may help me figure out how to create the different types of art. watching video tutorials of photographers will also help me to gather information about this art.

I will need to buy some equipment to be able to shoot this. I would like to look into fibre optic light painting for the portraits and maybe plexiglass for landscapes however I think phone lights/flashlights may give a similar effect. Ive looked into the cost and it seems to range around £20 for fibre optics.My budget is around £50. I will also use the help of my brother who is a photographer as well to help me with these shots because I have not done much like this before.

I hope to produce up to six final images. If both landscape and portrait shoots are successful, i aim to create 3 landscape shots and 3 portrait shots as my final piece.