Evaluation

Overall, I am extremely pleased with my outcomes for this photo shoot project. I feel that my research helped me entirely, in the best way to ensure that my final photographs were how I wanted it to be. I feel that I managed to create the aspects that I set out to, such as; The Cindy Sherman expression, the black and white effect to create 'grunge', the relaxed cigarette style from Kurt Cobain, and the crazy facial expressions that show that grunge characters are 'too cool' for posing. Throughout my final photograph, and the final possibles, I managed to create this.

 

One of the problems that I had with this project, that I would change differently, is the fact that I photographed myself in my work. The idea of a self portrait is great, and I think it worked well, how ever I feel that I protrayed my photographs differently, simply due to the natural reaction that I judged the photos differently. This effected the project slightly, and would be something I consider for next time.

Final Grunge Photograph

So this is my final photograph and outcome, for my grunge photo shoot project. It is a self portrait photograph of myself, expressing a facial expression, that i'm hoping could be protrayed in many different ways.

When editing the photograph in Adobe Photoshop, I set out to go for an effect that was; black and white, an attention to high contrast, and used the' colour filter' to give a slight blue tinge. I also used the 'selective colour', to take attention for the blues in the photogaph. This brought out a high amount of contrast in the darker bits of the Levis denim jacket, and I think this worked brilliantly. I also did this for shades of reds, which darkened the lips.

This is the original of the final photograph, before any editing. I am delighted with how grungy I created it to be, through Photoshop.

Possibilities For Final Photograph

After taking around 200 photos in the photo shoot, I finally managed to narrow it down to four. These are the the three photos that I decided not to choose. The main reason as to why I made this decision, is because I feel that the composition of my final photo worked much better, not only for grunge, or my Cindy Sherman influence, but as a better photograph in itself. I definitely think that I made the right decision with this.

Outfit Planning

This is the selection of clothing and accessories that I put together, in order for my grunge photo shoot. I managed to get this collection together by borrowing off friends, family, and some from my own wardrobe. I am happy with outfits that I collected, although I still really wanted to have a black beanie, for the shoot.

Cindy Sherman

Cindy Sherman is an artist and self portrait photographer, that is famous for taking photos in hundreds of different concepts, and poses. She wildly changes her makeup and styles, to make herself look like a completely different person.

I like how this portrait is close, starting at the neck. This concept is interesting, and shows more detail within her face. Which brings me to her makeup. I will need to think about how I will approach the hair and makeup of my model (which I am thinking might be me), to suit grunge.







This self portrait of Cindy Sherman's, is famously taken in New York, and has a totally different approach to the previous. To my knowledge, this is Sherman's most popular photograph.

I had quite a debate with myself, about Sherman's expression in this photo. I've come to a decision that she looks either disgusted, or bemused. This once again relates to Joseph Cornell's unknown story. I really do love this idea.

Terry Richardson

Terry Richardson is an American fashion and portrait photographer. He is still currently working as this profession, and has been since 1993.

This is photograph taken by Richardson, of model and actress Ashley Olsen. Ashley is an identical twin, with her sister being Mary Kate Olsen. These celebrity twins are also famous, for their grunge image.

I like the composition of this photograph. I also take interest to Ashley's serious facial expression. Is this grungy?




This photograph, is of Terry Richardson himself, with four female models that he was shooting. Although group photographs can work extremely well, as there is a lot going on, I do not think that this would suit what I am going for, in my photo shoot.

Although, I interestingly like the idea, that Terry Richardson is in the photograph himself. I think this is a great idea, for photographers.

Kurt Cobain & Courtney Love

Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love, are the legendary couple that rock the name of grunge. Kurt Cobain was a popular American musician, famously known for being the lead singer of the band Nirvana. Courtney Love was Cobain's wife - Also a musician.

Their image was very much 'grungy', and this photograph instantly explains this.

My favourite aspects of this photograph, is the faded black and white effect, giving it that 'old' image. I think that this suits the grunge style brilliantly.








This photograph, has a very different approach to the last. It is not a pose, and almost looks like what is called a motion shot. I really like this whole idea that pulling emotions like this, shows that they're 'too cool' to pose, which ironically suits the grunge style also.

I decided to include this photograph of Kurt Cobain on his own, as it shows great charisma, as to what I think grunge relates to.

The leather, the hair, the guitar, the cigarette. Grunge. Not only the aspects of the photograph, but also the mystery behind it, interests me. It also relates to my research taken from Joseph Cornell. Is he performing? Rehearsing?

Introducing Grunge

Exploring the whole concept of 'grunge' in fashion, as a starting point I have decided to create an ideas board, to give me an insight into the trendy 'style', rather than working with what I know already.

I decided to chose this certain theme, mainly down to my own personal taste, and how easily I could create the best outcomes. Not only do I know more about grunge, rather than the other themes, I will also be able to gather 'grunge' style clothing, together fairly easily. I am planning on asking friends, family, and possibly using some of my own clothing/accessories too. I am determined to make this a cheap project.

Joseph Cornell

I have recently discovered the astonishing American sculptor, Joseph Cornell, who has simply amazed me with his work.

Cornell creates intricate little sculptured boxes like these, made of mixed medias such as wood, cardboard and plastic. They were often glass fronted.

This box here on the left, is named 'The Hotel Eden', and it was created in 1945 - Interestingly the ending year for World War 2. The box below, is called 'Habitat Group'.











The main reason as to why the boxes interest me so much, is not only for my love of birds, but for the detail, and the story as to why. Cornell's idea for this was very unique, one like never before. It makes me wander as to what interested him into creating these cute little boxes, and why he included what he did, for each one.

This 'story' idea, links in with the sculpture that I have written about, earlier on in my blog. A detailed sculpture of a house, that I discovered at the V&A Museum in London. (See 'Visit to the V&A').

After taking such an interest from this idea, I am going to try and interpret this into my photoshoot, which is my next brief for this module.

Too Many Shapes

This second illustration consists of many, many layers. So many layers that most of my time creating this illustration, was spent being baffled, and confused.

As the brief recommends including typography into the illustration, I firstly inserted the letter 'A' and 'Z'. I chose these letters for ascetic purposes only. Rotating the 'A' upside down like this, I filled out negative space, making the letters fit together perfectly.

Originally both the letters and the figure were white, and because of this some parts of the figures would not show up. Therefore I had to introduce a different colour to bring separation, and I used black as it creates the best contrast. To do this, duplicated the layers and after changing the background black, I removed sections of the figure using the Polygonal lasso tool, leaving the black layer underneath to show. I repeated this process, for different parts that I wanted black.

Now, I was ready to include my galaxy theme, into the positive spaces. How ever, I like to think that is a finished illustration, in itself.

I chose this stunning image for the background, of this chosen illustration, due to the mixture of bright colours and the way that they blend together. It suits the theme perfectly, and I think that it would stand out amazingly in the background, of a black and white illustration. I found this image on tumblr, and wanted to use it instantly.

Inserting the image, to be the background of my fashion illustration was fairly easy, as long as I knew which layer I was working in. I pasted it into a layer which was underneath any others, except the white layer that I wanted to replace.

I absolutely love the way that this image has come out, and the way that the galaxy image gleams through. I initially had the idea, to edit the galaxy image using another technique, but I decided that it didn't need it - And that I really like it as it is.

As a whole, I am very pleased with my fashion illustrations for this project. At the beginning, I struggled with using Adobe Photoshop a lot, and I think that was down to my awful short-term memory. But after playing around for hours, I definitely feel that the time has paid off, and that I have achieved everything that I could.

Gravity Has No Limits

This is my outcome of my figures, taken from my tracing of the Kenzo advertisement. I decided to keep the clothing influenced from the original slightly, but adapting the colour shades, and giving it more of a 'cartoon' look. I think that this will suit well with the planned background.

For the prints used on the clothing, I used patterns that I found on google images, that were appropriate, and pasted them into a new layer on my project. I then created duplicate amounts of the image, creating enough to cover the area size needed. By putting this layer underneath the others, and deselecting anything unwanted with the Lasso tool, the selected print shows though.

I repeated this technique to create the pattern for the women's shoes, and her bracelets. For everything else, I simply chose colours provided by Photoshop. How ever, I used the gradient tool for the extra effect on the skin, and hair.

I chose galaxy and space as a theme, as not only for it's 'endless' possibilities, I also thought that it would be very appropriate for a current fashion illustration, to include on of the top latest street trends, in fashion now.

This is an image of an album cover for the producer Major Lazer, which shows a 'cartoon' looking galaxy. I found this image on google, however I had the image in mind before hand.

This is the final outcome of my first fashion illustration, created on Adobe Photoshop. The background layer was easy. I simply pasted it into a separate layer and put it behind the figure layers. I did not make

any other alterations to this, as I thought the colours worked well as it is.

To finish the illustration of as a whole, I decided to duplicate the layer of the figures, before slightly rotating it. I then changed the blending mode of each layer of the figure. As a final technique on the illustration, I changed the opacity for each rotated layer, to give the impression that the figures are fading away. This works perfectly to suit the theme, as it looks like the lack of gravity is effecting, and the figures are floating away.