Studland shoot:
Photoshoot Plan:
On Tuesday this week, I visited Studland Beach with my family, and after seeing how beautiful it was, especially all the dunes and trees behind the beach which feel like completely different terrain to the sea behind, I thought it would be the perfect place for my first proper shoot. Below is a map of the beach and pictures off the internet to give an initial idea of the location:
Inspiration:
After discovering and reading the 'Suffocated Bride' legend last week and it making me picture a lot of decayed white, floaty fabric, I thought that this could be a big inspiration for this shoot. I also want to combine this with the folk horror aesthetic I've been looking at, so lots countryside and nature playing a big part and a 'imperfect'/faded effect to the photos. Below is my mood-board for this shoot combining these idea:
My photos
Contact Sheets:
Lightroom Edits:
Photoshoot Evaluation:
From the get go I didn't think this shoot was going to go well as the model I was supposed to use for this shoot cancelled on me last minute, so I ended up having to use myself as the subject. As I was taking self-portraits and using the timer on my camera to take the photos, the shoot took a lot longer than I expected and I didn't get as many photos as I wanted. It also meant I wasn't able to shift the zoom as the shutter was going off, which is what I had planned to do as well as long exposure shots to give that blurry, overlay effect like in the photos in my mood-board. However, despite this, I am happy with some of the shots. The background looks like a different planet in some of them which enhances that other-wordly, in-between state I was going for. As it was a really bright day and there was a lot of brightness and reflection from the sand, sadly a lot of my photos were over-exposed, but that's definitely a lesson learnt for next time, how to adjust my camera correctly in a very bright area. I also took the film camera that I hired with me for this shoot, and there's a whole other set of photos on there, so I will only know what they look like when they're developed. It was good to experiment with both an analogue and digital camera for this shoot, as it's not something I've ever done before and it definitely pushed me! My choice to use the white piece of fabric to drape around me and hold in different positions also worked a lot better than I thought it would. It definitely makes me look very powerful, ethereal and folk horror-esque, which is what I was going for and adds some really interesting shapes and textures to the photos. As well, in the end, I think it worked in my favour to use myself as the subject of these photos considering the very personal message I want to express through this work. I also feel that I have a very strong connection to the sea and the water, and finding being by it very therapeutic. So the fact that this shoot was done by the sea symbolises my healing process after being sexually assaulted, using nature as a way to help me do that.
Overall, although this shoot started off with some issues, there are definitely some photos I think could be strong enough to go into my photo-book. There's also a lot of potential in these pictures for the folk horror edits I'm going to attempt in photoshop.
Week 7 reflections:
I'm very happy that I finally have a proper shoot for this project. Although it didn't particularly go to plan, as aforementioned, I think that I can still use quite a lot of them for my photo-book. I'm also really excited to see how my film photos turn out from this shoot, as I tried to double-expose some of the shots which should hopefully create the overlaid effect that I couldn't achieve on my digital camera. My plan for next week is to start bringing together the photos I've taken so far together in photoshop, and play around with trying to re-create the folk horror aesthetic I've been looking at.
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