Life (shoot 1)- Work record

Basic information:
Date: 23/02/17
Location: Brixton, London, Harlow
Camera used: Fujifilm Instax mini
Editing program: Photoshop CC 2014 
Camera settings: N/A

Plans for shoot:
In this shoot I will be focusing on the use of Instant film photography as a means of documenting a day out.  I will not be gathering souvenirs such as tickets as I wish to solely focus on the images captured on the day.

What I hope to achieve:
I hope to experiment with a different medium of photography through the use of Instant film this will challenge me to be creative with my lighting and framing as polaroid cameras have a fixed aperture and film cannot be edited post shoot.  I feel that Instant film is suitable for this project as a scrap book should be unaltered and unedited.  I also feel that this film will give the final image a nostalgic feel as polaroids were typically used for scrap booking in the past.

Outcome of shoot:
I was relatively happy with the outcome of this shoot due to the fact that I feel that I succeeded in capturing events in my life in an effective way.  I feel however that my documentary provides a somewhat warped view of my life due to the fact that I only focused on the more interesting days in my week opposed to my week as a whole.

Progression:
If I were to revisit this shoot I would consider adding items from the event that I attended in order to add more variety to my collage.  I would also consider experimenting with different sizes of instant film as I believe this would give my image a more engaging appearance.

I would also consider shooting my entire collage on one day instead of attempting to focus on more than one day per series.  I feel that this provides a more truthful look at my life as it shows one exciting day opposed to numerous consecutive fun days which were in reality not consecutive.

Favourite image:

This is my favourite collage form the series due to the fact that I liked the effect created as a result of the white space surrounding the images.  This use of white background gives the composite a similar appearance to some of Dash Snow's work.

Denotation: This is a composite image which is focused around a night out a gig in Brixton.  The Instant film varies in dimensions from landscape to portrait which gives the image as a whole a more uniform and fine art appearance.  The images are all well tied together as a result of the lighting used of the characteristic dark background with blown out colours as a result of the close range flash of an Instant film camera.

Connotation: The darkness of the image suggests that youth are rebellious as does the consumption of alcohol in one of the images.  An interest in music can be inferred from the gig setting as well as the image of the David Bowie memorial wall.  The gig poster provides a information as to where the images have been taken.  The use of Instant film provides a sense of nostalgia in the image.

Context: This image is based around the desire to remember the nights of out youth and times with our friends.

Least favourite image:

This is my least favourite image as whilst it has some strong images in it it does not fit as well together as the other set of images which I took.

Denotation: The above composite was shot around Harlow and features the things that I did in a day.  The images were shot on Instant film.

Connotation: The Instant film used creates a sense of nostalgia as this kind of composition with images is associated with scrapbooking and Instant film is a more historic form of photography.  The images all carry connotations of childhood and friendship with iconography such as bubble mixture which is a traditionally childish pass time.

Context: This image is based around the desire to remember the times of our youth that we sometimes forget but are the most important in reality.