Point of View

In this project, I explore how an item is portrayed or seen from the point of view of different objects. This is interesting as I start to think of random stuffs and how they view the same thing differently, which is something that not everyone will do normally.

I randomly picked an item, and came up with “shirt”. In this case, “shirt” refers to not just a formal buttoned shirt, but more of tops in general. After coming up with the main subject of focus, I started brainstorming for other objects that could view “shirt”, and what they felt a shirt might be to them. Here’s the list that I generated, and the six in blue made it to the finals, with a little bit of edits –

  1. A shirt from the point of view of a hanger is a warm embrace.
  2. A shirt from the point of view of a designer is a canvas.
  3. A shirt from the point of view of a fashion mall is money.
  4. A shirt from the point of view of an African kid is hope.
  5. A shirt from the point of view of a bamboo pole is burden.
  6. A shirt from the point of view of a pair of bottoms is frenemy.
  7. A shirt from the point of view of a chair is a jacket.
  8. A shirt from the point of view of the Hulk is a rag.
  9. A shirt from the point of view of a beach-goer is a redundant / wardrobe malfunction.
  10. A shirt from the point of view of a soldier is refreshment.
  11. A shirt from the point of view of a mum is a chore.
  12. A shirt from the point of view of a body is security.
  13. A shirt from the point of view of a model is reputation / fame. / popularity
  14. A shirt from the point of view of a cat is a bed.
  15. A shirt from the point of view of a wallet is depressing.
  16. A shirt from the point of view of a loose thread is farewell.
  17. A shirt from the point of view of a bird is a toilet.
  18. A shirt from the point of view of an interviewer is judgement.

Next, was to think of how to carry it out. Usually for 2D projects, I have been doing them hands-on, using paints, paper, or even exploring a variety of materials to play with texture and space, making the subjects 3D. This time round, we were advised to keep it 2D, and thus I decided to explore and improve on something I have been weak at – Photoshop. I am very bad at photoshop as I only started using it in university, and thus I tend to try to avoid using it for projects but to do something that I am more confident and comfortable with, doodling with pens and pencils, making things hands-on instead of digital. I decided to use mainly photography, but making the entire composition black and white in general, then add vibrant colors to enhance the subject, which is usually the shirt itself. This technique is only widely known as color splash, and here are some examples that I have came across –

3 1 2

This technique helps to bring attention to the colored subject immediately, with the black and white subtle background filling in the rest of the details to complete the picture. I find this technique very interesting, and thus decided to employ it in my project. So here’s my final 6 compositions –

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A POOR AFRICAN KID IS HOPE.

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A POOR AFRICAN KID IS HOPE.
A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A POOR AFRICAN KID IS HOPE.

In this composition, I placed a topless African kid at the bottom right corner, in black and white to show how he seems to be neglected, his life has a lack of colors, seems dull and sad, but not without realizing that hopeful look in his eyes. I then placed a shirt at the top right corner, disguised as a kite as suggested by the frame and string. A kite seems like a source of happiness for kids, and I wanted to portray the shirt as a form of hope and happiness for this shirtless African kid, thus putting it against a sky that is overlayed with vibrant colors of the rainbow, which slowly recedes to black and white towards the kid. This shows a contrast between black and white as compared to colors, as well as the contrast between the two moods.

 

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A BEACH-GOER IS WARDROBE MALFUNCTION.

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A BEACH-GOER IS WARDROBE MALFUNCTION.
A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A BEACH-GOER IS WARDROBE MALFUNCTION.

In this composition, I portrayed a man well-dress in a blazer holding a surfboard. To him, the shirt is redundant and does not serve its function a the shirt will get wet if he surfboards in that outfit. As such, it is a wardrobe malfunction. His blazer is overlayed with a warm pink to suggest the warmth of the beach, yet not too red to prevent stealing all the attention towards the blazer alone. He is placed along one third of the picture, with a horizontally placed surfboard to balance out the composition. On the other vertical one third, 2 surfboarders are placed in the background to juxtapose the difference between being topless and wearing the blazer. This composition was fun to make as the initial portrait of the man in blazer at the beach was a narrower portrait, and I had to clone the background out to make it seem natural and show the vastness of the beach as well. His shadows were extended and the surfboard added in, in place of a pair of shoes he was holding initially. His belt was also removed and I made his tee longer, all to remove the initial portrayal where he looked like a model for a beach photoshoot as seen below.

Initial picture of the subject
Initial picture of the subject

 

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A CAT IS A BED.

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A CAT IS A BED.
A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A CAT IS A BED.

Cats always like to snuggle in the shirts of its owner, often curling up on these small cosy areas instead of enjoying the large beds. Similarly to the previous composition, the cat and shirt is placed towards one third of the picture, with only the shirt in color. The shirt is blue to signify a sense of serenity and calmness associated with sleeping and resting, and the shirt is placed on another fabric which is typical of bedsheet and blankets. This shows the emphasis of how the cat sleeps on the shirt, instead of on the bed. In the composition, the sourcing of cats to be in a similar angle of shot as the shirt was key, to make the image look more real instead if incoherence because of different angles. Then, shadow was added to the cat, in a similar way to the shirt’s shadow to have consistency. I also experimented to control the feathering edge of masking the image, to preserve the soft and furry texture of the cat which does not make him look like he is superimposed onto the shirt.

 

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A DESIGNER IS A CANVAS.

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A DESIGNER IS A CANVAS.
A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A DESIGNER IS A CANVAS.

This statement works in 2 ways! One, a designer would want to make his/her own shirt, and thus the shirt would be like a canvas to him/her. Two, even when a designer does not make his/her shirt a canvas, very often while painting and drawing, the paints get onto the shirt, making it seem like a canvas after all! In this composition, I put a series of plain white shirts on mannequins and the third shirt is slightly cropped out, suggesting a continuing row of shirts. Then, I put splashes of paint over these shirts, in the basic colors of red, yellow and blue, which overlapped to create areas of purple and orange. The background is a very raw concrete feel to give the “industrial” look which many studios nowadays take after.

 

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A FASHION MALL IS MONEY.

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A FASHION MALL IS MONEY.
A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A FASHION MALL IS MONEY.

Who doesn’t know shopping malls make a huge load of money out from your pockets, with the cost of shirts being really low overseas and the prices being ridiculously high here? Yes, to fashion malls, a shirt is money! As such, I used a photograph of a display window with several mannequins, then cropped out their shirts and underlayed with trademark american dollar bills. The dollar bills are then tinted with the 3 basic colors of red, yellow and blue, with green added in between. This is to show like how this shirts are made of money, OUR MONEY.

 

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A MODEL IS FAME.

A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A MODEL IS FAME.
A SHIRT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF A MODEL IS FAME.

Last but not least, this is one of my favourite compositions, as it has a very trendy and local feel to it. It is also probably the most tedious composition in this project. To models, it seems like their #ootd, or “outfit of the day” is very important to them, as it in turns determines the number of “likes” they get, their reputation and fame. Sometimes these #ootd shots are also advertisements or sponsored apparels, making it even more important to ride on their reputation and fame. To begin, I took quite a number of #ootd shots of a local model, and then rearranged and repeated them in tiles in the background to create a messy yet homogeneous backdrop. I took screenshots of these #ootd shots from instagram, then had to crop them out, and arrange them neatly in squares before duplicating, flipping and rearranging them so that they look slightly different. Then, I put over a transparent layer of a facebook’s “like” button, before adding colors of the rainbow to this button to make it stand out from the black and white background. This composition is also tricky in that the size of the tiles mattered, as they had to be small to be subtle as a consistent background, yet big enough to tell the subject in the background, which is a focus of #ootd shots with a shirt. As such, it was fun experimenting with different sizes, overlaying with different colors and trying to see which is the nicest, to me at least.

With that, Point of View project is done, so what’s your point of view of a shirt?