Journey in Progress: Initial deas/thought process

Featured image is, again, my brainstorming list. It went from I have no idea what I’m going to do, to I have too many ideas, back to I have /almost/ no idea because I didn’t really like any of my ideas.

Of the list I shortlisted 3 or 4 ideas.

One involved Green Corridor, or the “Wild place” as my friend and I used to call it. I had a vague idea that I want to take photos of plushies in the jungle/foresty place (And I still do), but I had no solid plot (This is going to be a recurring problem..). I did not find any of my plushies suitable, not any props since I had. No. Plot. D<

The second one…

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I wanted to play with the idea of the body as a temple, so going through part of the body (scars and markings..) would be a pilgrimage of sorts, and likening the body to some sort of landscape.

I really like the idea, and I attempted some shots. Unfortunately I was not entirely comfortable with the execution of the idea in more than one ways… plus I would prefer to use a better camera (Macrophotography) which will be difficult for me to use at my current skill level >A<

I also briefly considered the idea of books… again. Link to what I did for the similar topic for the the portfolio application earlier in the year.

It’s more of photomanips, so I’m not sure how suitable it’ll be. Plus, I felt a bit redundant when I keep using the same subject matter in my works, so it was swiftly rejected.

In the end, I decide to try something I have never done before: “system” work.
It’s inspired by the artist Prof showed us in class, Tehching Hsieh’s “Lifework”

It was, in a way, simple. I take two photo once every waking hour for a week, one of my feet, and one of whatever is in front of me. The journey is, of course, just my life.

This kind of video is unlike anything I have ever done before X”DD

 

Falling into Books

Featured image (top) is the final display.

Photos below are organized in the originally intended order of a story:

1 Display of all the books. This didn’t change from my initial idea. Consist of 3 sketchbooks and 7 Diaries and Journals through the years, as well as some random novels I love, in both English and Chinese. It’s the first picture as it severs to “set the stage”  or the theme of the entire series of photographs.

2 My eyes. When I did my first task a classmate said that my combined love of eyes, books and drawing makes me a very visual person. That’s true.

It might not be very nice that the phone is reflected in my eyes (I did try to edit it a bit). However I like it as a highlight in my eyes, and it’s interesting because the image of my eyes on the phone screen can actually also be seen if scrutinized.

3 Falling.

4Path.

5 Sinking.

6 This is one of the first photos I took and it turned out well enough I kept it till the end. The mask is one I got in Vienna (Nope, not Venice.) And I love it’s intricate and artistic detail.

It is a good representation of myself (the reason is personal and irrelevant) yet it also symbolize the characters one can take on while reading (novels in particular). Kind of like hiding from reality in a book by wearing different masks and relating to different characters. Reading is always a solace.

7 Originally intended to mirror the first photo in terms of set up as well as content, with the addition of the mask. However I’m glad I explored and changed the original composition. The spiral here is much more aesthetically pleasing, and it is meant to generate some sense of being absorbed into the books. Hopefully it’s like falling into the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland, as the title of my series might suggest.

Overall I am quite happy with this assignment. I didn’t intend for it to be about books, again (I did that for my portfolio earlier this year) and I didn’t know what mood nor story I was going for. Yet in the end the photos were natural and the dreamy and fantasy mood just…happened. Perhaps it’s subconscious but it so accurately depicts the “in a world of my own” feeling I love when reading. And given the amount of time I spent with books, what other object could be as effective a self-portrait?

WIP: Self portrait

Featured image is part of my brainstorming list @@.

I basically started taking random photos of objects to explore my options.IMAG3590Objects on my tableIMAG3589Having a book for breakfast..IMAG3591IMAG3594 These are petticoats for Lolita fashion which I love (and the name is irrelevant to the book by Vladimir… Nabokov ^^”) The first one is exploring blue/cyan as my favorite color, the second, the possible “eye” motif.

IMAG3611 My beloved (but neglected @@) guitar.

IMAG3600IMAG3605IMAG3604 The amount of bottles I keep. Obviously exploring the “eye” motif again, trying to put my hand in to explore object as an extension of self.

IMAG3615 IMAG3616 Boxes of valued items, and beloved CDs.

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After a lot of detour and exploring I finally decided on my book theme, and above are two relevant but rejected photos from the first round of shoots.

Second round of shoots are a lot more dull and consist of more redundant photos to get the “perfect” one. But these are some of the ones from the work in progress.

IMAG3679 IMAG3709Tryouts to get the hair without the face, and early composition for one of the photos.

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The “books” as a journey/ pathway attempts. There’s actually quite a few things I like in this part of the exploration with my feet, but mostly it did not fit well into the series and I had to reject them.

I also really wanted to incorporate the “object as an extension of self” idea. But alas it didn’t work out, be it due to the mood of the photo or the composition or the things in the background…

IMAG3714 … And I don’t even know what to say about this. It was weird. And difficult to take when I can’t see what I’m doing.

That’s all.